Surprise Partners

“I just had another frustrating conversation with Heather. I swear this Valentine’s Day fever is warping her mind. She’s determined to set me up with a date for a hospital fund-raiser she and her fiancé are attending next weekend.”

“Is it a dance and silent auction for the new neonatal wing, by any chance?”

“Yes, that’s the one. Are you going?”

“A couple of my sister’s paintings are being auctioned. She wants me to be there—and she just happens to know a great guy to escort me,” she added with a scowl.

“From what you said when you answered the phone, I assume you’re planning to decline?”

Forgetting for the moment that he couldn’t see her, she nodded. “I have no interest in going to a party with a man my sister has chosen for me.”

“And I’m not interested in spending an evening with one of Heather’s overeager friends.”

She thought that problem was easy enough to solve. “So tell her no.”

“I have. She’s determined. She knows I’m sort of committed to attending—I have a lot of friends in the medical community. She’s threatened to tell every unattached woman there that I’m available—and looking for a mate.”

Lydia smiled ruefully. “She really is terrifying, isn’t she?”

“She’s impossible.”

“So why don’t you take a date of your own choice to the event?” she asked simply.

“That’s exactly what I have in mind. How would you like to go to the charity thing with me, Lydia?”

She blinked, certain she must have misunderstood him. “I’m sorry, but did you just ask me to go with you?”

“Yes. It’s the perfect solution. We’re friends who aren’t interested in anything more at the moment. Going together will be pleasant, uncomplicated—and it will get our sisters off our backs.”

It didn’t sound at all like the perfect solution to her. She and Scott were hardly friends—more like friendly acquaintances. They didn’t actually know each other very well. “I don’t know, Scott….”

“Think about it. Is Larissa going to give up without a fight?”

Her mouth twisted. “I’m not actually expecting a fight. But she will argue.”

“And when she doesn’t get her way, will she sigh and pout and make you feel guilty for not appreciating her sincere concern for you?”

Lydia couldn’t help laughing a little at his uncannily accurate prediction. “Something like that.”

“So wouldn’t it be easier to go with me than to argue with her about the blind date she wants to arrange for you?”

“I wasn’t planning to go at all.” She ran a hand through her hair. “I’m really not very good at parties, Scott. Like most scientists, I’m more comfortable with a laboratory beaker than a champagne glass in my hand.”

“And I’d rather be addressing a jury than making small talk with strangers. But since I have to go anyway, I would enjoy spending the evening with you.”

It wasn’t the most flattering invitation she had ever received—but it was among the most honest. Lydia found that vaguely refreshing. “I’m not a very good dancer,” she warned him.

“We’ll try not to injure each other.”

“And you’ll cover for me if I get all awkward and tongue-tied in front of your friends?”

“Gladly—if you’ll protect me from your scary sister.”

She laughed again. “She isn’t really scary. Just…obstinate.”

“So you’ll go?”

She imagined the satisfaction she would feel upon telling Larissa that she already had an escort for the event. The image gave her the nerve to blurt out, “Yes. I believe I will.”

“Thanks, Lydia. For the first time, I can actually look forward to this thing.”

She wouldn’t go quite that far, but she would much rather spend the evening with Scott, a man she already knew and liked, than with Larissa’s fix-up, whoever he was.

Lydia sat for a while on the side of the bed after hanging up the phone, thinking about what she’d just done. It seemed that she had a date, of sorts, with Scott Pearson. She couldn’t say the possibility had never occurred to her during the past few months, but she hadn’t really expected it to happen.

It wasn’t that she didn’t find Scott attractive. What woman wouldn’t? He was good-looking, charming, personable, impeccably mannered. He could have stepped straight out of the pages of the romance novels she enjoyed reading for relaxation after long, hard days in the lab and classroom—and she had pictured him more than once lately as the hero of those stories, with herself as the heroine. But she had considered that a harmless fantasy with little chance of becoming reality since he’d given her no reason to believe he was interested in anything more than her passing knowledge of forensic DNA.

He’d flirted some, but not seriously, making her think it was more habit than intent on his part. She’d even felt comfortable flirting back a little although she’d never been very good at that particular art. Yet this was the first time he had asked her for a real date, even as casually worded as this invitation had been.

Though she wasn’t the type to weave romantic fantasies for herself, she knew she’d better be very careful when it came to Scott Pearson. She hadn’t had enough experience with men like him. She simply didn’t have time, not even for a man as intriguing as Scott Pearson.

“So who is this guy? Why haven’t you mentioned him before?”

Lydia examined a long silver dress on a hanger, then shook her head and moved to the next selection in the boutique she and her sister were visiting. “I told you, Larissa. His name is Scott Pearson and he’s an attorney who lives in my apartment building. I haven’t known him very long, so there really hasn’t been anything to mention.”

“An attorney?” Larissa uttered the word with a curled lip.

“I know you don’t care for the profession, but Scott’s a very nice man. He seems quite reputable.”

“How old is he?”

A bit surprised by the question, Lydia looked away from the dress racks to glance at her sister. “I don’t know. I haven’t asked him. About my age, I guess. Why?”

“I just want to know more about him. You’re being very mysterious.”

“You’ll meet him for yourself Saturday evening. I’m really not trying to be mysterious. I just don’t know what else to tell you about him.”

“Well, at least tell me if he’s good-looking.”

Lydia pictured Scott very clearly—his dark auburn hair, glittering green eyes, the long, disarming slash of dimple in his left cheek when he gave her one of his slow, sexy smiles. “Yes,” she said, keeping her voice casual. “He’s very nice-looking.”

Larissa apparently read more into Lydia’s tone than she had intended. “Really?” Her expression turned speculative.

“I just need something appropriate to wear for the occasion,” Lydia said repressively. “I’m not trying to impress Scott particularly.”

Larissa held up a scrap of iridescent red fabric that would cover very little more than the law required. “Why don’t you try this on?”

“You must be joking.”