Surprise Me...

“You know, Chicago?”

Chicago? Was that her code word for what they’d done? So they could talk about it in the office and no one would guess? Very odd. She was not acting the way he expected. “It was…God, Melanie, it was fabulous. The best night of my life.”

“Wow. That’s…wow. Great.” She tipped her head, looking a little surprised. “What made it so great?”

“Uh…” He was not really sure he liked this game. “The sights. The, um, sensations. And really, most of all the. emotions. More than I’ve ever felt in…Chicago.”

“Oh. Well. I’m glad you had fun.” Her eyes narrowed. He’d said something wrong. She’d blindsided him with all this coded talk; he was hopelessly confused. And hopelessly in love with her.

What else was new?

“Edgar.” She leaned closer to whisper, her shy smile so sweet he could barely keep from kissing her. Last night those lips had belonged to him. He still couldn’t get over it. He probably never would. “I had a fabulous night, too.”

His heart rose like a rocket, the hope almost as painful as the countless rejections. “Yeah?”

“Mmm, yeah.”

Oh, dear God. He was getting hard again, not the best place or time. But this was everything he’d hoped for. Melanie, acknowledging what went on between them, admitting she enjoyed it. “You had a good time, huh?”

“Ohh, yes.” She blushed. “You know what I mean, right?”

“I do.”

Her smile turned a little anxious. “I hope it’s okay with you.”

“It’s more than okay, Melanie.” He was whispering, too; his passion for her made voice impossible. “It’s what I’ve dreamed of for the last two years.”

Her shy smile froze. She looked as if she’d eaten something rotten. “Uh…really?”

Crap. Crap. He’d gone too far. He had to remember whom he was talking to. That she wasn’t in the same emotional place he was. That letting herself be so open to him was undoubtedly a new and frightening experience. If he pushed too hard now, this soon after the breakthrough, she could bolt.

“Okay, not everything I’ve dreamed of.” His laugh came out goofy and strained.

She didn’t seem to mind. In fact, her face relaxed and she laughed, too, considerably more musically than he had.

“Well, I’m glad you approve. I wouldn’t want anything to upset our friendship, Edgar.”

His heart sank. Lower than he thought possible. Friendship?

No way. No effing way. What went on between them last night was not friendship no matter what she wanted to tell herself this morning. It was not friends with benefits, it was not getting their rocks off just for the hell of it. What they had last night was everything sex with love should be. And if she blew it off like it was another romp in the hay, he was going to check himself into a psychiatric hospital. Or have her committed.

“I think we’re talking a hell of a lot more than friendship, Melanie.” His voice actually came out with strength.

“Whah?” She looked bewildered.

“Last night. It was not about friendship.”

“Oh, no.” Her face cleared. “No, Stoner and I aren’t friends, not the way you and I are. Nor will we ever be, I’m sure. Don’t worry.”

He gaped at her. “Why would I worry whether you’re friends with Stoner?”

She gaped back. “I mean, after I was with him last night.”

Last night? With Stoner?

No, no, wait, Stoner had mentioned he’d bumped into her. “You mean when you saw him in the bar?”

“Ed-gar.” She rolled her eyes. “What is with you this morning? No, not in the bar, afterward, in your bedroom.”

“What does that have to do with Sto—” The rest of his brother’s name refused to leave his lips. This morning Stoner had said a planned late-night date with Melanie hadn’t worked out. Melanie had been worrying that sex with his brother would affect her friendship with Edgar. Her ugly, dorky buddy, Edgar.

“Excuse me.” He got up, staggered across the room, nearly knocking down his boss, coming out of his office.

Todd looked concerned. “Edgar? Something wrong?”

Yes! Everything! “No. Nothing. I’m fine.” Suicidal, maybe, but nothing serious.

Luckily, there was no one in the men’s room. He made a beeline for a stall, horribly afraid he was going to be sick.

Melanie had thought she was screwing Stoner last night. She didn’t know she’d been making love to him. All that passion, all that emotion, all that sweetness between them.

A dream after all.

He wanted to puke even if his body wasn’t ready to. Melanie hadn’t come to him; there was no miracle there. Of course not. She’d come to his brother, the sex god, the hot masculine jerk without a shred of depth, without much intelligence, without room in his monstrous head to care about anyone but himself.

Melanie’s type all over. What had Edgar been thinking? How could he even have imagined she’d crawl into bed with him?

Stoner had bumped into her at the bar, invited her up to Edgar’s room, Edgar’s bed, knowing Edgar would be sleeping on the couch so as not to inconvenience his brother.

Chicago? That would be Stoner’s invention. Which helped only a little, knowing at least Melanie hadn’t come into his apartment expecting to step over Edgar on the sofa bed and then screw his brother’s brains out a few feet away.

He leaned back against the partition, making himself breathe slowly and carefully until the urge to lose his breakfast subsided. This was worse than when he’d introduced Melanie to his jewelry-artist downstairs neighbor, Sledge, in order to buy her one of his pieces. Sledge repaid him by hitting on Melanie and then telling Edgar all about it. This was much worse. His own damn brother, who had everything Edgar didn’t—except brains and integrity, which didn’t count for enough in this world.

Edgar had grown up invisible to women, one of those kids fawned over by adults, a “good worker,” a “great help to his parents,” a “responsible citizen,” while his mess of a brother was like a bug zapper for the female sex. One after another, drawn to his light and his high voltage, zap, zap, zap, they went up in blue smoke one after another, the destruction of so many not slowing the lineup at all. While “responsible citizen” Edgar sat on the sidelines in awed misery.

This time it was his heart that got busted, not his ego.

Zap.

He turned to the wall, took a few more deep breaths; the cold metal felt good against his forehead. Solid. Impartial. Calming.

Okay, Edgar. Deal with facts. Fact: Melanie hadn’t known in the dark that he was himself. Fact: they’d had incredible sex. Fact: she’d left in the middle of the night, which he happened to know she didn’t usually do, because generally she was hopeful the relationship would continue and she wanted to be around in daylight. So something had been different last night for her.

That was good. He’d concentrate on that. Regardless of whom she’d thought he was, she’d experienced emotion so intense she’d ducked out rather than face it. Which meant that on some level, however subconscious, she had feelings for him. Only she didn’t know it yet.

Therefore, logically, all Edgar had to do was go out there and tell her she’d been with him last night. Make sure she knew he was an innocent party in this, explain the bed mix-up. She’d be shocked at first, but then her wheels would start turning, she’d remember what it had been like with him, Edgar, and she’d come around. She’d realize—she had to realize—that they were meant to be together. And once she realized that.

There would be nothing stopping them.