Ugly Ducklings Finish First (4 page)

“Of course.” Shooing her money away, he put a ten-spot on the table and searched for ways to stall her. “What’s your presentation subject again?”

“The need for readily available pediatric emergency equipment. When a medical emergency occurs where an ambulance or ER is called for, some facilities are equipped with only adult-sized apparatus, even in this day and age. When those large-sized devices are used on tiny bodies, more harm than good can come of it, and that’s...” She stopped and laughed, missing how his eyes narrowed at the husky, intimate sound. “I’d better stop before I bore you into a coma. Though it’s very important to me, even I know some of the technical rhetoric is on the dry side.”

He stiffened. “I have no doubt your lecture is in another language, it’s so technically superior. Certainly nothing the rest of us mere mortals could possibly understand.”

“I’d hardly say that.” She shot him a bewildered look. “I just assumed it would be yawn-worthy to nonmedical people.”

“You assumed wrong.”

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time,” she returned a little heatedly. And only then did he realize that she was watching him as if he were an animal that may or may not have rabies. “I just don’t see why anyone would be interested—”

“I am,” Wiley said, and though he had a suspicion he was overreacting, he didn’t care. One way or another, he was going to prove to former child prodigy Payton Pruitt that she was one smart cookie who didn’t make him crumble.

* * *

Payton’s hotel room was quiet when she entered, save for the gentle hum of the air-conditioning. Tossing her purse and hotel card key on a credenza, she toed out of her high heels, sank onto the edge of the bed and closed her eyes.

What a night.

She pulled in a measured breath and let it out just as slowly. It didn’t help. She couldn’t pull in the peace of the room any more than she could sprout wings and fly. The funny thing was, she’d been prepared for a certain amount of upset. She had run into the first stirrings of the emotional upheaval by deciding to attend the reunion in the first place. But she’d thought that for her pride’s sake, it would be worth the risk.

Then Wiley showed up and blew that theory to smithereens.

Wiley Sharpe.

Heaven help her, what a scrumptious man he’d become. Gorgeous. Confident. Sensually charismatic. There wasn’t a woman alive who wouldn’t suffer brain-melting hot flashes when confronted with Wiley’s masculinity. From nine to ninety, females fell for him in droves. And, damn the man, he knew it.

What she hadn’t known was that she—practical, intellectual Payton—could be just as susceptible as the rest of the drooling horde.

She flopped back onto the firm hotel mattress, arms outstretched. It was criminal how easily he got past her defenses with his stunning smiles and careless charm. She could accept that a decade ago, his friendly but impersonal touch could send her awakening nervous system into spastic overload. But not now. She wasn’t supposed to lose it at the merest touch, but she lost it in a big way when Wiley inadvertently brushed her lip with his finger. Erotic heat had surged through her, loosening taut muscles and fogging her mind. That one caress had left her yearning to take his finger into her mouth and suck on it with wanton abandon. And that near loss of control had been terrifying.

No, terrifying was too strong a word, Payton decided, struggling to put the evening into perspective. Sure, she’d reacted to Wiley like every other female on the planet, but so what? Her reactions were probably just unresolved issues from her formative years. After all, he had been the only person who’d spoken to her in high school. It was logical to conclude she’d feel a certain closeness because of that.

Logical?
Really?

Great. Now she sounded like a native of Vulcan.

But as a theory it didn’t sound too shabby. If she put her mind to it, she could even talk herself into believing it.

What she couldn’t believe was how she’d unloaded all her childhood traumas on him when he had been the one person who had made life in Bitterthorn bearable. He must think she was a total head case, Payton thought with a groan. She had to be, to compulsively reveal just how much the past still hurt.

Or at least...it
had
hurt.

It was strange, but after venting all the old grievances she’d lugged around like the world’s biggest carry-on, she felt...calmer. At peace. Maybe she was finally ready to stop whining about the past, leave it behind where it belonged, and concentrate on the present.

A present that didn’t include Wiley Sharpe.

With a strange ache burrowing into her sternum, she dragged herself off the bed and headed for the bathroom.

Chapter Four

All in all, Wiley was seriously done with gatherings where name tags were a necessity. Though admittedly, this all-business crowd was nothing like the easygoing partygoers from the night before. With the hotel’s ballroom door swinging silently shut behind him, he leaned against a pillar at the back of the room and hoped no one would notice his lack of a name tag, though he doubted security would be that vigilant. He’d be willing to bet there weren’t too many people who were eager to crash a medical seminar. Hell, he never thought he’d be a likely candidate for such a thing.

Yet here he was.

A fleet of laptops and tablets were open and standing at attention everywhere he looked. Seminar files and pamphlets were spread out like playing cards on linen-covered banquet tables. Digital recorders were lined up in front of their owners like toy soldiers, all turned in the direction of the podium.

Recording Payton’s words.

A quick glance at his watch told him how much time he had left before he had to be in class several blocks away. For a moment he wondered if his stalker was busy going Picasso on his house again, scrawling
Rabid Coyotes Must Die
like the last time. Or maybe something new would be tried out, like the latest name that had come with the harassing emails—
manwhore
.

Or maybe...there would be nothing at all.

It wouldn’t surprise him if the harassment eventually wore itself out and vanished without the culprit ever being revealed. That was a pretty crappy scenario as far as he was concerned, even if the aggravation did come to an end. He didn’t relish the possibility of looking over his shoulder for the rest of his life, but now that the reunion was history it wasn’t a stretch to think his stalker was history as well. Since the Coyote nickname had been at its height during his high school years and the harassment had started when the reunion invitations went out, he’d figured his best bet in sniffing out a suspect would have been last night. The reunion had turned out to be a royal bust, at least on that score. But on a much more personal level, he wasn’t sorry he went.

If only for the moment, Payton was back in his life.

She was the complete package, no doubt about it. Every man and even the women seemed to hang on each word spoken from that wide, lush mouth. And while he pondered the alluring shape of her lips, he wondered if it was her presentation or the passion vibrating in her tone that held the audience so captivated.

Maybe his memory was on the fritz, but he was sure Payton didn’t used to have a voice that reminded him of melted wax and night-blooming flowers. Standing there so coolly untouchable while speaking in intimate tones promising all sorts of earthly sins, she was every man’s fantasy. Hell, he’d bet real money the men in the room were dealing with some uncomfortable action below the belt with that voice of hers making love to every last one of their nerve endings. And those dark, mysterious eyes and that kiss-me-now mouth probably had them dreaming of unbuttoning her severe suit jacket to discover what lay beneath it.

The wayward thought hit a jarring note somewhere deep inside, and his face tightened with a scowl. The idea of what other men were thinking made him want to punch something. They didn’t know Payton like he did, so those bastards didn’t have the right to wonder if she was wearing a camisole that was more lace than fabric. Or if she preferred something soft and silky and as wildly feminine as the veiling business suit was severely tailored. A lacy brassiere, perhaps. Or maybe she wore nothing at all.

Wiley shifted again. Damn. Now he was the one dealing with some uncomfortable below-the-belt action.

To keep his mind off the tightening ache in his groin, he tried to concentrate on what she was saying. The lawyer in him found particular interest in the story she recounted of a small boy who had been injured by a well-meaning EMT, who had used adult-sized forceps in an attempt to remove food from the child’s windpipe. The man in him found particular interest in the way she moistened her lips with a quick sweep of her pink tongue.

It wasn’t until the end of the question-and-answer period that she saw him. Wiley knew the exact moment it happened. Her gaze glanced off his, but it was powerful enough to stop the rhythmic operation of his lungs dead in its tracks. Her shoulders stiffened, as if she’d just been stuck with something sharp, and her flow of words stumbled to a pause.

In the momentary silence, with the wave of nuclear-level heat that was his awareness of Payton being aware of him, Wiley swore he could hear his own heartbeat.

He wasn’t sure whether he was amused or irritated when she wrapped up her lecture and moved away from the podium without looking in his direction again. But he was definite about not being amused when a man emerged from a pack of admirers to take her hand, while his interested eyes embraced much more than that.

Wiley’s jaw hardened. A predator always recognized his own kind.

“This is one of my main priorities as well, and I’m glad the problem is being recognized,” the man was saying as Wiley pushed through the throng. “If you’re free this evening, Dr. Pruitt, I would love to have the chance to delve into this subject further.”

“Ah. Dr. Falkener. Actually...” As if she could feel his determined approach, her dark eyes slanted his way and lingered in a way that he decided silently pleaded for help.

When a damsel was in distress, what else was a knight in shining armor supposed to do?

“I’m afraid Dr. Pruitt already has arrangements for this evening.” Wiley plucked her hand from the bold interloper’s and whisked Payton away.

* * *

Payton’s stunned silence lasted only a handful of seconds. “Wiley... Wait, what the hell are you doing here?”

“Saving you.” His smile was all dimples and charm. She could have choked him. “You’re welcome, by the way. I was happy to do it.”

No, choking would be too good for him. He needed something far more painful. “You shouldn’t be here. I didn’t come to San Antonio for a vacation, I’m here to work.”

“I respect that. For what it’s worth, I didn’t interrupt or in any way disturb you. Or did I?”

“Did you what?”

“Disturb you.” His voice had dropped to hover somewhere just beyond an intimate whisper, and the way his thumb brushed over her knuckles could, in an alternate universe, be labeled a caress. “Did my being in the same room with you, watching you, disturb you, Payton?”

“I barely noticed you were there.” And she was going straight to hell for telling such a bald-faced lie. The moment she’d caught sight of Wiley at the back of the room, it was as though a bolt of lightning traveled from him into the very core of her. She was still jangling from the effects of it, damn it all. She tingled in all the right places just from the weight of his gaze, and it irked her to no end. Wiley Sharpe wasn’t supposed to have this effect on her grown-up self. He wasn’t supposed to make her want to smooth her hair and smile at him in flirtatious encouragement. And he certainly wasn’t supposed to be there, simply
be
there, and captivate her attention.

Yet that’s exactly what he did.

When they emerged from the hotel’s ballroom and into a wide carpeted hallway, he fell into step with her, his hand still holding hers. “You’ve gone quiet. I always get nervous when you get quiet.”

That surprised her. “What? Why?”

“When you’re quiet, it means you’re thinking.”

“My thinking makes you nervous?”

“Oh hell, yes.” His fingers tightened on a squeeze. “I liked your lecture.”

“I still can’t figure out why you came. This kind of boring, academic scene isn’t exactly your cup of tea, you know. I would have thought you’d be bored silly just at the thought of being here.”

Like a switch being thrown, the humor vanished from his expression. “Despite my rather dim academic past, I am capable of following a presentation that’s above a fourth-grade reading level.”

“That wasn’t what I meant.” Though part of her yearned to do nothing more than to put distance between them, the last thing she had meant to do was hurt him. Coming to a halt in the middle of the hotel lobby, she rested a staying hand on his chest. “Let’s get this out of the way once and for all, okay? You’ve always been smarter than everyone thought, including yourself.”

“And you were always a pain in the ass when you pushed me to achieve.” The darkness in his green eyes evaporated, and his hand came up to cover hers. “You may have been a kid back then, Payton, but you would have done any drill sergeant proud.”

“I took my responsibility toward you seriously.”

“You took everything seriously.”

“I wasn’t that bad.” Hurt by the offhand comment, Payton didn’t notice he kept her hand in his as they resumed their trek into the main lobby. “I’m not serious all the time, you know.”

“Of course not.”

“I do know how to have fun.”

“Hmm.”

“I
do
.”

“Sure you do.”

“Damn it, I’m serious!”

Wiley chuckled with such good humor it was hard to keep from smiling in response. “Ah, Payton. I never realized how much I’ve missed you.”

“Like a toothache, I’m sure.”

“No. Like a best friend I didn’t know I had.” With another laugh he raised her hand to his lips. Payton’s knees threatened to vanish out from under her. “Have dinner with me tonight.”

“Um.” It was impossible to pull a coherent thought together when her skin throbbed with the lingering brush of his lips. Wiley Sharpe, the Coyote and every young girl’s fantasy, was flirting with her.
Her
. Payton Pruitt, Baby Brain and Queen Geek.

For the span of a heartbeat she teetered on the edge of throwing caution to the wind, but reality had too great a hold on her. And the reality was Wiley was a player. For him, it didn’t mean anything. But it wasn’t like that for her. As long as she remembered that, she would be safe.

She hoped.

“Payton?”

She struggled in vain to remove her hand from his. “This is ridiculous.”

“Dinner’s ridiculous?” It was his turn to come to a stop as he caught her other hand in his. “How so?”

“I have a dinner meeting already scheduled.”

“With who?”

The surprisingly hard tone in his voice killed her smart remark. Why would Wiley care? “With several other pediatricians.”

“Can’t you cancel it?”

“At the risk of repeating myself, I’m here to work, not goof off. Wiley, people are staring.” She shot him a bewildered glance and wriggled her fingers. “We can’t just stand here holding hands.”

“Lunch, then.”

“It’s barely ten in the morning.”

“I have a class to teach at UTSA until noon.” His gaze held hers captive while his thumbs glided over her knuckles in an easy, almost hypnotic rhythm. “I’ll meet you here at twelve-thirty.”

“Wiley—”

“Say yes, Payton. Please.”

Please. She could have withstood him if he hadn’t said please, she was sure of it. But his seemingly genuine desire to spend time with her, coupled with the power of his touch, sucked the wind right out of her sails. “I’ll meet you here in the lobby,” she sighed in defeat, then felt like she’d won when he beamed.

* * *

Ensconced in a lobby chair, Wiley struggled against the desire to check his watch yet again, before he sighed and flicked his wrist over.

Twenty-six minutes after noon.

Payton should be there already, he decided, drumming his fingers on the armrest. She was always early; it was a habit that used to drive him crazy. Everything about her used to drive him crazy.

Apparently some things never changed.

He frowned at the Xavier property foreclosure file in front of him, but the words swam before his eyes. It might as well have been written in ancient Aramaic.

She was going to stand him up.

He wouldn’t blame her if she did, he thought on a short sigh. What an idiot she must think he was, to have gone off the deep end over an innocent remark about her presentation. What he had to do was get a frigging handle on himself. He may have accused her of being too serious but he was just as guilty, at least when it came to Payton. Everything she did or said or thought somehow became all-important to him, as though his entire world hinged on her opinion of the man he had become.

Which was absurd.

With a huff of self-disgust, Wiley closed the file and shoved it into a briefcase. He couldn’t remember when a woman had ever made him feel like he was on a bed of hot coals, jumping from one foot to the next. This wasn’t a life-and-death situation, for crying out loud. It was just a couple of old high school chums getting together, nothing bigger than that. It was such an inconsequential event he could even talk himself into believing he’d be doing them both a favor if he just walked away and never saw her again.

Muscles locked, Wiley sat unmoving. Barely breathing.

The sound of brisk, no-nonsense footsteps reached his ears, and he knew with unnerving certainty it was Payton. To test himself, he refused to look up until she had almost reached him, denying himself the pleasure of simply watching her move. When the self-denial became too agonizing to bear, he brought his gaze up to lock with hers and was almost sorry he did. There was something about falling into those dark depths that made him wonder if he could ever find his way back out

Or if he even wanted to.

“You look like you’ve been waiting awhile.” Payton rounded a love seat, and the natural seductive sway of her lean hips made his mouth go dry. “I’m not late, am I?”

“Late?” Stalling for time to get his mind off how her skirt swirled around her long legs, Wiley rose while taking another peek at his watch. “You’re right on time, but for you, that’s late. I was beginning to think I’d been stood up.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” She slanted him a dubious look as he guided her toward the hotel’s glass doors and the famed River Walk beyond. “I’ll bet you’ve never been stood up in your life.”

“I’m shocked. Your memory isn’t nearly as good as I thought it was.”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t tell me you don’t remember.” She had ditched the tailored business suit jacket somewhere along the way, revealing a gold-colored sleeveless top, and her skin was like crushed silk beneath his hand. As they navigated the tourist-choked path along the river, his mind tormented him with speculating on whether the rest of her was just as soft. “There was that one time you stood me up during our senior year in high school.”