Her Convenient Christmas Date

“Precisely.” The rush of someone understanding made Lewis want to grab her hands and squeeze them. “Telling them isn’t enough. They need tangible evidence that I am not the same person. That’s where you come in.” Taking a chance, he reached over and laid his hand on her forearm.

In a flash, her hands stilled. Lewis felt the muscles in her arm tense. Slowly—very slowly—her gaze rose to meet his. “How so?”

Before he could answer, their waiter returned. As the man placed her drinks on the table, his eyes flickered to Susan’s arm, which she quickly pulled away. Lewis tried not to smile. “Are you ready to order?” the waiter asked.

So eager had he been to discuss business, neither of them had had a chance to look at the menu. “Not—”

“I’ll have the egg-and-avocado sandwich,” Susan announced. “Is that all right? Or do you need to change my order?”

Man, but she had a bite to her. And here he’d thought last night’s sharpness was from the alcohol. “Sounds perfect. In fact, I’ll have the same. You’re very decisive, for a woman who didn’t have time to study the menu,” he said once the waiter had moved on.”

“I read the item at the top of the page and decided it sounded good. I’m not much for hemming and hawing when there’s a decision to be made.”

“You don’t like to waste your time.”

“Not if I can help it.” She swished her celery-stalk garnish around in the glass and took a crisp bite off its end. “Bringing me back to my question. What are you looking for from me?”

Lewis placed his hands on the table. He thought about covering her arm again, but that might look too forward. This was where actions and word choice mattered. “You might think I’m crazy, but I got the idea from Lorianne’s site. Until now, I’ve been staying out of the public eye, hoping people would realize I’d given up the party life, but it hasn’t been working. People only believe what they see.”

“Or think they see,” she added.

She caught on quick. “Precisely. This morning, I read Lorianne’s ‘Blind Item,’ and I realized I had things backward. Instead of being out of the public eye, I need to do the opposite. I need to be seen as much as possible, only, in the way I want to be seen.”

“In other words, you want to create a new tabloid persona. Makes sense. Although I’m not sure where I come in.”

“Well…” This was where the proposition got tricky. “I was hoping you’d be my partner in crime,” he said. “Nothing says changed man like a relationship with someone completely against type. A woman who is the total opposite of all the other women I’ve ever dated. You.”

Susan stared at him, drink hovering just below her lower lip. “Are you trying to get another drink tossed in your face?”

“Wait.” She’d set her drink down and was gathering her things. “Hear me out.”

“I already heard you. You spent your sporting career dating beautiful women. Now, to prove you’ve changed, you want to date someone who isn’t beautiful and that someone is me.”

“That’s not what I meant at all.”

“Really?” She cocked her head. “What did I miss?”

“Yes, I dated a lot of beautiful women, but…” He threw up his hands in case the noise she’d made was the precursor to a drink toss. “They were just good-time girls.”

“The kind of girls whose name you forget.”

“Right. I mean, no. You should never, ever forget a lover’s name.” He could almost hear the thin ice cracking beneath him with each sentence. So much for making sure his words mattered.

“You’re smart,” he rushed on. “You own a respected business. Doesn’t Collier’s Soap have the queen’s blessing?”

“We have a Royal Warrant, yes.”

“See? You’re someone society takes seriously. No one would expect to see you involved with a party boy like me. So if you were involved…”

“They would assume you must not be the empty-headed wild man anymore.”

Forgetting about overstepping, he clasped her hand in his. “That’s it exactly.”

Her fingers were cold and damp from her glass. Lewis pressed his hands tight to warm them. “And it’s not as though you’re unattractive,” he added.

She didn’t smile. So much for humor. He was mucking this up big-time. “Look, you’re smart. You’re cute.” Cute wasn’t the right word, he realized. She radiated too much class and intelligence to be labeled merely cute. Sophisticated? Maybe. Different?

Yeah, different. Unique.

“Bottom line is, I need your help, if I’m to have any chance of getting a network job,” he said. “Lorianne has already marked us as a potential couple. It would take a while to find another woman as qualified.” Not to mention one whose company he enjoyed as much as he did Susan’s, surprisingly.

“Why is being a broadcaster so important?” she asked. “Surely there are other jobs out there?”

“Because I think I’d be good at it. No, I know I’d be good at it,” he told her. There was more though. “Besides, football is the only thing I’ve ever known. I’m not ready to leave it behind.”

The field and the fans had been the only real home he’d ever had. Without them, all he’d have would be a handful of hazy memories of the glory days. He wasn’t ready to be kicked to the curb, unwanted, again. To go back to being nobody.

He blinked. Susan was frowning at him from over her drink.

“Were you even listening?” she asked.

“Sorry. I drifted off for a moment.”

“Obviously.” She took a long sip of her drink, which, Lewis noticed, was about a third gone. “You said on the phone this proposition would be mutually beneficial. You explained what you would get out of this ‘arrangement,’ but what’s in it for me?”

“Simple,” he replied. “You get seen with me.”

Thank goodness she’d swallowed before he spoke or she would have spit tomato juice all over the table. “You’re joking. That’s your idea of mutually beneficial?”

He leaned back against the bench, his arms stretched out along the back. “You disagree?”

Talk about ego. Like he was such a prize.

She took in his chiseled features—far more prominent in the light of day—and the way his cashmere sweater pulled across his equally chiseled torso.

Okay, he was a prize.

Still, did he think her so desperate she needed a fake boyfriend?

Aren’t you? She ignored her own question.

“I think you have an extremely high opinion of your appeal.” She paused to sip her drink. Much as she hated to admit it, the combination of tomato juice and vodka was easing her hangover. The tension in her shoulders and neck were lessening with each sip. “Why would I care whether I was seen in public with you?”

“To quote… ‘my own brother didn’t want to be my date.’”

“When did I say that?” It was true, but she couldn’t see herself sharing the information.

“While we were waiting for the car.”