Gone With the Nerd (Nerds, #4)(28)
Author: Vicki Lewis Thompson

Luanne pushed herself upright. "As for my potential boyfriends, it doesn’t look so good. You should see the prospects I have to choose from." She rolled her eyes. "Hopeless."

"I was hopeless when I was eleven," Flynn said.

Luanne studied him. "I can see that. You have that late bloomer look."

"Thanks."

"And look at you now," Luanne said. "Spending the weekend with Zoe Tarleton’s body double. That’s not too shabby. Well, I’ll see you guys tomorrow morning. Is seven too early?"

"Yes," Flynn and Zoe said together.

"All right, all right! I’ll make it eight."

"Make it ten," Flynn said.

"Okay, ten." Luanne hoisted her backpack over her shoulder. "But you said if I found out something about my brother, I should let you know. Does that mean I shouldn’t let you know until ten?"

"You can call my cell phone." Flynn rattled off the number.

Luanne repeated the number twice. "Got it. Cool. I have the cell phone number of the guy who’s dating Zoe Tarleton’s body double. That practically makes me part of the in crowd. I’m at least on the fringes of the in crowd. Excellent."

"I’m not part of the in crowd," Flynn said.

"I know that, but Vera is right on the border, having all that contact with Zoe, and you’re with Vera, and I’m in touch with you." Luanne grinned. "That’s only three degrees of separation from Zoe Tarleton. See you guys tomorrow morning." She crossed the driveway and started through the trees.

Flynn watched her go. "I’m afraid she’s very close to figuring out who you are."

"You think so? She seems convinced of this body double thing."

"Give her a little more time and she’ll have it." He turned to gaze at her. "Especially after you told her Zoe liked brainy types."

Yes, she certainly did. Especially the brainy type sitting on the porch steps with her. "I don’t see a problem with telling her that."

"She’s sharp. Eventually she’ll make the connection that the supposed body double is up here with a brainy type. Then she’ll start to wonder if Trace Edwards is history and whether she came to the wrong conclusion."

"I suppose."

"With luck she won’t figure anything out until tomorrow, and even if she does, she’d want to keep it to herself."

"Uh-huh." Zoe hoped that was the right response. She’d become so engrossed in looking into his eyes that she’d lost track of the conversation. His eyes changed color, too.

Or maybe his eyes changed temperature more than color. They were definitely a cool gray, like a piece of slate or a storm cloud, whenever Margo was around. She couldn’t blame him for being upset with poor Margo, who had made his girlfriend look like a psycho stalker.

But his eyes weren’t cool now. They were warm, like a soft wool sweater or a gray kitten in a sunny windowsill. The longer Zoe fixated on those eyes, the more she knew the answer to the question they’d been debating endlessly.

The answer was yes.

Chapter Twenty

Flynn stopped talking as he realized what was happening. Sitting there on the porch steps in the warm afternoon sun, without him lifting a finger, he’d somehow managed to seduce Zoe Tarleton. He couldn’t imagine how he’d accomplished that.

He’d never considered himself a very persuasive guy, which was why he’d gone into contract law instead of criminal law, where he might have ended up arguing cases in front of a jury. When it came to Zoe’s decision to have sex with him, he’d thought the jury was still out. From the expression on her face and the deep blue of her eyes, the jury was in and a verdict had been rendered.

So he could stand on principle and pass up the opportunity, which he doubted would ever come again. Realistically, this was a once-in-a-lifetime chance, given his nerd status and her cool status. The odds of a guy like him ever hav**g s*x with a woman like her were at least one in a billion.

Somehow he’d beaten those odds. And yet he wasn’t morally free to take advantage of this miracle. He should break up with Kristen first. Yeah, right. He’d call her on the cell phone and say that Zoe was giving him the green light and so sorry about that, he had to break up now.

Not only was that the tackiest and most insensitive move on the planet; it would change Zoe’s green light to red immediately. If he so much as spoke Kristen’s name, Zoe’s green light would change. She had a pretty active conscience herself.

Therefore, he couldn’t make that phone call, for a bunch of reasons. What then? He pictured himself doing the noble thing and gently declining the invitation Zoe was making with those flushed cheeks and parted lips. If he could turn away, then he could break up with Kristen later this week knowing he’d done everything in order.

Normally he preferred doing everything in order. He preferred a balanced approach to life. But when he weighed sex with Zoe against denying himself that chance, maybe forever, so that he’d have a clear conscience when he told Kirsten it was over… well, sex with Zoe tipped the scales. It practically broke the scales, to be honest.

He was about to sin. He was about to demonstrate that he was fallible, that when presented with a temptation of this magnitude, he couldn’t resist. For such a momentous decision he would have expected thunder and lightning or at least a dramatic wind to blow across the porch, signaling that life as he knew it was about to change forever.

Instead, the moment was incredibly simple. No fanfare whatsoever. He stood, held out his hand, and said, "Let’s go in."

Zoe put her hand in his, and that was when he realized she was trembling.

He began to shake, too, as he started toward the door. The porch was wide, yet he walked across it as if balancing on a tightrope. This was far from being a done deal. One mistake in judgment, one awkward moment, and she could change her mind. He knew that as surely as he knew that right now she was all systems go.

The mood breaker might not even be his fault. They had three telephones that could ring. If some idiot was playing tricks on them, another prank could interrupt them at any time. Margo could show up with more news about Kristen. Luanne might decide she couldn’t wait until tomorrow morning to come back. Bigfoot could make a surprise daytime run through the forest.

The potential for sexual disaster was huge, and that wasn’t even counting his own likelihood of screwing up. He had a decent record of making women happy in the bedroom, but because he was so eager to make this particular woman happy, he could easily do something stupid. In fact, the odds of him doing something stupid were way lower than the odds that he’d ever be in this situation in the first place. Way lower.

First of all, he had to decide the door issue. Hand in hand, they couldn’t go through together or they’d get stuck. He’d read somewhere that under stress, people’s bodies tended to swell. They could get stuck in the door and stay that way until Luanne showed up in the morning. Getting stuck in the door would pretty much rule out sex.

But how to proceed? A man was supposed to let the woman go through a door ahead of him, but that put Zoe in the lead, taking him by the hand through the door. That wasn’t the optimal dynamic.

So he led the way through the door, because he also had to figure out which bed to use. Hers had more room, but his was closer to the condoms. He couldn’t imagine leading her down the hall, making a side trip to his room for condoms, and then setting off hand in hand for her room. Inelegant—too much like running errands.

So they’d have to use his bed, short and narrow though it might be. He’d work around that restriction and hope he wouldn’t fall off the bed at some critical point in the action. This might have been the easiest seduction in his sexual history, but the follow-through was turning out to be damned complicated.

Then, as they started down the hall, she squeezed his hand.

He stopped breathing, sure that she was about to call it off. Well, if she did that, he’d back her up against the wall and kiss her until she changed her mind again. He’d come too close to give up that easily.

Glancing down at her, he braced himself for a battle. "What?"

She smiled, and her eyes were still that encouraging deep blue. "Which room?"

Thank God he’d figured that one out. "Mine."

"Mine’s bigger."

"I know, but I have the—"

"I’ll meet you in my room."

His breath came out in a rush. "Sure." His voice cracked, but at least he’d been able to speak. With his tongue feeling about twice its normal size, any speech at all was amazing. He wanted her way too much. Even knowing that, he couldn’t seem to get any perspective on the matter.

Reluctantly he released her hand so she could continue on down the hall without him. Maybe letting go of her had been a bad move, though. Maybe he should have insisted on using his bed so he could keep that connection. He watched her start to go into her room and wondered if he’d blown it.

Then she turned, and of course he was still standing motionless as if someone had glued his shoes to the floor. He fully expected her next words to be Forget it. Instead he noticed something absolutely incredible. On the way down the hall she had unbuttoned her blouse.

It hung open, giving him a generous view of what lay beneath—heaven cradled gently in stretchy cotton. His erection, which had been making its presence known for the last few minutes, snapped immediately to attention.

She rested one hand against the door frame, which made the blouse gape open a tantalizing bit more. Then she took off her glasses and glanced at him, her color high. "Don’t be long," she said.

And it dawned on him that he was wasting time. While he’d stood there like a kid playing a game of statues, she’d been making good progress, closing the distance to the party bed and starting on the undressing. He, however, had achieved nothing but a hard-on. If he didn’t correct his tardiness, she might dump him for dawdling.

Charging into his bedroom, he wrenched open the closet door and pulled his suitcase down from the top shelf so fast that it hit him on the head. He didn’t even flinch. Unfortunately, his coordination was off and it took two tries before he successfully unzipped the pouch containing the box of condoms.

Once he had the box in hand, he started to race out of the room again. Then a shred of reason floated through his fevered brain and brought him up short. Coordination was important for the activity he was about to engage in, so he’d better slow down and get a better grasp on his reactions.

Damn, he was usually much smoother than this. The thought of hav**g s*x with Zoe Tarleton had him rattled. Sure, he needed to hurry down to that bedroom, but he didn’t want to slide through the door like Cosmo Kramer.

Taking several deep breaths, he finally had the oxygen his brain required to think rationally about the box of condoms in his hand. Taking the entire box down might send the wrong signal, not to mention that it might remind Zoe of when she’d first seen it. He’d rather she forget all about the origination of the condoms.

Easy enough to fix. Opening the box, he took out one and stuck it in his pocket. He could always come back for more if the first time went well, but arriving in her bedroom with a boxful, or even a handful, was presumptuous. If they should be unfortunate enough to have bad sex they might be able to laugh about it, as he’d said, but he wouldn’t be needing any more condoms. Leftovers would be embarrassing.

All right. He was as ready as he’d ever be. Now-or-never time had arrived. Improbable though it still seemed to him, he was about to enter the bedroom of one of the world’s great beauties. He prayed he’d make a good impression.

Heart thudding, he took the long walk from his room to hers. In reality it was only about fifteen feet, but it felt like fifteen miles. He wondered if she’d be in bed yet and, if so, whether she’d have the covers pulled up to her chin. If she had the covers up to her chin, would she still be wearing underwear?

Or maybe… His brain shut down as he stepped through the door and found her stretched on the bed, sans covers, sans clothes, sans everything except an allover tan and a come-hither smile. And she was waiting for him.

Zoe barely made it to the bed before she heard Flynn coming down the hall. When he walked in and found her there, the expression on his face was worth all her efforts to strip before he arrived. Her dramatic training had prompted her to do it, although she’d never tried such a bold move.

Flynn looked like a man who had accidentally grabbed hold of a high-voltage wire, the ones the electric companies warned people not to touch. His eyes widened and his body shook. She even imagined his hair stood up a little. As for the action going on below his slender silver belt buckle—very gratifying.

She should probably say something, something sultry, but she couldn’t think what. Frantically she tried to remember a movie scene she could draw from. A snatch of dialogue came to her, and she used it.

She propped herself up on one elbow. "I decided to get the party started."

He swallowed. "So I see."

"You, uh, might want to do the same." If he undressed himself, then he wouldn’t find out that she was shaking and might fumble the job. Having him do it would preserve her image as the cool babe.

He nodded, reached into his shirt pocket, and pulled out his PDA.

"You have an appointment?"

"No." He seemed to be having trouble concentrating on what he was doing, though. He kept glancing from her to the PDA in his hand. "I need a place … a place to put it."

She was incredibly touched. He really cherished that PDA she’d given him. "On the chair, maybe." A ratty wicker chair next to him was piled high with her clothes, but there was room for his PDA and his clothes on top. She hadn’t had time to neaten up the room. She hoped he wasn’t turned off by the mess.

Judging by the jut of his penis under his slacks, he wasn’t even slightly turned off. He laid the PDA on top of her clothes and started on the buttons of his shirt. He kept his gaze firmly on her as he progressed. "You look. . ." He paused to clear his throat. "Incredible."

"Thank you. I work out." It occurred to her that the actors she’d dated mostly took it for granted that the women in their bed would have a toned body. Flynn didn’t seem to take anything for granted.