Hero in Disguise

by Wilkins, Gina

“I’ll try. Will you come over and give me some pointers?”

  She wiggled her bare feet on the coffee table in front of her and watched them with a little smile playing at the corners of her mouth. “How are you at taking advice, Derek?”

  “I haven’t had a great deal of experience at it,” he answered ruefully, “but I can try. Shall I pick you up in an hour?”

  “Sure. See you then.” She hung up the phone and wriggled her toes happily. She tried to tell herself that she was suddenly in such a good mood because she now had plans for the rest of the day. She tried to tell herself that she was pleased that Derek seemed willing to try to patch things up with his sister, which should make both Anderson siblings happier. But she knew that the real reason she felt good was that she would be spending the afternoon in the company of a man she was beginning to like very much. Not an ideal hero, of course, she reminded herself rather sternly, trying to quell some of the anticipation she felt toward seeing him with her old, standard excuse for not getting involved. Still, teasing Derek had turned out to be more fun than she’d expected.

  Then her smile faded. Swimming. She’d have to wear a bathing suit in front of him. Her body wasn’t so bad, but there was no way to conceal her mutilated right knee in a swimsuit. After five years she’d learned to wear her maillots and occasional shorts without too much regard for what others thought of her scars, but for some reason Derek’s reaction was more important to her. She told herself that she was being silly. He’d already seen the scars, hadn’t he? Still, she knew that her scars and limp would only remind both of them of the many reasons there could be nothing more between Summer and Derek than friendship. He would want a woman who was more nearly perfect, physically and every other way. Summer wanted a man who could accept her, flaws and all.

  So she would concentrate on making friends with him and helping him do the same with his estranged sister. And she would try very hard to avoid any more intimate scenes like that near kiss the morning before. No matter how much she might be tempted to do otherwise.

  IN HIS ELEGANT SAUSALITO HOME Derek replaced his own receiver and frowned down at the telephone beneath his hand. Calling Summer with the impromptu invitation had been an impulse, just as dropping by to invite his sister to breakfast yesterday had been. Dumb move, Anderson, he told himself.

  He wondered dispassionately at the urge that had made him call Summer and invite her to his home. True, he wanted very much to come to some kind of an understanding with Connie. And true, Summer was Connie’s best friend and would therefore be the logical person to advise him on how best to approach Connie with a long-overdue attempt at reconciliation. But was that really the reason he’d called Summer? Or was it just an excuse to spend more time with her?

  From the little Connie had told him about her roommate, he hadn’t expected to like Summer Reed immediately. But he had. So much so that he’d wanted to spend more time with her. Alone. He had to ask himself if the real reason he’d wanted to ask Connie to breakfast yesterday had been so that he could see Summer again and find out if she was really as intriguing as she’d seemed at the party. She was.

  He swallowed, remembering the rush of heat that had hit him at her door. He wanted to be with Summer, not only because she made him want her to the point of distraction but also because she had proved to be such damned good company. She irritated him, she amused him, she kept him on his toes. She made him feel alive again, really alive for the first time in nearly a year. He’d thought he was past thriving on risks and challenges. It seemed that he was not.

  Summer was not at all the type of woman he’d expected to find himself suddenly obsessed with. And yet he was.

  It was a shame she was wasting her very obvious intelligence and competence in a job that admittedly bored her and a series of parties that seemed only to fill her free hours. Of course, he had no right to criticize her. Could it be that his sister’s life should be equally exempt from his well-meant interference?

  He had never meant to drive Connie away from him when he’d come home. It was just that he’d had such expectations for her when she’d been a bright, spunky little girl. He couldn’t help but be disappointed that she wasn’t taking advantage of the opportunities she’d had to better herself. Ever since her marriage to that jerk actor when she’d been no more than a kid, she’d seemed intent on living as frivolously as possible. Was he supposed to just stand by and say nothing?

  With a frown and a shake of his head he abandoned the troublesome self-debate and allowed himself—just for a moment—to contemplate Summer’s visit with an unfamiliar sense of anticipation.

  Catching sight of himself in a mirror on the wall in front of him, he realized he was wearing a stupid, infatuated schoolboy grin. The expression made him look like a stranger, even to himself. What was this woman doing to him to make him look like that? What was it about her that was tying him in knots, making him plot and connive for ways to convince her to spend more time with him?

  He was going to have to be very careful, he told himself sternly, the grin slowly fading to be replaced by a look of wary caution.

  And then he found himself whistling as he started toward his kitchen to thaw the steaks.

  4

  “YOU’RE AN EXCELLENT SWIMMER,” Derek complimented Summer after a swimming race he’d won only with great effort.

  Gasping for breath, Summer clung to the edge of the pool, tossing her wet bangs out of her eyes and smiling at him. “Thanks,” she said when she’d regained her voice. “I spent hours in pools during my recuperation, from my accident to strengthen my leg. I still try to swim laps three or four times a week.”

  Derek reached out to brush a wet strand of hair away from her eyes. “I thought you said you weren’t athletic.”

  She wanted to turn her cheek into his hand, to drop a kiss into his palm. Instead, she casually shook his hand away and pulled herself out of the pool. “I’m not,” she threw back at him, reaching for her gaily colored beach towel. “Exercising is just something I do, or I’d end up walking more like a duck than I do now.” Wrapping herself in the huge towel, she dropped onto a lounge chair at the pool’s edge, watching as Derek shoved himself out of the rippling blue water.

  More than once during the afternoon she’d found herself tempted to ignore her resolution to keep things between them strictly platonic. There had been several incidents in the pool, when wet skin had brushed wet skin, that could have turned into something dangerous if both she and Derek hadn’t been so obviously trying to remain in control. She’d known from the moment he’d picked her up that Derek was as determined as she to make an effort to ignore the unbidden attraction that had flared between them from the beginning.

  Summer had fallen instantly in love with Derek’s home, a good-sized house of rock, cedar and smoked glass nestled into the Sausalito hills. Though she was sure the place had been professionally decorated, Derek had opted for comfort and warmth rather than trendy style. Each room he led her into on the quick tour he’d given her upon their arrival had been beautiful, yet Summer could easily imagine a family living in the home without worrying about smudges and clutter. She could be very comfortable in such a house, she found herself thinking, then made herself stop picturing herself in residence here. Such thoughts were detrimental to her peace of mind.

  She’d been in Derek’s company for more than two hours now and was surprised at how well they got along. Carefully avoiding the subject of his sister, they’d kept their conversation light and impersonal, with Summer tossing out her usual quota of one-liners and Derek serving with amiable resignation as her straight man. She had yet to make him laugh outright, but the hint of a smile had flashed frequently in his pewter-gray eyes. The only quips that made him frown were the ones she made about her physical impairment.

  In response to her remark about walking like a duck, he was scowling now as he draped his lean form on the chair beside his guest’s. He pointedly made no reply.

  Chuckling under her breath
, Summer slid an oversize pair of purple-framed sunglasses onto her nose and settled comfortably in her chair to enjoy the still-warm early September sun, allowing the beach towel to fall aside to reveal her becomingly simple scarlet maillot. It was simply habit to keep the towel draped over her scarred knee when she was with people she didn’t know well. She was hardly aware that she had done so this time.

  Derek was lounging in a position almost identical to her own, his eyes half closed as he squinted meditatively across the pool. Since he wasn’t wearing his glasses, his eyes looked smaller, his dark lashes longer. Summer took advantage of the opportunity to study his roughly carved profile and powerful, slim physique.

  When he had stripped to his conservative navy swim trunks, she’d realized that her first impression at the party Friday night had been correct. His body was as solid and firm as she’d first thought, corded with hard-earned muscles and marred only by an interestingly jagged scar across his left shoulder. Thinking of their silly repartee on the night they’d met, Summer mused that Derek’s body looked like that of an ex-spy’s, even if his sister would have scoffed at the very idea that he could do something so daring and irresponsible.

  It had been easier than she’d expected to appear before him in her own swimwear. Though his eyes had drifted down to her scarred leg, he’d managed to keep any distaste he might have felt well hidden. He neither stared at the scars nor pointedly avoided them. Funny, she’d almost forgotten her earlier misgivings.

  “Why are you keeping your right leg covered with your towel?” Derek asked suddenly, as if he’d read her mind.

  Summer flushed a little and looked down. “Just habit, I guess.”

  “Obviously you don’t always keep it covered or your right leg wouldn’t be as tanned as your left,” Derek pointed out logically. “Your scars don’t bother me, Summer. I have a few of my own, and I’m not trying to hide them.”

  Summer sighed and brushed the towel away from her knee. “You’re right, of course. It’s silly.” She glanced at his shoulder. “How did you get yours?”

  “Trying to prove what a hotshot jock I am,” he answered, telling her nothing yet reminding her that this was a man who enjoyed sports of all kinds. Sports she would never be able to share with him, she told herself rather cruelly.

  “Where were you attending college when you had your accident?” he asked suddenly.

  Grateful for the distraction of Derek’s question, Summer answered. “UALR—the University of Arkansas at Little Rock.”

  “What was your major?”

  “Theater arts.”

  His eyebrow lifted. “Drama?”

  “Mmm. Drama, dance, music.”

  “Had you had any training before you entered college?”

  “Yes. I took dance lessons from the time I was three years old, after one of my aunts—a frustrated ballerina—decided I showed some talent. I loved it, and though my parents thought it was basically a waste of time, they never complained about the expense involved.”

  “What were you planning to do when you graduated?”

  Summer fluffed her drying bangs with her fingertips and answered lightly. “Oh, I had dreams of becoming the next Mary Martin or Debbie Reynolds. I thought Hollywood would revive the musical comedy movies just for me.”

  “Were you any good?”

  “Oi was bloomin’marv’lous, oi was,” she answered in a shrill Cockney accent.

  Derek nodded approvingly. “You played Eliza Doo-little?”

  “I beat out two dozen others for the spring production of My Fair Lady my sophomore year. Which was rather surprising since I only auditioned to please my boyfriend, a gorgeous senior who’d won the part of ‘Enry ‘Iggins.”

  Derek frowned at the mention of her old boyfriend but let it pass without comment. Still, he had more questions to ask. “How were your reviews?”

  She sighed dramatically. “Alas, I’ll never know. I was on my way to the final dress rehearsal when I had the close encounter with the motorcycle-eating Ford. My stand-in got all the rave reviews.” Summer had gotten drugs to dull the agonizing pain in her shattered knee, and the news that she would never dance on stage again.

  Derek sat still for a moment, studying her seemingly unregretful expression before finally asking, “Whatever happened to ‘Enry ‘Iggins?”

  “As soon as he graduated, he headed for the bright lights of New York. He’s on a daytime soap now.”

  “Do you ever hear from him?”

  “No. He married an actress on the same soap. We broke up soon after my accident.” And she’d learned that active men did not want to be slowed down by a woman with a handicap. She’d do well to keep that in mind now, she told herself.

  “Was he a hero-type?”

  Summer forced a laugh. “Hardly. He took one look at my mangled leg in the hospital and fainted dead away. He managed to visit me twice before he announced that he just couldn’t deal with it and took off for New York. The really funny part is that he plays a doctor on the soap.”

  “You don’t appear to be brokenhearted.”

  She shrugged. “It’s ancient history.” And broken hearts mend with time, as do broken limbs, though the scars remain for a lifetime.

  “You told me that you’ve had several jobs since you left college. What have you done, and how did you end up in the accounting department of Pro Sporting Goods?”’

  “What is this, an interview?”

  “You interest me. I’d like to know more about you,” Derek replied candidly. “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to.”

  “What the heck. Somehow you’ve managed to drag my entire life story out of me during the two times we’ve been together. You might as well ask about my work history, too.” She shoved her sunglasses higher on her nose. “While I was recovering from the accident, I kept the books for my father’s store. We were both relieved when I ditched the walker and decided to look for employment in Little Rock. There I found a job in a small credit union for a while, but it was so boring. I quit after only four months.”

  “Then what?”

  “Well, my next job was in a ladies’ dress shop, but it didn’t work out.”

  He groaned. “Let me guess. You told the ladies exactly how they looked in the dresses they tried on.”

  She giggled. “How did you know? That’s exactly what I did. Can you imagine how some of those, um, well-endowed women looked in dresses two sizes too small and ten years too young? I could tell I wasn’t cut out to be a saleswoman, so I decided to move here and try something new.”

  “Why San Francisco?”

  “I had a crush on Michael Douglas when I was a teenager. I watched The Streets of San Francisco every week, so when I decided to get out of Arkansas and started imagining all the places I could go, I automatically thought of San Francisco.”

  “That’s a damned odd way to choose a place to pick up and move to,” Derek grunted, looking at her again with that dull silver glint that told her he wasn’t quite sure whether she was teasing him.

  “A lot of things I do are damned odd,” she replied airily.

  “I wondered if you were aware of that.”

  “But fun,” she added, swinging her legs over the side of the lounge chair. “Any further questions?” she asked as she sat up facing him.

  “How many jobs have you had here?”

  “Only two. The first was as a hostess in a lovely little restaurant. That didn’t work out, either.”

  “I’m almost afraid to ask why.”

  “Well, every time I invited the diners to ‘walk this way’—”

  “Summer, that’s enough of the jokes about your limp. It’s sick humor, and I don’t find it at all amusing.”

  “It’s called gallows humor, and you’re just too stuffy to appreciate it.”

  He sighed but asked one final question. “How’d you get the job with Pro Sporting Goods?”

  “No one else wanted it.” She stood, dropping her towel. “If the inquisition’
s over, I’m going back into the pool.”

  He waved a hand to indicate that she could do as she liked, then watched broodingly as she limped to the side of the pool and dived expertly into the cool depths. In the water her awkwardness vanished, giving way to a graceful style that was a pleasure to watch. His eyes followed her through several laps, noting the racer’s turns at the ends of the pool, modified so that she was pushing off only with her strong leg. Summer was a puzzle to him. She seemed too bright, too complex, to explain her apparently shallow approach to life. But when she’d told him about her accident and the long months of recovery, the end of her career as a dancer and as a performer, the desertion of her college boyfriend and the chain of unfulfilling jobs, she’d tossed out the pieces of information as if she’d been speaking of someone else. Did she really think that her glib manner hid the pain and traces of bitterness in her eyes? Was he the only one who could see them there?

  Why the hell should he care? he asked himself exasperatedly. He barely knew the woman. She was someone he was spending time with only because he wanted her to help him get closer to his sister.

  Bull. Even he didn’t believe that.

  He narrowed his eyes as Summer stopped swimming to float lazily on her back, her eyes closed in pleasure. Her trim, sleek figure floated effortlessly in the clear water. The wet scarlet maillot hugged her taut curves caressingly. Caressingly? Now where had that word come from? His palms were itching, but that didn’t necessarily mean that he was imagining the feel of Summer’s skin beneath them. Dammit, he had no intention of giving in to an inexplicable attraction to a woman who would only laugh at him if he should tell her how he felt. She probably used men as unconscionably as his sister, her alleged search for the perfect hero an excuse for going through scores of potential candidates. Someone could get hurt in a relationship with the flighty young woman in his pool—and chances were it wouldn’t be Summer, he told himself sternly.

  He closed his eyes and tried to remember if his palms had itched even once during his pleasantly uneventful, short-term affair with Joanne Payne. He didn’t remember them doing so. Damn.