Greene growled ominously, but she wasn’t finished.

  “Why don’t you suck it up and be a man about it? Stop your whining! You know what they say about sticks and stones! Get over it!”

  A dangerous silence stretched between them. Greene cracked his lips open and somehow spoke despite his rigid jaw. “Are you…taunting me?”

  “No.”

  More silence followed, reminding Simone of the audience’s hushed silence one time when she watched the tiger tamer at the circus; just as she had then, she knew the wild animal could strike at any second, but prayed that he wouldn’t.

  “Hmmm.” Greene tapped an index finger against his lips and tilted his head to the side, just as she had done.

  Was he mocking her?

  “You’re awfully glib. I wonder how you’d feel,” he said, leaning his hip against her desk, “if someone printed stories about your sexual exploits and ruined your reputation.”

  Unease replaced anger. She certainly didn’t want her private life trotted out for public inspection, especially now. Not now. Trying to appear nonchalant, she tossed her head. “What do you mean?”

  “Are you familiar with the term comeuppance?”

  Unease gave way to a panicked feeling of dread. Frozen, she couldn’t look away from his dark, intense stare. Something told her both that she did not want this man as her enemy and that she must not—must never—show him any sign of weakness. But as her ears burned and a cool drop of sweat trickled between her now clammy breasts, she couldn’t help it. She blinked.

  His gaze sharpened.

  Abruptly she looked down, brushing lint off her slacks. “I have no idea what you think you’re talking about.”

  “Will you issue the apology?”

  “No,” she said, her stubborn streak refusing to allow her to back down.

  Risking a glance at him, she saw, to her horror, a slow, wicked smile widen across his face—exactly the way a conniving smile had dawned across the Grinch’s face in that old cartoon where he decided to steal Christmas. She swallowed, hard.

  “You’re going to regret that, Dr. Simone,” Greene said. “You’ll see.”

  Chapter 2

  After Greene stalked off, Simone’s quivery knees finally gave out and she collapsed into her desk chair. Leaning back, she closed her eyes and tried to take several deep breaths to calm her racing pulse, but her lungs seemed to be suffering from amnesia and wouldn’t cooperate. Her brain, likewise, went haywire and focused on only one frenzied thought: what did he mean? What did he mean?

  Worrying solved nothing, but her roiling gut wouldn’t let her do anything else. Greene wanted a pound of her flesh, preferably bleeding and tattered, and wouldn’t stop till he got it. As tempted as she was to hope he was the idle threat type, she knew better. Greene was the Captain Ahab, scorched earth type—the type who’d follow her to the ends of the earth until he got vengeance, no matter what kind of destruction he left in his twisted path. She knew it.

  But what could she do? She couldn’t—

  Hurried footsteps in the hallway startled her out of her thoughts and she jumped to her feet. Freddie rushed in, followed by her lawyer/agent, Pat White.

  “Pat’s here, honey,” Freddie told her.

  Pat stepped around Freddie, looking him up and down as she went. “What are you, the butler?” she snapped, her sleek salt-and-pepper bob swinging around her unlined light brown face. “I’m quite sure Simone can see that I’m here.”

  Freddie sniffed and looked away.

  In her omnipresent shapeless dark suits with alternating white or cream tailored shirts, Pat looked like a consummate professional, but Simone had always secretly thought the spirit of some dead but confused New York cabbie had possessed her body. If she had to pick a motto for Pat, it would be something like, “My opinions: always available. No need to ask.” Pat and Freddie, alas, got along like gasoline and a lit match.

  She hurried forward to kiss and hug Pat. “I’m so sorry!”

  Pat frowned at her. “What happened to you? I’ve been waiting down at the café for twenty minutes! What? Have I got all day?”

  “Well, I—”

  “Wait, don’t tell me.” Pat waved a hand and perched on the edge of the desk. “Freddie, here, said some maniac barged in and bragged about his penis. Was it really that big? Never mind. What happened?”

  Simone scowled at Freddie before answering. “I’m not sure what Freddie told you, but we did not have a penis viewing here in my office this morning.”

  “A shame,” Freddie muttered, flopping on the sofa and throwing his arm over the back.

  “As I was saying,” Simone said, shooting Freddie a death glare, “this man was upset about a letter he claims his angry ex wrote for revenge. I think he wanted me to print a retraction or apology or something. We argued, I pointed out doing something like that would probably draw more attention to the whole issue than he really wanted, and he left. Well, actually, he made a veiled threat, and then he left.”

  Pat clutched her arm. “Why didn’t you say something? What kind of threat? Did he have a gun? Do we need to get a restraining order?”

  “No. Nothing like that. He’s a lawyer. I don’t think he’s a wacko.”

  Pat snorted. “I hate to burst your bubble, Snow White, but lawyers are the biggest wackos out there.”

  “Amen,” Freddie said from the sofa.

  They both ignored him. “It wasn’t a violent threat,” Simone said. “He was just kind of wondering aloud how I’d feel if someone told stories about my sex life, or something like that. I’m not going to worry about it.”

  She meant it. Now that a few minutes had passed and she’d repeated his veiled threat aloud, it all seemed so silly. The man was a lawyer. A professional, just like her. What was he going to do? Hire Sammy “the Bull” Gravano to carry out a hit on her? Of course not. So she’d just forget about the whole ridiculous incident. Greene couldn’t do anything to her.

  “I don’t know. I don’t like it.” Pat whipped her PalmPilot out of her jacket pocket. “Gimme his name. I’ll check him out a little.”

  Simone told her, then moved on to what was to have been the topic of their lunch meeting. “Soooo? How was the conference call? What’d they say?”

  “Well, I’ve got the good news and the not-so-good news. I’ll give you the good news. The good news is, National Press is definitely ready to add a sex columnist to its daily papers. They think the time is now, people are ready, yadda, yadda yadda. They like you, they think you have enormous appeal, they think they can work with you and they’re excited about your book coming out. This would be tremendous exposure, of course. With USA Every Day, you could be huge. Huge. And I think the deal would be worth about ten percent more than I quoted you.”

  For the second time that day, Simone’s professionalism left her and she giggled and clapped her hands. Finally! After a million years of graduate school and dissertations and research and building her practice and working her behind off, now—finally—real financial security, for herself and her mother, was within reach. She could buy a house, travel and put more money away for retirement. If they syndicated her column and her book took off, the sky was the limit.

  “I’ll be wanting that raise,” Freddie told her, grinning.

  Pat held up a warning hand. “Not so fast. I haven’t told you the not-so-good news.”

  Simone froze in midclap and dropped her hands. “What?”

  “They’re also looking at another columnist. You know that woman out in Minnesota? The granny-nurse woman? Her. They think she’s more reassuring and a little more scientific. I dunno. More credible, maybe. Who knows. Anyway, the point is, they haven’t decided. It’s between you and her.”

  Freddie made an outraged noise. “Well, that’s probably just a negotiating trick. You know—so they can get Simone for cheap if she thinks they might give the job to someone else. That’s all that is.” He smiled reassuringly at Simone. “Don’t you worry.”

  Pat pivoted on her hip to gape at Freddie. “What are you? A lawyer now? Did you go to law school since last week? Huh? You think I didn’t think of that? You think I didn’t do a little research?”

  “Heifer,” Freddie muttered.

  “Okay, people,” Simone said, shooting them both warning looks. Once they got started they could bicker like the Honeymooners. “Just give me the bottom line, Pat.”

  Pat drew herself up. “The bottom line is, you need to keep your nose to the grindstone and keep cranking out a great column. And keep up with all the little local interviews and radio shows and positive publicity. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “And didn’t you sign up to cochair the auction to benefit the West-End Clinic? Poor kids and all that? I want you right out front on that thing. Smiling, helping. Et cetera, et cetera. See if you can’t borrow a baby or something and get your picture taken kissing it.”

  “Oh, my goodness, I’m trapped here with Machiavelli,” came the running commentary from the sofa.

  Simone dropped her head and threw her hand over her mouth so Pat wouldn’t see her laugh, not that Pat paid attention to anything else while spouting advice.

  “I think they’ll realize they want a young, hip, sexy woman in their papers every day,” Pat said. “Not some shriveled old grandma. This gig is yours to lose, Simone. Got me?”

  “Oh, I got you.” Simone shoved all thoughts of Alex Greene and his nameless threats far away. She would not sit around waiting for the other shoe to drop. There was no other shoe. There couldn’t be.

  “Alex? Alex? What are you doing?”

  Startled, Alex looked up from the blue glow of his computer screen to see his older sister Laurel standing in his dark living room, staring at him as if his face had gone striped. Shaking her head and muttering, she put down her briefcase and moved around the room switching on lamps. Her long, flowery purple dress—how did she walk around like that without stepping on the end of it and falling on her face?—flapped behind her like a flag waving in the breeze. When she finished with the lights, she turned to the windows and closed the curtains.

  Alex massaged the back of his stiff neck, rubbed his tired eyes and stretched. It dawned on him that it was dark, inside and outside the house. What time was it? He checked his watch: eight-thirty. Eight-thirty? Already? He’d meant to order a pizza hours ago, but he’d forgotten all about that once he hit the Internet. And now Laurel.

  “Who let you in?”

  Leaning against the open French door between the living room and his office, she put her hands on her hips. “After I rang the doorbell ninety-seven times and you didn’t answer, I let myself in.”

  “Maybe it’s broken. I’ll check it.”

  “It’s not broken. I heard it. You were in one of your little zones again.”

  “Oh.” He watched warily as she planted herself on the sofa and adjusted the pillows behind her back. She wasn’t planning to stay, was she? Couldn’t she see he was busy?

  He turned back to the screen and scrolled down. “What are you doing here?”

  She scratched her head, adjusting some purple scarf-type thing she had wrapped around her short Afro. “Good to see you, too, Alex. Wasn’t that you I talked to half an hour ago on the phone? Wasn’t that you who told me you’d take a look at my laptop for me? Hello? Hello?”

  Alex grunted and clicked on another page. “How’s my nephew?”

  “Keith’s good. He’s supposed to be doing his homework right now, but I’ll bet he’s IM’ing his little friends.”

  “Need any money?”

  She frowned down at her skirts as she smoothed them. “No, I do not need any money. I wish you’d stop asking. I don’t need any more handouts from my little brother.”

  Alex gritted his teeth. What a proud pain in the posterior she was. Why wouldn’t she just let him help her? He’d foolishly thought he’d wear her down one day, to the point where she’d graciously and quietly accept a check from him every month. No dice. “It’s what I’m here for. What’s the point of working hard and making a lot of money if I can’t spread it around?”

  “It’s not your job! You’re not his father.”

  “Well, if Joe was around I wouldn’t have to, but he’s not. And you can’t do everything by yourself on your salary at the clinic.”

  “No, thanks,” she said flatly.

  Alex scowled and drummed his fingers on the desk, running through his options. He’d drop it for now, but maybe he should send a couple months’ rent directly to her landlord. Or he could buy her one of those gift cards for groceries. Or—

  “What are you working on, Alex?”

  —he could make a car payment for her. They went to the same bank, so—

  “Alex! What are you working on?”

  Alex snapped out of his thoughts, forcing himself to pay attention to his sister. “Nothing. A little research.”

  “On what?”

  “Dr. Simone.”

  Actually, research wasn’t the right word. He did research at the office when a client had a question or he was working on a patent application. What he’d done tonight went far beyond research. He’d put together a dossier about the good doctor. Right there, on his laser printer, sat a two-inch-thick stack of data about that woman—every tidbit of information the Internet could provide. Every column or article she’d written. Every interview she’d ever given. Plus he’d studied and memorized every page on her Web site.

  He now knew she was thirty-four, same as him. He knew about her nomadic childhood in the U.S. and Europe. Her single mother, a B-movie actress who’d had one marginally successful movie about a hundred years ago, then made a career out of living a jet-set lifestyle, had raised her. How she’d paid for it he had no idea, but he’d get to the bottom of it eventually. He’d also learned about Simone’s extensive credentials, practice, work habits and hobbies—scuba diving and alpine skiing. Before the night ended, he planned to know more. Much more.

  “Dr. Simone? Why do you want to know about her?”

  Lost in thought, he scrubbed his hand over his goatee. Funny how the Internet could tell him everything about some things, and nothing about others. It didn’t, for example, say how tiny Simone was. No more than a hundred and ten pounds. Barely up to his shoulder—a little over five feet, if that. Or how velvety her light brown skin looked—and probably felt. Or how silky-shiny her wispy black Halle Berry hair looked. Or how her eyes spat fire when she got good and mad, like she’d been today. Or how unusual her big eyes were. Not green. Not blue. Not gray. Some color he didn’t know the name for between all three. Or how she blinked and looked away when she wanted to hide something, which he knew she did. Or how she smelled. Fresh. Powdery. Flowery. Delicious.

  “Alex? Alex!”

  Alex jumped and snapped his attention back to his sister. “What is it?”

  “Focus a little, will you? Why are you researching Dr. Simone?”

  His jaw tightened and he felt his temples throb. “Because she’s a quack. Just like Dr. Tom, Dr. Dick, Dr. Harry, and all those other fake doctors. They go around spouting touchy-feely feel-good nonsense and everyone looks at them like they cured cancer or something.”

  Laurel leaned her elbow on the sofa’s arm and rested her head in her palm. “Interesting. I suppose only engineers turned patent lawyers like you keep the true faith.”

  “Right.” He clicked the mouse again and the printer hummed and spat out another article. “Well, no. Doctors do, too. People who rely on science. Numbers. Facts. Not opinions and theories.”

  “I see.” He thought he heard a touch of humor in her voice, almost like she was making fun of him, but who could tell? “Well, you’d better brace yourself because—”

  “And look at this.” He picked up the remote and unfroze the DVD he’d been watching on his wall-mounted flat screen TV. Immediately Meg Ryan started whimpering and groaning, oohing and ahhing her way to a fake orgasm in the middle of some NewYork deli. Like that would ever happen. As soon as the scene came on, he’d known this was what Simone meant when she taunted him earlier. Flabbergasted, he’d watched the scene five or six times already. “Can you believe this nonsense?”

  “You’re watching a romantic comedy?” Laurel twisted around to face him. “Have you been replaced by a pod person?”

  Annoyance surged again and, snorting, he typed in new search terms. “Have you ever seen this crap? When Harry Met Sally? About women faking it?”

  “Every woman in America has seen this movie a hundred times,” she said in that condescending, men-don’t-have-a-clue voice she reserved for Alex and her son. “And the whole movie isn’t about women faking it. Just this one little part.”

  “Puh-lease. Like a man wouldn’t be able to tell if a woman was faking it.”

  Laurel threw back her head and laughed, to his further irritation. “Every woman in America has faked it a hundred times.”

  Alex’s typing slowed and stopped as her words sank in. The disbelieving knot in his belly that’d been there since he left Simone’s office tightened. Could it be true? Were women such good actresses? Had he been fooled? And if so, how many times? By who? Were women around the city laughing at him right now? He shuddered.

  Fumbling for the remote, he clicked the TV off. “That mmovie’s bull.”

  Laurel turned to stare at him with wide, alarmed eyes. “I haven’t heard you stutter in years, Alex! What’s wrong?”

  He grimaced. Great. Now she felt sorry for him. Worse, he felt like the same nerdy little stutterer he’d been all those years ago. Frustrated. Awkward. A misfit. He’d felt this way ever since he’d read that stupid article. No. Ever since he’d laid eyes on cool, aloof, tiny Simone, he’d felt like he was some big bull stumbling through the china department at Macy’s.

  With a few well-chosen words she’d even made him question the unquestionable—whether he was good in bed. He, who’d studied every book he could find about how to please a woman. He, whose personal creed ought to have been do it right or don’t bother doing it at all.