He thrust the photos back at her, but she shook her head. “Keep them. I know this is a lot to take in. We need to talk and you need to meet Gabe. Assuming you want to.”
He nodded because he was too enraged to speak.
“My cell number is on the back of that first picture. Call me when you’re ready and we’ll set something up.” She hesitated. “I’m sorry about all of this. I wanted to talk to you before coming by but you weren’t available. I wasn’t trying to keep him from you. It’s just, you made it so clear how much you didn’t care.”
Then she turned away. He watched her go.
Something inside of him yelled that he needed to go after her, but he didn’t bother. She might run but she couldn’t hide. Not from him. Not now.
He closed the front door and started for his office. Electra glided into the hallway.
“Who was that? What did she want? You’re not seeing her, are you, Matt? She didn’t look like your type.”
He ignored her and walked into his study. After shutting the door, he crossed to his desk, where he sat down. He spread the pictures out and studied them one by one.
Electra pounded on the door, but didn’t open it. He heard something about her threatening to leave. He didn’t bother to respond.
He had a son. He’d had one for more than four years and he’d never known. Technically Jesse had tried to tell him the kid was his before she’d left Seattle, but she’d known he wouldn’t believe her. Not after what had happened. She’d done this on purpose.
He reached for his phone and dialed a number from memory. “Heath, it’s Matt. Do you have a minute?”
“Of course. We’re heading out on the boat, but I have time. What’s up?”
“I have a problem.”
He quickly explained that an old girlfriend had shown up unexpectedly with a four-year-old she claimed was his.
“The first thing we’ll need to do is establish paternity,” his lawyer told him. “What are the odds you’ll come back as the father?”
“He’s mine.” Matt stared at the pictures, hating Jesse more by the minute. How could she have kept this from him?
“So what do you want to do?” Heath asked.
“Hurt her in every way possible.”
CHAPTER TWO
Five years ago…
JESSE SIPPED HER LATTE as she read the want ads in the Seattle Times. Technically she wasn’t looking for a job. She wasn’t qualified for anything she wanted to do and nothing she was qualified for was better than her crummy shift at the bakery. So what was the point in changing?
“Someone needs to work on her attitude,” she murmured to herself, knowing feeling like a failure wasn’t going to help her situation. Nor was feeling trapped. But both seemed to loom large in her life.
It was her most recent fight with Nicole, she thought, even though fights with her sister were nothing new. Maybe it was her entire lack of direction. She was twenty-two. Shouldn’t she have goals? Plans? As it was, she just sort of drifted through her days, as if waiting for something to happen. If she’d stayed in college, she would have graduated by now. Instead, she’d lasted two weeks before dropping out.
She folded the paper, straightened in her seat and tried to inspire herself to some kind of action. She couldn’t keep drifting. It wasn’t healthy and it made her crabby.
She sipped on her latte and considered possibilities. Before she could decide on one, a guy walked into the Starbucks.
Jesse was a semi-regular and knew she hadn’t seen him before. He was tall and could have been kind of cute, but everything about him was off. The haircut was a disaster, his thick glasses screamed computer nerd. His short-sleeved plaid shirt was too big and-she nearly choked on her coffee-he had an honest-to-God pocket protector. Worse, his jeans were too short and he was wearing geeky tennis shoes with white socks. Poor guy-he looked like he’d been dressed by a mother who didn’t like him very much.
She was about to return to her paper when she saw him square his shoulders in a gesture that spoke of determination. Ordering coffee wasn’t that hard.
She turned in her seat and saw two women at a table against the far wall. They were young and beautiful-the kind of women who looked like models and probably dated rock stars. He couldn’t, she thought frantically. Not them. They weren’t just out of his league, they were on another plane of reality.
She’d never lived through the phrase “train wreck” before, but she did now. He walked toward them, his hands twitching slightly. His gaze seemed to zero in on the brunette on the left. Jesse knew it was going to be a catastrophe. She should probably leave and let him crash in private. But she couldn’t seem to get up and walk away, so she slumped down in her seat and braced herself for disaster.
“Uh, Angie? Hi. I’m, um, ah, Matthew. Matt. I saw you last week at the photo shoot on campus. I kinda ran into you.”
His voice was low and had the potential to be sexy, Jesse thought. If only he weren’t mumbling. He sounded so tentative.
Angie looked at him politely as he spoke but her friend grimaced in annoyance.
“At Microsoft, you mean?” Angie asked. “That was fun.”
“You were beautiful,” Matt muttered, “in the light and stuff and I was wondering if maybe you’d like to get coffee or something and it doesn’t have to be coffee even because we could, ah, go for a walk or ah, I don’t know-”
Breathe! Jesse willed him to pause and break his conversation into sentences. Amazingly enough, Angie actually smiled. Could the geek possibly get the girl?
But Matt didn’t notice because he kept on talking.
“Or do something else. If you have a hobby or you know, something with a pet, a dog, I guess, because I like dogs. Did you know that there are more cats as pets than dogs, which doesn’t make sense because who likes cats, right? I’m allergic and they don’t do anything but shed.”
Jesse winced as Angie’s expression hardened and her friend’s face began to crumple.
“What’s wrong with you?” Angie asked, standing and glaring at poor, quivering Matt. “My friend had to put her cat to sleep yesterday. How could you say something like that? I think you should leave us alone. Now!”
Matt stared at her, wide-eyed and totally confused. He opened his mouth, then closed it. His shoulders slumped in defeat and he walked out of the Starbucks.
Jesse watched him go. He’d been close to getting the girl, she thought sadly. If he hadn’t gone on about cats. Not that it was really his fault. What were the odds?
She looked out the front window and saw him standing just outside the door. He looked stunned, as if he didn’t know what had gone wrong. Points to Angie-she’d been willing to look past the sad exterior to the guy within. If only he’d stopped talking sooner. And dressed better. Basically, the guy needed a major overhaul.
As she watched, he slowly shook his head as if accepting defeat. She knew what he was thinking-that his life would never be different, that he would never get the girl. He was trapped-just like her. Only his problem was more easily solved.
Without having any idea what she was doing, Jesse jumped up, tossed her empty coffee container in the trash and went outside. She could see Matt walking up the street.
“Wait,” she called.
He didn’t turn around. Probably because it never occurred to him that she was talking to him.
“Matt, wait.”
He stopped and glanced over his shoulder, then frowned. She hurried toward him.
“Hi,” she said, still without a plan. “How are you?”
“Do I know you?”
“Not really. I just, ah-” Now it was her turn to stammer. “I saw what happened. Talk about a nightmare.”
He shoved both hands into his jeans and ducked his head. “Thanks for the recap,” he said and kept walking.
She went after him. “I didn’t mean it like that. Obviously you’re really bad with women.”
He flushed. “Nice assessment. Is this what you do? Follow p
eople around and point out their flaws? I’m clear on what’s wrong.”
“It’s not that. I can help.”
She had no idea where the words came from, but the second she spoke them, she knew they were true.
He barely slowed. “Go away.”
“No. Look, you have a lot of potential, but no clue. I’m a woman. I can tell you how to dress, what to say, what topics to avoid.”
He flinched. “I don’t think so.”
Suddenly this mattered. She wasn’t sure why, except maybe worrying about someone else’s problems was easier than thinking about her own. Besides, his life was fixable.
She remembered a segment she’d seen on the news a couple of weeks before. “I’m training to be a lifestyle coach. I need to practice on someone. You need help. And I won’t charge you for my time.” Mostly because she was totally making this up as she went. “I’ll teach you everything you need to know. You’ll get the girl.”
He stopped and looked at her. Even through the glasses she could see his eyes were large and dark. Bedroom eyes. Girls would go crazy for them, if they could see them.
“You’re lying,” he said flatly. “You’re not a lifestyle coach.”
“I said I was in training. I can still help. I know guys. I know what works. Look, you have no reason to believe me. But you also have nothing to lose.”
“What’s in it for you?”
She thought about the ongoing fights with her sister, the job she hated and the lack of direction in her life. She thought about how she spent every single day feeling like the biggest failure on the planet.
“I get to do something right,” she told him, speaking the truth.
He studied her for a long time. “Why should I trust you?”
“Because I’m the only one offering. What’s the worst that could happen?”
“You could drug me and ship me off to some country where my dead body will wash up on the beach.”
She laughed. “At least you have an imagination. That’s a good thing. Say yes, Matt. Take a chance on me.”
She wondered if he would. No one ever believed in her. Then he shrugged.
“What the hell.”
She grinned. “Great. Okay, first thing-” Her cell phone rang. “Sorry,” she murmured as she pulled it out of her purse. “Hello?”
“Hey, gorgeous. How are you?”
She wrinkled her nose. “Zeke, this isn’t a good time.”
“That’s not what you were saying last week. We had a great time. Sex with you is-”
“Gotta go,” she said and hung up, not wanting to hear what sex with her was like. She returned her attention to Matt. “Sorry about that. Where was I? Oh, yeah. The next step.”
She pulled her Starbucks receipt out of her back pocket, then took one of the pens sticking out of his pocket protector. After tearing the receipt in half, she wrote down her cell number on one piece and handed it to him.
He took it. “You’re giving me your number?”
“Yes. Changing you will be more challenging if we don’t get together. Now give me your number.”
He did.
She handed him back his pen. “Okay. I need a couple of days to get a plan together, then I’ll be in touch.” She smiled. “This is going to be great. Trust me.”
“Do I have a choice?”
“Yes, but pretend you don’t.”
JESSE DROPPED HER heavy backpack on a chair at a table and set down her latte. She and Matt had agreed to meet at yet another Starbucks to discuss her plan.
She pulled out her list and dug through the material she’d brought for a pen, then shifted impatiently as she waited for him to arrive.
She was early. She was never early. Even more unusual, she was actually enthused about her makeover project. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been excited about anything. Not that Matt had sounded that thrilled when she’d called to set up their meeting. Still, he’d agreed.
Five minutes later he walked into the Starbucks. He was dressed just as badly as he had been the first time she’d seen him. What was with the too-short jeans? And the pocket protector? They had to go first.
He waved at her and walked up to the counter to order. Her cell phone rang.
She grabbed it. “Hello?”
“Babe. Andrew. Tonight?”
“Andrew, has it ever occurred to you that things would go more smoothly in your day if you used verbs?” She looked up and smiled as Matt approached. “I’ll just be a sec,” she whispered.
“I don’t need verbs, babe. I got the goods. So we on or what? There’s a party. We go there, come back here. Everybody wins.”
Wow-almost an entire conversation. “Tempting, but no,” she said. For once she wasn’t in the mood for Andrew and “the goods,” as he referred to his penis. Which she supposed was slightly better than naming it Andrew Junior.
“Your loss.”
“I’m sure I’ll regret it for weeks. Bye.” She hung up. “Sorry. I’m officially turning off my phone. We won’t be interrupted again.”
Matt sat across from her. “Not your boyfriend?”
“Are you asking or telling?”
“The guy from before was Zeke. This one is Andrew.”
“You’re observant. An excellent quality. And no, neither one is my boyfriend. I don’t get serious like that.” What was the point? She’d never really found someone she wanted to keep seeing more than a few times.
“Interesting. Why is that?”
She stared into his dark eyes. “Don’t for a second think you can make me forget why we’re here by asking me about myself.”
He shrugged. “It was worth a try.”
“Uh-huh. Moving on. We have a lot of stuff to get through today.” She paused for effect. “I’ve come up with a plan.”
Matt sipped his drink and blinked at her.
She refused to let his lack of support slow her down. “First, I have a few questions. What do you do for a living? Something with computers?”
He nodded. “Programming. I work on games a lot. At Microsoft.”
“I figured. Do you have any hobbies?”
He thought for a second. “Computers and games.”
“Nothing else?”
“Movies, maybe.”
Which meant no, but he’d had to come up with something quick. “Have you seen How to Lose a Guy in Ten Days? It opened last week.”
He shook his head.
“Go see it,” she told him, then tapped the table in front of him. “You should be taking notes. You’re going to have homework.”
“What?”
“You have a lot to learn. It’s going to take effort on your part. Are you in or out?”
He hesitated for a moment. “In,” he said, although he didn’t sound very excited about the prospect.
She passed him a couple of pieces of paper. He dutifully wrote down the movie title.
“We’ll deal with your apartment later. Today I want to talk about cultural references and your wardrobe.”
“I don’t have an apartment.”
She blinked at him. “Excuse me?”
“I live at home. With my mom.” He pushed up his glasses. “Before you say anything, it’s a really nice house. A lot of guys live at home. It’s convenient.”
Oh, my. The situation was worse than she thought. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-four.”
“It’s probably time to fly free. What’s the point in getting the girl if you don’t have anywhere to take her?” She made a note. “Like I said, that’s for the advanced half of the class.”
“Where do you live?”
Jesse stared at him, then started to laugh. “With my sister.”
He looked smug. “See?”
“I’m not a guy.”
“So?”
“Point taken. But you have to move out first.” She dug into her backpack and pulled out a stack of magazines. “People is weekly. Subscribe. Cosmo and Car and Driver are monthly. So i
s In Style. Read them. There will be a quiz.”
He grimaced. “These are girl magazines, except for the car one and I’m not into cars.”
“These are cultural textbooks. In Style has a great section on guys who dress well. There are also lots of pictures of pretty women. You’ll like that. People will keep you up to date on celebrity news, which you may not care about but at least you’ll recognize a few of the names people are talking about. The car magazine is to make you well-rounded and Cosmo is every twenty-something woman’s companion. Think of it as the enemy’s playbook.” She pushed the magazines toward him.
“Next,” she continued. “Television.”
“I don’t watch much.”
“You’re going to start watching American Idol and Gilmore Girls. You can find old episodes of Gilmore Girls on the Family Channel every day. Record them to watch when you’re free. That’s going to teach you how to talk to a woman, or at least how women fantasize that men will talk to them. It’s fast, it’s funny, it has lots of insight. American Idol is the most popular show on television. Get involved. Discuss it with coworkers.”
“You can’t learn how to talk to women by watching television,” Matt told her.
“How do you know? Have you tried?”
“No.”
“Okay, then.” She scanned her list. “Next. We’re going out to dinner. I want you to call and ask me out on a date, over and over again. Sometimes I’ll say yes and sometimes I’ll say no. We’re going to do that every day for a couple of weeks, until you’re comfortable with the process. Next up, shopping. You have got to get some new clothes.”
He glanced down at himself. “What’s wrong with my clothes?”
“How much time do you have? Don’t worry. It’s all fixable. I’m actually more concerned about the glasses.”
He scowled. “I can’t wear contacts.”
“Have you thought about LASIK surgery?”
“No.”
“Check it out online. You have great eyes. It would be nice if we could see them. So what do you think about the Mariners’ chances this season?”
He looked blank. “That’s baseball, right?”
She groaned. “Yes. Follow the team this season. Add it to your homework assignment.”
Sweet Trouble Page 2