Hung Up on You
Holly Jacobs
Somewhere in between managing the family business and dealing with out-of-control relatives, Ari Kelly had done something for herself–finished her thesis on stress and phone-answering systems.And now that was causing her more stress than anything else! Because her brilliant thesis had been picked up by the newspapers (yeah!) and had had the facts twisted (uh-oh). Now her phone was ringing off the hook–and a gorgeous hunk was pounding down her door, determined to make her retract her statements about his new answering service.Yep, Ari knew stress. Because just when she'd least expected it, at the very worst possible moment, the guy she'd been waiting for her whole life finally showed up….
Dear Reader,
Readers frequently ask where I get my ideas for stories. This one started exactly where the book starts…with me lost in the clutches of a phone maze. I’d punched buttons until my fingers were mere nubs and my head was throbbing from way too much Muzak. I mean, how many times can you listen to an instrumental version of “Like a Virgin”? Try as I might, I couldn’t navigate my way to a real live human being who might help me. I sat there feeling my blood pressure spike and suddenly I thought…hey, this could be a story. After that the wait wasn’t nearly as bad because I was busy scribbling the opening to what would become Hung Up on You! No one ever said life was easy…but as Ari and Simon discover, sometimes love can be! And this particular love story was ever so easy to tell, because I totally fell for Ari and Simon’s plight.
I hope you enjoy their adventures with phones, family and a friendship that turns into something more. And I hope you enjoy Harlequin Flipside…the name may be new, but there’s still laughter and lots of love at the heart of every story.
Best wishes!
“We’ll be using each other for our mutual pleasure,” Simon explained
He continued, “We’ll set a time limit right now, then no one will be confused or angry.”
“I’ll think about it,” Ari promised. She turned and left the office, Simon’s proposal playing over and over in her mind.
If they did set a time limit, an expiration date of sorts on their “relationship,” then maybe no one would get hurt.
It meant she’d be able to have him guilt free.
It meant she’d do all the things she’d been fantasizing about.
It was an enticing offer.
She was tempted.
But then, so was Eve in the Garden…
And just look how that had turned out….
Hung Up on You
Holly Jacobs
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
When Erie, Pennsylvania, writer Holly Jacobs heard about a new romantic comedy series called Flipside she knew she’d found her future home. After all, her life had always seemed a bit…well, flipped! That’s what a large family and an even larger (200-pound) slimy dog will do to a woman—flip things around and inspire all sorts of laughs.
Having penned several popular Harlequin Duets novels, Holly had become a key author for that series. Now, with Harlequin Flipside, she’s hoping to repeat her success.
Holly also enjoys writing for Silhouette Romance. You can visit the author online at www.HollysBooks.com (http://www.HollysBooks.com), or snailmail her at P.O. Box 11102, Erie, PA, 16514-1102.
Books by Holly Jacobs
HARLEQUIN DUETS
43—I WAXED MY LEGS FOR THIS?
67—READY, WILLING AND…ABEL?
RAISING CAIN
84—HOW TO CATCH A GROOM
92—NOT PRECISELY PREGNANT
100—THE 100-YEAR ITCH
108—HOW TO HUNT A HUSBAND
SILHOUETTE ROMANCE
1557—DO YOU HEAR WHAT I HEAR?
1653—A DAY LATE AND A BRIDE SHORT
1683—DAD TODAY, GROOM TOMORROW
Thanks to Kathryn for being in my corner and for simply being the best; to Jess, Kate and Mandy for a taste of Philly; to Trooper Rob Erdely, who knows computers as well as plastic; and to Eda who’s lived through a dreaded thesis and was willing to share the experience. And a very special thanks to Pam and Susan for always listening.
I don’t know where I’d be without you all!
Finally to DJ, “W.D.W.”
Contents
Prologue (#udb0ee428-6359-51c6-ad3f-7b5a04ded80e)
Chapter 1 (#u20e8b971-da42-52aa-b963-d18eaf34b014)
Chapter 2 (#u42fc34b8-7c50-52f7-acbf-b4bb29798294)
Chapter 3 (#uc7a87eae-780e-5f57-b1cd-924580d43e1b)
Chapter 4 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Prologue
“YOUR CALL is very important to us….”
Adrienne Kelly felt a spurt of annoyance. She didn’t feel as if her call was important to anyone but herself.
“Please stay on the line….”
Her pencil tapped an angry beat against the desktop.
“We’ll be right with you.”
She’d been trying to talk to a real-live-breathing-human-being-type for what seemed like forever and all she’d gotten was bad Muzak and that annoying mechanical voice that kept repeating, “Your call is very important to us. Please stay on the line. We’ll be right with you.”
Right must be a subjective word, but in Ari’s vocabulary ten minutes of bad Muzak wasn’t quite right…it was torture.
The pencil slipped and flew across the room.
She sighed. The phone maze wasn’t just torture; it was cruel and unusual punishment.
She was throwing pencils, her head ached and she was sure her blood pressure was probably through the roof all because of the computer-induced runaround.
“Your call is important to us….” the machine began again.
Suddenly, it was as if a lightbulb went off over her head. A bolt of inspiration struck.
Ari actually smiled, despite the fact that the machine was now playing a horrible instrumental version of “Like A Virgin.”
The machine had it all wrong. This call wasn’t important to the company, but it was very important to Ari’s future.
Very, very important.
1
“SO, I GUESS we should just do it,” Collin Walters said without a hint of enthusiasm.
“Pardon?” Adrienne Kelly asked her long-time fiancé.
Collin looked rather pale today. And pale for Collin’s blond-haired, fair-skinned complexion was just about as white as a sheet.
The only plus to this particular shade of ghost-white was that it made his eyes look very blue, rather than their normal washed-out sort of grayish-blue.
Maybe Ari was just being exceptionally dense today, but she didn’t have a clue what Collin was talking about.
They were sitting on a bench in a quiet corner of Penn’s Campus. It would have been more convenient to sit right outside Penn Hospital, but the view would have consisted of Philadelphia traffic. The green space in the center of the campus was much prettier to look at and worth the short walk.
They often shared lunches here, but Collin had never just blurted out doing it statements before.
Now, if it were any other man, she might think he was talking about sex.
Hey, babe, let’s just do it.
She felt a bit hot and tingly at the thought.
Not that Ari was the type of person who would want to do it in a public place. But it might be nice to have someone want her bad enough to want to do it in a public place.
But Collin would never suggest doing it on a park bench. As a matter of fact, he wasn’t overly prone to doing it at all.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t. But his sex drive rode a few notches below her own.
Not that she was a nympho.
But Ari liked sex.
Hot, wild, abandoned sex. Fast and hard. Slow and soft. She just liked it.
Collin blamed his less than lustful sex drive on his stress-filled career as a surgeon. Ari sometimes worried that maybe it was something more. Maybe they just didn’t click.
No, of course she clicked with Collin. They were perfect for each other. He just worked too hard.
Collin interrupted her wild musing and repeated, “A date.”
She must have still looked puzzled, because he said, with exasperation tingeing his voice, “Don’t play coy with me, Adrienne.”
Coy?
That was the description of someone who promised sex, but didn’t follow through.
Coy didn’t describe Ari at all. She’d follow through in a New York minute…a Philadelphia minute, to be more exact. She’d gotten herself quite worked up thinking about hot sex in a public place.
Of course, unless Collin had become psychic or suddenly much more perceptive than he normally was, he didn’t know that she’d been thinking about doing it right here, right now, so what was he talking about?
“Coy?” she repeated, knowing she sounded as confused as she felt.
“You’ve been nagging about setting a wedding date since the day we got engaged.”
Ah, wedding dates.
No nooky on a park bench.
A wedding date.
That’s what this was all about. Just then his statement fully hit her.
“Nagging?” She was sure that even Collin couldn’t miss what was her annoyance this time.
He raked his fingers through his blond-to-the-point-of-being-white hair. With a normal, mortal being, this would result in someone’s hairstyle un-styling.
But not Collin’s.
He was the kind of man whose perfection couldn’t be messed with.
Ari assured herself that she liked that quality about him. It’s just that sometimes—like at this particular moment—she forgot she liked it.
“Adrienne, why are you being difficult? This is what you wanted. We’re going to choose a date and move ahead with our plans.”
“Why now?”
“It’s a perfect time.”
Perfect.
Perfect like everything else about Collin.
He came from the perfect, nondysfunctional, upper-class family.
He’d been a perfect trouble-free teen, gone to his father’s ivy league alma mater and followed in his father’s footsteps and become a surgeon.
He’d even joined his father’s practice. He was the perfect son, his parents reminded her…frequently.
She’d noted they’d never referred to her as the perfect potential daughter-in-law.
She realized that Collin was reciting all the reasons that now was the time to set a wedding date. “…you’ve not only finished your thesis, but you’ve had it published. You’ll be starting a great new job. And my career is quite solid now. We’ll plan a small Friday night ceremony and a weekend getaway, so we won’t interfere with your work schedule.”
“I’m sure they’d give me time off for a honeymoon.”
A tropical beach honeymoon.
Just her and Collin. With no outside demands. Totally alone and stress-free.
Lolling around in the sun. Having sex.
Going out to eat. Having sex.
Sleeping late. Having sex.
What was up with her today? She had sex on the brain. Maybe because she hadn’t had sex on anything else for quite a while.
A very long while.
Just when was the last time she and Collin had done it? She couldn’t remember.
“A nice, long, stress-free honeymoon,” she added with what she hoped was a suggestive lilt to her voice.
Maybe if she could get him away from the hospital long enough, Collin would rediscover his sex drive.
Maybe rather than neutral, it would kick into overdrive.
They’d really click then.
She bet they had park benches on tropical beaches. She felt a bit more overheated at the thought.
He shook his head. “Taking time off for a long honeymoon wouldn’t be responsible. You’ve just taken the position at the institute. You don’t have any vacation time built up. You can’t just take days off whenever it suits you.”
Ari sighed.
Collin had a point.
Collin always had a point. And his point was perfectly correct, but no surprise there, either, because Collin was always correct.
Sometimes living with perfection was…taxing.
“So when were you thinking about setting the date?” she asked.
She thought, but didn’t add, because you’ve obviously already worked this all out already.
She should appreciate his thoughtfulness, his attention to detail, she chided herself.
“How about three months from now? Since we’re not planning anything big and elaborate, that should allow a sufficient amount of time to pull it all together.”
“But I want big and elaborate. A huge wedding and reception with all our friends and family there. Music. The bouquet and the garter. Dancing. You and me—”
“Ari, we’ve talked about this. It doesn’t make sense. I’m an only child of two only children. You’ve got one unmarried brother. And your extended family consists of your grandmother. We don’t have big families.”
“Friends. We’ve got lots of friends.”
“Colleagues. We both have many colleagues.”
Collin had colleagues. As a matter of fact, Ari couldn’t think of one person that she would really call his friend. Maybe that’s why he wanted to keep the wedding small, to keep from thinking about his friendless state.
Poor, proud baby.
He’d been so busy with school and then starting a demanding career, that he hadn’t had time to build deep meaningful relationships…except with her.
She reached out and patted his hand affectionately. “Yes, a small wedding would be best.”
He smiled, obviously relieved.
“A small wedding in three months,” she murmured. “Bethany should be back from her trip by then. It wouldn’t do to have my maid of honor overseas.”
Bethany was adventurous. She was always doing something wild and crazy. This time she was backpacking through Asia and from all reports having the time of her life. She’d be back by August for the wedding.
August?
Ari sighed. August in Philadelphia got hot. Very hot and humid. Not exactly the perfect wedding weather.
Ari had always dreamed of a traditional June wedding. Early June, so the weather was warm, but not oppressive. Her family and friends celebrating with her. A huge party.
Rather than voice her doubts about the wisdom of a wedding in August, she simply said, “That’s fine.”
“I knew you’d agree. I’ll leave you to the details. I’m sure Mother will help.”
“I’m sure she will.” Ari knew there was more than a hint of sarcasm in her voice, but Collin didn’t seem to notice.
Just like his mother would fail to notice anything she said. Anything she wanted.
Collin’s mother wouldn’t just help. She’d take over. She was the chair of so many organizations and groups that she practically ran anything remotely philanthropic in the city.
The woman didn’t know how to help…she knew how to steamroll.
“There,” he said with a smile, obviously having missed her sarcasm completely. “We’ve settled it. Our wedding will be in August.”
“We still haven’t narrowed down a day,” Ari said.
“It doesn’t matter. See what you can book on what day and we’ll just go with that.”
“Fine.”
He kissed her cheek. “Sorry, but I have to run. People counting on me and all that. I’ll call you tonight.”
“Maybe you could come over tonight?” she said, giving him her best come-hither look. “We could celebrate our upcoming wedding.”
Not just celebrate, have sex. Wild, hot, steamy—
“I’d love to Adrienne, you know that, but I have surgery early tomorrow and I need my sleep. We’ll do something special this Saturday when we go out if you like.”
Darn. The only thing hot and steamy she was going to get was a long bubble bath.
What would Collin do if she whispered her fantasies about having sex right here and now?
Probably quirk his perfect eyebrow and tell her why it was a less than perfect idea. Not that she didn’t know that, but just once she’d like more than his chivalry…she wanted his lust. His unbridled passion.
She wanted an orgasm.
Not just one.
Multiple orgasms.
“Adrienne?” he asked.
“Sorry,” she said, feeling a bit shaky after her wild thoughts. “That’s fine. I understand.”
“I knew you would. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Fine.”
He kissed her on the cheek and headed back toward the hospital.
Ari walked toward the subway station, heading toward home. She had two more weeks before she started at the Warnheimer Institute of Psychology. She wished she’d already started her new job. After two years of juggling work and grad school, she wasn’t quite sure what to do with this time off. The day stretched before her with no end in sight.
No sex in sight, either.
What was wrong with her today?
Everything was perfect. Her life was exactly the way she’d planned. The perfect job and the perfect fiancé who’d finally set a wedding date.
She had the perfect life.
So, why was she feeling so…less than perfect? It couldn’t just be that she wanted sex. But other than no park-bench sex, everything was great. So, why wasn’t she thrilled?
Suddenly she knew she couldn’t head home. She’d go stark raving mad locked in her small apartment.
She decided to head to her parents’.
Yes, that was just the thing.
If anything could drive all thoughts of sex out of her mind, it was her parents.
She could enlist her mother’s help planning the wedding. Her mother could definitely take Collin’s mother if it came to a showdown.
Ari pushed all thoughts of orgasms out of her mind. She wasn’t going to think about sex, or about the strange empty feeling she got whenever she thought about actually marrying Collin.
She was lucky to have a man so perfect for her.
Perfectly wonderful.
That pretty much summarized Adrienne Kelly’s life.
SIMON MASTERSON read the headline of Rag Magazine.
Reading its headline—or any other part of the tabloid magazine—wasn’t something he normally did. But this particular headline couldn’t be ignored.
If The Wait Doesn’t Kill You…The Answering System Will.
Celia Nixon, his assistant and the current bearer of bad news, waited nervously for a response.
She shifted from one foot to the other. Tall and blond, she always made Simon think of a Valkyrie from the ancient Norse myths. She protected his privacy and ran the office with a cool, efficient hand. He’d be lost without her.
But Celia was a worrier. She was good at it…probably because she had so much practice.
“I’m sure it will be okay,” he said, soothingly. “After all, the customers we’re marketing to are more prone to read the Financial Journal than Rag Magazine. This is nothing.”
“I don’t know, Simon.” There was uncertainty in her voice. “Rag Magazine is popular and has a huge circulation. Why, there’s probably not a grocery store in the entire country that doesn’t carry it. Even if our clients don’t buy it, they won’t be able to miss that headline. I just don’t think we can afford to ignore this.”
“I do. So don’t worry about it.”
“But—”
“Really. Why don’t you get going on the plans for the reception, okay? I’m anxious for Cindy’s debut. Three months sounds like a long time, but really it isn’t. Actually it’s a little less than three months now and there’s still a lot to do.”
Celia gave him one last doubtful look before she shrugged and left his office.
Simon glanced at the magazine she’d left on his desk and shook his head.
Of course this wouldn’t be a problem. No one put any stock in publications like Rag Magazine. Now, if the Financial Journal had run a headline like that, he might worry. But a classy publication like the Journal would never run such a hyped-up story.
Having settled that particular problem in his mind, he promptly forgot all about the headline and went back to work. He had a few kinks to iron out before Cindy’s debut.
“Come on, sweetheart,” he murmured. “Talk to Daddy.”
Simon lost himself in the computer system, forgetting about the article, forgetting everything except a world of digital commands.
Here everything made sense. A always led to B, X always led to Y.
Orderly.
Dependable.
There were no worries about the future of his company riding on this one program. Cindy. His baby. Cutting-edge technology made user and consumer friendly.
Simon forgot all about the article as he ran through a part of the program that still needed some ironing out.
He lost himself in the solitary world of computer commands.
Hours later, Celia walked into the room. “Simon, Rag Magazine called for an interview, some guy named Newman—”
He looked up from his computer screen, glanced at the clock and noted he’d totally lost track of time again. It happened a lot when he was working.
“Sorry, what?”
“Rag Magazine called for an interview. They said that since SimonSays is known as an innovator in the answer-system market, you might want to make a comment on the article. They want to run a follow-up.”
“I hope you told them no.”
He turned back to the computer, the crisis settled in his mind.
“Of course I told them no,” Celia said. “But you’ve got another call on line one. I think you might want to take this one.”
He looked up impatiently from his screen. He just wanted to get this section right. “Who is it?”
“The Financial Journal. They want to interview you for their upcoming article on everyday stress and the impact that it has on twenty-first-century health.”
“The Financial Journal?” he asked weakly.
“Yes.”
Damn.
This was trouble.
2
THIS WAS TROUBLE.
Minutes after walking into her parents’ house last night Ari had known visiting them had been a mistake…a big mistake.
Things had been tense there since her father’s heart attack had forced him into an early retirement, but last night she realized just how bad it had gotten.
Instead of feeling comforted by the visit, Ari felt torn. She sympathized with her father’s frustration. After years of running a company, he’d forgotten how not to control things.
She sympathized with her mother’s annoyance. Having her father underfoot all day, every day, would drive her nuts. Just a short visit left her feeling drained and more than a little anxious.
Her parents’ relationship had always seemed so solid. Suddenly it seemed shaky, precarious. Ari didn’t know what to do to help either of them.
She had headed home, anxious for some peace and quiet.
Instead she’d found more trouble.
Bigger trouble.
She didn’t doubt her parents would work things out. They loved each other too much not to adjust to their new circumstances.
But this?
Ari read the article over and over throughout the course of the long night, yet she still couldn’t believe the horrible headline and the article that followed.
Even worse, she couldn’t believe her name was there in black and white for the world to see. She felt sick to her stomach.
When she’d come home from her parents she’d found her answering machine jam-packed with messages. Rag Magazine, the Financial Journal, and some maniac named Simon Masterson were the three most persistent callers. Each had left multiple messages. There was a handful of other magazines and papers, all asking for interviews about her study.
Her thesis, “The Effects of Telephone Answering Systems on Psychological and Physical Well-Being” had not only been accepted and passed by the thesis committee in practically record time, it had been published in Psychology Forum. She’d been so proud, so thrilled to see it in print.
And now she wished she’d never made the phone call that led her to think of doing a study on answering systems.
She’d run out to the all-night grocery store after listening to her messages and bought a copy of the Rag. She’d been instantly mortified when she read the headline.
If The Wait Doesn’t Kill You…The Answering System Will.
It was a horrible headline, and the rest of the article had been just as bad, distorting the results of her study to the point of ridiculous.
Yes, she’d found that people’s stress levels rose when they were forced to work their way through answering systems that resembled phone mazes. Systems where it took more than five minutes to reach a human being.
The subjects’ blood pressure climbed, their heart rate and respiration increased, but none to the extent it threatened their lives.
She’d never claimed phone answering systems were deadly, just that they could induce stress and that was cause for concern. The twenty-first-century world was stress-filled. Look at what it did to Collin’s libido.
Ari thought if she could prompt change in some of the smaller stressors, such as phone mazes, it would leave people more capable of dealing with the bigger ones.
She’d hoped the study would prompt companies to look at their systems and find ways to improve them, making them more user friendly.
She’d never expected anything like the story Rag Magazine had run.
She had no idea how to handle something like this. They didn’t teach Public Relations Disaster Management in her psychology classes.
She’d sat up all night worrying, a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach and a raging headache.
She glanced at the clock. It was almost eight now. Her father would be up soon. She’d call him and see if he had any suggestions on what she should do for damage control.
After all, he’d run Kelly’s Plastics for years. He must have some experience with media. Nothing like this, of course, but he had to know more than she did. She wondered if her calling would upset him. He’d retired to avoid stress and—
The doorbell rang, interrupting her thoughts.
Not just one polite ring.
No, a continuous string of rings.
Who could be at her door at such an ungodly hour on a Saturday morning?
She didn’t need any more surprises. Last night was all she could handle. What she really needed was some peace and quiet to get things in order.
The ringing continued.
Not an exactly peaceful sound, and certainly not quiet.
Sighing, she went to the door. She left the chain in place, and opened it to find a large man standing on her stoop.
A large, rather annoyed-looking man.
“Yes?”
“Are you Adrienne Kelly?” he asked.
His voice was low and gravelly. The sort of voice that probably had women swooning at his feet his entire life.
Maybe she should do some research on auditory aphrodisiacs.
No, forget that. She shuddered to think what the tabloids could do with a subject matter like that.
She took a closer look at Mr. Sounds-Yummy.
He looked good, too.
Real good.
Okay, so maybe the frown lines on his rather annoyed-looking face took a bit away from his tall, dark looks, but it didn’t take away enough to dim his hot looks.
“Miss Kelly?” he said, even more annoyance tingeing his tone.
She sighed.
Yesterday, Collin didn’t ravish her on the park bench, and now this good-sounding and good-looking man was scowling at her.
She couldn’t seem to catch a break lately with men.
Thinking about her parents’ strained relationship and the tabloid’s perversion of her research, she realized it wasn’t just men she couldn’t catch a break with but rather life in general.
“Yes?” she said with a sigh.
“You’re the Adrienne Kelly from this article?” He held out a well-crinkled copy of the Rag.
Drat.
A reporter.
Yes, this was just what she needed to start her day off right.
“I’m sorry, I’m not doing any interviews.”
It was almost a sin that a man who sounded that good was a reporter—a man who made his living listening more than talking.
Wait, maybe he worked for a television station, although she didn’t see a camera.
“I’m not a reporter,” he said. “It’s not about an interview. I want to see copies of your findings. I want to see the figures you collected. You’ve single-handedly set out to ruin my company with this article and I want you to back it up.”
He waved the paper at her, as if he wanted to be sure she knew what he was talking about.
“Who are you?” she asked.
Annoyance faded and for a second he looked slightly chagrined. “Sorry. I’m Simon. Simon Masterson. I called you last night. I own SimonSays. We produce computerized telephone answering systems for businesses. We work hard to see to it that our products are the best there are. And you are trying to ruin us.”
“Oh.”
Okay, Ari realized it wasn’t the most brilliant reply, but at the moment she was feeling less than brilliant. As a matter of fact, she was feeling quite rumpled, anxious and sleep deprived.
This Simon Masterson owned a business that manufactured answering systems. No wonder he was annoyed.
“Mr. Masterson, I had nothing—absolutely nothing—to do with that article. I’m as upset as you are. Rag Magazine used my name, but totally bastardized my study.”
He shot her a look of disbelief.
“I didn’t even know about the article until last night. I had to go out and buy a copy. My findings were published in a reputable psychology magazine. Maybe that’s how the Rag stumbled on them.”
“Could we talk?” he asked, calmer now.
Ari knew that there was nothing she could do for him…nothing for them to talk about. And yet, he had the look of someone who could make a pest of himself. Maybe it was better to just get it over with.
“I don’t know what we have to talk about.”
“Please?” he asked.
It was the please that did it.
Since Ari had spent the night worrying rather than sleeping, she was still wearing yesterday’s jeans and blouse. She knew she looked decidedly wrinkled, but at least she was presentable enough to let him in.
Remembering caution, she asked, “Do you have a card with you?”
She didn’t doubt his story, but felt it was wise to be sure. Plus, as he dug through his pocket, she had a few moments to collect herself.
Rather than thinking of something to say, she noticed his hair. Dark-brown hair…so dark it bordered on black. It had a slight curl to it so that, even though she suspected he’d recently dressed and brushed it, it had a disheveled sort of look to it. It lent a boyish sort of charm to his looks.
This Simon Masterson was the sort of man that women fantasized about.
Not that she fantasized about other men. She had Collin for her fantasies.
The thought didn’t exactly cheer her.
“Here,” he said, handing a card through the gap in the door.
“And here’s my license.” He opened up his wallet and flashed her a license.
It was indeed him, with the name Simon Masterson on it. And it was a good picture.
Who on earth did he bribe to get the DMV to take a good picture for his license?
She always ended up looking like she was recovering from a weekend binge, or surgery—which was to say, she looked horrible on every license she’d ever been photographed for.
Shaking her head at the injustice of it all, she looked at the card.
SimonSays.
Unfortunately, he seemed to be legit, which meant she probably should let him in to talk about the stupid article. Not that there was really much she could say.
She closed the door in his face, unlatched the chain and opened it again. “Come in, Mr. Masterson.”
“Simon,” he corrected as he strode into the apartment, which suddenly seemed smaller with him in it. It was as if he filled up all the empty space, displacing it and the oxygen that normally filled it.
That had to be why she suddenly found herself short of breath. He was hogging all the air.
“Miss Kelly?” he said.
She realized she’d been standing there, just looking at him. She gave herself a mental shake and said, “You can call me Ari. I just made a pot of coffee. Would you like some?”
“Fine.”
She led him to the tiny kitchen and nodded at one of the stools next to the island. “Now, what did you think we had to talk about?”
She turned her back to him and busied herself at the counter, needing a moment to collect her rather frayed wits. She was obviously sleep deprived, or else this man wouldn’t be affecting her like this.
She wasn’t the type to be turned on by a man’s looks, or even his voice. This strange reaction to Simon Masterson had to be the product of her current state of stress.
Yes. Stress-induced lust.
That’s what it was.
“I came here to insist you print a retraction. But if you really didn’t know about the article, and if they really got your findings wrong, then I want you to insist they print a retraction,” he said.
She turned around.
Big mistake. He looked even more gorgeous up close.
Her breath deserted her with a whoosh, and she barely managed to squeak out, “Mr. Masterson—” when he interrupted her.
“Simon.”
“Simon,” she repeated.
She took a deep breath and started again. “Simon, like I said, I had nothing to do with the distortion and out-and-out fabrication in the article. I learned about it last night when I came home to a full answering machine. It’s not even close to accurate. They distorted my study until the only thing that’s really mine is my name, and I can’t tell you how much I wish they’d made that up as well.”
“That’s why you can demand a retraction.”
She took two mugs out of the cupboard, then turned around and shook her head. “I don’t think that will help. It will just give them more fuel for their flames. It’s what papers like that love.”
“I think you’re wrong. I think they’d be forced to print a retraction.”
“Simon, Rag Magazine doesn’t worry about who it offends, or how it bends the truth.” She poured coffee into the two mugs, handed one to him and took the stool opposite him as she continued, “It just worries about numbers, about how big a market share it can grab. Our best bet is to ignore it. After all, it’s not that big of a story. No space aliens, or two-headed women. It will go away.”
She shot Simon what she hoped was a reassuring smile.
“The Financial Journal is picking the story up, too, as part of some article on stress,” he said.
Her smile faded. So much for reassuring either Simon or herself. “I heard. The Journal said they wanted to run an article in their August issue. They left me messages and I plan on calling them back. I’d be happy to answer their questions. I’m pretty sure they’ll be much more factual with the article they run, which will be good for both of us.”
“But the Rag?” he pressed.
“Simon, tabloids aren’t interested in the truth. All they want is shock value. Anything I say will probably just be twisted to suit their purposes, just like my study was.”
She took a sip of the strong black brew, and realized Simon hadn’t. “Did you need cream or sugar?”
“No,” he said, and took a sip as if to prove it was fine. “So you won’t come with me to their office and demand a retraction?”
“I’m telling you, it won’t do any good.”
“Will you at least give me a written statement saying that their article was fraudulent?”
Ari sighed. “If that’s what you want, sure. But truly, I don’t think it will help.”
“It will. I’ll make it work.”
Ari doubted it, but didn’t say so.
Simon Masterson might be gorgeous, but he was stubborn, tenacious and confident to the point of foolishness.
Annoying qualities in a man.
Enough to almost make her forget that she’d had a lust attack when she first saw him.
Almost, but not quite.
She’d give him his statement, and with any luck that would be the last she would hear of Simon Masterson.
They went into the living room and he sipped his coffee as she downloaded her thesis from her laptop onto a disc.
She glanced at Simon and tried to concentrate on how annoying he was, but her heart did this weird little beat. Annoying but good-looking. Not that she cared. Maybe he wasn’t even all that hot.
Stress.
Stress just made him look better than he really looked.
Wouldn’t that be an interesting study?
How Stress Impacts a Woman’s Libido.
“Hey, are you going to write a letter or not?” he asked.
She sighed and opened a blank document, then wrote a quick letter to the Rag expressing her outrage over their article and demanding they print a retraction. She signed it with a flourish.
“Here,” she said, handing him the paper and the disc. “All my data—the real data, not the stuff they made up—is there, along with my conclusions. Maybe that will help.”
He was off the stool and headed toward the door without even a thank you.
That was rude.
Rude men weren’t attractive men.
He probably didn’t look nearly as hot now, she thought.
Ah, but she was now walking behind him, following him to the apartment door and the view was mighty fine.
And hot.
Darn it all.
She needed to sleep. Maybe she’d do some yoga. Anything to reduce her stress, and thus reduce her state of lust. Because, boy, did she have it bad right now.
“I still think you’re making a mistake,” she said, frowning.
He opened the door and turned to face her. “I don’t think—” he said, just as a bright light flashed.
They both whirled toward the hall and saw a small, dark-haired man with an oily smile and a camera.
“Alphie Newman,” he said, smiling even broader, which bared his uneven teeth. “I’m from Rag Magazine. I know you. You’re Simon Masterson from SimonSays. I got your messages on my machine this morning. I tried to call you, but didn’t get an answer. Imagine finding you here with Miss Kelly. Maybe I could get a statement from you before I interview Miss Kelly?”
“No interviews,” Ari said even as Simon said, “I was just going to head to your office to talk about the retraction you’re going to print. You’ve saved me a trip.”
Leaving the two men in the hall, Ari closed the door. She had a bad feeling about Simon’s plan.
A very bad feeling.
THE FOLLOWING WEEK, Ari’s persistent bad feeling had mushroomed into a horrendous feeling.
It seemed that anything that could go wrong in her life, was going wrong.
But this? This was out of the blue.
She hung up the phone feeling a bit more than shell-shocked.
The Warnheimer Institute’s director had called, saying there was a problem with the funding for her position. Her new job—her dream job—was temporarily on hold.
The director had been apologetic as she assured Ari that she’d try to clear it up as soon as possible.
Then the woman had added that while she was trying to clear up the funding problems, she hoped Ari would clear up her little media disaster.
Ari hung up the phone and cursed the tabloid.
She’d hoped her ten minutes of fame—or rather infamy—were over.
Now this.
Her dream job was on hold, possibly gone for good.
What was she going to do for money?
Maybe the hospital would hire her back? It was an option that didn’t thrill her. She didn’t want to go back to nursing. She wanted her research job at the institute. She’d worked hard to get her advanced degree. Two long years of working full-time and going to school.
And now what did she have to show for it?
Nothing.
As she pondered how she was going to pay next month’s rent, her doorbell rang. It was one polite little ring, so she knew it wasn’t that Simon Masterson coming back, which was good. She hoped she’d seen the last of him.
She opened the door and found Collin standing there, looking decidedly annoyed.
“Collin, what a surprise,” she said, letting him into the apartment as a wave of gratitude swept through her.
She so needed him to hold her and tell her everything was going to be all right, that the institute would realize how valuable she was despite the tabloid coverage and tell her that her job was waiting for her whenever she was ready to start.
He strode in and as soon as she’d shut the door, he thrust a paper at her.
Uh-oh.
Feeling more than slightly sick to her stomach, and knowing that things might be worse than she thought, she looked at the headline on this week’s Rag Magazine.
Attack of the Deadly Phone Maze, just under it was a picture with the caption, “Simon Says…Study Stupid.”
It was the picture the reporter had taken of Ari and Simon when they’d opened the door last week. It was apparent that there was more than just a little tension between them.
“I told him it wouldn’t work,” she muttered.
“Told who?” Collin asked.
“Simon Masterson. He came here demanding I do something, write a letter to Rag Magazine refuting their article. I told him it wouldn’t work.”
“And yet you wrote it anyway, they quoted you.”
She skimmed the article, and the sinking feeling in her stomach sank even further. “Misquoted is more like it. They took everything I said totally out of context.”
“Ari, this is ridiculous.” Collin paced the length of her small living room, then turned back toward her and said, “The first article was bad enough, but now this?”
He started pacing again.
“Collin, it’s not as if I asked for this kind of publicity. This isn’t what I wanted.”
She’d tried to avoid this very thing, but would Simon Masterson listen?
No.
Just like a man.
“You didn’t ask for it the first time,” he said, mid-pace, “but you certainly provoked this second article.”
“I didn’t provoke anything. Simon Masterson provoked it because he wouldn’t listen to me.”
And it was obvious that Collin wasn’t listening, either, as he paced back and forth.
“I didn’t provoke anything,” she said again. “It’s not as if I thought a letter to that Rag would work. It’s all Simon’s fault.”
“Either way, this is unacceptable.”
“I—”
Collin stopped right in front of her. He looked pastier than normal. And for a fleeting moment, Ari wondered what she’d ever seen in him. He was a very hard man to love.
She quickly squelched that disloyal thought.
Collin was perfect. He’d never find himself in such an absurd, embarrassing situation.
“Collin, I agree. The situation is unacceptable. I wish I’d never written that thesis. To make matters worse, the institute called, and—”
He interrupted her and said, “I think we need a break.”
“A break?” she repeated.
She wanted to break down and be comforted. She wanted a hug and a pat on the back.
She wanted Collin to reassure her, to tell her that everything was going to be all right. That’s what fiancés were supposed to do…comfort you when you were down.
Jeez, you’d think someone as perfect as Collin—someone who prided himself in always doing the right thing—would know that.
But instead of comfort, he wanted a break?
“Yes,” he said. “There’s no way that we can be married under these circumstances. You need time to clear this mess up, and I’m afraid that’s going to take all your time and attention.”
“What you mean is that by calling off the wedding you’ll be able to distance yourself from me. From this fiasco. What’s the problem, Collin? A fiancée who’s in the tabloids might be detrimental to your career?”
“As a matter of fact, yes.”
He said it so coolly.
So calmly.
So matter-of-factly.
There was no trace of chagrin. No embarrassment that he was so shallow. Just the statement that her misfortune reflected poorly on him, and could affect his career.
Ari hadn’t expected him to admit it. She stood, totally dumbfounded.
“Mother and Father are just as distressed as I am. We discussed your situation and decided taking a break, putting the wedding on hold, was best for all of us.”
For all of them.
He didn’t care what was best for her, his fiancée, the woman he was supposed to love.
When he’d first walked into her apartment she’d wanted nothing more than to pour out her woes to him, to have him hold her and tell her it would all be all right.
And now, she just wanted to kick him.
Summoning her pride, she said, “I believe you’re right. It’s over.”
She tugged her engagement ring from her finger.
The gaudy diamond surrounded by little diamond clusters that had been in Collin’s family for two generations. Ari had never liked it. It had always been rather formal and ornate for her tastes.
“Here.” She handed it to him.
“Ari, I didn’t say we had to call it off permanently. We’ll just put the wedding off until this incident is cleared up.”
“No. It’s over. Here’s your ring.” She opened his hand and dropped the ring in it. “You can go now.”
He looked a bit taken aback, as if he’d expected her to argue or even plead. Well, there was no way that was ever going to happen.
She walked to the door and held it open. “Goodbye, Collin.”
“This is only until you get your life in order,” he said as he planted a gentle kiss on her forehead before walking out the door.
“No, it’s not. This is goodbye. Permanent. Whatever we had is over.”
Ari shut the door in his face and simply stood there staring at it.
What had she done?
She’d dated Collin since right after college. She’d met him as a student nurse, her first day at the hospital. They’d been together ever since.
What was she supposed to do now?
No job.
No fiancé.
No reputation to speak of.
What was she going to do?
She didn’t get to wonder long before her thoughts were interrupted by the doorbell.
For a second she thought it might be Collin coming back to say he was wrong, that he couldn’t live without her, that she was more important than his career. But the bell didn’t just ring one polite little ring. No, it was that long, continuous sound that didn’t leave a doubt in her mind who was on the other side of the door. And it wasn’t Collin.
Simon.
Simon Masterson.
He’d probably read the article and was back to blame her. She swung open the door, ready to take him on and give him a piece of her mind…because it was obvious he didn’t have one of his own.
She’d told him his plan wouldn’t work.
“I told you—” she started, then realized it wasn’t Simon. “Bubbi?”
“Shh,” her grandmother said. “Hurry up and let me in before they catch me.”
3
ARI HELD THE DOOR open as Bubbi wheeled her walker into the living room.
“Close that door and lock it before they find me. I think I gave them the slip, but who knows? They’re cagey enough to figure out where I was going.”
“Who are they?” Ari asked as she closed and locked the door.
“The home. Shady Pines. They probably sent some of their goons to bring me back. After all, they want my money.”
“What money do they want?” Ari asked weakly.
Bubbi had broken her hip last fall and moved to Shady Pines, an assisted-living apartment complex in the heart of the city.
“Money? Why, the money I pay to live there. And they’re not getting any more. I’ve run away.”
“Bubbi, you can’t run away. If you don’t want to live there anymore, we can make other arrangements.”
This couldn’t be happening.
Truly, Ari just couldn’t deal with one more thing.
Not one more.
Tabloids, her parents fighting, lost jobs, lost fiancés, and now a runaway Bubbi?
No, it just wasn’t fair.
Just one short week ago she’d thought her world was perfect and now it was perfectly awful.
“Okay, you’re right,” her grandmother admitted. “I didn’t run away, I rolled away. My walker and I rolled right out the front door, hailed a cab and came here. I thought about going to your parents, but things have been weird there since Ralph retired. So I need to borrow your guest room until I can find someplace else to live.”
“Bubbi, you know you’re welcome to stay with me, but I thought you liked the retirement community.”
“I thought I did as well. At least until that man moved in. Now, I can’t stand it. Everywhere I go he follows me, he talks to me. Why, he even asked me to dance.”
So this wasn’t about problems at the home, but about a man.
“A man,” Ari said, the statement akin to a curse.
That made sense.
Men did tend to muck up things.
Look at Simon…and Collin. They were certainly making a mess of her life, so it figured that a man was responsible for her grandmother running away from the home.
Ari wasn’t quite sure she understood the tie between running away and dancing, but she certainly sympathized with the man part.
“Problems dear?” Bubbi asked, obviously picking up on Ari’s distress.
“I lost my job at the institute, and Collin broke up with me,” she admitted.
“I’m sorry about the job, but not about Collin. I never did like him. Just like I don’t like Hiram. Taunting me by asking me to dance.”
“You ran away because a man asked you to dance?”
“Look at this thing.” Bubbi gave her walker an annoyed little shove. “Do I look like dancing material? He’s just mocking me, that’s what he’s doing. And I won’t take it. I asked to be moved to some other area of the complex, but they say there are no more open rooms. So, I’ve left.”
“Bubbi, maybe he just likes you,” Ari said.
“Likes to tease me.”
“But—”
Bubbi didn’t let her finish her protest. She simply said, “Can I stay?”
“Of course.”
What else could she say?
Ari couldn’t kick her grandmother out onto the street. And she did have a spare room.
“Fine,” Bubbi said. “You can go to the home and pack a bag for me. Give them my two weeks’ notice.”
“But Bubbi—”
“Actually, don’t just pack a bag, pack it all. They’ll probably be searching through everything, trying to decide where I’ve gone. I don’t want strangers pawing through my things. While you do that, I’m going to go take a nap, then I’ll make you dinner.”
“I—”
Again Bubbi interrupted. “Don’t tell me no, young lady. I may not be as fast as I used to be, but I can still pull my own weight. I’m cooking. No lip from you. I’m in a mood.”
“I see that, and I wouldn’t dream of talking back.”
“Good.”
Without another word, Bubbi wheeled off down the hall to the guest room.
Ari knew better than to fight with her grandmother when she was like this.
Sensing she was defeated before she’d even really started, she grabbed her keys from the hook, ready to head to the retirement home to collect her grandmother’s things.
Despite her grandmother’s order, she wasn’t going to bring everything back. Just enough for a few nights. Hopefully they’d be able to make some arrangements for her.
Thinking about Bubbi’s problems was actually much easier than thinking about her own.
Ignoring the newest issue of the Rag that Collin had left behind, Ari headed to the door. She was thankful to have something to keep her busy, something to keep her mind off her problems like being unemployed, unengaged and a sudden tabloid darling.
She realized that things just couldn’t get any worse.
The only place left to go was up.
Feeling a bit better with that positive thought, she opened the door.
Simon Masterson stood there, finger poised at her doorbell.
Her momentary optimism didn’t just fade, it instantaneously evaporated.
Things could indeed get worse.
SIMON STOOD outside the door to Ari’s South Philadelphia apartment, not wanting to ring the doorbell. Not wanting to face her because when he did he was going to have to admit he had been wrong. He hated that.
Hated being wrong.
Hated admitting it even more.
And to be honest he wasn’t wrong often so he didn’t have much experience with it, or admitting it.
But boy, this time he’d been so wrong.
Horribly wrong.
Undeniably wrong.
But maybe he wouldn’t have to actually say the words I was wrong. He’d simply tell Ari that she was right, then ask for her help.
Yes, saying she was right would be so much easier than saying he was wrong.
Sometimes semantics could be everything.
He was about to press on the doorbell when the door flew open.
Ari scowled when she spotted him.
“You,” she said, making the word sound more like a curse than a simple pronoun.
“Me,” he agreed. “May I come in?”
“No. I’m on my way out.” She walked through the door, slammed it behind her and started down the front stairs without looking back to see if he was following her.
Simon sighed as he hurried after her. She’d practically hit the sidewalk running, flying past the brick row houses and apartments.
“Fine,” he said as he caught up. “Then, I’ll walk with you.”
“I’d rather you didn’t. We have nothing to say to each other. I wrote your retraction…fat lot of good it did you, or me for that matter.”
“It didn’t work. You were right.”
There. He’d said it.
He might have been wrong about the retraction, but he was right about saying Ari was right being easier than saying he was wrong.
It was fuzzy logic at best, but with the way things were going Simon would take what he could get.
Ari stopped dead in her tracks and looked him directly in the eye. “My being right makes you…?”
“Disappointed?” He suddenly knew there was no escaping it. She was going to make him say the words after all.
It was as if she’d read his mind and decided to torture him.
This might only be the second time he’d met her, but he knew that Ari Kelly was a difficult kind of woman. The kind who would enjoy sticking it to a guy who’d made one tiny, little innocent mistake.
She just shook her head, folded her arms and waited.
Giving in to the inevitable, Simon said, “Wrong. I was wrong. There. I said it. Are you happy?”
“Yes, you were wrong, and no I’m not happy. Not happy at all. You have no idea what your little mistake has done to me. Done to my life. You’ve turned it upside down. I don’t know if I’ll ever get it right side up.”
She turned her back on him and started walking down the block again.
“Just where are we going?” he asked, walking alongside her.
She had a brisk pace for someone so much tinier than he was. She couldn’t be more than five-four, which gave him seven inches on her.
Ari Kelly was tiny, but fast.
“To the Broad Street subway station. I have to go to Shady Pines to pick up some things for my grandmother.”
“My car’s just up here,” he said, pointing to the next block.
Parking in Ari’s neighborhood was horrendous. He’d been lucky to get this close to her building.
“I could drive you,” he offered.
She studied him, suspiciously. “Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why would you want to drive me?”
“Because I’m a helpful sort of guy?”
Again, she just stood there and waited, watching him.
Simon sighed. She’d defeated him not once, but twice, with just her look.
“Because I have a plan to save our behinds,” he said.
“My behind doesn’t need to be saved.” She whipped around and started down the street, her brisk pace even faster than before.
Simon watched the woman as she presented him with an entirely new view of herself.
Actually, her behind didn’t need anything. It sashayed back and forth in a tantalizing sort of way as she strode angrily down the street.
Wow.
The first time he’d met her Simon had been so focused on the article and what it could mean to his company, that he’d totally ignored the fact that Ari Kelly was gorgeous.
Even today, he’d been so worried about admitting he was wrong, that he’d overlooked her looks until right this second.
She was a babe.
Beautiful.
It had taken him well into his second meeting to realize what a looker she was.
What kind of man did that make him?
How could he not notice that this tiny woman packed a mighty big wallop?
A totally, breathtaking sort of wallop.
Her hair was shoulder length and brown. But the word brown didn’t quite describe it. There were these light streaks that really showed up this afternoon as the sun hit them.
And her eyes were brown as well. The way they’d bored into him today guaranteed he’d noticed that.
What he hadn’t really thought about until now was that brown didn’t adequately describe them.
Brown sounded plain and ordinary.
Her eyes were anything but. They sort of sparked with her anger, and he had seen her intelligence in them.
They were the color of brandy, more than just brown.
Warm and dusky.
They made a man think of sex.
Okay, it might have taken him a while to get around to it, but he was thinking of sex now—hot, wild sex.
Celia, his personal nag, had warned him he was spending too much time locked up with the Cindy program, that he needed to leave his computer and mingle with real people.
He argued he knew all the people he needed to know, that he enjoyed his solitude.
Solitude was one thing. But if it took him until his second meeting to notice that Ari Kelly wasn’t just a thorn in his side, then Celia had a point. Because Ari was all woman. A gorgeous woman at that.
She wasn’t just a means to save his company.
Yes, he was forced to admit Celia was right.
Which meant he’d been wrong.
Again.
Darn.
See, once a man admitted he was wrong even once, he ended up admitting it more and more frequently.
He realized that Ari had turned the corner while he stood staring at her, lost in a daze of thought.
Damn.
“Hey, Ari, wait up,” he called.
He was practically jogging as he hurried to catch up with her.
“You’re still here?” she asked, looking less than pleased when he reached her side.
“Just hear me out,” he said, a bit breathless from trying to catch her. “Listen, I’ll drive you where you have to go and tell you my plan. If you’re not interested, at least you’ll have saved on the cost of the subway.”
For a moment, he thought she was going to argue some more. But then she sighed and said, “Fine.”
“Not exactly enthusiastic,” he teased as he led her back toward his car.
“Definitely less than enthusiastic. I told you that your retraction idea was stupid, but you didn’t listen, and now look where I am.”
“Just where are you?”
“A tabloid queen. Disengaged. Unemployed. Rooming with my grandmother. The only reason I’m letting you drive me to the home to get her clothes is that I don’t think things can get any worse.”
Simon felt a stab of sympathy for her.
Oh, he wasn’t going to take the blame for all of Ari’s bad luck, but maybe some of it was his fault.
The tabloid queen part at least.
Well, he’d make it up to her.
He was thrilled she was coming with him because though Ari had been right that his last plan was anything but foolproof, this one was better. It was a plan that would save them both.
He led her to his car. Even opened the door for her.
Rather than looking impressed at his manners, she glared at him.
Convincing Ari to go along with his plan wasn’t going to be easy.
Not easy at all.
WHAT ON EARTH was she doing?
Ari had packed a small—a very small—suitcase for her grandmother, and as Simon drove her home, she’d listened to him extol the virtues of his new plan.
His foolproof plan.
Foolproof?
Ha!
She’d already fallen victim to one of Simon Masterson’s foolproof plans and all it had gotten her was into a worse predicament.
She wasn’t placing the blame for Bubbi moving in on Simon. At least not yet. Maybe down the road she could figure out a way to tie that to him.
He continued to talk about his plan as they drove down Broad Street.
Ari shook her head and was surprised she couldn’t hear the rocks rattle in it. There had to be some clanking around in there, because here she was listening to Simon Masterson again. Simon’s new, improved, insane plan.
Listening to his idea to discredit her good name wasn’t worth the saved subway fare.
“Another study?” she finally asked. “After all the trouble that last study got me into, you want me to voluntarily do another study with your new computer system as the subject? You must think I’m as nutty as you are.”
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