Abby Gaines - The Engagement Project / Her Surprise Hero - The Engagement Project / Her Surprise Hero

Whoa—where had that thought come from?

“Gage?”

He forced his attention back to the woman on the other end of the phone. “That’s a tempting offer,” he lied, “but I already have plans for tonight.”

“Oh.” He could hear the disappointment in her voice. “Maybe another time?”

“Actually, I don’t think so, Norah.”

“You’re seeing someone,” she guessed.

He started to deny it, but then he thought of Megan again. “Yeah, I am.”

“Well, then, maybe I’ll try again in a few weeks,” she said.

He frowned at her response, at this confirmation that everyone knew his reputation, and that no one ever expected his relationships to last—least of all Gage himself.

Even after he ended the call, he wondered how to define his relationship with Megan, or even if it could be called a relationship. She was a coworker, and maybe she was becoming a friend, but beneath everything else was an underlying physical attraction that was as baffling as it was intriguing.

He’d never known anyone like her—sweet and sexy and blissfully oblivious to her own appeal. And maybe it was this uniqueness that fascinated him.

Not that he had any intention of getting himself all tied up in knots over a woman just because she had eyes that haunted him in his sleep and lips that were so soft and sweet and so incredibly and passionately responsive.

No way. Especially not with the vice-presidency on the line.

He picked up the phone again and dialed her number, anyway.

Megan was caught off guard by Gage’s phone call. It was the only excuse she had for saying yes when he asked if she wanted to catch the movie they’d missed a couple of weeks earlier.

Still, she hated that she was a nervous wreck waiting for him to show up. In the lab, she wasn’t quite so intimidated by him because they were on a more equal footing. Over the past few weeks, she’d gradually become accustomed to working closely with him. But outside of the lab, she was all too aware of how completely out of her league she was with him.

“You’re not wearing your glasses,” he commented when she answered the door.

“My sister stepped on them, snapped the arm off.”

And Megan wasn’t convinced it had been an accident. Of course, Ashley denied that she’d broken them on purpose, but in the next breath she’d accused her sister of hiding behind the thick lenses and claimed she’d done her a favor by breaking them. Whether Ashley’s actions had been intentional or not, the end result was that Megan had to put her contacts in if she was going to see anything.

“How is your sister?” he asked now.

“She’s feeling much better.”

“Was it that nasty cold that’s going around?”

She shook her head. “No, it was just, uh, a female thing.”

“Oh,” Gage replied and, thankfully, left it at that.

Uncomfortable with the direction of the conversation, Megan ducked her head and lifted a hand to push her glasses up. Then she remembered they weren’t there and rubbed a finger over the bridge of her nose, as if to assuage an itch. But the corners of Gage’s mouth lifted, and she knew she hadn’t fooled him.

“I don’t wear contacts very often,” she admitted. “So I keep trying to push up glasses that aren’t even there.”

“I like when you wear your contacts,” Gage said. “It’s easier to see your eyes.”

She dropped her gaze again.

“You have beautiful eyes, Megan.”

She felt her cheeks flame. “Thank you,” she managed to respond.

“And lips so soft a man can sink right into them.”

She absolutely would not get all weak and flustered just because that smooth, sexy voice tempted a woman to forget all reason. “How many lines like that have you memorized for the sole purpose of making a woman go all warm and quivery inside?”

He only smiled. “Are you all warm and quivery inside?”

She was hot and trembling and very close to melting into a puddle at his feet. Recognizing that fact, she drew in a deep, calming breath and moved away to pick up her purse. “Yes, but Vin Diesel always has that effect on me.”

Gage chuckled. “I guess that put me in my place.”

But the real problem for Megan was that his place was right beside her through the movie.

He did his best to make her comfortable, keeping the conversation light and easy while they waited for the feature to begin. It wasn’t his fault that her heart sped up when the lights dimmed, or that her pulse raced when his fingers brushed against hers inside the tub of popcorn they were sharing, or that she felt shivers down her spine when he leaned close to whisper in her ear during the movie. It wasn’t his fault, but by the time the final credits rolled up on the screen, every nerve ending in her body was tingling with awareness.

And he seemed completely unaffected by their nearness. Of course he would be—he had dated a lot of women, beautiful and sophisticated women.

Which made her again wonder: What was he doing with her?

And what had happened to the guy who was reputed to go out with a different woman every night?

Because the man she was slowly getting to know didn’t bear any resemblance to the Casanova he was reputed to be. Or maybe it was simply that he wasn’t interested in anything other than friendship with her.

And that was okay, because she enjoyed being with him and talking to him and maybe, as they spent more time together, she would gradually stop acting like a silly schoolgirl with a crush on the captain of the football team.

Except that every time he touched her—a casual touch of his hand to her arm or an accidental brush of his shoulder against hers—she couldn’t help thinking about the not-so-casual or accidental full-body contact that had occurred at Ashley and Trevor’s engagement party.

Just the memory of the kiss they’d shared had enough power to steam her glasses, even when she wasn’t wearing them.

After the movie, they went for pizza.

While they waited for their medium deep dish with hot sausage and hot peppers, they chatted casually about current events. While they ate, the conversation veered to work topics, and Megan asked him, “When you were growing up, was it always your plan to work at Richmond Pharmaceuticals?”

Gage shook his head. “First I wanted to be a firefighter, and then a baseball player … or maybe it was a baseball player then a firefighter.”

She smiled. “Seven-year-olds are so indecisive.”

“I was eight,” he told her.

“And when you got a little older?”

He thought about the question, about the career options he’d considered through the years. There had been several, though none that he’d considered too seriously—aside from the microbrewery his friend Brian wanted them to start in college, when beer was very serious business to them. And he knew that he’d never thought too long or too hard about anything else because Richmond Pharmaceuticals had always been there.

The insight made him uneasy, but he responded casually to her question. “When I got a little older, I decided I would rather be a doctor or a rock musician.”

“A doctor or a rock musician?”

“It was a tough call—help sick people or get lots of girls?”

“And somehow you manage to do both while working at R.P.”

His smile was wry. “So the rumor goes.”

“Does it bother you—being the subject of company gossip?”

“It didn’t used to,” he admitted. “Or maybe I was just unaware of it before. But recently it seems to have become an impediment to my career advancement.”

“How so?”

“I had a conversation with my father recently,” he admitted. “And he told me that my inability to commit to a relationship has given some members of the board cause to question my maturity and commitment.”