Sleeping with Beauty (28 page)

Lucy gulped. “I can’t believe we’re even talking about this. It’s my first date with the guy, and you and Vivian both have me romping in the hay with him already.”

Jana just laughed. “Right. With Jason Prescott. Like you haven’t pictured that very thing, like, a thousand times. Ten thousand times.”

Lucy couldn’t pull off that lie, so she didn’t even try. “Fantasizing isn’t the same as doing. Maybe if I make it through this date without tripping over my feet, spilling something in my lap—or worse, his lap—and he asks me out again,
then
I’ll begin to think about whether I’ll let him take things to the next level.”

“Oh, for God’s sake, you sound like a reality dating-show contestant. ‘I feel such a connection. We’re on this journey together. I can’t wait to take it to the next level,’ ” she said, mimicking the words in a breathy exaggerated voice. “If you want to jump the guy, jump him.”

“Says the woman who no longer worries about safe sex.”

“Yeah, well, maybe I should have.” She raised a hand. “Kidding, kidding.” She sighed, looked at Lucy. “You want Jason Prescott. So take him. But tell me, do you really like the guy? I mean, apart from what he represents to you?”

“Sure.”

Jana just cocked her head.

“Okay, so maybe we didn’t get much of a chance to talk. I don’t know him all that well. But he still has that same charm and sizzle he always did. Only now it’s all grown-up and even more potent.”

“So you’re thinking long-term-relationship possibility here?”

“I’m not thinking anything beyond getting through this date.”

“Okay. That’s fair.”

Lucy wondered if Jana’s ambivalence about her dating Jason Prescott had more to do with her feelings about Grady not liking it than whatever she might personally feel about the situation. But Lucy didn’t have time to delve into that right now. Convenient excuse, that.

Jana slid off the bed and shoved her feet back into her suede walking boots. “Just be prepared for anything. That’s my motto.”

“Vivian’s, too.” She didn’t tell Jana she’d already moved
all
the contents of her reunion-night clutch to her regular purse.

“I’m liking this Vivian more all the time,” Jana called out, as Lucy went off to get dressed.

“You would,” Lucy said. Then pulled out her war paint and began preparing herself for battle.

She just wished she knew exactly what it was she was fighting for.

Chapter
22
                                                                                                                                       

C
hirra was a spectacular location for Lucy’s dream date. So elegant. One look around at the sumptuous Mediterranean design, the pricey art, the serious menu, and she realized that there must be a lot of money to be made in getting athletes acquitted of assault and DUI charges.

“Wine or champagne?” Jason queried.

She was still absorbing her surroundings, not to mention her company for the evening, and didn’t respond right away.
My, how The World According to Lucy Harper has changed, eh?
She studied her artsy menu, which was a single page mounted on an abstract-shaped piece of slate.
Handy as a menu or a weapon,
she thought. It was hand-drawn, complete with a small watercolor pattern bordering the edge. Every aspect of the restaurant, down to the tiniest detail, had been handled with care. So elegant, so perfect, it made Lucy a bit nervous.

“Wine would be fine,” she finally said, proud that she’d managed to utter all of four words without dropping, spilling, or mispronouncing anything. She’d even rhymed. Emboldened by her success, she chanced a glance up and offered a smile, hoping for sophisticated and worldly, but satisfied with nice and nominally intelligent. “Why don’t you select?”

He beamed. Another male, happy to be in charge.

Lucy was fine with that. Let him handle the ordering. She was still busy trying to figure out what she hoped to get out of this date. Part of her felt that this evening was nothing more than self-esteem payback after Jason’s rude dismissal of her so many years ago. But . . . sitting across from him now, in his gorgeously tailored suit, she was forced to admit she didn’t feel so far removed from that starry-eyed high school senior she’d been ten years ago, the one with a hopeless crush on the most popular boy in school. He was beautiful then and he was beautiful now.

Vivian’s words about her being the beholder floated through her mind. It wasn’t just about what he sees.
So,
she wondered,
is this what it feels like to recognize passion?

Upon her arrival at the restaurant, Lucy discovered that Jason was waiting just inside the restaurant door, watching for her. She saw him first, tall and handsome and hers, and had paused for a moment to really absorb that fact. But even when he turned and saw her, began making his way toward her with unmistakable interest gleaming in his eyes, she still felt like the dorky wallflower playing dress-up in her glamorous older sister’s clothes.

If Lucy just pretended to be the hot, sophisticated chick long enough, maybe she’d actually become the hot, sophisticated chick. If it walked like a duck, and looked like a duck . . .

“Duck?” Jason said, startling her.

Dear God, had she spoken out loud?
“I beg your pardon?”

“The foie gras? Would that work as an appetizer for you? You’re not a vegetarian or anything, are you?”

“No, no,” she quickly assured him. An easy question, she could answer this one without thinking. “I’m a big meat eater. Nothing better than a big piece of meat, I always say.”
Oh, God!
This time she had spoken out loud. She quickly buried her flaming face in her menu.

“Me, too,” he said, chuckling.

She wanted to crawl under the table, but she forced herself to peek over her menu and attempt a good-natured smile, only to be caught once again by his brilliant smile and golden-boy tan. He really was beautiful.

“You look nice,” he said, as she ducked back behind the safety of her menu before she started to drool.

With a rather limited but refined set of choices, Lucy feared that she appeared to be either extremely picky or indecisive. She finally set the menu slab aside. He’d been so tickled to have his judgment deferred to about the wine, he’d be downright ecstatic when she told him he could order the whole damn meal. “Thank you,” she said, forcing herself to meet his gaze head-on.
Don’t picture him naked. Or say anything about meat. Any kind of meat.

“You look so different from the dance, I almost didn’t recognize you.”

She froze in mid-casual-smile. “I do?” She knew the sweater was too casual for this place. She was going to kill Jana. She should have gone with the red silk. Jason Prescott was a lady-in-red kind of man. Dammit, she’d known that. So what if she was a woman-in-wool kind of girl? This wasn’t about her being comfortable. This was about—

That stopped her. She still wasn’t quite sure what this was about.

Proving to herself that she could make Jason want her as revenge for prom night? Yes, Jason had been a jerk to her that night, but that was ten years ago. Right now he seemed more like a great-looking guy who was treating her to a lovely dinner and apparently interested in getting to know her. Wouldn’t it be okay if she felt the same way? After all, they were both single, available adults.

Maybe this wasn’t about the past at all, but about what the future might hold now . . . years later. Let bygones be bygones, and all that. Could it really be that simple? And if so, why in the hell was she wearing this stupid garter belt?

Because it wasn’t regular Lucy Harper who’d gotten his attention in the first place. It was Vixen Lucy. Cyborg Lucy. Fake Lucy.

“Is that a bad thing?” she blurted out. “Looking different?”

“No, no, not at all,” he assured her with that smooth, easy charm of his. “I love cashmere.” His gaze drifted down to her sweater. “Very tactile.”

She was trying to decide if that was some kind of come-on, when his gaze moved back to her face and he said, “I know a guy on Seventh Avenue who does wonders with cashmere. I had him make a winter coat for me last year. Dynamite. Very versatile. Goes with everything.”

My God, he actually meant
he
loved cashmere. Personally. Jason Prescott. Metrosexual?
“‘Seventh’? Is that northeast or west?”

He frowned for a moment, then laughed. “Not in D.C. New York City. Sorry, I should have clarified. If you want, I’ll give you his card. You should really check him out next time you go up.” He flashed her another dazzling smile of encouragement. “He could do amazing things with you.”

She basked in the glow just for a moment because, after all, she was human. And female. No matter how much of her was fake, the original wiring was still all hers. She wondered how to break it to Jason that she didn’t just “go up” to NYC on any kind of regular basis. Like ever. She settled for, “I don’t get up to the city all that often.” Since her seventh-grade field trip, to be exact.

“Oh.” He seemed a bit startled by the idea. “Well, there’s a place in Georgetown. He’s appointment only. But I’d be glad to put in a word.” He chuckled self-deprecatingly, all handsome abashed perfection. “Of course, I shouldn’t assume. For all I know, you could give me a better recommendation. Do you use a tailor? I guess women call them ‘tailors,’ right? ‘Seamstress’ seems a bit dated.”

Lucy managed a grin that could only be considered weak in comparison to his beaming smile. She didn’t even use a Macy’s personal shopper. She spent a few more seconds trying to decide how long she could maintain any kind of real pretense, then gave it up. If this wasn’t about revenge, but about truly getting to know the adult version of a guy she’d had a major crush on in high school, then the only thing to do was to be true to herself and see where that took her.

“Actually, I’m a department-store girl myself,” she said. No point in dragging out the inevitable. At least she’d get a good meal out of it. She hoped foie gras tasted better than it sounded. “Seamstresses and tailors are a bit outside my budget, I’m afraid.”

Jason’s bright smile dimmed slightly. “I’m sorry. I’ve presumed too much. And here I’ve been going on and on like some stuck-up snob. It’s just that dress, and the jewelry, the night of the reunion . . .”

“Borrowed.” She waited to see if he was still the same old Jason Prescott from high school. The one that would ask if she wouldn’t mind giving him the number of the hot chick who really owned all that stuff.

Instead he lifted one broad shoulder and ducked his chin quite endearingly. “I jumped to conclusions I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry.”

And the fantasy momentarily gasped back to life, struggling to stay alive.

The waiter stopped by their table then, and after reciting an exhaustive list of specials that weren’t on the menu, in a tone that made it clear they couldn’t even begin to understand the enormity of their chef’s ability, Jason made quick, decisive selections, then smiled easily as the waiter hurried off to do his bidding. It was good to be the Boy King.

When he returned his attention to her, he did it with such focus, she felt like the only woman in the room. On the planet. In the universe.

Okay, so maybe she still needed to get a grip on things. Which was it going to be? Fantasy? Or reality? Could they really be one and the same?

“So, since you’re not an international supermodel after all, what is it you do, Lucy?”

He was teasing, but she
so
wished she could say something more interesting right now than “third-grade teacher.”
I empower the youth of tomorrow,
however, was too pompous, even for Lucy 2.0.

Reality it was. “I’m a schoolteacher,” she said, then offered a wistful smile. “Third grade.” No need to be ashamed of what she did or how much it didn’t pay. And she wasn’t. It just sounded so . . . repressed. And goody-goody. She didn’t want to be a goody-goody. Not with Jason.

“Wow, really? Well, I wish I’d had an elementary-school teacher who looked like you. I might have actually paid attention in class.”

She flushed at the compliment, feeling decidedly less goody than she had a moment ago. “I’m sure you were an ace student. The teachers probably adored you.” She caught herself. Too gushy?

His face warmed a bit, or maybe it was the lighting. But it worked for him, either way. “I guess I did okay.”

Their wine arrived and after Jason went through the taste-testing routine, which he carried off with the same casual aplomb he did with everything, he handed her a glass. She took a sip, resisting the urge to down the entire contents in one gulp. She’d revealed the truth about herself, and the date hadn’t come to a screeching halt. In fact, if she was any judge, he still seemed interested.

“More than okay,” she said, confidence momentarily bolstered.

He grinned at that. “You know, I’ve been thinking about you these past two weeks. You wreaked havoc on my focus while I was writing my closing arguments. I was tempted to call you, just to get you, that dance, the kiss, out of my head. At least for the moment.”

Okay, the wine must have been laced with a hallucinogen. Was Jason Prescott really saying these things to her?

“Or at least put it in some kind of perspective.”

She almost choked on her sip of wine. Perspective. Now there was something she’d apparently long since lost a grip on where he was concerned.

“But you didn’t tell me your last name.” He reached over then, traced one of those long fingers along her wrist and over the back of her hand. And suddenly she was very, very glad she’d kept the condoms. “I felt sort of like the prince after the ball, with only your first name as my glass slipper.”

She put the wine down.
No more wine.
It sloshed a little in the glass as she fought to clear her throat.

For just a split second, years of wallflower paranoia swam to the surface and she wondered if this was all another setup designed to humiliate her. That at some point everyone from his old crowd was going to magically appear and they’d all point their fingers at her and have a good laugh. But no, even she wasn’t
that
paranoid.

“It’s Harper.” She bit the corner of her bottom lip, heedless of the carefully applied lip liner she was probably chewing off.

Jason’s perfect smile and gorgeous face squinched up a little as he tried to recollect the girl she’d been.

Lucy thought he even looked sexy when he squinched.

“Did we have any classes together?” he asked.

Fifteen in four years.
“A few.”
Not to mention the student council and the yearbook staff.
She waved her hand lightly. “I wasn’t one of the popular gang back then.”
Or ever.
“And, like I said at the reunion, I’ve changed a little.”
Completely. Except on the inside.

Jason’s expression smoothed as he smiled again. “It was a big school, so I guess none of us knew everyone.”

“Some of us fewer than others,” she mumbled.

“What?”

“Nothing.” She was saved by the foie gras. Which, as it turned out, was not going to make her top-ten list of things to order on first dates. Or any dates, ever again.

Lucy forced herself to swallow another bite of pasty duck liver without choking. “So,” she said, gagging just a little as the gelatinous glob went down. She recovered by dabbing her mouth with her napkin. Once the duck had slid home, she worked up a smile.

“Very nicely done,” Jason was saying as he savored the taste. “I’ll have to recommend this place to my partners.”