Captain, I’m Marrying Someone Else

For five years, Irene loved Captain Carson the way girls in movies love pilots. She had every flight number on his roster burned into her brain. Booked tickets just to ride his routes. Set her alarm for 2 a.m. so she'd be wide awake the second his wheels hit the tarmac. Quit her job back in Seattle and followed him to a city where she didn't know a single soul. In her head, this was love. The real kind. The kind where a man walks off the jet bridge, drops to one knee, and the whole terminal claps. Her mistake? Thinking he ever planned to. The truth? In Carson's eyes, Irene wasn't a girlfriend. She was a warm body. Convenient. Always available. The girl he practiced on while figuring out what a real woman liked in bed. The woman he actually loved was Blair — a hooker from the red-light strip he kept on retainer between layovers. When Irene finally found out, her heart didn't just crack. It flatlined. She didn't cry. Didn't scream. Didn't even tell him she knew. She smiled. Took a breath. And said yes to the proposal from the sweet boy next door who'd been quietly in love with her for years. A year later, Carson figured out Blair for exactly what she was — a cold-blooded gold digger who'd been laughing at him behind his back the whole time. He showed up at Irene's door. No pride left. Just a broke man, begging for the girl he threw away. He was ten months too late. Irene didn't even look up from signing the marriage license.