Because She Could: The unputdownable debut novel that spans the globe (The Osprey Series Book 1) Read online

  BECAUSE SHE

  COULD

  By

  Kaylie Kay

  Copyright © Kaylie Kay 2018

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of

  binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent publisher.

  The moral right of Kaylie Kay has been asserted.

  ISBN:

  ISBN-13:

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  DEDICATION

  For Olivia xxx.

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

  Chapter 61

  Chapter 62

  Chapter 63

  Chapter 64

  Chapter 65

  Chapter 66

  Chapter 67

  Chapter 68

  Chapter 69

  Chapter 70

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  To my friends who have allowed me to put you in my book, albeit exaggerated forms of yourselves, I thank you. Julie, I can only apologise, but it has caused me much amusement to write your scenes!

  For those of you that have read the book as it has evolved I can’t thank you enough, your kind words and encouragement have given me the confidence to believe I could do this, and to carry on.

  Olivia, one day you will be old enough to read it. Thank you for letting me use your name – I hope you like your namesake!

  All of the characters are fictitious, unless I have told you that you are in it!

  Chapter 1

  ‘Well good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and a very warm welcome onboard this Osprey Aviation flight OS908 to Hong Kong.’ Olivia knew the boarding announcement off by heart, and she also knew that nobody was listening to her right now. As she told them about restrictions on using their electronics, and whether or not their seatbelts contained an airbag, they were far too busy finding room in the overhead lockers to stow their luggage, and making claim to what was going to be their personal space for the next eleven and a half hours, to listen to what she was saying.

  It was almost 10pm, half an hour until the scheduled departure time, and Olivia was pleased to see that most of them looked weary, just like her. From her door at the rear left of the aircraft she watched them flow into the cabin, and slowly take their seats. They seemed to be mostly young and Chinese, probably university students going home for the summer, it was July after all, she mused, continuing with her announcement mindlessly.

  ‘Captain Barnes informs us that the flight time tonight will be a little over eleven and a half hours and reminds you that smoking is not allowed on board…’ Blah, blah, blah. Still they continued to board, and still no one was listening as Olivia finished the PA and hung up her handset.

  Twenty-eight years old and Olivia Kaye had been crew for Osprey almost all of her working life, it was all that she knew, and she had worked her way up to purser at the airline. She loved her job and the lifestyle that it gave her, even now when she could feel the tiredness creeping up and the long night stretched ahead.

  The butterflies in her stomach reminded her that she was going to the city she loved most in the world, but even they felt a little fatigued right now. She wondered what this trip would hold when they got there, what she would get up to on the two-night layover. Would it be as good as her last trip here was? What would the crew that she had only met an hour or so before be like once they were out of their smart navy uniforms? One thing she did know already was that the flight would be easy enough, these always were, and for that she was grateful. She’d take this over a party flight to Las Vegas any day!

  She looked longingly at the locked door to her right, in the middle of the galley. Behind it lay the staircase which led up to every flight attendant’s favourite place, the crew rest area. Oh, how she wanted to be in that bunk up there right now, under that duvet, sinking her head into that big feather pillow! Just three hours, she thought to herself, then the meal service would be over and breaks could start.

  As the cabin filled up Olivia’s attention was caught by a western family struggling down the left-hand aisle. The dad led the way, towering over the smaller Chinese passengers around him. He carried a bag over each of his broad shoulders, no doubt full of everything they would need to survive the flight, and a small boy, perhaps two years old, clung to his neck. Without a spare hand to push it away, his mop of thick, dark, wavy hair fell forward into his eyes. He stopped and placed the child into his seat, before scraping it back with open fingers, clearly relieved to be able to see properly again. She watched him drop the bags onto the floor and stretch briefly before bending back down.

  Behind him Olivia could now see a petite blonde lady, dressed sensibly in black trousers and floral blouse. She seemed flustered as she ushered a second child, a young fair-haired girl of three or four, ahead of her whilst pulling a small case behind. Olivia’s heart went out to them, it was hard enough flying long-haul with small children, let alone so late at night with such young ones.

  ‘Can you watch my door, hon?’ she called to the girl who was busy preparing carts in the galley. She wanted to go and offer them some help but it was strictly forbidden to leave a door unattended on the ground. Rules were rules.

  ‘Of course,’ said the other girl. Olivia thought her name was Alex, but wasn’t quite sure enough to call her by name yet, so ‘hon’ or ‘babe’ would suffice until she could get a proper look at her name badge. With thousands of crew it was impossible to know everyone, and whilst she had flown with a couple of them on today’s flight before,
the rest were just new allies to be made.

  ‘Excuse me, sir, excuse me,’ she chanted as she made her way up past the people standing in the aisles, grateful that she was slim and able to squeeze past them. When she eventually made it to row 43, where the family had stopped, she watched in amusement for a brief moment as the lady busily unpacked her bag in her seat. She hadn’t noticed that as quick as she was stuffing essentials into their seat pockets, the youngest child was pulling it all back out again. The man, meanwhile, was playing the overhead locker game, arranging and rearranging the bags to make them fit, muttering under his breath, clearly annoyed.

  ‘Can I help you at all?’ Olivia asked.

  ‘No, we’re fine,’ came the curt reply, without so much as a look in her direction. ‘Dammit,’ he cursed, shoving one of the bags angrily when it still wouldn’t fit.

  The lady looked up at Olivia and gave her a weak smile. She was noticeably older than the man now that she could see her up close, the lines around her eyes forged by the extra years. Olivia was struck by how beautiful she still was though, with high cheekbones and perfect teeth, and she hoped that she would be fortunate enough to age so well.

  ‘Thank you for the offer, I think we are ok though,’ she said kindly.

  ‘Ok, well let me know if there is anything we can do for you,’ Olivia replied earnestly before turning back around. ‘There is space in the locker opposite, sir,’ she said over her shoulder as she walked away. If he had just taken a deep breath, instead of getting all stressed out, he might have noticed that the locker on the other side was half empty. Had he been an ounce of polite Olivia may have stayed and helped him stow his bags, but she was damned if she was going to now.

  ‘Are they ok?’ asked Alex when she got back to the door.

  Olivia took a sly look at her badge and confirmed her name.

  ‘Mmm, I think they’re just a bit stressed with the little ones. He’s a bit rude though.’

  ‘You can’t help some people,’ Alex sighed. ‘Never mind, it’s his problem, don’t let it get to you.’ She had obviously seen the frown on Olivia’s face.

  Normally Olivia didn’t let rude passengers get to her. She had learnt not to take things personally. You are just a uniform, she would remind herself. Maybe it was because it was so late that she was being more sensitive tonight, but the man had really annoyed her; she had only wanted to help.

  ‘Cabin crew, arm your doors.’

  The announcement snapped her out of her blackening mood and back to reality; she had a job to do and a long night ahead.

  As they taxied to the runway Olivia quickly took her phone out of her handbag, glancing first at her reflection in the blank screen and fastening the piece of her long dark hair that had escaped back with a grip.

  Bye babe, love you xxxx, she texted.

  She always sent a message to Tom before she left, always the same four words, and he always sent the same message back.

  Love you too, miss you already xxxxx. It came straight back. She smiled and switched her phone off, dropped it into her handbag and stuffed the bag into the small cupboard opposite her jumpseat.

  As she strapped into her seat she could hear a child crying. She hadn’t seen any others boarding so she was almost certain it was one of the poor mites with the grumpy father. A small part of her felt sorry for them, but she couldn’t help thinking that he deserved the extra stress for being so rude to her! As usually happened, by the time they took off and the landing gear was up the vibrations of the aircraft had calmed them and the crying had stopped. Hopefully they would sleep through the night now, for their sake and for the other passengers!

  Chapter 2

  ‘What can I get you for dinner, sir?’

  ‘Would you like wine with your meal?’

  The family had all been asleep as she passed them with the meal service, they were obviously exhausted. She felt her annoyance subside as she watched the youngest child sucking gently on his dummy, with his father’s arm wrapped protectively around him. The daughter slept soundly with her head on the lap of the lady, her grandmother perhaps, she thought. She smiled at the peaceful scene and moved on to the next row.

  The dinner service was over quickly. So many of the passengers were already sleeping, and as she turned the lights off in the cabin only the glare of a few TV screens broke the darkness.

  Just as they were putting the last few things away the flight manager, Julie, floated into the galley in a waft of expensive perfume. Everyone at Osprey knew Julie Margot, even if they had never flown with her before. She was an icon at the airline, there since the start-up twenty-five years before. She was probably in her mid-fifties, but it was hard to tell thanks to the botox and fillers so popular with people in this industry, and with a size eight figure any twenty-year old would die for, she was clearly not ready to give in to ageing any time soon.

  Rumour was that she had once had an affair with the founder of the airline, back in its small and glamorous days, before it became the corporate machine that it was now. Apparently he had bestowed gifts of cars and jewellery on her to keep her silence and not kiss and tell, and she had been promoted through the ranks very quickly. In the years since the affair had run its course there had been allegations against her for all sorts of misconduct: turning up for work inebriated, inappropriate behaviour downroute, the list went on. Yet here she still was, apparently untouchable, and Olivia couldn’t help but like her.

  ‘Wow! That was quick, everyone. Well done!’

  ‘Easiest service ever,’ gushed Flic, the tall blonde girl working in the other aisle.

  ‘Well I think we all deserve a break then.’

  Julie began writing times and names down in her small red notebook.

  Result, thought Olivia, watching over her shoulder. First break, three hours. She was so ready for it; it was nearly 1am and she could sleep standing up right now.

  ‘Thanks, Jules. Goodnight all,’ she called cheerily and opened the door that led up to the crew rest area, followed eagerly by the rest of the crew going on break now. She climbed the steps and crawled into the middle bunk at the front, her favourite of the six that sat three either side of the stairwell. In her early flying days Olivia had found the crew bunks claustrophobic, with their low ceilings and narrow walls, but it was funny how you just got used to things. She removed her shoes and skirt, switched out her light and fell fast asleep in a matter of minutes.

  Three hours seemed to pass in a flash.

  ‘Time to get up,’ came a soft voice over the PA.

  Ugh.

  Olivia rubbed her eyes and took a moment to come around.

  Back down in the galley, she hugged her mug of tea as she tried to wake up. She hated those happy morning people that could just bounce out of bed; she was definitely not one of those. The other crew had disappeared into the restrooms to sort themselves out, leaving her on her own to cheer up.

  ‘Excuse me,’ came a voice from behind her.

  Seriously, she thought. Go… away!

  She turned slowly and was surprised to see the father from the beginning of the flight standing behind her. Olivia would never have made it as a poker player, and she was quite sure that the look on her face was telling him that he was an unwelcome guest.

  ‘So sorry to bother you but any chance of a coffee?’ He ran his fingers through his hair and grinned sheepishly at her.

  ‘Milk and sugar?’ she asked abruptly.

  ‘Just milk, please.’

  Well at least he was remembering his manners now, she thought, somewhat appeased. Her displeasure was subsiding quickly; he was far too handsome to be annoyed with, all chiselled jaw and dark eyes, with long black eyelashes that she would die for.

  She made his coffee and handed it to him.

  ‘Thanks so much, I really appreciate it. Sorry about earlier, I was really stressed when I got on.’

  ‘No problem.’ He obviously knew that he had upset her, and she accepted his apology. ‘Are the children st
ill sleeping?’

  ‘Yes, thank God,’ he replied.

  ‘Tough, huh, flying with little ones?’

  He nodded, rolling his huge dark brown eyes upwards.

  Olivia was becoming intrigued by this man and wanted to know more, starting with who the lady was that was with him.

  ‘At least you have someone to help you.’

  ‘My mother,’ he offered. ‘She’s a saint, I don’t know what I’d do without her.’

  Interesting, so what about the children’s mother? Olivia was naturally nosey, although she preferred to call it interested. Maybe that was too forward a question to ask though.

  ‘Are you going on holiday?’ she asked.

  ‘No, I work out there, I’m a doctor,’ he said matter-of-factly.

  ‘Oh, wow.’ Olivia was impressed, even if he wasn’t. He was both handsome and successful.

  ‘Yeah, I’ve been out here three years now, we’ve just been home for a couple of weeks.’

  ‘So is your mum coming out on holiday?’ We will get there in a minute, she thought, beginning to get impatient.

  ‘No, she lives with me.’ He paused, as if he wasn’t sure if he should go on or not, looking down at his coffee for a moment before starting again. ‘My wife passed away last year and Mum has moved out for a while to help look after the children.’

  Well she hadn’t expected that. Olivia suddenly wished she hadn’t been so ‘interested’ because now she felt really bad. He was looking at her as if trying to read her reaction.

  ‘Oh, I’m so sorry.’ It was all she could think of to say, and she struggled to make eye contact for the first time since he had come in.

  ‘Hey, it’s fine. Thanks for the coffee, I’d better get back in case one of them wakes up,’ he said gratefully as he turned around and walked back towards his seat with his drink.

  Poor, poor man, she thought. Poor handsome, gorgeous man!

  Chapter 3