Kate Carlisle - An Innocent In Paradise

“He took advantage of that.”

“Yes. After two months of working together, he finally asked me out and I was over the moon. He took me out for a romantic candlelight dinner at a restaurant overlooking the lake. Then later when he took me home, he wanted to come inside. I was a little hesitant to let him in.”

“It was your first date, right?”

“Right.”

“He should’ve kissed you good-night and left.”

“That’s sort of what I thought. But he said we’d known each other long enough and he wanted to spend the night with me. Except he used a much cruder expression than that.” She frowned, remembering that night. But at the moment, Walter’s face in her memory was as fuzzy as her mind felt. She realized she liked him better that way. “Anyway, I told him I wasn’t ready to take that step and he got angry. He said he knew I wanted it, so what kind of game was I playing? He said he’d spent almost two hundred dollars on me and wanted to get his money’s worth. I ended up smacking him hard and while he was recovering, I ran inside my house and locked the door on him. He took it badly. Work became a nightmare with him around.”

“Worse than a jerk,” Dee said. “I hate him.”

“Thank you. Me, too. But at the time, I felt like an idiot.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” Dee said, jumping up and grabbing two bottles of water off the dresser. “He was a toad.”

“I know.” Grace popped open one bottle and took a long sip. “But I felt like such a cliché.”

“Oh, been there, done that.”

“Anyway, he finally quit, thank goodness, but he stayed in Minnesota. He’s at a rival university and he’s trying to claim my studies as his own.”

Dee gasped. “What a total jackass.”

“Yes, that describes him nicely.” Grace couldn’t sit still thinking about Walter, so she stood and walked over to Dee’s window. She stumbled, but caught herself, then frowned at the rug, looking for whatever had tripped her. She didn’t see anything. “I found out after he left that he’d stolen a small batch of my spores and some of my papers, and now he’s applied for new funding to allow him to work on the exact same line of research as mine.”

“Can we kill him?”

Grace blurted out a laugh. “Oh, Dee, you are the best.”

“Hey, it’s an option.”

“I wish,” she said, only half kidding. “No, all I can do is collect lots of new spores and continue my research when I get back. Thank goodness I never told him exactly where these rare spores could be found.”

“A good thing for Walter,” Dee said with a decided edge to her voice. “Because if he showed up here, he’d be very sorry.”

“I really appreciate that,” Grace said with a smile, then added, “even though you scare me a little.”

She laughed. “I’ll scare Walter a lot worse and that’s a promise. I got your back, girlfriend.”

Grace felt sudden tears prickling her eyes. Nobody had ever had her back before. Oh, she knew Phillippa would support her, if it came down to that. But somehow the way Dee had said it so simply and unconditionally, made Grace feel all warm and snuggly inside.

And even though she trusted Dee, she couldn’t bear to confess the worst part to her. Yes, her university had promised to defend her against Walter’s lies, but Grace knew that if she couldn’t get the spores and raise the level of her research and experimentation to new heights, her reputation would suffer.

She also had to prove to the foundation that her work was her own and that she was the one deserving of the funds, not Walter. Otherwise, within a month she could lose her funding, her job and, most important, her reputation.

“Forget about stupid Walter,” Dee said, interrupting her worries. “What about Mr. Hunkadelic?”

“What? Who?” Grace wondered if she’d had a few too many sips of Dee’s cocktails because the lightning-quick change of subject made her head spin.

“You know who.” Dee stared meaningfully at Grace. “The hunky man who is our boss? Mr. Big?”

“Oh, Logan.” Grace stared intently at the label on her water bottle. The letters looked wobbly. Very odd. “What about him?”

“Something happening between you two?”

“Nothing.”

“Then why aren’t you looking at me?” Dee said, chuckling. “Do you have something to hide?”

Grace whipped around. “No! I mean…okay, he kissed me, but-”

“He kissed you?”

She sighed and flopped down on the bed. “Yes, and I warned him not to do it again.”

“You…wait.” Dee moved her chair so she could rest her feet on the bed. “Okay, I’ve got to hear your explanation for this one.”

Grace stared at the ceiling as if help might be sent down from up above. But none came, so she finally met Dee’s gaze. “It was for his own good.”

“I don’t get it. Is he a bad kisser?”

“Oh, no,” Grace said, shaking her head. “He’s really good.”

“Well, then…”

“I ran away,” Grace said, and buried her face in her hands. Humiliation swept through her. She still couldn’t believe that she’d run from Logan like a teenager afraid of her own hormones.

Dee’s eyebrows shot up and her feet thumped to the floor. “You ran away? Honey, are you crazy? Nobody runs away from Logan Sutherland. We’re all running toward him.”

She had known that, deep down of course. But hearing Dee say it out loud only confirmed that once again, Grace was “not normal.” She didn’t do anything like your average woman did. Heck, she hadn’t even been able to stand her ground when a gorgeous man kissed her. It was pitiful. Just pitiful.

Still, she had to try to defend herself, pointless though it might be. “Dee, he doesn’t know me. He’s the one who would go running if he knew…”

“If he knew what?”

Grace gritted her teeth and forced herself to say it. “If he knew how smart I really am.”

Dee came over to the bed, grabbed a pillow and sat next to her, resting her back against the headboard. “Honey, I confess I’m not sure how smart you are, but what does it matter? He kissed you. He likes you. Why are you running away from that?”

Grace folded her arms across her chest, anxious to make Dee understand. “Men don’t like smart women.”

“Oh, Gracie, that’s just plain prehistoric. These days, men love smart women.”

Grace shook her head stubbornly. “Not when they’re as smart as I am.”

Dee’s mouth twisted in confusion. “Just how smart are you?”

“I have an IQ of 172,” she said, annoyed with the slight whine in her voice.

“Oh, Gracie.” Dee reached out and grabbed Grace’s hand. “You realize that means nothing to me, right?”

“Yes,” Grace said, laughing. “That’s just one reason why I like you so much.”

“I like you, too, Gracie,” Dee said, “but really, is 172 good? I mean, what’s average?”

“Well, that’s difficult to say, really, since IQ scores have been gaining three points every decade now for some time, but-”

“Ballpark figure,” Dee interrupted. “What’s average?”

“About 100,” Grace admitted with a sigh.

“Whoa.” Dee blinked. “And what’s genius?”

Grace groaned as she said, “One forty and above.”

“Damn.” Dee grinned at her. “So, you’re like, what? Über genius?”

Stunned to discover that Dee’s opinion of her hadn’t changed, Grace relaxed and for the first time in her life, actually giggled. “ Über genius? I like that.”

“You could be a superhero or something,” Dee continued. “You could be Smartgirl!”

Relief and gratitude rushed through Grace as she returned Dee’s smile. She had been so worried that once Dee knew the truth about Grace, she wouldn’t want to be anywhere near her. After all, her own parents had run the other way from her, and that was a memory she really didn’t want to dwell on just now. No, right now she wanted to concentrate on the amazing sensation of having her fears dissolve. For the first time, she was being accepted and liked, completely, for exactly who she was, not how smart she was-although Dee seemed to think that was pretty cool, too.