Glass Houses by Stella Cameron Page A

faint. Clinging to the handle of her luggage cart, she made it to a row of chairs and sat down—and studied her sensible flat brown shoes. Her tan linen jacket had wrinkled badly. She ought to have remembered Penny warning her to avoid linen unless she was certain she wouldn’t have to sit down—or go to the loo. The straight, russet-colored skirt was of different material from the jacket and probably wasn’t quite the thing, but at least it didn’t clash with the jacket.
    If Sam wanted to, he’d find her. If he didn’t come at all, she’d have no choice but to return home.
    He wasn’t the type not to show up.
    A girl’s squeal pierced Olivia’s ears and she shuddered. Toddlers charged around, some pausing to cry for no evident reason. But what did she know about children, other than that they were generally inappropriate but often sweet? There were even some little ones who gave her an urge to pick them up.
    Where was he?
    She made herself look up again.
    She didn’t have to study faces, only buttonholes. The crowd had thinned out, but she couldn’t see a single man with a flower in his buttonhole.
    There didn’t seem to be many people who had come on their own to greet the plane. Some lone women and men stood by. Most of the women pressed to the rope. Most of the men hung back.
    She hadn’t told him they should meet in baggage claim, had she? Oh, no, she couldn’t have made that mistake when she knew she’d be bringing her luggage through customs. She could go to check the baggage area, but he might come here while she was away.
    Now the people waiting had dwindled to a number that allowed a study of each one. Sam wasn’t a woman, so that eliminated more than half of the candidates.
    A handsome, dark-haired man let out a whoop and swept a little boy into one arm while he wrapped his other arm around a pretty woman who was clearly his wife.
    No one who looked like that would be Sam, anyway. Sam was a nice man, an intelligent man, but he’d be ordinary to look at. Guilt attacked. She’d never been into stereotyping people, and this wasn’t the time to start. Just because a person was smart, he or she didn’t have to be plain. It was just that she didn’t care much about how people looked, although—and this was a form of bigotry—she supposed she didn’t generally trust handsome men.
    Four more excited groups came together and moved away. Three of the lone men remained.
    Olivia tried to be discreet while she considered and dismissed a man who couldn’t be more than twenty-two. His hair was bright red, that carrot color. White skin and big freckles. A cheerful-looking person, but his T-shirt announced, “Tonight’s The Night.” Not Sam.
    Of the remaining two candidates, one was tall, with dark blond hair, wavy, well-cut, and streaked by the sun. His charcoal-gray suit was a perfect fit, his shirt collar and cuffs very white. His tie suggested he needed ways to express his individuality. Even at a distance Olivia could identify a rather wild, geometric design done in shades of mauve through purple and red. He had the build of a wel l-toned athlete—lithe and long- muscled—and the loose stance of a runner. No, not a runner, they were too thin. A hurdler, perhaps—or one of those people she’d seen on the telly once in that violent American game where they wore helmets and a lot of grotesque padding inside their clothes. There was one really attractive person on each team, the one who got to decide everything and throw the ball or run, whatever he wanted. All the other players waited for him to decide, then shout about it. He was muscular but slim— and fast on his feet. You’d think whoever was in charge of getting players would twig to it that those other men they chose, the huge ones who could only run a few feet before they fell in a heap with all the other big ones—well, they ought to figure out that what they needed was a whole lot more like the slim, brainy one.
    Wild Tie held a bunch