Ugly Ducklings Finish First

by Gail, Stacy

  “Oh, my. Wiley, that’s wonderful.” She threw her arms around his neck and pressed a smacking kiss to his clean-shaven cheek before she could stop herself. “I always knew you had it in you.”

  “Yeah?” Smiling in apparent bemusement, he raised an absent hand to his cheek. “You’re not surprised?”

  “Should I be?”

  “Everyone else is.”

  The resentment threading through his words made her smile. “They don’t know you as well as they thought they did.”

  “But you do?”

  Her heart executed a Baryshnikov-level pirouette when his tone lowered to a purring intimacy, and she hated herself for it. Intimacy with the Coyote was the last thing a smart woman needed, and if she was one thing, she was smart. “I guess I did know you, a decade ago. But remember, I haven’t seen you since I left for college.”

  “Not true.” Another couple bumped into them, oblivious to everyone but each other. Wiley’s arms curled around her back to shield her, bringing them together in one long line of heat. “I saw you the day of your father’s funeral.”

  “Oh.” Payton’s brain stumbled to a halt the moment his body pressed flush against hers. Alarm bells went off while a crazy quilt of surprise, desperation and a pulsating, primitive awareness smothered her thought processes until only one thing was left to echo through the sudden stillness of her mind.

  Oh man, what a body.

  Scrabbling for composure and trying not to drool, she struggled not to notice how the beat of his heart thudded against her breasts. “I don’t remember seeing you that day.”

  “I’m not surprised. We barely had time to speak, but I remember it like it was yesterday.”

  “It was seven years ago, Wiley. With that much time separating us, we could qualify as strangers.”

  “A stranger wouldn’t know you have a habit of chewing on your necklace when you’re wound up.” His gaze dropped to her mouth, tracing it with an intensity that made his eyes glitter. “It took me a couple of seconds, but I recognized you.”

  “Still, I’m surprised.” She had to consciously stop herself from licking her lips to sample the lush heat ignited by his heavy-lidded gaze. “I didn’t think anyone would recognize me.”

  “When I first saw you standing alone by the doors, I thought you were someone’s date. I couldn’t believe some guy would be stupid enough to leave your side, even for a second.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Absolutely not. For instance, I never would have left you alone.”

  A heady surge of pleasure bubbled through her, but the weight of reality smashed it flat a second later. Wiley Sharpe practically shot out of the womb bringing the female population to its knees with his charm, but it didn’t actually mean anything. It never did.

  Her smile was little more than a wry twist. “Don’t waste your flattery on me, pal. It won’t work.”

  “It’s not flattery when it’s the truth.”

  “Uh-huh. So my nervous habit gave me away?”

  “Pretty much.” To her surprise he hooked a finger around her neck chain and lifted it to her lips. “The way you work your mouth when you’re concentrating is...unforgettable.”

  “I see.” The feathery brush of the chain against her sensitive lips made her shiver, and his words made her imagine all sorts of things she could do with her mouth. But to think that while in the arms of the legendary Coyote of Bitterthorn was akin to playing with fire, so when the music wound down to a sensuous close she couldn’t quite stifle her sigh of relief. “Well. Thank you for the dance. I told you I was good.”

  “So you did.” He didn’t return her smile, instead tightening his hand on hers before she could pull away. “How about we find a seat and talk?”

  “Like I said, I’m giving a presentation tomorrow morning. I should be going.”

  “Are you staying with your mother?”

  “No.” The word came out more sharply than she intended, and she cleared her throat to ease its sudden tightness. “I’m staying in San Antonio, at the hotel where the convention’s being held.”

  “Ah.” Wiley tilted his head, as if to view her from another perspective. “I take it things are still tense between you two?”

  “It’s not that bad. Wiley—”

  “Does she know you’re in town?”

  With a hiss, Payton jerked her hand away. “That is none of your business.”

  “I’ll take that as a no.”

  “Take it any way you like,” she said snippily. “I’m leaving.”

  “We both are.”

  Before Payton had a chance to dodge, he took her by the elbow and guided her toward the doors. A few people called to him, and a sheriff’s deputy by the main doors tipped his hat as they passed. Raising his free hand, Wiley offered smiling nods of farewell, but he didn’t stop. Just like royalty, she thought with a resigned sigh. She was only surprised his adoring fans didn’t throw flowers at his feet.

  “Slow down,” Payton ordered as Wiley dragged her through the nearest exit. With her ears ringing from the loud music, she took in a breath of cool night air that carried the unmistakable perfume of spring. “Wiley, stop pulling on me.”

  His unrelenting pace eased up a fraction. “You’re a doctor. If I pull something loose, you can always put it back in place.”

  “Funny, I don’t remember you being this much of a jerk,” she muttered as they headed into the parking lot. “Where are we going?”

  “Someplace where we can talk.”

  “Has it occurred to you that I’m not interested in talking?”

  “Nope.” He scanned the lot as if looking for enemy troops before he made a beeline for a vintage Corvette two-seater. “We’re going to have a nice little chat, you and I, and get all caught up like the old friends we are.”

  “Please, we were never what I’d call friends.”

  He stopped in his tracks between a heavy-duty pickup and a late-model luxury coupe so abruptly she almost ran into him. “What do you mean, we were never friends? Don’t you remember—”

  “I remember the first time I spoke to you. The question is, do you?”

  His eyes narrowed, as if he sensed a trap. “Tell me.”

  “After I had been given the assignment to tutor you, I had to make an appointment with you to schedule our study times. The mere thought of talking to you... Seriously, you don’t know how it terrified me.” With a rocky laugh, Payton raked a hand through her hair. “There I was, the ugliest, most unpopular geek in school, maybe in Bitterthorn history, being forced to talk to the most popular boy. I’m surprised I didn’t throw up. Or faint. Or both.”

  “It didn’t seem that way to me.” A vertical line appeared between his brows, and she wanted to groan out loud when it made him appear poetic. Her frowns only made her look crabby. “No sooner had I heard I’d been assigned a tutor, there you were, wanting to talk about study schedules.”

  She fought a cringe as the painful memory welled up. “I’d decided to get it over with as soon as I saw you. Sort of a social version of ripping off a bandage.”

  “I had no idea it was so hard for you.”

  “It only got harder from there.”

  His frown sharpened. “What do you mean?”

  “The first time I saw you that day was in the cafeteria. You were surrounded by your usual entourage of admirers. Laurie Beeson was your girlfriend for that week. For some reason I remember she was sitting on your lap, sort of...bouncing all over the place.”

  Wiley snorted. “She did that.”

  “Yes, she did.” Laurie Beeson had always bounced, which no doubt explained her attraction for every male who had managed the momentous accomplishment of reaching puberty. “Watching her with you, I felt so scrawny and little-girlish. Inadequate. But I had a job
to do, and there was no way to get out of it. So even though I felt like a Christian facing a pride of lions, I stopped at your table.”

  Wiley’s eyes were half-closed, as if watching the memory. “How old were you then?”

  “Around thirteen.”

  “Lord, you were young. I never realized how young you were. You always seemed so much older.”

  “Maybe if I had been, I might have been able to cope with things better.” Then Payton shrugged. Maybes didn’t matter. “I’ll never forget how that table of your friends went dead silent, like I’d trespassed on hallowed ground or something. I said something like needing to talk to you about setting up a study schedule. You looked at me like I was a creature from Mars and said—”

  “Go away, Baby Brain, can’t you see I’m busy?” He looked at her and winced. “Right?”

  “Right.” Payton nodded, deflating with a sigh. “It was the unforgettable birth of the Baby Brain moniker that followed me for the rest of my high school life. I remember Laurie laughing in that shrill twitter of hers. In that moment, I honestly didn’t know who I wanted to murder more—you or her.”

  “Payton.” At a loss and clearly damned by his own memory, Wiley spread his hands wide. “I don’t know what to say. ‘I’m sorry’ doesn’t seem to cover it. I know it’s not an excuse, but I can tell you the reason for my behavior that day was nothing short of mortal embarrassment. I didn’t mean to be cruel to you.”

  “I get that you were embarrassed.” Pride had her lifting her chin, irritated now that she’d allowed him to see just how much that moment had added to her long-ago misery. “Who wouldn’t have been? Bitterthorn High’s official Queen Geek spoke to you in front of your cool friends. Talk about the social kiss of death.”

  “Wrong.” His heavy-lidded gaze slid over her, and the heat of it was so intense her skin tingled wherever they touched. “I was deathly embarrassed I needed help. It wasn’t exactly barrels of fun having everyone know I was too stupid to get through high school on my own.”

  “Wiley, you were ashamed to even know me, but that’s—”

  “Payton, I never thought I’d say this, but don’t be stupid. I’ll admit in the beginning I wasn’t all that eager to hang out with you, but that was before I got to know you.”

  She searched his face, wanting to believe it so much she shied away from it. “The only time we ever spoke, the only time you even acknowledged my presence, was during our study sessions away from school. Not once did you speak to me in public, Wiley. Not once.”

  “Every time I saw you at school, you had your head buried in some book.”

  “I was studying—”

  “You were avoiding me,” he shot back, dead-eye accurate. “You used to walk right by me without even looking at me and my—what did you call them? My dumb-jock friends. You never deigned to acknowledge my existence. And believe me, I looked for it.”

  “I didn’t think you wanted me to,” Payton said defensively. “Considering how our first meeting went, there was no way I was going to risk approaching you publicly again. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s learning a lesson and learning it well.”

  “Too well.” His tone was as dark as the night around them, and for some reason it made a shiver run up her spine. “Payton, I’ll be the first to admit I could have tried harder to connect with you outside of our study time, but trust me—the vibe you always gave off made you impossible to approach. What’s more, you were wrong about not wanting to approach me in public, if that’s even the truth. I wouldn’t have hurt you.”

  “What do you mean, if that’s the truth? Why else would I have avoided you?”

  “You made no secret that tutoring a dumb jock who couldn’t even get past algebra was beneath you. That I was beneath you.”

  Her jaw dropped. He couldn’t have shocked her more if he’d claimed he was the Tooth Fairy. “Wiley, the only time I ever called you that was when you refused to show everyone how intelligent you are. I used to wonder if you were afraid people would think you were becoming like your nerdy tutor.”

  “After a week of knowing you, I stopped thinking like that. And I wouldn’t let anyone else think that either. When that moron Lenny Deutsch—ah hell, never mind.” He tugged at his tie as if it were strangling him. “None of this matters now.”

  “Lenny Deutsch?” Payton searched her memory as the name sent up a red flag. “As I recall, you and he got into a fight or something, right?”

  “Or something.”

  “That Neanderthal broke your nose,” she announced with a snap of her fingers. “I never did get the full story of what happened, so I’m fuzzy on the details. But I clearly remember you were suspended for a week because of it.”

  “Your memory is scary good.”

  “I thought that was so unfair, you getting the suspension while that knuckle dragger remained in school. It’s not like you started the fight.”

  “I did, actually.”

  “What?” Stunned, Payton searched his face in the sodium-lit gloom for signs of humor. He was dead serious. “Why? Your philosophy has always been that of a lover, not a fighter.”

  “It is. Usually.”

  “But not then?” She tilted her head as she tried to unravel the mystery. “Help me understand this. You said you wouldn’t let anyone think badly of me. Did Lenny...” She paused, because the thought was so inconceivable she could barely put a voice to it. “Did he say something...about me...to make you angry enough to hit him?”

  “It was over a decade ago, Payton. It doesn’t matter.”

  “It matters to me.” She was shocked by how much. “He did, didn’t he, Wiley?”

  “Yeah.”

  It was a barely audible growl.

  “Oh.” Something clenched in her chest, and she lifted a hand to press against it. How could she not have known he’d defended her without a thought to his popular reputation? He’d had his perfect face rearranged—albeit for the better—because of her. Worse yet, she’d been so wrapped up in her own teenage misery it hadn’t even occurred to her to delve any deeper into the matter. Talk about self-centered. “Wiley...wow. Why would you do that? I wasn’t worth it.”

  “Don’t ever say that,” he shot back with surprising force. “I’d do it again in a heartbeat. Because whether you agree with me or not I considered you one of my closest friends, Payton. I always will.”

  “Then I’m incredibly lucky.” Not wanting to show how much he’d moved her with his twelve-year-old act of chivalry, she reached out to grasp his hand. “And now that I have a friend who’s a crack attorney, what are my chances for suing Laurie Beeson for emotional damages?”

  “The success you’ve made of yourself is revenge enough.” With the reluctant beginnings of a smile Wiley steered her toward his car. “Though, if you want to go back and kick her in the shins...”

  “I’m good, thanks. Oh, no,” she gasped as she reached for the Corvette’s door. “Wiley, someone’s keyed your car.”

  “Yeah.” He grimaced at the deep gouges in the otherwise glossy paintjob, before reaching around her to open the door for her. “That happened last week, followed by a good old-fashioned tire slashing day before yesterday. I’m being bedeviled by Bitterthorn’s version of a crime wave, and it’s eating up a lot of my leisure time.”

  “Are the police looking into it?”

  “Absolutely. It’s fine, Payton,” he assured her when she didn’t get into the car. “It’s just some kids having the wrong kind of fun. There’s nothing to worry about.”

  Chapter Three

  “I always wanted to come here when we were in school.” Dark eyes sparkling, Payton craned her neck to look beyond their high-backed padded booth situated at the front window of the fifties-style café, The Dirty Duck. “This was where all the cool kids hung out after school. If you could
walk in here and hang with your posse, it meant you were officially awesome.”

  “It hasn’t changed much.” Wiley sipped his coffee, not distracted by the bustling café with its horseshoe-shaped chrome counter, whirling black ceiling fans and a neon-lit jukebox, from which Doris Day crooned about her “Secret Love.” His focus remained on the woman opposite him, so familiar and yet so different.

  When had Payton gotten so damn sexy?

  Her sable hair caught the light to show warm golden highlights, and a flush of excitement outlined her sculpted cheekbones. Laughter lurked in her doe eyes and danced at the corners of her full-lipped mouth. It looked sweet, that mouth. Impossibly, irresistibly sweet.

  His sweet tooth was frigging killing him.

  “It’s fabulous.” Payton released a sigh of pleasure so profound Wiley had to grit his teeth against the instant heaviness in his loins. “I wonder if it’s still the place to hang out.”

  A little savagely he put his coffee mug down. “It is.”

  “Even better. I wouldn’t want to be seen in a place that wasn’t cool.” With a laugh, she poked her straw at the ice in her glass. “If I hadn’t already put down roots in Houston, I think I’d buy this place.”

  That surprised him enough to momentarily set aside feverish thoughts of tracing the pouting fullness of her lips with his tongue. “I thought your heart belonged to medicine.”

  “Oh, it does. I just wonder what my life would have been like if my path hadn’t been set so early.”

  “By your mother.” Wiley frowned when the light trickled from her expression. “I never was sure who wanted you to go to med school more—you or your mom.”

  “It was her dream at first. It became my own a long time ago.”

  “I remember when I met your mom. There I was, walking up to your front door for the first time, wanting to be anywhere but there. Suddenly there was Deborah on the front porch, arms crossed and looking like she was going to bar the door against me.”

  Payton’s eyes widened. “You’re kidding.”