Cause Célèbre: A Feel Good, Do Good Romance

by Gayla Twist

  Cause Célèbre:

  A Feel Good, Do Good Romance

  Gayla Twist

  Copyright © 2013 Gayla Twist

  All rights reserved.

  ISBN:

  ISBN-13:

  DEDICATION

  To my darling Q and my wonderful J.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thank you very much to Lisa Scott and Mary Rudy.

  For all legal information, please see the end of this work.

  Chapter 1

  “Now boarding first class for flight 599 to Los Angeles, California.” The announcement crackled over the PA system. The garbled words, said with a heavy Thai accent, made the message almost incomprehensible to the average traveler.

  “Finally,” Margot said, being an expert at deciphering PA announcements in foreign lands. She hauled herself out of the vinyl chair she’d been occupying for what felt like a lifetime, grabbed her dingy backpack, and hooked it over her shoulder before staggering toward the gate, her boarding pass clenched in her hand.

  The gate attendant took in Margot’s frayed T-shirt and dirty khakis that unzipped at the knee in case there was a sudden urgency for shorts but no discrete place to actually change. The woman drew breath, and Margot could tell she was about to say, “We’re only loading first class at this time,” or something to that effect, but before she could, Margot pressed her boarding pass into the woman’s hand. She was too tired to even try to explain that while she was flying home from Nepal, she had been waylaid in the Bangkok airport for the last eighteen hours. For some reason, her ticket had come up in the computer as expired. By the time the airline got the problem ironed out, it was too late for her to make her connection. All flights to the states were booked to capacity. Finally, a ticket agent took pity on her and upgraded her to first class so she could grab the last seat available on a direct flight to Los Angeles. Margot had been so grateful she could have leaned across the Asian Airlines counter and kissed her.

  There was barely time after stowing her backpack in the overhead for Margot to marvel at how spacious and luxurious her window seat in first class actually was before her eyelids became too heavy to keep open. She was only vaguely aware of a tall, handsome man with curly chestnut hair taking the open seat next to her. Great, she thought before curling herself into a ball and giving her back to him. Why can’t I be seated next to some gorgeous man when I’ve actually showered in the last twenty-four hours?

  “Can I offer you something to drink, sir?” The flight attendant’s voice somehow penetrated the haze of Margot’s brain. She had a strong feeling the woman was talking to her. Some Thais were under the impression that it was a sign of respect to call everyone “sir.” Margot found it charming.

  “Champagne,” the man next to her said.

  Margot couldn’t blame him for thinking the question was directed at him. She rousted herself from sleep long enough to say, “I’d like a glass, too, please.” A little bubbly was just what she needed to tamp her sleep back down for a few hours while the rest of the plane boarded and they took off. If she was lucky, she’d sleep right through until the meal service, which might even be good, given that she was in first class.

  “Your champagne,” the flight attendant said a few moments later. She was balancing two glasses on a tray. The plane was so packed with people trying to board for business class and economy, Margot wondered how the woman had negotiated through the crowd without spilling a drop. Something they must drill for in flight attendant school, she decided.

  The attendant lifted a glass and moved it in their general direction. Margot reached for it with her left hand just as the man reached for it with his right. Their elbows clunked together, and he jerked away from her like he’d been shocked with a cattle prod. “Sorry,” she blurted, wondering why he was being so defensive. “That’s the curse of being a lefty.”

  He gave her a weird, penetrating look. Margot wasn’t sure how to read it. A little elbow bump didn’t seem to warrant such scrutiny, but it did give her time to note that his eyes were the perfect color for blue jeans, right before they begin to fade. “Damn,” she thought to herself, wishing she didn’t smell like an armpit. Maybe that was why he looked at her so strangely. “Sorry that I’m not so fresh,” she told him as she plucked her champagne from the tray. “I was stuck in the airport for a while.”

  He took in her frayed T-shirt and grubby khakis. “How many years were you there?”

  It was probably meant to be a snub, but Margot couldn’t help but chuckle. So he was a jerk. At least he was a clever jerk. But she had recently implemented a no-jerk policy, so there didn’t seem to be any reason to verbally spar with the guy, even if he was inappropriately good looking. She preferred to watch the insides of her eyelids.

  When the man realized she wasn’t going to respond, he added, in a low voice, “Don’t worry about it. I’ve worked with Ronaldo Aldos, and you’ve got nothing on him.”

  Ronaldo Aldos? Margot wondered to herself, sipping her drink and enjoying the bubbles as they tickled her nose. Who the heck is Ronaldo Aldos? She decided not to ask.

  The champagne did the trick, and she slumbered through the rest of the boarding process, only being disturbed slightly by the wheels lifting from the runway and the slight incline experienced while the plane gained altitude. Then there was the gentle bong sound that let the passengers know they were free to move about the cabin.

  “Excuse me,” said an overly bright female voice. “Are you who I think you are?”

  “Probably,” the man next to Margot replied.

  “Can I get your picture? My daughter would just kill me if I didn’t ask.”

  The woman was speaking in such an excited tone that Margot couldn’t tune her out. She shifted in her seat and cracked open an eye to see what was going on. A digital camera was suddenly thrust in her face. “Would you take our picture?” asked a rather pleasant-looking woman, probably in her fifties, her cheeks glowing bright red with excitement.

  “Um, sure…” Margot accepted the camera. The woman squatted down next to the handsome man and posed, her smile wide and her eyes sparkling. The man didn’t look half as enthused about the process. At best, he looked tolerant. Margot snapped the photo and then checked the display. “It’s a good one,” she said, handing the camera back to the woman. It was hard to imagine the man taking a bad photo. He was that good looking.

  “Thank you so much.” The woman snatched the camera out of her hands, although the thanks weren’t directed at Margot. The man said nothing, just gave her a curt nod. There were several seconds of awkward silence, and then the woman returned to her seat.

  “Weird,” Margot couldn’t help but exclaim. “What was that all about?”

  He gave her another enigmatic look. “It’s for my job,” he finally said.

  Margot knew she was tired, but the guy wasn’t making any sense. “Oh?” she said, her brow furrowed. “Sorry, I don’t get it. Why did she want your photo?”

  “I’m Noah Donavon,” he said with a slight sigh.

  “Okay… Hi, I’m Margot Hernandez.” She wasn’t sure if that was the response he was expecting, but she thought she might as well be polite if he was going to introduce himself.

  A young guy on his way back from the first class bathroom stopped right in front of Noah and held up his hand, palm out, in the high-five position. “Dude, you were awesome in that Tarantino flick.”

  “Thanks,” Noah said with a dismissive nod.

  He’s an actor, Margot concluded. That explained a lot.

  The kid didn’t get the hint. “Don’t leave me hanging,” he insisted, keeping his hand in the air, palm ready to be sl
apped.

  “Sorry,” Noah told him. “I don’t high five anymore, but I’m glad you enjoyed the movie.”

  Walking away disappointed, the kid let his hand droop. “You could have probably high-fived him,” Margot said. “I mean, it doesn’t cost you anything.”

  The movie star gave her a single shoulder shrug. “This is a long flight. I just don’t want to let things get started.”

  Margot thought about it. “I guess I understand,” she said after a moment. “I was once on a flight that was filled with Chinese businessmen, and for some reason, one of the guys asked if he could pose with me for a photo. I said okay, but after that all his friends wanted me to pose, too. And then more guys kept asking. I finally put on my headset and pretended to be asleep. It didn’t matter because the businessmen kept taking my picture anyway. Then I got annoyed and pulled a sarong out of my bag and put it over my head, but they started taking pictures of that. It got really annoying.”

  Noah nodded. “I can imagine.”

  “I always thought being famous must be something like that.”

  “Yeah, but if I pull a sarong over my head, it ends up in People.”

  The plane was a little chilly. Margot tucked her legs up under her and folded her arms. “Being famous must be pretty annoying a lot of the time.”

  He shrugged again. “It also has its good moments.”

  It was time to stop talking, Margot decided. The guy probably wanted some privacy, and she still desperately wanted to sleep. She nestled into her chair and was about to close her eyes.

  “Why do you fly to Asia so often?” Noah asked.

  She glanced over at him. A subtle shift in his face had taken place. His expression was more open, less guarded. He’d probably decided she wasn’t a crazed fan, Margot concluded. “I work for a nonprofit. We do a lot of stuff out of Southeast Asia.”

  He leaned toward her a smidge, apparently interested. “What are you nonprofiting about?”

  “We’re trying to end slavery.”

  Both eyebrows rose halfway up the movie star’s forehead. “Didn’t we already do that? I thought Lincoln freed the slaves back in the eighteen hundreds.”

  “Yeah, that’s a common misconception,” she told him. “There are actually about twenty million people still living in slavery around the world today. Some estimates say it might be as high as thirty million.”

  “Thirty million?” Noah’s eyebrows rose so high they disappeared under the hair that hung across his forehead. “You’re kidding. That’s like the population of Australia and New Zealand combined,” he exclaimed. “I read the papers. How come I don’t know anything about this?”

  “Because a lot of them are girls and women that are sold into the sex trade, and the media assumes people just don’t want to hear about it.”

  “You mean they’re prostitutes?” Noah asked.

  “No, they’re not prostitutes,” Margot snapped. She hated when people jumped to that conclusion. “They are slaves. What do you call it when a six-year-old is stolen from her home in Nepal, smuggled across the Indian border, sold to a brothel, repeatedly raped by the sleazebag who runs the place, forced to take drugs until she’s addicted, and then raped for fifteen hours a day every day by the different scumbag customers? I call it slavery. And it’s the very worst kind of slavery.”

  The denim-blue eyes of the movie star next to her were wide with… some kind of emotion. Margot couldn’t tell what. “I’m sorry,” he said in almost a whisper. “I had no idea.”

  “No, I’m sorry.” Margot had to blink rapidly to stop the tears that were brimming in her eyes from rolling down her cheeks. “It’s just these girls suffer so much, and then people turn up their noses and refuse to help because they are part of the sex trade. As if that’s their fault.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t have a tissue. Here,” Noah said, taking the square napkin out from under his glass of champagne and handing it to her.

  His small act of kindness made the tears flow, and Margot had to look out the window for a while to collect herself. She was grateful that Mr. Too Good Looking let her have a moment. “I’m sorry I’m being such a freak,” she said once she finally felt she could hold it together. “I’m just coming off of six months in Nepal. I was only supposed to be there for three this time, but my replacement never showed.”

  “And then they made you live at the airport,” Noah said with an understanding wink.

  “That’s right.” She let out an embarrassed laugh. “Then I got stranded at the airport. I’m just really tired.”

  “So take a nap,” he said. “I’ll wake you when they bust out the food.”

  “Thanks.” Margot gave him a wavering smile. He was actually nice once he decided you weren’t a stalker or anything. As she closed her eyes and snuggled down into her chair, she wondered what movies he’d been in and whether any of them featured a scene where he had his shirt off.

  Chapter 2

  “Margot?” Noah said, his husky voice tickling her ear. They were snuggled together under a blanket, and she was pretty sure he was about to make the big move. “Do you feel like eating?” he asked.

  “Mwhaah?” She wiped the drool from the corner of her mouth. “Mmmphff.” Food sounded good. Not as good as making love with an Adonis, but it still sounded good.

  “Margot?”

  Reality began seeping into her dream. Cracking open an eye, Margot surveyed her surroundings. She was still on the airplane jetting across the Pacific. Someone had thrown an airline blanket over her, which probably explained how she was able to sleep for so long. She opened the other eye. Noah was looking at her with a slightly amused expression on his face. Margot thought to herself, please don’t let me have been talking in my sleep.

  “They’re about to start the meal service, and I thought you’d probably be hungry,” he told her.

  “You got that right.” Margot sat up. As a matter of fact, she was starving. Noah handed her a small square of paper. “What’s this?” she asked, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

  “It’s the menu,” he replied.

  “You’re kidding.” She sat up even more and peered at the small card. There were actually three different choices for an entree. “First class rocks.” Her excitement caused Noah to chuckle. “Oh.” She felt embarrassed. “You’re probably used to it, but this is a whole new experience for me.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not used to it at all,” he said. Then, lowering his voice, he added, “Don’t tell anyone, but up until four years ago, I’d never even been on a plane.”

  “Seriously?” Margot found that hard to believe.

  “Scout’s honor,” he insisted. “I drove out to LA in a rusted-out pickup truck. It completely gave up the ghost just as I was pulling into town, so I was stuck on the side of the highway with all my stuff blowing around in the back.”

  “Did anyone stop to help you?”

  “Are you kidding? In LA?” He laughed. “People just laid on their horns because I was slowing down traffic.”

  “What did you do?” Margot asked.

  “Eventually a cop came along and helped me out. Called me a tow truck, made sure none of my stuff got stolen, helped me find a place to stay, actually. Lucky thing, too. Otherwise, I’d probably still be on the side of the road.”

  “A cop?” Margot thought about it for a second. Then she squinted, giving him a scrutinizing look. “It was a lady cop. Wasn’t it?”

  The movie star actually blushed a little. “You got me there.”

  As they ate their meals, they fell into easy conversation about different times they had a flat tire or got into a fender bender. He seemed happy to talk, and after six months of intense conversations with her coworkers about the horrible plight of the girls they were rescuing, she was glad to just chat about mindless things.

  When the movie was about to begin, Margot leaned over and said in a low, joking voice, “Are you in this one?”

  “Yeah, but you never see me above the wa
ist,” Noah replied with an indecipherable expression on his face. In response to her questioning look, he added, “Before I made it to bigger parts, I used to pay the bills by being a butt double.”

  Margot just about choked on the ginger ale she was sipping. “Are you kidding?”

  “Yeah, I am.” He laughed, his eyes twinkling. “Actually, I worked as a waiter, just like every other actor trying to make it in the movie business.”

  They kept talking in low voices straight through the movie—about bad jobs they’d had and good jobs they’d lost. Noah never brought up his acting career, keeping his stories more focused on jobs like his calamitous time as a dishwasher when he was in high school and, a lot like most teenagers, thought he was too good for the work.

  Another film started, and Margot found herself getting sleepy. How could she possibly be sleepy when there was a gorgeous man sitting next to her perfectly willing to whisper funny stories in the dimly lit cabin? But her body didn’t care that her brain was shouting, “Wake up and flirt, you idiot!” Sometimes there is no fighting when the sandman wallops you with his giant bag of sand.

  “Margot?”

  “Mwumphh.”

  “They’re doing another meal service. Are you hungry?”

  There was a hand on her shoulder giving her a gentle shake. Margot did her best to pull herself out of her sleep coma. But it was too hard. She was all snuggly and comfortable and pressed against a warm, firm chest that just smelled sooo good and... A chest?

  “Oh, my God!” Margot sat bolt upright. “Oh, no.” She covered her face with both hands. Sometime during her snooze, she had apparently decided that the movie star’s chest was the perfect place to nestle. To make matters worse, she was pretty sure she had left a little drool spot on whatever ridiculously expensive shirt Noah was wearing. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” she said through her fingers, too embarrassed to look at him or even lower her hands.