By the Book

by Nancy Warren

  Awkwardly, he placed the flowers in her umbrella stand, hoping she’d rescue them once he left. It seemed a shame for innocent roses to be sacrificed because she was angry.

  “What do you want?”

  “You!” It wasn’t suave, and it wasn’t smooth. It wasn’t even well thought out. But it was the raw, bare truth, and he needed her to believe it so much it hurt. “I need you.” He shoved a hand through his hair and tried to pull his thoughts together into some coherence, but like the curls he’d detested since he was a kid, they insisted on tossing themselves wherever they pleased.

  From her unmoving stance it was clear she wasn’t buying his argument.

  “I owe you an apology. I should have told you I wrote that book. But, at first, all I wanted to do was to find out whether it would work. I wrote it in the first place because it was good money, but I didn’t believe a book could teach a person how to be a better lover.”

  “You made a fool of me.” She said it as though the words were ripped from her throat against her will.

  “No.” He stared at her in complete disbelief. How could she believe that? “I would never do that to you.”

  “‘How do you like to be touched, Shari? Do you like this? Does that work for you?’” She mimicked him cruelly, and only then did he see her pain. She really believed he’d been toying with her.

  “Please. Please don’t believe that. Not of me, and certainly not of yourself. I thought you’d figured it out just the way I did. It wasn’t the book that taught us to be great together. We taught each other. We fell in love and that’s what made the sex special.”

  She made a gagging noise when he got to the love part. And that started a coughing attack, which had her hunting in his robe pocket for a tissue. His robe, which filled him with hope. She had a perfectly good housecoat of her own, but she’d chosen to bundle herself up in his robe when she wasn’t feeling well. That had to be good.

  He glanced from the robe to her flushed face, heavy, sad eyes and red nose. She needed looking after, not emotional trauma.

  But he couldn’t let her go if she was thinking those awful things about him. He leaned his back against her front door and tried to explain how he’d ended up in this mess.

  “Remember the day you brought me that envelope and the book fell out?”

  “Vividly.” He wished her hoarse voice didn’t sound so sexy. It was turning him on something awful. Which was the last distraction he needed when he was practically fighting for his life here.

  “That was the first time I’d seen the book in print. I was horrified that you thought I’d sent for it, and almost told you then that I’d written the damned thing.”

  “And you didn’t because?” she asked with false sweetness.

  “I didn’t because I was embarrassed, frankly. I’d written it basically for the money. I mean, I still did the best job I could, but that’s what it was. A job.” He shifted his weight and dropped his suit bag at his feet so he didn’t feel so weighted down. “I didn’t believe a book could teach a person how to be a good lover. I pretty much figured the only way to learn was to get out there and have lots of practice. Like sports.”

  Her lips narrowed alarmingly, and it occurred to him that a sports analogy probably wasn’t going to win him brownie points with a woman who had just accused him of playing with her emotions.

  “In my arrogance—” he grinned at his own conceit and found his companion didn’t share his amusement, so he stashed the grin “—I thought no one would believe I needed a book like that. So it was a bit of a shock when it was pretty obvious you did believe it.

  “And that’s when it hit me. The best way to prove to myself whether the book was worth the paper it was printed on was to give it a trial run.”

  She made a noise like a scalded cat.

  “I didn’t really know you,” he added hastily. “You were just a sexy woman I’d been fantasizing about while I wrote the last few chapters of the book. I’d planned to ask you out, but I had a pile of deadlines that had built up while the book took up all my time. I was just getting clear of them when you came down and the book fell out.” He winced in retrospect. “You have no idea what that did for my ego, seeing you believe I needed that book.”

  “Just as you can have no idea what it felt like for me watching you tell all of America about your little experiment.”

  Damn, had he said that? He didn’t entirely remember everything he’d said on Ginger’s show. What with the hot lights, the noisy studio audience, his nerves at finally being outed as Lance Flagstaff…the whole thing was a bit of a blur. One thing he did remember clearly, however.

  “I also told all America that I love you.”

  “That was nothing but phony P.R.”

  He understood her feelings, sympathized with them even, but this was too much. Anger speared through his groveling. “What the hell are you talking about? I love you. I told every viewer on that show and now I’m telling you, if you hadn’t already figured it out. I love you and I want to marry you.”

  Maybe other proposals had been made at the top of the lungs in extreme frustration, he didn’t know. He only knew that his first effort at asking a woman to be his wife had been made so loud they’d be hearing him in Oregon. And for all his bellowing, Shari didn’t look inclined to say yes.

  She shook her head. “Yesterday, those words would have meant everything in the world to me.”

  “What about today?”

  “Have you ever heard the expression, ‘A day late and a dollar short’? Go home, Luke. I’m tired and sick.”

  “I’m sorry,” he said, not knowing what else to say.

  She sighed heavily. “I’m sorry, too. I thought you were the man I’d been looking for all my life.”

  “I am that man,” he said frantically. He’d spent most of his life working to make sure no woman ever looked at him as the man she’d been waiting for all her life. Now he knew that if Shari stopped thinking he was that man, his life would lack any meaning at all.

  “I am so angry with you.” She clenched both fists as she said it and he actually felt the heat of her rage.

  “I told you I love you. I want to marry you. Doesn’t that mean anything?”

  She shot him a contemptuous glance. “It means you don’t know any more about love than your father does. News flash! When you love someone you don’t lie to them, you don’t use them as an experiment to…to prove your stupid book works.”

  He threw up his hands and yelled right back at her. “All right. You don’t believe me. I give up!”

  He yanked the door open, picked up his suit bag and left.

  He’d barely gone a step when he heard the door open again behind him. With the wild hope that she’d decided to give him another chance surging in his belly, he turned back, only to watch his roses come flying out the door behind him, end over end like a dozen red-costumed circus acrobats flipping in perfect synchronization.

  As they flopped to the industrial beige carpet in the apartment hallway, he thought about just leaving them there to die, but somehow he couldn’t do that, not when they’d started the evening with him in such high hopes.

  He knelt to retrieve the roses and walked to nosy Mr. Forrester’s door and knocked.

  When it opened, he said, “Here. Give these to your wife.”

  20

  SHARI HAD NEVER BEEN so angry in her life. The worst thing emotionally she’d ever dealt with before this was when B.J. stole her boyfriend and she went around baring her misery for all to see. Next to Luke’s betrayal, the B.J. caper was a minor felony.

  In variations of pain, losing Randy was a hangnail compared to this feeling that her heart had shattered into jagged shards, each one scraping and slicing at her tender innards.

  Groaning at her own hyperbole, she decided she was in a lot of pain.

  Even though her health improved, her energy level hadn’t pick up. At least she’d grown up enough to not broadcast her pain to all and sundry. They probab
ly put her heavy red eyes and lack of energy down to her recent bout with the flu. Only Therese knew the truth.

  She dragged herself home Friday and, just remembering how she and Luke had spent every Friday since the day the book fell out of the envelope, had her alternately blushing with embarrassment and fuming with outrage.

  She ought to go out, but she didn’t want to go out. She could manage to fake it through the day, but socializing with adults would be too painful.

  Therese had invited her to go along with her and her new “friend” Brad to a movie, but Shari couldn’t imagine anything more depressing than being caught in the middle of that blossoming romance. It was the only bright spot in her miserable existence. Brad had embraced her suggestion that he only try to be friends with Therese. Now Therese was complaining that she couldn’t seem to seduce him.

  Shari thought it was great that they were getting to know each other again before jumping into bed, and if she weren’t so miserable she’d be secretly smiling at how eager Therese was to get back to intimacy with that Olympic-gold-medal tongue.

  But then she’d recall her own recent experience with superb sex and cringed with humiliation.

  No. She was better off alone. She might as well get used to it, she thought dismally. She should probably think about getting a cat so she’d have something warm to cuddle up to now that she’d sworn off men.

  She got home and checked her answering machine. No messages.

  Fine. It was a good thing Luke hadn’t left a message. He’d understood that her goodbye was final. Still, the fact that he’d done no groveling at all, and hadn’t once left a message or tried to contact her in two days only proved she was right and he hadn’t loved her at all.

  She hoped his book was keeping him warm at nights. Or perhaps he already had a new woman on his hook. Teaching him to be a better lover. Ha!

  She tossed her bag onto the couch with all her strength and opened the freezer. All those neat little single-girl packets of frozen home-cooked food depressed her somehow. She wasn’t hungry anyway.

  She thought about watching a movie on Netflix. But what was the point? She’d choose a chick flick that ended up at happily-ever-after and she’d spend a sleepless night rewriting the ending in her head, killing off the movie star hero.

  Perhaps she’d watch a war movie…where a lot of men died in the end. She’d grab dinner out somewhere. Sitting alone on a Friday was not healthy.

  She grabbed her bag and headed for the door. She’d already opened it and was in the hallway when she noticed Luke standing there.

  Damn her rotten timing. If she’d waited, he’d have knocked and she could have squinted at him through the peephole then ignored him.

  Why did it have to hurt so much to see him? And why did she want to throw herself into his arms at the same time she wanted to knee him hard in the groin?

  “Hi,” he said.

  “I’m on my way out.” She pulled herself up to her full five feet seven inches and glared down her nose at him.

  “I brought you some mail.”

  He held out a sheaf of papers, and she took them automatically, too busy trying not to notice how painful it was to look at him to spare any attention for the mail. He looked tired and his eyes were bloodshot, as though he hadn’t been sleeping well. Good. Neither had she.

  When her fingers encountered papers, she glanced down, not sure what she was looking at.

  Puzzlement pulled her brows together. “What is this?”

  “It’s Prisons of the Mind. I changed the ending.”

  They’d argued heatedly one night over Luke’s insistence that Jenkins and the psychiatrist couldn’t end up together. It wouldn’t be realistic, he’d said, and she remembered feeling it was somehow vital to make him understand that love was the one thing that could cure Jenkins. She’d been able to see that, and she figured that psychiatrist was smart enough to see it, too. But Luke wouldn’t have it.

  “Why did you change it?”

  Luke glanced up and down the corridor and asked if they could discuss it inside.

  She wasn’t nearly done being angry with him yet. “No. Here is fine. I’m going out, remember?”

  He exhaled a breath noisily. “Because you were right. Love can sometimes fix a truly screwed-up guy. Take me, for instance.” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “There’s been a lot of…response to my appearance on the ‘Ginger’ show.”

  Just being reminded of that horrible, humiliating program had her shoulders tensing. “Lots of women calling and emailing you for private lessons?”

  His eyes narrowed. “Sometimes you can be a real pain in the ass.”

  “Then why do you insist on bothering me?”

  “Because,” he said in the tone of one goaded past reason, “I love you.”

  They glared at each other for a moment. She was tempted to sweep past him on the way to her exciting evening alone at a restaurant, but was more curious about the book contract. What on earth was Luke up to?

  After a moment’s silence he continued. “As I was saying, there was a lot of response. The how-to book’s sold out everywhere and going back for another printing.”

  She almost congratulated him, but then remembered how mad she was and how he didn’t deserve her praise, so she kept her mouth shut.

  “Meanwhile, my agent called, and I’ve got an offer for Prisons. But I knew I couldn’t send it until I’d changed the ending.”

  He reached out and took her hand. “I’m not my dad, Shari. You made me realize that. When I fell in love with you it was different from anything I’ve ever experienced with anyone else.” He laughed shortly. “You know what I’ve missed most this week?”

  She shook her head, but she was pretty sure it was that section of chapter eleven they’d decided to try a second time because the first time had been so much fun.

  “I missed not being welcome to come make you tea and rub your feet when you were sick.”

  She grimaced. “You didn’t miss much. I felt hideous and looked worse.”

  “I know.” When she glared at him, he only laughed. “I mean, I didn’t care that your nose was red and your eyes were watery. I only wanted to look after you. I’ve never felt like that before. I imagine you pregnant with our child, and I get goose bumps. I imagine you old, with gray hair and wrinkles, and I see this vibrant older woman I’ll be proud to spend my life with.”

  She blinked her eyes rapidly and hoped he’d assume it was still the cold making her tear up.

  “I went for a beer with my dad the other night and we had a long talk. One we should have had a while ago, I guess. You know what I think? I don’t think he’s ever really loved a woman. Maybe he doesn’t have it in him. He loves all his ex-wives and kids in an easy sort of way, but I don’t think he’s got sticking power.”

  “And you do?”

  “You can bet your life on it.”

  In fact, that was what he was asking her to do. This was her place-your-money-and-make-your-bet moment. Was he a good gamble?

  She cocked her head and studied him, the usually lazy green eyes so sharp and serious. And so anxious for her answer. She suddenly realized it didn’t matter all that much what her head said about it, her heart had already placed everything she had on Luke Lawson to win.

  “Come on inside,” she said, stepping back and opening her apartment door.

  “Are you planning what I hope you’re planning?”

  “I’m going to let you make me some tea and rub my feet while I read your book,” she told him.

  She didn’t get more than a step before strong male arms hauled her back. She turned to him and he kissed her, deeply and hungrily but with an aching tenderness.

  “Tell me the words,” he said. “I need to hear them.”

  Tipping her head back so she could look deep into his eyes, she said, “I love you.”

  “You know, you taught me to love.”

  Her smile was warm and open and promised him everything he’d ever wanted an
d hadn’t known he was missing. “I’m a great teacher.”

  Also by Nancy Warren

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  Toni Diamond Mysteries

  Toni is a successful saleswoman for Lady Bianca Cosmetics in this series of humorous cozy mysteries. Along with having an eye for beauty and a head for business, Toni's got a nose for trouble and she's never shy about following her instincts, even when they lead to murder.

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  For a complete list of books, check out Nancy’s website at nancywarren.net

  About the Author

  Nancy Warren is the USA Today Bestselling author of more than 70 novels. She’s originally from Vancouver, Canada, though she tends to wander and has lived in England, Italy and California at various times. She’s currently in Bath, UK, where she often pretends she’s Jane Austen. Or at least a character in a Jane Austen novel. Favorite moments include being the answer to a crossword puzzle clue in Canada’s National Post newspaper, being featured on the front page of the New York Times when her book Speed Dating launched Harlequin’s NASCAR series, and being nominated three times for Romance Writers of America’s RITA award. She’s an avid hiker, loves chocolate and most of all, loves to hear from readers! The best way to stay in touch is to sign up for Nancy’s newsletter at www.nancywarren.net.