Just Trust Me…

Prologue

KAYLA WATSON hurried through the Miami airport, cursing the high heels that prevented her from breaking into a dead run. Of course her gate was at the very end of this seemingly endless concourse. Damn it, if she missed her flight-

She cut off the thought, refusing to consider the havoc that would wreak with her already insane schedule. Her cell phone rang and she shot it an impatient glance, grimacing when the name Nelson Sigler showed on the caller ID. As much as she didn’t feel like talking to her boss at the moment, he was the CEO and expected her to answer the phone when he called.

“How’d the photo shoot go?” Nelson asked without preamble.

Exhausting. But, as the director of public relations at the New York office of La Fleur, the world’s most innovative cosmetics company, Kayla was well-acquainted with putting a positive spin on things. Especially headache-inducing photo shoots that pitted cranky, moody models against impatient, moody photographers.

“Fine,” she answered, forcing a cheery note into her voice as she wove through the crowd. “The photos will be fabulous. Perfect for the new ad campaign.” Right. Just don’t ask how much finessing and cajoling and feather-smoothing it took to make certain of that.

“Good. No problem with Alicia?”

The mere mention of the petulant model’s name made Kayla’s eye twitch. Alicia possessed a million-dollar face-and a diva streak the size of North America. She showed up late for her bookings, and was difficult when she finally did arrive. Which was why the photo session had run late. Which is why sweat now oozed down Kayla’s spine as she hurried to make her flight.

“Everything with Alicia worked out perfectly,” she told Nelson in a soothing voice.

“Excellent. You sound out of breath.”

“The shoot ran a bit long and I’m dashing to make my flight. I’ll see you at the office tomorrow.”

She’d no sooner disconnected than the loudspeaker warned, “Final boarding call for flight 254 to New York.”

Many gates and travelers still stood between her and her flight. Too many. Reaching down, she yanked off her heels and ran. When she arrived at the gate five minutes later, barefoot, sweating, breathless, the gate agent said, “I’m sorry, you missed the flight. But I’ll be happy to re-book you on the next one. It departs in two hours.”

Swallowing her frustration, Kayla thanked the woman, then, with her new boarding pass in hand, she flopped into the nearest seat, her mind spinning with the various appointments she’d need to reschedule courtesy of this delay-when all she really wanted to do was take some aspirin for her pounding stress headache and go to sleep.

With a sigh, she reached down to slip her shoes back on, and her gaze fell on an issue of U.S. Weekly Review magazine a previous traveler had left on the chair next to hers. She read the bold-print headline: Stressed? Out Of Balance? No Change, No Gain!

A short, humorless sound escaped her. Between her job, helping to plan her older sister’s wedding, dealing with the drama that was her younger sister’s life, her matchmaking mother and what seemed to be a never-ending string of miserable dates, stressed and out of balance perfectly described the chaotic whirlwind her life had become over the past year.

She glanced around at the nearby travelers. Most seemed to be business people, talking on cell phones, tapping on laptops, all engrossed in their own little world, oblivious to everything and everyone around them, frowning, looking stressed. Is this what she’d become? Unfortunately, it seemed so.

With a sigh, she picked up the magazine and settled back to read the article. By the time she’d finished, Kayla felt emotionally drained, yet at the same time elated, renewed and filled with purpose. The article’s dead-on descriptions of the discontent and frustrations she’d been experiencing both personally and professionally made it seem as if the words were written expressly for her.

Yes, she was stressed. Yes, she lacked balance in her life. And according to the article, if she didn’t shake things up, step out her comfort zone, things would only get worse. No change, no gain.

Her gaze settled on the handwritten testimonial scribbled in ink at the end of the article, obviously by the magazine’s previous owner: “This changed my life. I hope it does the same for you.”

Kayla closed the magazine and held it against her chest.

She hoped so, too. Because she badly needed a change.