Читать книгу Write It Up!: Rapid Transit / The Ex Factor / Brewing Up Trouble - Elizabeth Bevarly - Страница 14

“SO. HOW’S THE SPEED-DATING story coming?”

Tess Truesdale asked the question just as Julia was enjoying a forkful of her carryout Waldorf salad, so she had to spend a few minutes chewing before she could reply. After all, dribbled lettuce and grapes would in no way complement her pale blue, pleated, beribboned miniskirt and cropped, ribbon-tied blazer of the same color. Tess had also lightened up today and was dressed in a clingy ivory sheath of pure silk, accessorized by a clunky bronze necklace that could have come from the Egyptian room at the British Museum—and, knowing Tess, it probably had.

Julia had been surprised by her editor’s invitation to share lunch in Tess’s office, but now realized her employer intended for this to be a working lunch. Which, of course, came as no surprise at all.

“It’s going very well,” she said evasively, not sure how much she wanted her editor to know about her budding relationship with Daniel. If indeed what she and Daniel had was a relationship, and if indeed it was budding.

It was still too new, too fragile, too personal to talk about—with anyone—having been only a few days since they’d made dinner together. But. Julia had awoken two mornings ago in a much better mood than she normally did on a Monday. That could only be because she’d spent her weekend with Daniel. Breakfast Sunday had led to a movie in the afternoon, then dinner that evening. And then drinks al fresco by the park before Daniel escorted her home, lingering inside her apartment just long enough to kiss her good-night. Twenty-seven times.

They’d spent Monday and Tuesday evening together, too, not to mention lunch yesterday. In fact, since meeting Daniel Friday night, Julia had spent virtually every moment of her nonworking life in his presence. Normally, being with one person that much would drive her nuts. With Daniel, though, the days had seemed to pass too quickly. Already, she was anticipating meeting him again, that night after work.

“And by ‘very well,’ you would mean…?” Tess asked.

Julia shrugged, hoping the gesture didn’t look as awkward as it felt. “I mean it’s going very well,” she said.

Tess narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “Have you met any men who might be worth mentioning for the article?”

“One or two,” Julia told her. The correct answer, naturally, being one. The other men she’d met weren’t exactly “worth” mentioning. Except maybe to provide some comic relief.

Tess uttered a sound of exasperation that put Julia on red alert, tossing her fork into her Cobb salad with much flourish. “Tell me you’re not wasting the magazine’s time,” she demanded.

“I’m not wasting the magazine’s time,” Julia vowed.

“Tell me this article is going to be excellent,” Tess insisted.

“The article is going to be excellent,” Julia promised.

“Tell me you’ve met someone special to write about.”

“I’ve met someone special,” Julia assured her. And then she smiled. Because she just couldn’t help herself. “Oh, Tess, I’ve met someone wonderful,” she added as she leaned back in her chair.

This time when her editor smiled at her, Julia didn’t feel at all like the main course. Because this time, Tess seemed genuinely delighted by what she was hearing. “Tell me more,” the other woman said.

Julia shook her head slowly, honestly not knowing where to begin. “I didn’t think I’d meet anyone even halfway decent doing this speed-dating thing,” she confessed, “but this guy…” She sighed eloquently. “He’s too good to be true, Tess. Gorgeous, funny, smart, kind, totally decent…”

“Nice ass?” Tess asked.

“Great ass,” Julia replied with a chuckle. “And he cooks.”

“He does not,” Tess gasped incredulously.

Julia nodded enthusiastically. “He can poach chicken in a kicky chardonnay.”

“Get out.”

“And make radish roses.”

Tess made a disappointed sound as she moved her fork around in her own salad. “He’s gay, darling. He just hasn’t accepted it. Find someone else to write about.”

“He’s not gay,” Julia said with certainty. “Trust me.”

Tess’s smile turned satisfied. “Then the two of you have—”

“No,” Julia interrupted her. “We haven’t. Not all the way. Which is another thing that makes him different from other guys. He’s not in a big rush to have sex.”

“I hear a ‘but’ in that sentence,” Tess said.

Julia had, too, quite frankly, something that rather surprised her. “But…” she said. “But I think maybe I’m starting to be in a rush for it myself. I really like him. A lot. I mean, maybe I even…”

No. She stopped herself before completing the statement—verbally or mentally. She would not permit herself to say it. She would not permit herself to feel it. Not yet. It hadn’t been long enough to know if she even…

No. She halted herself again. Not yet.

Tess nodded with much approval. “Good. I was beginning to worry about you, darling. You and Abby and Samantha, all of you. None of you girls has enough epic romance in your life.”

And Tess would know, Julia thought, since she was currently working on the third epic romance of her own life.

“It’s going to be a great article, Tess,” Julia promised again. “Because Daniel is such a great guy. There have even been times this week when I honestly found myself thinking he might just be…”

No. Not yet.

“The one?” Tess finished for her.

For a moment, Julia didn’t dare acknowledge anything of the kind, certain she’d jinx it if she did. And also because she wasn’t ready to admit it yet, on account of—had she mentioned?—it was too soon for her to know such a thing. Then she realized how silly she was being. Nothing could jinx the way she and Daniel were together. And she was completely crazy about him.

“Yeah,” she said softly. “Sometimes, I think he might just be…the one.”

Tess sat back in her chair, propping her elbows on the arms and tenting her fingers together. It was her life-is-good pose. “I like seeing you so enthusiastic, darling,” she said. “It will serve you well when you write this article.”

Naturally, Tess would see it that way, Julia thought, forking up another bite of salad. She herself saw it another way entirely. Forget the article. Having Daniel in her life was serving to make Julia happy. Deliciously so. She didn’t know what she’d done to deserve such incredibly good fortune, but she wasn’t about to question it.

Daniel Taggart was a dream come true. Perfect beyond words. The answer to every silent plea for Mr. Right she’d ever sent out. Regardless of the manner in which she’d found him, and no matter what Abby and Samantha experienced on their assignments, Daniel was Mr. Right.

Tess was right. Life was good. And Julia couldn’t imagine a single thing that would change that.

DANIEL HESITATED BEFORE entering the bar his editor had directed him to for yet another round of speed-dating, wondering at the likelihood of running into Julia here. She had said she would be attending three more of these parties herself. Just how many speed-dating events were going on in New York on any given night?

He did some quick mental math. Eight million people, probably half of them adults, then another half of those single, then half of the singles looking, then another half desperate enough to try a half-dozen different types of dating…Half by half by half by half, then a half dozen of that…Drop the zero, carry the two, then divide by pi…Do the hokeypokey and turn yourself around…

Oh, hell. The chances were probably pretty good.

But the bar was packed, he reassured himself as he peeked inside, so he could probably pop in for a quick look around without being noticed. Grab one of the lists of participants for the event to see if Julia’s name was on it. Not that anyone was ever fully identified by name at these things, since security was a major consideration, especially for the women. But there were usually first names followed by a number or letter, or people were identified by drink preferences, or celebrity names they chose for themselves, or some character trait like “Loves music” or “Sleeps in the buff” or something. If Julia was on the list, Daniel was confident he knew enough about her by now to recognize her, even under an alias.

And the reason he knew enough about her was because the two of them had seen each other nearly every day in the week that had passed since the night they’d cooked together in her kitchen. And then cooked together on her couch. No, what had happened couldn’t be called a one-night stand by any stretch of the imagination. But they had enjoyed quite a nice little make-out party. Then they’d enjoyed some Marx Brothers on DVD. Then they’d enjoyed those two pints of Godiva.

And it went a long way toward telling Daniel how far gone he was on Julia that he’d returned home that night feeling even better than he had after those delirious one-night stands with the two women from that first speed-dating party.

Only a week, he marveled. Damned if it didn’t feel as if he’d known Julia for years. He had barely seven days’ worth of memories of her, but there were so many good ones, it might as well have been enough for a lifetime.

In addition to the ones from dinner last Saturday, there was spending the day with her all day Sunday. There was lunch at Rockefeller Plaza, where they’d met three days this week because it was located almost exactly midway between their two workplaces. There was the midweek foray to an off-off-Broadway play that was so bad they’d spent two hours afterward improving the writing themselves. There was the trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a place Julia said she visited once a week to keep herself in touch with her humanity, a place Daniel hadn’t visited since college. Seeing it again with her, he wondered why he’d stayed away.

He was supposed to have hit on her once to see if he could score, and when it became clear that first night he wouldn’t make it past first base, he should have moved on to greener pastures. Greener baseball diamonds. Whatever. Instead, he’d gone home that first night feeling oddly relieved that she hadn’t invited him up to her place. Odder still was the fact that he hadn’t pressed to get her into bed since then. Not even the night they’d cooked together. For the life of him, he didn’t know why. He was just having too much fun getting to know Julia. Talking with Julia. Doing other things with Julia. Being with Julia. Yeah, he wanted her. Something fierce. But there was so much else he wanted, too.

The image of her face swam up in his brain then, the way it had a habit of doing lately, her mouth curled into that wry smile, her green eyes laughing at something. She laughed a lot, he’d noticed. She found humor in almost everything, the same way he did. She had a quirky way of looking at things that was unlike anyone else’s. In spite of his own protestations to the contrary that first night, he had no choice but to admit she was like no woman he’d ever met before. Daniel liked that. He liked all of it. Hell, he just liked Julia. A lot.

And he had no idea what to do about it.

He glanced down at the list in his hand, reminding himself he wasn’t supposed to be thinking about Julia right now. In fact, he should be putting thoughts of her as far away from himself as he could. Because he had a job to do tonight. He had women to meet and charm and cajole into bed. And then abandon. The way he was supposed to have done with Julia.

And dammit, would he never be able to think about anything again without having her slip into his thoughts?

Work, he reminded himself. Work now. Julia later. Then he chuckled derisively at himself. If work turned out the way it was supposed to tonight, Julia had better not find out about “later.”

Man, could he do that? he asked himself. Could he really sleep with some woman he picked up tonight for casual sex, just so he’d have a story to write? Well, yeah, since he’d already done it twice. But that was before Julia. Could he do it now? Sleep with some stranger one time and hope that the woman he was beginning to care about never found out? A month ago, he could have answered that question easily, and in the affirmative. Tonight, though…

Damn. He honestly didn’t know.

No names, he saw when he looked down at the list in his hand. No identifying elements at all. Damn. The participants for this event were only assigned numbers. There was no way he’d be able to tell if Julia was among them.

He really needed to stay for this party tonight, he told himself. Because the third one he’d attended—the Sunday night after meeting Julia—had been a complete bust. Not a single woman in the bunch had stirred his libido in the slightest, and he’d gone home alone.

And it wasn’t as if he had high standards. His main requirement in a woman was that she needed to have produced estrogen at some point in her life. His second was that she have a pulse. His third was that she breathe oxygen. His fourth and final was that she not set off his gag reflex. Yet still he’d ended that third party without checking off a single name from his list.

And he’d been so besotted by Julia at the second event that he hadn’t even turned in his name list at the end of the night. Thank God for the two women from the first party or he wouldn’t have a story at all. Thing was, he could barely remember either one of them now. Good thing he’d taken notes.

All the more reason to focus on work tonight, he told himself. He was in desperate need of material. Which meant he had to go to this party and find a few halfway decent—or rather, wholly indecent—women to fill the pages of his story.

As long as, you know, Julia wasn’t here.

Still wary of her appearance, Daniel hovered near the front entry, skirting the wall, keeping one eye on the door, in case she was a last-minute show. But by the time the party finally got going, ten minutes late, there was still no sign of her. Obviously she wasn’t coming tonight, so he’d be free to pick up women at will. And as he’d scanned the crowd looking for Julia, he’d spied a number of attractive women who might work well for his purposes. At least none of them had set off his gag reflex, all clearly possessed beating hearts, and he couldn’t detect gills on any of them. Now, as long as he didn’t see any Adam’s apples or facial hair…

A tall slender redhead caught his eye as he was pondering her hormonal composition, and she smiled at him. Naturally, Daniel smiled back. He waited for that kick to the gut that usually hit him when a pretty woman smiled at him that way, but it never came. Neither did the heated speculation about what she looked like naked that usually came right after the kick to the gut. Nor did the deep-seated sexual anticipation that had his fingers curling over imaginary breasts.

Which could mean only one thing.

He was so far gone on Julia that it was absolutely, unequivocally, irretrievably essential that Daniel get that woman into bed tonight, and enjoy every last inch of her. Twice. At least. Because maybe that, finally, would work Julia Miles out of his system, and put him back on the road to eternal hound-dogging perdition, which was where he wanted to be. Right?

Damn right.

Daniel had neither the time, nor the inclination, to be besotted with anyone. Besotment led to even worse things. Things like commitment and monogamy and chick flicks and remembering obscure milestone anniversaries like the day they discovered a gum wrapper on the street together. He had far more important things to do. He had a sensational story to write. A postadolescent dream job to keep. A lifestyle as an arrogant alpha male to maintain. And it was about time he remembered that.

Instead of remembering how good it felt to have his arm around Julia’s waist. And how nice she smelled. And how her hair caught the light in a way that made it look like liquid gold. And that soft, husky laugh that was just so damned sexy. And that afternoon they discovered the gum wrapper on the street together…

JULIA CAUTIOUSLY WATCHED the retreating back of her sixth speed-date of the night, whose identifying number looked way too much like what would appear under his mug shot, and wondered again what she was doing here. Oh, yeah. Trying to get a story for Tess magazine. She hoped Abby and Samantha were having more luck meeting write-worthy men than she was, and couldn’t quite curb the fear that they might have to scrap the whole story. Or at least her portion of it. So far, the only decent guy she’d met speed-dating was Daniel.

Which, okay, might provide her with all the material she needed for the story, since she’d pretty much decided he was her Mr. Right. But her contribution to the article was going to be pretty short and pretty boring if she didn’t have at least a few good guys she could hold up as examples. 40387—yeah, that was definitely a prison jumpsuit number—wasn’t anywhere close. She riffled through her notes for the night so far and sighed. Neither was any of the other guys.

And for this she’d dressed in a screaming red, lace-trimmed, curve-hugging slip dress? What a waste of perfectly good designer clothing.

She had flipped to a clean page and was tipping back her glass to suck up the last of her appletini—the way things were going, she needed every last drop of vodka she could absorb—when she saw Daniel sitting at the table of some tarty redhead in the corner of the room. Worse, he was smiling at the tarty redhead in much the same way he had smiled at Julia that first night they met. Worse still, he was holding the tarty redhead’s hand. Or maybe the tarty redhead was holding his hand. Hard to tell from this angle. In any event, they were both holding hands and neither seemed to mind very much.

What was he doing here? she wondered as something cool and heavy slithered into her stomach. Why was he still speed-dating when the two of them had been getting along so well? He’d told her that first night he was looking for companionship. So what was Julia? His faithful canine friend?

Okay, so she didn’t have any major claim on him, she reminded herself. And they’d only known each other a week. But they’d seen each other nearly every day this week, and they’d had a lot of fun. And, yeah, they’d done a lot of making out. That was part of the fun. Daniel had been totally affectionate with her, and God knew she’d felt affection—and then some—for him. The night they’d cooked dinner at her place had been one of the most enjoyable Julia had ever spent, even before the lip-locking on the couch. And things had only gotten better after that.

Okay, so maybe she hadn’t been as ready to do the horizontal boogaloo as he was, despite her claims to Tess at lunch Wednesday. That was actually a good sign. It was. It meant Julia cared enough for Daniel to want to make sure she didn’t screw things up with him. Sex could make people weird with each other if it came into a relationship too soon. Which—she had to be honest with herself—Julia had finally decided was what she and Daniel had.

Maybe she should have told him that, she thought now. Well, the worrying-about-things-getting-weird thing, if not the actual relationship thing, since guys tended to get really weird after that word came up. But she’d been afraid even that small mention of her feelings might spook him. Even when things were going really well between a man and a woman, guys didn’t want to cross that emotional bridge as soon as girls did. And if the man and woman weren’t progressing at quite the same pace in their relationship…

Something hot and scary splashed through Julia’s midsection. She had assumed Daniel was getting as serious about her as she was about him. He’d been as eager to see her from one day to the next as she had been to see him. They’d spent their final moments together every night locking lips in a way that indicated they were both fully sprung on each other.

But what if she was wrong?

Why was he speed-dating? she asked herself again. He knew she was still doing it, too. He had to have realized he might run into her at one of these things. But he’d done it, anyway. Evidently because he didn’t care if she saw him here. With a gorgeous, if incredibly tarty, redhead. Smiling at the tart. Holding her tarty hand. Still holding it as both of them stood up to say their goodbyes at the conclusion of their speed-date. Kissing her tarty cheek before leav—

Kissing her cheek? Julia realized in openmouthed amazement. He hadn’t kissed Julia’s cheek that first night! Just who did he think he was? Why, she ought to march over there right now and tell him—

What? she asked herself, deflating some. He’d never said he wanted to be exclusive with Julia. She’d never said that, either. She’d just figured he felt the same way she did about the way things were progressing between the two of them. She’d assumed he wasn’t seeing anyone else because he liked her well enough that he didn’t want to see anyone else. The same way she didn’t want to see anyone else, either. Because she liked him well enough, too.

She was such an idiot.

He was such a jerk.

The tarty redhead said something to him that made him laugh, and Julia’s stomach knotted tighter. Before she even realized what she was doing, she was palming her purse and walking slowly across the room. But he left the tart’s table before Julia reached them, so she turned to follow him.

She kept her distance as he went to the bar—was he getting the tarty redhead a drink, the way he’d gotten one for Julia that night?—then ducked behind a chatting couple when he turned to look behind himself. But he didn’t look back at the redhead, Julia noted. Instead, he seemed to be scanning the crowd, looking for someone else.

Jeez, just how many women was he hoping to meet tonight?

He picked up his order from the bar—one drink, the color of Scotch, she saw with some meager reassurance—and started to make his way back across the room. He was looking over his list of dates as he came toward her, so he didn’t see her standing where she was…still cowering behind the same two people who were now looking at her as if she were a complete moron. When someone accidentally bumped him, making him drop his list barely two feet from where she was standing—oh, all right, where she was cowering—Julia took her chance. Stepping forward, she scooped up the list just before he would have grabbed it himself, and stood.

He straightened, too, saying as he did, “Oh, thanks for getting that for me. I really appreci—”

And that was when his gaze connected with Julia’s and he realized who he was talking to.

“Julia,” he said softly.

“Daniel,” she replied tersely.

“I…” he began vaguely.

“You,” she remarked pointedly.

He smiled, that boyish, self-deprecating smile he’d used so successfully the first night they’d met.