Big Girl Panties Read online

  Dedication

  For the Boyz of 1900,

  who have been making my dreams come true

  since 1986, 1989, and 1992. Love you guys.

  Acknowledgments

  It is with sincere affection and admiration that I’d like to thank the following:

  Bob Podrasky—for telling me to “just finish the thing!” and that he’d help me. And then he did.

  Andrea Cirillo—for taking Bob’s call. And then taking a hundred of mine.

  Meg Ruley—for suggesting a title that still makes me giggle.

  Rachel Kahan—for being the best editor a writer could have. And for always making me laugh.

  Liate Stehlik—for making it look easy. And by “it,” I mean “everything.”

  Michael Morrison—for revving up his e-reader.

  The team at HarperCollins/William Morrow—Trish Daly, Kathy Gordon, Heidi Richter, Jen Hart, Megan Traynor, Lynne Grady, Tavia Kowalchuk, Shelby Meizlik, Doug Jones, Rachel Levenberg, Virginia Stanley, Erin Gorham, Lorie Young, Julia Meltzer, Jamie Kerner, Mary Schuck, and Andrea Rosen—for all their hard work and dedication.

  Amy Parratt—for being my partner in crime in too many adventures to count, this being one of them.

  Caroline Murphy—for knowing just how to talk a girl off a ledge.

  Joe Palamara—for being the smartest personal trainer in the business today. For his knowledge and wisdom on the topic of what makes a body tick. And for the last time, dude, this book is not about you.

  Contents

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  About the Author

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Chapter One

  I’m sorry, Mr. Montgomery,” the pretty employee behind the counter said apologetically, “but for the next flight out, it’s the best I can offer.”

  Logan Montgomery rarely hated anything, but flying coach was an exception. He thought he had left those days behind long ago. Even with two seats side by side, there was never enough room. He could’ve waited until the middle of the night and flown first class, but Logan chose to get home sooner. Not only was he ready for a night in his own bed, he simply had too much to do on the other end of his flight.

  Logan was booked solid for the next three days, thanks to the shuffling he had to do to accommodate this trip. Football season was gearing up, basketball was winding down, and baseball was in full swing, and if it had been anyone but Chase Walker who’d asked him to fly from New York to Toronto on the spur of the moment, he would’ve begged off.

  Chase was first baseman for the New York Kings, and while the Kings had extremely qualified trainers on staff, Chase wouldn’t settle for anyone but Logan. And, what an overpaid baseball player and best friend wants, he gets. Logan had stretched Chase out for two days and then worked him out earlier that morning, and the Golden Boy was ready to go. Logan really couldn’t complain. The cost for such spontaneous, unparalleled services was premium; the money was already in Logan’s account.

  Logan slid into his seat, long legs wedging up against the seat in front of him. He tried in vain to sit up straighter, attempting to somehow create more room, then took a deep breath. He closed his eyes, filtering out the external noise, the passengers filing in around him, their accompanying scuffles with the overhead compartments. A toddler fussed, refusing to sit down, insisting on remaining in her mother’s lap. Logan exhaled a silent Zen mantra of gratitude for his window seat and relatively short flight. Satisfied that mind had overcome matter, Logan clicked his seat belt into place. That’s when he looked up and saw her.

  Oh, please don’t let her sit next to me, he silently begged, watching her make her way down the aisle, her thick thighs rubbing together and her ample hips bumping into seats as she passed them. Her auburn hair was disheveled in ten different directions. She counted the rows and stopped right in front of Logan, giving him a quick glance. Why do I always get the old lady, the drunk guy, or the fat chick? Logan thought. God, I hate coach. His mantra transformed quickly into moping.

  Perfect, Holly thought, withholding the maniacal laughter she knew would have the flight crew calling for security. It wasn’t enough that she hated to fly. It wasn’t even enough that she had to give up her original same-day flight and stay in Toronto overnight after what felt like twelve rounds with the Mike Tyson of corporate raiders. She even managed to maintain her sanity after mistaking the hotel’s tiny bottle of body wash for shampoo and lathering her already overgrown hair into an unmanageable, flowery-smelling mop. Blow-drying only made it worse. She couldn’t even find a rubber band to pull it back with. The waistband of her pants felt like a tourniquet due to the weight she’d gained in recent months. She could feel her bra strap cutting painfully into her right shoulder. And now she had to spend the next two hours squishing Adonis himself.

  Holly could almost feel his disgust toward her radiating out of him, as if the irritated expression on his handsome face wasn’t enough of an indicator. Another round of her pissing someone off just by showing up. She gritted her teeth and stuffed a large, brown, worn-out-looking satchel under the seat in front of her and ran her fingers hurriedly through the rat’s nest on her head before sitting in it. In an effort to create some extra room for herself, she moved the armrest up. Trying to appear casual, she took a deep breath, sucked in her stomach as best she could, and buckled herself in.

  At least she doesn’t need the seat belt extension, Logan mused. He was a little afraid to inhale, recalling a fat woman he sat next to some years ago who smelled of hard-boiled eggs and rotten cheese. Tentatively, he drew in a breath. She smelled like baby powder and lavender, distinctly lavender. He relaxed a bit, giving a small nod in her direction.

  He couldn’t help but notice how white her knuckles got on takeoff. Her fists were clenched so tight against the seat. Curiously, she showed no other outward signs of fright. At least she didn’t start wailing or get the vapors or do absurd tricks to take her to her “happy place.” But with a second glance, Logan realized she wasn’t just gripping her armrest. She wasn’t moving. At all. He took a quick look at her face to make sure she wasn’t turning blue. She was staring straight ahead, eyes wide open, fixated on some focal point in the front of the aircraft.

  “Breathe, girl,” Logan found himself saying.

  Holly blinked once, her face pale, and tried to inhale, which to Logan sounded more like a gasp. “I’m not so good at takeoff,” she responded on an exhaled whoosh of air.

  “You’re doing fine,” he told her confidently, and opened a magazine.

  Thanks, Superman, she thought, feeling the plane start to level off. Easy for you to say. I’ll bet you can actually fly and are just on vacation.

  Once they were safely in the air and Holly’s panic passed, she noticed how perfectly groomed he was. He probably got a haircut every four weeks without fail. His eyelashes were longer than hers, and he
even managed to make a green polo shirt and jeans look dressy. His broad shoulders vied for space much the same way her hips and thighs did, only where he was defined muscle, Holly was just mass. She glanced down at the magazine he was casually thumbing through. Health and Fitness. Its pages showcased dozens of toned, firm bodies, much like his. The fitness models wore skimpy garments that appeared painted onto their flawless tan skin. They flashed gloriously white teeth as they stretched and posed before backdrops of waterfalls, pools, and cliffs overlooking warm, sunny beaches. There were pictures of people in that magazine who looked like Holly, too—all with the word “before” in big bold letters underneath. She couldn’t swear to it, but they looked like they were taken in front of grocery stores. Holly felt the sweat start to bead on her upper lip.

  A female flight attendant, looking strikingly like the model on page twenty-five, stopped at their row with the refreshment cart and turned on the charm. It was all Holly could do not to give a loud snort. But then he spoke. No longer in the throes of takeoff anxiety, she could actually listen to him. Even his voice was like velvet, level and silky with a touch of a sexy drawl. He flirted with the flight attendant briefly before requesting bottled water, then passed on the food. Holly did the same, dead sure she was robbing them both of some cruel, prejudicial satisfaction by not saying, “I’ll take everything you’ve got.” Holly turned to Logan as the cart rolled away and gave half a laugh.

  “Nothing like the fit of an airplane seat to ruin an appetite. I’ll bet this plane was used to transport munchkins out of Oz.” Holly liked to get right to the point—taking on the six-hundred-pound gorilla in the room—but felt like kicking herself. Why the hell did she feel the need to validate this specimen of masculine vanity? But she knew exactly why. She was going to be spending an hour sitting next to him and she knew she didn’t make the grade on his first-impression meter. If she didn’t want to spend the flight sitting like a statue in an effort not to embarrass herself by occasionally rubbing against him, she’d have to win him over.

  He actually smiled, confirming the existence of his magazine-worthy pearly whites, and gave a small shrug. He had grown accustomed to other people’s feeling intimidated by his looks. “Airline food stinks anyway.” He was being sincere and his smile said so. Logan believed in karma.

  She had sensed his original reaction when he first laid eyes on her—Logan could tell. And Logan didn’t want to be thought of as the sort of guy who deliberately made others feel bad about themselves. He was just a busy guy, a temporarily stressed guy. A guy too big to fly coach on a packed flight, and he felt bad for having thought the worst of the woman next to him right away. Especially about the way she smelled. Only lavender lingered, mostly from her hair. He’d always liked lavender. “I’m Logan,” he said.

  “Holly.” She extended a soft, unmanicured hand, which he shook. He had a strong, manly hand, not callused and gnarled from manual labor, but not the limp-wristed softness of a coddled pretty boy, either. “Holly Brennan. Nice to meet you. Sorry if I’m squishing you a bit. They didn’t have any room in first class.”

  So, she was in the same boat as he. But by the looks of her, he imagined it would’ve taken quite a bite out of her pocketbook to buy the extra space. “I know. I got bumped out, too. Heard some guy hit a big lottery and is flying in his extended family so they can climb the Statue of Liberty or throw pennies off the Empire State Building,” he said, then added, “Go figure.”

  Of course he’d been bumped. After all, why would a Greek god willingly choose to mingle with mere mortals? Around a guy like this, it was impossible not to take inventory of all your own flaws. He looked like he belonged on his own private jet, sipping Patrón, or whatever the ultrachic were currently imbibing. He didn’t look like he was accustomed to being jammed in like a sardine in coach. Now he was stuck having to make small talk with the likes of her.

  Holly stumbled through conversation, hating the words as they rushed forth. “I never realized there was that big a difference between coach and first class. Almost like night and day. Of course, ever since my butt grew a twin, I notice.”

  It was the second time she’d tried to make direct reference to her size, but Logan again refused to join her in the joke. He understood Holly’s tactic, though: laugh at yourself before others get the chance. Classic defense mechanism.

  From a professional point of view, Logan couldn’t help wondering what type of body Holly Brennan had under all her self-esteem issues. Bodies were his business. Holly had sparkly green eyes and a sweet smile, despite the fact it came with a double chin and self-inflicted insults. The red hair, in its current state at least, could have passed for a three-alarm fire. Her clothes were wrinkled like she’d slept in them, and not comfortably. It was a look that would have made anyone else appear insane. But Holly Brennan didn’t look crazy. She just looked worn out.

  Logan didn’t want Holly to feel he was judging her, so he let her off the hook. “Keeping in shape is an everyday battle,” he said. He also knew the key to learning something about a person was to make them feel safe enough to open up. He wanted to make Holly comfortable, so maybe she’d stop all the jawing and cut to the truth.

  “Watching somebody die is an everyday battle, too,” she mumbled, her round face scrunching up.

  “Pardon me?” Logan hadn’t expected to hear anything so tragic, and the shock showed on his face.

  “I was never thin,” Holly blurted, suddenly feeling even more closed in by her surroundings, “but when my late husband was diagnosed, it seemed like food was the one thing I could always count on being there, you know?”

  In his mind’s eye, Logan saw himself thumping his fist against his own forehead.

  “I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to pry. You look too young to have lost …” Smooth, he thought, the words trailing off. Widowing and loss in general have no age limit. Where the hell was his composure all of a sudden? Probably in first class with a hot towel being applied to it.

  “It’s all right.” She hated the pity. But what she hated even more was the fact that she’d just used her status as a widow to make this man feel as uncomfortable as she did. Besides, it probably wasn’t his fault he was a total buck—the silver-spoon variety, the type nothing bad ever happens to. She hurried through the rest of her speech, sorry she even brought it up. “He was thirty-two. We met in college. He stayed home ’til … eighteen months. Then after—” Holly paused, aware that her wall was weakening, something she refused to let happen in front of a total stranger. She had already said more than she intended to. “Well, after”—she shrugged, mentally replacing the bricks—“I don’t know. Doesn’t really matter, does it?”

  No. It didn’t matter. “I’m sorry,” Logan repeated, not willing to risk becoming tongue-tied again.

  They sat in awkward silence, the word “sorry” swirling thick in the air around them. He was sorry for her situation. She was sorry for herself.

  Exhausted from depression and self-loathing, Holly folded her hands in her lap, an unconscious effort to hide her muffin top. She flashed back to the customer-service counter at the airport no more than two hours ago and the uncomfortable way the airline rep looked her over as she booked Holly into one of the last remaining seats on the flight, and the rep’s not-so-gentle suggestion that Holly might want to wait for another flight to keep her first-class seat—a reservation Holly had made to avoid the embarrassment of being forced to buy two seats in coach. The victory that resulted after the stare-down and subsequent judgment that one seat would suffice felt hollow. Holly shifted in her chair, and with that movement, shifted her thoughts as well—to all she’d lost in the past three years, and how fast those years had passed. Logan studied her discreetly. She’d laid it all out in front of him on a flight from Toronto to Newark. Had she done it because of his initial reaction, one that maybe he hadn’t been so good at hiding? Would he have been so quick to judge her if they were seated together in first class? Would he even have taken a second
look? Would he have extended his hand, started a conversation, if his own comfort zone hadn’t been violated? In the spirit of karmic exploration, he decided it might be worth learning more.

  Logan regrouped and started over. “So. Are you coming or going? I’m on my way back. I live in New Jersey. Englewood.”

  “Coincidence,” she replied politely, turning her head in his direction, the frown back in place. “I live in Englewood Cliffs. My husband had an account in Toronto that needed to be settled.”

  The sense of karma returned like a wave crashing down upon him. It was a chance to right a wrong, to reach out to another person and at the same time bring himself back into balance. Logan waited a moment, wanting to choose his words carefully.

  “You’ve been through a real rough stretch, I know. It’s easy to let yourself go when you’re focused on someone else. But the fact is, you’re still here, very much alive, and far too young to hang it up. I could help you break some bad habits. Might even make you feel better.”

  “And just how might you be able to do that?” She gave him a skeptical sideways glance, intrigued by the fact that he’d turned on the charm for her.

  “I’m a personal trainer,” he told her, “primarily for athletes. We live so close to each other, I could get a program going for you with no trouble.”

  She bristled. “Do I look like an athlete to you? Hate to break it to you, but the last time I played any sports, Billie Jean King was smack-talking Bobby Riggs.”

  His smile grew wide. “Somehow I doubt that. That happened in the seventies. You probably weren’t even born yet. And besides, I said ‘primarily.’ ”