Chapter 5
LUCAS
“You can’t be serious.” Lucas leaned against the counter, his heart sinking. The woman behind the counter gave him a sympathetic smile as she shook her head.
“I’m sorry, but the next flight to Cabo is completely booked out. I can get you on a flight tomorrow morning, though, or I can get you a flight with a connection in Mexico City later this afternoon.”
Lucas wanted to bury his face in his hands. He’d been so ready to escape to Mexico and leave all this behind, but now he might not even get there. A layover in Mexico City didn’t sound great, as it would add hours to the trip. He didn’t want to go back to his empty apartment, though, either.
“Isn’t there anything you can do?” he asked.
“Well, I can get you on the standby list,” the woman offered. “It’s always possible that someone won’t check in for the upcoming Cabo flight.”
“Fine.” Lucas shook his head. The woman’s face fell slightly at his sharp tone, and he managed a half smile. “Thank you for your help.”
He leaned against the counter while she worked to put him on the standby list. It felt like the universe was laughing at him today.
First, he’d found out that a close friend was defrauding him on the day he’d planned to launch an exciting new product.
Then, he’d practically been run over by the pretty auburn-haired woman who’d been quite rude.
Now, there wasn’t even a seat on the flight he needed.
“There you go. Good luck.” The woman behind the counter smiled, but Lucas could only manage a grimace in return.
He took his passport and headed to security.
The line was short, surprisingly so for LAX, and he got through security quickly and headed straight to his gate.
The board above the gate showed that he was first on the standby list. Even if he got on the flight, though, he’d probably end up in a tiny middle seat by the bathrooms.
Lucas really missed his private jet.
He sank onto a seat at the edge of the boarding area between an elderly couple holding hands and a young mom bouncing a baby on her knee. The baby smiled a gummy smile at Lucas, but he barely noticed.
It wasn’t that long ago that he’d traveled like this all the time.
He’d grown up in a lower-middle-class family, where vacations had been camping trips in the mountains or road trips to visit family, and they’d carefully saved money for big expenses.
Back then, he hadn’t flown anywhere, and a trip like this would have been a dream come true, even in an economy middle seat.
Lucas had started computer coding as a teen and had won a college scholarship based on his skills.
He’d taken his first plane ride at seventeen years old on the way to college on the East Coast and had been awed by the fields and mountains far below.
Hard work and plenty of side jobs meant that he’d finished college in only three years with enough capital to invest in Omegron, which he’d already been working on at night while studying.
Omegron had grown quickly, and soon Lucas had moved from flying economy to flying business class. Within a few years, he had his first private jet, and he hadn’t been in a commercial airport since then.
Lucas smiled as he thought about how far he’d come. Years of hard work had brought him so far — or had they? His heart plummeted as he remembered Omegron’s shaky footing. It could all collapse around him so easily. Worse, he couldn’t even do anything about it. He was essentially being banished.
Lucas looked up, taking a deep breath, and swept his gaze over his fellow passengers, hoping for a distraction from his worries.
He got one. The auburn-haired woman from the check-in counter was sitting near the window, wearing headphones and bobbing her head along to something she was listening to.
He could only see her in profile, but he recognized her easily.
Great. With his luck, they’d run into each other again while boarding. Lucas scoffed again as he remembered how confidently she’d told him that her day was worse than his. There was no way that was true. Unless she’d also seen her fortune ruined by a close friend, she couldn’t top his day.
Lucas glanced up at the screen above the counter, where his initials still flashed at the top of the standby list. The screen changed to show it was about fifteen minutes away from the first group’s boarding time, so Lucas grabbed his phone and looked for news about Omegron.
The articles and social media posts had doubled since the last time he had checked in the car on the way to the airport.
The journalism ranged from high-quality and factual to wild conspiracy theories about Omegron being a front for terrorism.
One article suggested that he’d started Omegron just to scam the public.
So, it began.
Lucas shook his head. Everything depended on whether the public was willing to believe the truth or not. If they believed the sensational stories being tossed around, no one was ever going to buy an Omegron product, much less Omegron stock, again.
“If I call your name, please come up to the counter,” a young man with a shiny shaved head announced. “Elizabeth Rice and Lucas Chambers.”
Lucas got to his feet and went to the desk. He was half-worried that the auburn-haired woman would be Elizabeth Rice, but the other passenger called was an older woman with graying hair and smile lines around her eyes. She gestured for Lucas to go first.
“I’m Lucas Chambers.”
“Great. Good news,” the shiny-headed man said. “We have a free seat for you, so we’re able to get you off standby. The seat’s even in first class. It’s your lucky day.”
“Great.” Relief flooded Lucas, so much so that he couldn’t even scoff at the man’s comment about it being his lucky day.
He was really going to make it out of LA.
Soon, he’d be in his vacation house, where he could hole up, refreshing the news, drinking Mexican Coca-Cola, and waiting for his staff at Omegron to call.
The man handed Lucas his boarding pass. Lucas thanked him and threaded his way back toward his seat, which was now occupied. Instead of finding a new seat, he leaned against a pole at the edge of the boarding area.
“You’re Lucas Chambers?”
He turned to see an older man approaching, and his stomach sank.
“Yes, I am.”
“I saw what’s been happening at your company.” The man shook his head, brandishing his phone in one hand. “It’s a real shame. I know you were involved — or you knew about it. You must have. No one could have stolen hundreds of thousands of dollars from a company without the CEO knowing about it.”
Lucas’s stomach sank further. “Excuse me, but I’m on vacation. I’d rather not discuss this right now. You can contact the Omegron hotline—”
“I have money invested in your company,” the man continued as if he hadn’t heard Lucas. “I’m planning to retire, you know. If Omegron stock crashes, it’ll ruin everything.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, but I am on vacation, and I’d prefer not to discuss this.”
“Well, I was supposed to be on vacation, too.” The man glared. “But thanks to you, I’ll spend the whole time worrying. I don’t even know if I can afford this trip now!”
“We’d now like to invite all priority and first-class passengers to begin boarding,” the young bald man announced over the intercom. Relief flooded Lucas as he stepped away from the older man.
“I need to board,” he said.
“First class.” The man scoffed. “Of course. Enjoy your high life while the rest of us suffer.”
Lucas’s hands balled into fists, but he managed to extricate himself from the conversation and make his way to the boarding line.
His heart was pounding, and he felt sick.
Even though he’d had nothing to do with Jim’s fraud, he still felt awful about it.
And his encounter with this man was a reminder of why he needed to disappear.
Lucas made it to the front of the line, where he scanned his boarding pass and stepped onto the gangway.
A few minutes later, he was on the plane.
He found his seat, 3C, stowed his small suitcase in the overhead compartment, and sat in the window seat.
Grabbing the in-flight magazine, he pretended to be deeply involved in an article about how a chain of vineyards in Napa Valley was revolutionizing the tourism industry.
Really, he just wanted to avoid eye contact with the people who were boarding, especially if the man who’d accosted him was also on this flight.
“That’s my seat.”
Lucas looked up from the magazine to see the auburn-haired woman standing in the aisle, her hands on her hips, her green eyes narrowed.
“I don’t think so.” Lucas turned back to the magazine.
“Yes, it is. You’re sitting in 3D.” She held out her ticket. “That’s my seat.”
Grudgingly, Lucas realized that he’d made a mistake. It had been a while since he’d flown commercial, and he’d automatically assumed that he had a window seat. He wasn’t about to apologize to this woman, though, not after she’d been nothing but rude to him during their two brief encounters.
“Fine.” He got up, and she stepped back to let him squeeze by. She was about a head shorter than him, and she smelled faintly of something flowery. Roses, maybe. His arm brushed hers as he squeezed past, and he tried to ignore the warmth that bloomed from that spot.
The woman took the seat he’d just vacated, stowing her purse underneath the seat and fastening her seat belt.
Lucas took the aisle seat next to her. Since they were in first class, the seats were only in rows of two, and they were wide enough that they didn’t touch.
If they’d been in economy, they would have been squashed together with their arms pressed against each other.
It was a good thing they weren’t in economy.
The woman took her headphones out of the purse. They were the kind with a strap that went over the top of her head, as opposed to the small earbuds that Lucas preferred. She put them on and turned to look out the window.
Lucas reached for his magazine. Luckily, the flight to Cabo wasn’t long. He could ignore her until they landed. At least she didn’t seem eager to chat.
The older man who’d cornered him boarded after a while, sending Lucas a glare on the way to the back of the plane.
Lucas tried to ignore him. Still, with the rude woman beside him and the even ruder man somewhere in the back of the plane, it was hard to put aside how awful today had been.
Lucas was practically fuming. What he really wanted was to get off this plane, take a cab straight back to the Omegron offices, and try to put this right.
His palms itched with the desire to work, not to go on some vacation that felt more like exile than relaxation.
Lucas turned the page a little too hard, causing the magazine to tear slightly. Sighing, he smoothed the page and flipped to a double spread on how to spend twenty-four perfect hours in Dubai. It wasn’t going to be easy to distract himself, but he had to try.