Looks are Deceiving

by Michele Hart

  Elissa frowned. “I hope I don’t disappoint you.”

  He shook his head to the possibility of that. “You’ve already surpassed my hopes.”

  They shared little smiles, hers cutely embarrassed.

  “What do you do?” she asked curiously, turning the table on questions. “Other than placing four-digit money on childish challenges?”

  “Well, childish challenges do take up a lot of my time, but when I’m free of that, I manage a family business that’s expanding and franchising right now. Lots of paperwork. Lots of business meetings with potential investors, market research, et cetera, ad nauseam.”

  “Doesn’t sound fun.”

  “Not as fun as looking at the stars, I’m guessing.”

  She seemed to glow.

  He grimaced when he had to say, “I wish I didn’t have to chase you off, Elissa, but the guys could walk in at any time. We both must be gone before they walk through the door.”

  Her smile dove into a frown, which made him very happy to see she might not be so eager to say good night.

  “I’d rather sit right here and talk with you all night,” he assured her, and the corners of her mouth perked, despite her fight to hold them back. “But if we plan to squeeze a grand out of the slugs, they can’t see you ... looking like that.”

  A new blush chased over her, pinking her cheeks in the most attractive way. Even her disappointed smirk was cute. “Yeah, I looked a bit rougher when they plucked me from the supermarket aisle. So you’re ripping me out of dinner, too. I should’ve felt it coming. Now that I see the kind of bozos who hang out at the Cash-n-Save, I’ll be switching supermarkets.”

  He did feel bad about cheating her out of dinner. “Take joy in knowing Allen’s bummed out because he thinks we’re hopping in the sack tonight. I promise to make it up to you.”

  She pretended a longsuffering hum. “The quick sex or dinner?”

  What luck to receive such an opening. “How about both?”

  “Just the dinner,” she replied, a playful gleam in her expression.

  The appetizers arrived packed to go, and he presented them to her.

  “That was considerate of you,” she said, at the discovery that he meant her to take the food home. “To make sure I’m fed.”

  He felt gratitude that she might possibly forgive him for such a mess. “I hated to rip you out of dinner tonight. At least this way I know you ate good food. What if I bring you to dinner here another night? This place has the finest cheesecake on Earth.”

  “Cheesecake....” Elissa made the most delightful yummy noise, causing her bosom rise and fall behind wavy tendrils of her paprika-red hair, candy for his eyes. He’d have to keep making her do that, somehow.

  “You bring cheesecake to mind,” he commented to her, unable to hold the compliment back. He was a bit sad to discover the restaurant’s most private booth kept him too far from her to smell her perfume.

  “Cheesecake’s proof there’s a God, and She wants us to be happy. I suppose I could put up with dinner and you here, if cheesecake’s involved,” she replied, a small invitation in her eyes. She reached into her purse, retrieved a business card, and wrote her phone number on the back side. Greg snagged the restaurant’s business card from the check folder left for his signature, and he quickly scribbled down his cell phone number. “I’ll call you tomorrow afternoon for directions to pick you up.”

  She took a final slurp of her drink, then stood and confiscated her tiny purse. “I’m going home to my ketchup.”

  “This ketchup connection is provocative.”

  Greg took to his feet and picked up the boxes of food to carry them for her. “I’ll walk you out. I need to leave as well if we’re sleeping together tonight.”

  “Wow, I’m easy.”

  Pacing up to a dark blue Volkswagen Bug, he set the boxes on the top of the car she’d already unlocked with her remote, and he opened her door for her.

  The paprika goddess of the stars stepped to the driver’s seat. “It’s been a weird night.”

  “A surprising one, for sure.”

  Amused, she sat in the seat sideways, probably unintentionally allowing him a long appreciation for her legs as she shuffled girl-stuff around the passenger seat to make room for the take-out, and Greg passed her the boxes of food. Elissa flashed entertained eyes and an adorable smile. “Hope it’s good for both of us.”

  The site of her long, beautifully shaped legs caused a brain scramble. “What is?” he asked.

  “The quick sex we’re having tonight. Don’t forget the bags. Two.”

  Greg belted out a hardy laugh, as he watched her start the car and leave the parking lot. He stood there until her little blue putt-putt car was out of sight.

  Damn, he’d lied to her already. He had three hundred dollars in his wallet. He even could’ve paid her from the restaurant’s cash register and sent her home, never to see her again, then leaned on Derek, Allen, and Jerry for the payback for their smart-ass manipulations.

  That didn’t sound nearly as much fun as hauling Elissa everywhere he could for the next month, pretending to be in love. Oh, the liberties coming to mind.

  It was bad timing. Greg had haunted the state police for over a year until they’d reopened the investigation and set up an opportunity for his father’s murderer to throw some clues. He had to make sure the case remained separated from the family. Luckily he didn’t expect any action from the case for at least a few weeks, if any action at all.

  As for his day job, it was high-pressure time right now, considering the upcoming Bay Cook-off, stock vote, and franchise arrangements. The last thing he had time in his life for was a woman. Her smile was etched into his brain forever now.

  As much as he needed to allow Elissa to slip through his fingers, he still couldn’t let her walk away yet. Something about her stole his mind.

  Well, not just something but a full list. Soft, expressive features enchanting him. Sweet blue eyes sparkling. Gorgeous paprika tresses he wished to see spread over his pillow. Her lean body, long legs. Her sharp mind and wit.

  What about this woman was wrong to want? If he worked it right, they’d have some fun fooling his friends, maybe some fun fooling around. It was a month’s entertainment with something pretty to look at, if nothing else.

  Elissa was just his kind of entertainment.

  Chapter 3

  “So, who is this guy?” Penny asked, as she flopped down onto the couch and threw her legs atop Elissa’s sixties vintage table. Her neighbor’s five pound Maltese, Smoochy, hopped up and settled upon her lap in front of the TV. A news story of Mid-East turmoil sounded through the apartment, guns and missiles blazing.

  Penny lifted the remote to turn the channel, and Elissa slipped her earrings into ear lobes, and shrieked, “Wait! Let the news play until I leave.”

  “How can you watch so much news? It’s depressing.” Not at all cursed with shyness, her neighbor dipped into the candy bowl for a fist of licorice candies.

  “I’m addicted. Everyone has an addiction, you know. Gambling, politics, chocolate, love. Licorice candies.”

  Penny sent a hand to her heart. “Ouch! Got me.”

  “Besides, you know it’s my job to know what’s happening in the world.”

  “Oh, yes,” her neighbor recalled. “You want to save the world. So, who’s this guy taking you out?”

  A bit frazzled, Elissa paced, forgot what she was doing, went back to the couch, recalled what she’d been doing, then went back to the closet for her white purse as she listened to the news broadcast move on to a fluffy Hollywood report.

  She couldn’t think straight.

  Elissa had dreamt last night of walking along the beach, the sound of Greg’s deep voice drifting by her in the wind. She couldn’t make out his words, but she imagined the lazy breeze caressing her felt like his breath. She recalled watching the sluggish incoming waves wash the dirt from her feet and feeling his presence with her as though he might’ve been thinkin
g of her, wherever he was.

  Today, all day, she’d thought of little but laying eyes on Greg again, to her distress. She’d achieved nearly nothing in the last twenty-four hours in the way of study, disappointing herself terribly. The closer this night came, the more Elissa thought of him. She just couldn’t shake her mind free to focus on anything else.

  More so than she’d felt for any man in a very long time, she was hungry with curiosity for him against her will, and she hoped a little time with him would feed the curiosity, then she could return to her goals.

  Greg felt like chaos in her ordered world, and she wasn’t ready for her world to be disrupted.

  Returning to the living room, she busied herself transferring the contents of one purse to another, a complete survival kit to solve all modern problems. “I’ve no idea who he is, but if I spend the month showing up with him at places where his friends hang out, I’ll get a thousand dollars.”

  Forcing her mind to other tracks of thought, she wondered if she shouldn’t wear lower heels for a party. Who wanted aching feet?

  “A grand?” Penny squawked, her eyes as big as half dollars. “Does that make you a high-paid escort?”

  Elissa froze in her task, rolling the question through her head. “That sounds too close to hooker, but I guess it does make me a paid escort.”

  She headed back into her closet and fished out a pair of white sandals with lower heels, as she listened to a news story about futuristic quantum computer technology. Lower heels would make her feel like less of an escort.

  “You go, girl,” Penny commented. “Is he good-looking?”

  Returning to the couch, Elissa blossomed into a grin of pure anticipation as she slipped the sandals onto her feet and buckled the straps.

  “That’s the best part and the worst part. He’s dead handsome. Tall, nearly black hair, yummy brown slip-into-your-bedroom eyes, a Latin tan. Nicely dressed too, well spoken and polite, deep, resonant voice that lingers inside you. Couldn’t really make out his build since he wore a business suit in a shadowy restaurant, but he did look fine. It’s no chore gazing at him, for sure. He’s a heart-stopper in too many ways.”

  “Oh,” Penny feigned a swoon, pressing the back of her hand to her forehead, “hot-blooded Latino. Good score. What does he do?”

  “Some kind of family business management. I actually had very little time with him. His friends were about to show up, and he didn’t want them to see us together yet.”

  Penny’s face twisted. “You gave this mysterious guy your home address? Would’ve been safer to meet him somewhere. Not that you can’t protect yourself.”

  “The bartender at Rubia’s Restaurant told me she grew up in his neighborhood and knows him well. If I turn up missing or dead, show up at the restaurant with the cops.”

  Penny rolled her eyes. “I guess you’ve no reason to fear. What man couldn’t you take down with ten years of karate behind you? I feel sorry for the guy if he tries a crude pick-up.”

  “Does the apartment look okay?” Elissa asked, as she examined herself over for flaws. She looked very LL Bean in that cute little shell-style dress with pretty little red roses all over it and some comfortable white sandals for a Florida-style summer party. She wondered what she didn’t see.

  Then, during a feel-good news story, she recalled she’d forgotten her perfume. She quickly snagged her bottle of butterscotch toffee body spray from the bathroom, gave herself a few squirts through the neck of the dress and a shot on each wrist. She sniffed it in, loving that irresistible smell melting her down to a craving. Then she paced back to the livingroom and stood nervous. She hadn’t felt this anxious since her SATs.

  Penny gave a long whistle as if blessed with revelation. “I just realized we’ve been neighbors for a year, and I’ve never seen you go on a date.”

  Elissa loathed the subject, and brushed nonexistent wrinkles from her dress. “I’ve devoted myself to school nonstop for years, sworn off men until I’m working in the field. I’ve years of training ahead. It’s not the time in my life when I should date anyone. I’ve brainwashed myself, managed years ago to cut off all communication with men so they haven’t been a threat. I can sit in an entire audience of men and not see a one of them.”

  Penny pouted. “That’s sad, Elissa. I hope this guy changes that.”

  “This thing with Greg isn’t a romantic thing, Pen. It’s a job. I’m so nervous. I can’t wait to be done with it.”

  Penny turned her ear closer, taking in a confidence. “Done with what part of it?”

  “Everything. I haven’t been to a social event in a long time. I’m awkward in a room of strangers, never know what to say, how to stand, what to do. I’m not all that great an actress, and I doubt I could maintain the sparkle level I’d carried when Greg first laid eyes on me. It was a rare good day for me in the looks department, and I'll probably disappoint him soon. I expect my face to explode into pimples at any time.”

  “You could eat better.”

  “Eating better takes time, energy, and money. I’m running from class to class with minutes to spare. Right now, I’m almost down to crackers and cheese from vending machines. I’m forced to catch edibles where I can. Sadly, it’s usually not healthy food I encounter.”

  “You could eat better at home when you study.”

  Elissa shrugged, admitting the truth of that. “I usually hate to stop studying just to eat.”

  “Yeah, you’ve dropped a few pounds over the last few months. What about spending time with a man? That ought to be a nice change. You owe that to yourself. Aren’t you looking forward to that?”

  Elissa squeezed her hands. “I’d rather pass on that, too.”

  “Why?”

  “I want to stay focused on school. I don’t want a distraction. And Greg Moretti is very distracting.” She fought a smile. “Very, very distracting. Just getting ready tonight, I’ve forgotten ten things, and he’s not even in the room. I’ll need to chant to myself, this is a business deal. This is a business deal.”

  Was she wearing too much jewelry for the LL Bean crowd?

  Penny fluffed Smoochy’s ears and snuggled into the Maltese’s fur to receive a lick on the tip of her nose. “What do you think, Smoochy?”

  “Smoochy hasn’t laid eyes on him yet. This is just a business deal. This is just a business deal.”

  Penny wagged the dog’s head. “Smoochy does not approve.”

  Elissa checked her makeup for the kabillionth time in the Victorian mirror hung on the wall, and was surprised to see herself reacting so much to what wasn’t even really a date. His mere expected appearance affected her.

  “Smoochy doesn’t have a car insurance bill overdue, a low-paying day job, rent, dojo and school fees every three months. Even with scholarships, I’m still sprinting to pay for it all. There’s no way I can refuse to do this. I’m lucky I’ve been handed an opportunity to grab a painless thousand dollars. Right now, I’d swim the Gulf for a grand. This is just a business deal. This is just a business deal.”

  Sweaty hands. She hated sweaty hands. Elissa paced over to the kitchen and snatched the dish towel hanging from the oven door handle, scrubbed the perspiration from her palms.

  “I’m so nervous,” she admitted aloud for the third time, hoping the confession would soften the stress.

  “I can hardly believe you haven’t had a date in years.”

  Elissa shot her a frown. “Just another reminder of my dull life. There’s no way the planetarium can give me a raise with their funds dropping, and I’m sure they don’t have more hours to give. I can’t take on any more daytime hours that won’t interfere with classes. Luckily, I’ve already landed a night job at Club Reno’s.”

  “I thought you’re supposed to get a thousand dollars out of this?”

  Elissa huffed out a frustrated breath. “It’ll take a full month to earn the money. That’ll get me out of trouble with most of the bills, but I need to take on more. Life is just getting more and more expensiv
e.”

  “You should go out with this guy for no other reason but to get out of this apartment. All you do is study. For the last year, your only entertainment has been your neighbor and her dog, the news, and ten DVDs we’ve seen ten times. And that’s only when you’re not studying, a rare thing. Give yourself some time to live, Elissa.”

  “Some time to live,” Elissa repeated, pausing her expressions of anxiety to take in a deep, unburdened breath of air. “God, it’s true. I need to feel alive again.”

  The doorbell rang, and the butterflies in Elissa’s stomach suddenly dropped dead. Sudden Butterflies Death Syndrome. “This is just a business deal. This is just a business deal. Oh, God,” she whined in her whisper, “I’m not ready for this. Do I look okay?”

  Penny gave her a head-to-toe scan. “You look marvelous.”

  Elissa steeled herself, went to the door, and opened it. There stood Greg, leaning against the stair railing of her second-story apartment, handsome in black slacks and a nice button-up gray shirt, neatly pressed. She couldn’t help but take notice of the breadth of shoulders, hidden under his business jacket just last night. His pecan-brown eyes lit upon sight of her.

  “Come in,” Elissa blurted, her arm swept out in welcome, suddenly feeling as though the sun had just broken the night with his appearance. She coached herself not to look so delighted.

  Greg stepped into the narrow hallway of the cubbyhole apartment, closed the door behind him, and his eyes hadn’t left her. “You look wonderful.”

  Then his smile fell into a frown. “Too wonderful.”

  “How can a girl look too wonderful?” Penny countered from the livingroom couch.

  Elissa led him further into the room, and presented the peanut gallery, sitting at attention and ready to inspect the poor man thoroughly.

  “This is my neighbor, Penny, who fancies herself a commentator on the world around her. She doesn’t have a TV in her apartment so she’s often in front of mine. I should just give her the TV, but then I’d never see another human being on study days. Penny, this is Greg.”