"Right. It's just a coincidence stories about my late-night partying hit the web the very next morning after you crashed the party."
"I can't be the only one who finds your selfish antics immature and frustrating."
He studied her, trying to decide whether to believe her or not. Before he could push it farther, a soft, less certain voice broke in.
"Uncle Henry?"
Both of them turned to see the small girl in her bunny pajamas standing in the hall, staring at them with uncertainty and a little fear on her face. Holy hell. Now she was causing him to traumatize his young niece.
"Happy?" he hissed under his breath.
She gave him a scowl, then turned back to the little girl. "Ella? Your uncle and I are just having a little discussion. Nothing for you to worry about," she said in the familiar soft voice she'd used in her office. "How's your nose feeling?"
"It's fine. Are you and Uncle Henry going to yell at each other much longer? Because I need him to pour me more cereal."
"I'll be right there, honey," Henry said, not taking his eyes from Benny Sorensen. For a woman who couldn't put two words together the other night in the presence of Dr. Suck Face, she could be surprisingly verbal with him.
What the woman needed was a distraction. She needed something or someone to take her attention off every little thing he did. Someone who could fill her time with human companionship, dinners, and dates
He stepped back and studied her.
She wasn't a bad-looking woman, not at all. If you could get past the lips pursed in disapproval, and the eyes that had their laser-beam quality burrowing a hole in his head. If she stopped pulling her hair back in that unflattering ponytail that left frizzy pieces flying all over her head, maybe tweezed those brows back a bit, and smiled once in a while, she could be actually pretty.
Okay, maybe he'd gone too far. She could be less terrorizing.
In fact, her eyes were such a bright, iridescent blue that if she could stop glaring at everyone or, in the converse, dropping her gaze down whenever Dr. Suck Face looked her way, they could be almost captivating.
"Why are you looking at me like that?" She peered uncertainly at him.
"No reason." He smiled. "I think I've just come up with a solution to our little problem, however. Would you like to hear it?"
She glanced at her watch and back. "If you can tell me in four minutes or less. I have early-morning hours at the clinic."
"You work on Saturdays?"
She shrugged. "We hold after-hour care on the weekends. We rotate so it comes to be about once a month. Today's my turn. You now have three and a half minutes."
"Okay. I have a little proposition for you. I couldn't help but notice the other night that you have a certain affinity to that other doctor. The guy with the blonde attached to his mouth?"
Her eyes narrowed. "I knew you were spying on me. Well, for your information, Dr. Seeley is merely a colleague, and I have no interest in him other than profession-"
He raised his hand. "Save it. If it's one thing I know, it's how to read a person. To see what they want sometimes before they know it themselves. That's why I'm so good at my work. In advertising," he added when she didn't bite or look particularly impressed. "And I know that you have the hots for the good Dr. Seeley."
"Two minutes left," she said, her eyes narrowed to near slits now. But he also could see a faint blush on her face, making her forehead glow almost red. "I hope you have a point."
"I do. In exchange for you dropping this"-he waved the notice in front of her- "vendetta you have against me, and telling the HOA that you are withdrawing your complaint and any legal threats you made to them-since they sure as hell have never been this proactive in enforcing the rules in the three years I've lived here-I'll get you a date with the esteemed Dr. Seeley."
She snorted. "Yeah. Right. First, not that I'm admitting to having any feelings whatsoever for Lu-Dr. Seeley, but you must be crazy to think I'd drop anything on some tenuous promise that you couldn't possibly deliver."
Now it was his turn to gloat. "Try me. I can sell anything to anyone, and I can certainly sell you. Believe me, if anyone knows what a guy like Dr. Seeley-or any guy, for that matter-wants in a woman, it's me."
She nodded. "Oh, that's right. Because you're a man whore. Of course you know what all men want, in your diverse and vast experience. However, I'm afraid Dr. Seeley is on a different level than you."
He remembered the stocky blond guy who probably played quarterback in high school while running for school president and maintaining a 4.0 GPA. Your typical all-American high-school hero who'd grown up to become your all-American grown-up hero as a doctor-to children, no less. "Trust me. I know what that guy wants. What kind of woman he wants. And I know that with a little effort on your part-scratch that, a lot of effort-I can make you into that woman."
The last dig might have been too much, the way she puffed out her chest like she was going to launch herself at him. But whatever she'd been about to say got caught in her throat, and instead, something else crossed that face of hers. Something that told him maybe they might have a deal.
Hope.
She'd known the moment he knocked on her door she should just ignore him. Refuse to engage with him until he'd had the chance to cool down after reading the letter-a copy of which she'd seen yesterday. But there'd been curiosity, an almost masochistic instinct to see his anger at an inconvenience that, for once, she'd caused him.
And it had been entertaining, up until Ella had come out into the hall to see what was going on.
But now, with this so-called proposition of his, she was at a loss. Was he even serious? Or was this some cruel joke to string her along until she'd dropped her complaints?
She studied him, his smooth polish even at this absurd hour in the morning. He'd retired his expensive refined suit for more relaxed jeans and a T-shirt that, unfortunately, made him look impossibly more debonair, which, if she didn't hate him so much, would be disarming. But she loathed him with a deep and growing fire, the way he just thought he could smile that charming smile of his and get people to do his bidding. She'd seen the articles about him, the women, the parties that would inevitably follow him not just because of his professional success, but because of his standing as heir to Brighton Jewelers-one of the oldest and most reputable jewelry companies in the country.
But she had to admit, he did make a convincing argument. He not only knew what men wanted, but he knew how to play people, to create the perfect package for whatever snake oil he was selling. Hadn't she just been commiserating over how she was going to be alone unless she made a change? He could be a guru of sorts-if she could learn to tolerate him.
"I'm not looking to be dressed as some bimbo Barbie. Slapping on makeup and prancing around the office isn't going to do anything but humiliate me."
"Lord, don't I know it."
She wanted to kick him. "Forget it." She should have known that even talking to him was a mistake. She stepped back, ready to slam the door in his face.
"Wait. Benny. Hear me out. I'm sorry, sometimes you just leave yourself open and I can't resist the opportunity. But I promise, I'll work on that-and keeping the music down to a respectable level and giving you access to your parking spot. Look, I know better than anyone that a decent hairstyle and a little lipstick aren't going to make any difference if you can't say two words without falling down in a faint, or running into a wall or whatever you do when he speaks to you. I'm going to give you the whole Henry Ellison treatment. When I'm done, you'll be able to not only slay Dr. Seeley with your wit and unbounding charm, but you're going to have him wrapped around your little finger after I verse you in the fine art of flirting."
"You're promising me a lot. But you have to be crazy if you think I'm going to drop my complaint now that I actually have your attention."
"I'm so certain of my prowess, that I guarantee you'll have a date with the good doctor by"-he scanned the contents of the letter-"August Twenty-Ninth. The day of the HOA hearing. That's a little over a month away. If I can't make you the walking dream this guy wants by then, then I'll agree to pay whatever fees the board rules on at that hearing, and I won't fight you any longer. But if I do prevail, then you're going to march in there and tell them you made it all up. Do we have a deal?"
Five weeks. Five weeks where she could pick his brain, learn the subtle art and skill of not just flirting, but socially engaging any man and not dissolving into Jell-O at his feet. That was, if she could stomach being in the same room with this guy without killing him.
It was a lofty promise. But what did she have to lose? As things were going now, Luke Seeley was never going to see her as a woman. A woman he wanted. Not a cute, nerdy klutz good for a little laugh every now and then. A woman to love.
"And you'll keep the music down and let me use my parking spot?" He nodded. "All right. Deal."
He raised his hand toward her. He actually wanted to shake on it? She accepted it begrudgingly. "So. What do we do first?"
He dropped his gaze down her body, skimming over the loose but comfy scrubs and down to her favorite worn sneakers. "First you need to stop dressing like a seventeen-year-old tomboy. What time are you off work today?"