Write It Up!: Rapid Transit / The Ex Factor / Brewing Up Trouble

This time when her editor smiled at her, Julia didn’t feel at all like the main course. Because this time, Tess seemed genuinely delighted by what she was hearing. “Tell me more,” the other woman said.

Julia shook her head slowly, honestly not knowing where to begin. “I didn’t think I’d meet anyone even halfway decent doing this speed-dating thing,” she confessed, “but this guy…” She sighed eloquently. “He’s too good to be true, Tess. Gorgeous, funny, smart, kind, totally decent…”

“Nice ass?” Tess asked.

“Great ass,” Julia replied with a chuckle. “And he cooks.”

“He does not,” Tess gasped incredulously.

Julia nodded enthusiastically. “He can poach chicken in a kicky chardonnay.”

“Get out.”

“And make radish roses.”

Tess made a disappointed sound as she moved her fork around in her own salad. “He’s gay, darling. He just hasn’t accepted it. Find someone else to write about.”

“He’s not gay,” Julia said with certainty. “Trust me.”

Tess’s smile turned satisfied. “Then the two of you have—”

“No,” Julia interrupted her. “We haven’t. Not all the way. Which is another thing that makes him different from other guys. He’s not in a big rush to have sex.”

“I hear a ‘but’ in that sentence,” Tess said.

Julia had, too, quite frankly, something that rather surprised her. “But…” she said. “But I think maybe I’m starting to be in a rush for it myself. I really like him. A lot. I mean, maybe I even…”

No. She stopped herself before completing the statement—verbally or mentally. She would not permit herself to say it. She would not permit herself to feel it. Not yet. It hadn’t been long enough to know if she even…

No. She halted herself again. Not yet.

Tess nodded with much approval. “Good. I was beginning to worry about you, darling. You and Abby and Samantha, all of you. None of you girls has enough epic romance in your life.”

And Tess would know, Julia thought, since she was currently working on the third epic romance of her own life.

“It’s going to be a great article, Tess,” Julia promised again. “Because Daniel is such a great guy. There have even been times this week when I honestly found myself thinking he might just be…”

No. Not yet.

“The one?” Tess finished for her.

For a moment, Julia didn’t dare acknowledge anything of the kind, certain she’d jinx it if she did. And also because she wasn’t ready to admit it yet, on account of—had she mentioned?—it was too soon for her to know such a thing. Then she realized how silly she was being. Nothing could jinx the way she and Daniel were together. And she was completely crazy about him.

“Yeah,” she said softly. “Sometimes, I think he might just be…the one.”

Tess sat back in her chair, propping her elbows on the arms and tenting her fingers together. It was her life-is-good pose. “I like seeing you so enthusiastic, darling,” she said. “It will serve you well when you write this article.”

Naturally, Tess would see it that way, Julia thought, forking up another bite of salad. She herself saw it another way entirely. Forget the article. Having Daniel in her life was serving to make Julia happy. Deliciously so. She didn’t know what she’d done to deserve such incredibly good fortune, but she wasn’t about to question it.

Daniel Taggart was a dream come true. Perfect beyond words. The answer to every silent plea for Mr. Right she’d ever sent out. Regardless of the manner in which she’d found him, and no matter what Abby and Samantha experienced on their assignments, Daniel was Mr. Right.

Tess was right. Life was good. And Julia couldn’t imagine a single thing that would change that.

DANIEL HESITATED BEFORE entering the bar his editor had directed him to for yet another round of speed-dating, wondering at the likelihood of running into Julia here. She had said she would be attending three more of these parties herself. Just how many speed-dating events were going on in New York on any given night?

He did some quick mental math. Eight million people, probably half of them adults, then another half of those single, then half of the singles looking, then another half desperate enough to try a half-dozen different types of dating…Half by half by half by half, then a half dozen of that…Drop the zero, carry the two, then divide by pi…Do the hokeypokey and turn yourself around…

Oh, hell. The chances were probably pretty good.

But the bar was packed, he reassured himself as he peeked inside, so he could probably pop in for a quick look around without being noticed. Grab one of the lists of participants for the event to see if Julia’s name was on it. Not that anyone was ever fully identified by name at these things, since security was a major consideration, especially for the women. But there were usually first names followed by a number or letter, or people were identified by drink preferences, or celebrity names they chose for themselves, or some character trait like “Loves music” or “Sleeps in the buff” or something. If Julia was on the list, Daniel was confident he knew enough about her by now to recognize her, even under an alias.

And the reason he knew enough about her was because the two of them had seen each other nearly every day in the week that had passed since the night they’d cooked together in her kitchen. And then cooked together on her couch. No, what had happened couldn’t be called a one-night stand by any stretch of the imagination. But they had enjoyed quite a nice little make-out party. Then they’d enjoyed some Marx Brothers on DVD. Then they’d enjoyed those two pints of Godiva.

And it went a long way toward telling Daniel how far gone he was on Julia that he’d returned home that night feeling even better than he had after those delirious one-night stands with the two women from that first speed-dating party.

Only a week, he marveled. Damned if it didn’t feel as if he’d known Julia for years. He had barely seven days’ worth of memories of her, but there were so many good ones, it might as well have been enough for a lifetime.

In addition to the ones from dinner last Saturday, there was spending the day with her all day Sunday. There was lunch at Rockefeller Plaza, where they’d met three days this week because it was located almost exactly midway between their two workplaces. There was the midweek foray to an off-off-Broadway play that was so bad they’d spent two hours afterward improving the writing themselves. There was the trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, a place Julia said she visited once a week to keep herself in touch with her humanity, a place Daniel hadn’t visited since college. Seeing it again with her, he wondered why he’d stayed away.

He was supposed to have hit on her once to see if he could score, and when it became clear that first night he wouldn’t make it past first base, he should have moved on to greener pastures. Greener baseball diamonds. Whatever. Instead, he’d gone home that first night feeling oddly relieved that she hadn’t invited him up to her place. Odder still was the fact that he hadn’t pressed to get her into bed since then. Not even the night they’d cooked together. For the life of him, he didn’t know why. He was just having too much fun getting to know Julia. Talking with Julia. Doing other things with Julia. Being with Julia. Yeah, he wanted her. Something fierce. But there was so much else he wanted, too.

The image of her face swam up in his brain then, the way it had a habit of doing lately, her mouth curled into that wry smile, her green eyes laughing at something. She laughed a lot, he’d noticed. She found humor in almost everything, the same way he did. She had a quirky way of looking at things that was unlike anyone else’s. In spite of his own protestations to the contrary that first night, he had no choice but to admit she was like no woman he’d ever met before. Daniel liked that. He liked all of it. Hell, he just liked Julia. A lot.

And he had no idea what to do about it.

He glanced down at the list in his hand, reminding himself he wasn’t supposed to be thinking about Julia right now. In fact, he should be putting thoughts of her as far away from himself as he could. Because he had a job to do tonight. He had women to meet and charm and cajole into bed. And then abandon. The way he was supposed to have done with Julia.

And dammit, would he never be able to think about anything again without having her slip into his thoughts?

Work, he reminded himself. Work now. Julia later. Then he chuckled derisively at himself. If work turned out the way it was supposed to tonight, Julia had better not find out about “later.”

Man, could he do that? he asked himself. Could he really sleep with some woman he picked up tonight for casual sex, just so he’d have a story to write? Well, yeah, since he’d already done it twice. But that was before Julia. Could he do it now? Sleep with some stranger one time and hope that the woman he was beginning to care about never found out? A month ago, he could have answered that question easily, and in the affirmative. Tonight, though…

Damn. He honestly didn’t know.

No names, he saw when he looked down at the list in his hand. No identifying elements at all. Damn. The participants for this event were only assigned numbers. There was no way he’d be able to tell if Julia was among them.

He really needed to stay for this party tonight, he told himself. Because the third one he’d attended—the Sunday night after meeting Julia—had been a complete bust. Not a single woman in the bunch had stirred his libido in the slightest, and he’d gone home alone.

And it wasn’t as if he had high standards. His main requirement in a woman was that she needed to have produced estrogen at some point in her life. His second was that she have a pulse. His third was that she breathe oxygen. His fourth and final was that she not set off his gag reflex. Yet still he’d ended that third party without checking off a single name from his list.

And he’d been so besotted by Julia at the second event that he hadn’t even turned in his name list at the end of the night. Thank God for the two women from the first party or he wouldn’t have a story at all. Thing was, he could barely remember either one of them now. Good thing he’d taken notes.

All the more reason to focus on work tonight, he told himself. He was in desperate need of material. Which meant he had to go to this party and find a few halfway decent—or rather, wholly indecent—women to fill the pages of his story.

As long as, you know, Julia wasn’t here.

Still wary of her appearance, Daniel hovered near the front entry, skirting the wall, keeping one eye on the door, in case she was a last-minute show. But by the time the party finally got going, ten minutes late, there was still no sign of her. Obviously she wasn’t coming tonight, so he’d be free to pick up women at will. And as he’d scanned the crowd looking for Julia, he’d spied a number of attractive women who might work well for his purposes. At least none of them had set off his gag reflex, all clearly possessed beating hearts, and he couldn’t detect gills on any of them. Now, as long as he didn’t see any Adam’s apples or facial hair…