Dating and Other Dangers

‘Pardon?’

‘You and I are going to go out on three dates. You’re the judge, jury and the executioner, right? So judge me on the facts. I’ll prove to you that what’s up on your site is untrue.’

She laughed—only one note lower than hysterical. It was preposterous. ‘I’m not dating you.’

‘It’s that or call your lawyers.’ His gaze coasted over her again, assessing in the most base way. ‘Got lots of money for lawyers, Nadia? No, of course you don’t. Otherwise why would you be working as a lowly HR assistant?’

‘The users of my forum sign a waiver.’ She tried to recover her ground. ‘I can’t be held responsible for what they put up there.’

‘It’s so convenient for you to hide behind that rule, isn’t it? I think it could be due for a test in court, though.’ He smiled sympathetically. ‘And it’ll take months. All that time off work … Everyone here at work is going to know, Nadia. And your family, friends.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘They don’t know either, do they?’ He went for the kill. ‘You’re going to need good lawyers for a long and expensive time, honey.’

‘You’re willing to waste that money yourself?’ Her stomach churned. He couldn’t be serious. Surely he wouldn’t do that?

‘I don’t think it is a waste. Anyway, I am a lawyer, I can represent myself.’

Of course he was a lawyer. He was every inch an aggressive, adversarial jerk. Well, he wasn’t going to intimidate her. She swallowed back the bile burning its way up her throat. ‘I’m not taking your thread down. It’s freedom of speech.’

‘Actually, I don’t want you to take it down,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Let’s face it, once things are out there on the web they’re out there for ever. What I want is a retraction.’

‘Then you need to contact the woman you slimed, not me.’ He didn’t need to involve her at all. Three dates? It was ridiculous.

‘They’re anonymous—I don’t know who they are.’

They? Oh, how very nice. ‘And you can’t figure it out because there are so many possibilities?’ She widened her eyes in fake surprise. ‘Be honest.’ She snapped into attack mode. ‘What you really want is a suck-up piece, going on about how fabulous you are in bed.’

‘You’re offering to sleep with me so you can report with accuracy?’

Her face went hot. So did every other part of her body.

‘I don’t need your approval to know my worth as a lover, Nadia. What I want is an acknowledgement that sometimes people put things up there with a warped perspective. Although what I really want is for you to pull the plug on this poisonous swamp of bitterness altogether.’

‘That’s not going to happen.’

‘Being a bitch is that important to you?’

She shrugged. ‘If warning other women about jerks who want to use them makes me a bitch, then I’m happy to be considered one. For a long time.’

‘So how do you know what they put up is accurate?’

‘Why would anyone lie?’ It was simple. ‘I’ve already told you these aren’t women with a vendetta. These are women who’ve been hurt really badly.’

‘Women like you?’

She froze for a nano-second. ‘It isn’t personal for me.’

‘Like hell it isn’t.’

Grimly, she hid her fists beneath the desk and tried to think of a way out. But she was backed into a corner and she knew it. ‘Okay, then. You want three dates? Fine. But we go Dutch.’

He winced theatrically, but that didn’t hide the satisfaction in his eyes. ‘Yeah, you would be that crass.’

‘I wouldn’t want to feel I owed you anything, Mr Rush. Or that you expected anything from me because you bought me an expensive dinner.’

‘Actually, I’m expecting quite a lot from you Nadia.’ He smiled with genuine amusement. ‘And call me Ethan.’

She stood up and walked to the door, because if she didn’t her anger was going to burst out utterly inappropriately. He stood too. She saw him take in her height and glance down to register the height of her heels. She just knew he was mentally calculating the difference if the shoes were off.

‘Very dangerous things come in small packages,’ she said tightly.

He grinned—the patronising, “amused by the little girl” grin that she’d seen way too many times in her life.

‘So do very precious things,’ he countered softly.

She didn’t see him the rest of the way out. Couldn’t. The wave of heat all but blinded her. Half fury, half something else altogether. Oh, yes, he deserved to be on WomanBWarned, even if he wasn’t a bona fide candidate. He’d trample hearts without any effort whatsoever.

But not hers. Never, ever hers.

CHAPTER TWO

WomanBWarned

Top tips for surviving the dating jungle. What not to do on your first date …

Don’t drink—at least not much. Alcohol impairs judgment and you want to make safe, sensible decisions.

Don’t be too sexual—if it’s a possible relationship you want, not a one night hook-up, then keep a little mystery. You want to be taken seriously.

Don’t go on and on about your ex(es) or your ailments or how awful your boss is. Negativity is a downer.

Don’t go to the movies—it’s a cop-out. You want to get to know the person, not sit next to them in silence for two hours.

Don’t try too hard—just relax and be yourself.

ETHAN sprawled on the sofa in his apartment and laughed as he read, his laptop balanced his stomach. Oh, boy! OlderNWiser—the online pseudonym for one Nadia Keenan—really had her rules, didn’t she? There were a ton of little blog bits on her site, giving tips for this and that in the dating realm. As if she was some kind of expert.

He so didn’t think so.

The woman needed a lesson or fifty from a true master. And he knew just how he was going to do it—by taking over her own turf, of course. Fighting fire with fire and all that. Because anyone could set up a blog, right? And fortunately he was partner at a firm that didn’t have uptight HR princesses like Nadia Keenan. His firm believed in treating adults like adults, and didn’t care about what personal things employees decided to put up on the internet. There were no draconian, moralistic guidelines attempting to govern their workers’ private lives. So long as it wasn’t work-related, and didn’t impact negatively on the business, they weren’t interested. If the people he did deals with stumbled across it they’d most likely laugh and cheer him on. They were human, with senses of humour.

Yeah, it wasn’t because of his work that he was bothered by her reputation-shredding website. For him, it was the core injustice of having to prove innocence instead of guilt. That violation of a fundamental legal principle. Okay, there was an element of the personal too. They’d picked on the wrong Rush. Ethan didn’t deserve to be slated—it was his father who was the jerk. And Ethan refused to be anything like his father—not fickle, not deceitful, not hurtful. Ethan might play, but he was up-front and honest about it, and always nice to the women whose company he enjoyed. Mind you, he didn’t feel like being nice to Nadia Keenan.

He logged onto one of the major blogging sites and thought for a second about a title.

GuysGetWise?

Fantastic—not registered, and his to use.

And his tagline?