Tame An Older Man

“You’re Wyatt, right?” she said, before he could get a word out. “Have a seat.” She patted the concrete beside her.

He hadn’t intended to spend any time at the party. But the redhead looked lonely, so he joined her. “How’d you know who I am?” he asked.

“You look just like your grandfather. Well, like he probably did forty years ago. He’s a handsome man.”

“Thank you.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean…” She blushed prettily. “You probably think I’m flirting with you now.”

“Would that be so terrible?”

“No. I mean, yes, because I don’t usually flirt. Phoebe sent you over here, didn’t she?” the woman said miserably.

“Actually, your smile brought me over here.”

“Now who’s flirting?”

Maybe he was. Maybe that was because the redhead put him completely at ease. Though she was undeniably pretty, with that gorgeous auburn hair, he could tell right away there wasn’t a bit of chemistry between them. If they got to know each other at all, it would be as friends.

“I’m Daisy Redford. Phoebe said you weren’t coming.”

Daisy Redford! Alarm bells went off in Wyatt’s head. This was the one Phoebe had been praising earlier.

“Is Phoebe trying to set us up?” Wyatt asked point-blank.

Daisy’s eyes grew huge. She tried to sputter a denial, but she wasn’t a good liar. Finally she said in a small voice, “They just wanted me to meet you, Phoebe and Elise, that is.”

“Why?”

Daisy shrugged, looking supremely uncomfortable. “Why not?” Then she laughed. “It was a dumb idea. Setups hardly ever work. Phoebe set me up with this dentist…My friends are not going to be happy I foiled all their plans for you and me.”

“You don’t look like the kind of girl who needs a setup,” Wyatt said. “And that’s an honest observation. I’m not flirting.”

“Nice of you to say. So what made you decide to show up after you told Phoebe you couldn’t come?” Daisy asked, not sounding quite so shy. Apparently he’d put her at ease, too, now that they’d set aside any romantic potential between them.

“I was going to complain about the noise,” Wyatt admitted.

“The band is kind of loud,” Daisy agreed. “I’ll come with you to talk to Phoebe, if you want.” She started to pull her feet out of the pool, but Wyatt stopped her.

“No, no, that’s not necessary. I’ve changed my mind. I won’t get any more work done tonight, and I’m here now, so I might as well enjoy myself. Where is our hostess, anyway?”

But he saw her then—with that fall of straight blond hair, she was impossible to miss. She stood near the bar with another woman, laughing with the bartender, whom Wyatt recognized as the guy who took care of Mesa Blue’s pool.

Without a green face, she was the most enchanting creature he’d ever seen. Not at all frog-like.

“I guess you spotted her,” Daisy said, giving him a knowing look.

Chapter Three

Wyatt closed his mouth. He’d been gaping at Phoebe like a lovesick schoolboy worshipping the head cheerleader from afar.

“She’s pretty hard to miss,” Daisy said. “I can’t understand why she didn’t get snapped up to star in some blockbuster movie when she was in Hollywood.”

“She’s an actress?” Wyatt asked, horrified. Somehow, his grandparents had neglected to tell him that part.

“Oh, yeah, don’t you recognize her? Vanessa Vance. From ‘Skin Deep.’” When Wyatt made no acknowledgment, she added, “You know, that nighttime soap a few years ago?”

“I, um, don’t usually watch soaps.”

“You didn’t miss much. The show was horrible. The only thing good about it was Phoebe. Then they went and killed off her character, the ratings tanked, and it got canceled.”

“She’s an actress,” he repeated. He could almost feel a wall going up around him. Lord save him from wanna-be movie stars and has-been starlets.

Phoebe had to know what he did for a living. His grandparents would have told her. So why wasn’t she all over him, trying to get on TV? A little national exposure on “Heads Up” could revive a stalled acting career.

“She’s not acting now,” Daisy said. “She’s st—” Daisy abruptly stopped. “She does beauty makeovers at the Sunrise Spa. But if you ask me, her talents are wasted there. She’s a lot smarter than that.”

The words actress and smart did not belong in the same discussion, Wyatt mused. Maybe Phoebe hadn’t hit him up yet. But she would. He could only surmise that she had some more elaborate scheme for getting to him. Something that would work better than throwing cat food onto his balcony.

STANDING NEAR the bar chatting with Elise, Phoebe savored the last few drops of her frozen margarita. She wanted another one because it was a warm evening, but she had a lot of studying to do tomorrow and couldn’t afford to wake up even slightly hungover. Since she seldom drank alcohol, it wouldn’t take much to give her a fuzzy head in the morning.

“Can I have a cola, Jeff, please?” she asked.

Jeff winked. “Sure thing, gorgeous. What’ll you give me in return?”

Phoebe snorted. Jeff was all of twenty-two and an inveterate flirt. But he was harmless. She suspected if she ever responded to his blatant come-ons, he’d run for the hills.

“I guess I better get back to my hostessly duties,” she said to Elise, as Jeff handed her the cola.

“And I better find my fiancé. I worked hard enough to get him. It’d be a shame to lose him now.”

They were about to turn and head for their various destinations when a man came up behind Elise and put his hands over her eyes. “Guess who?”

It took Phoebe a moment to realize this was Chance, Elise’s brother. He’d called earlier in the week to say he couldn’t come.

“Chance! What are you doing here?” Elise turned and hugged her brother. He looked especially handsome tonight, Phoebe thought, in casual khakis and a pale green knit shirt. She adored a man who dressed well. He put Wyatt and his old T-shirt to shame.

Then why was it her thoughts turned so frequently to how that T-shirt had molded to the planes of Wyatt’s chest, and the way his faded jeans had hugged his butt?

“My meeting got canceled,” Chance said. “Hi, Phoebe. I hope it’s okay that I showed up without warning.”

“No problem.”

“Hey, Elise,” he said, voice lowered, “who’s that gorgeous woman sitting with her feet in the pool?”

Elise looked in the direction Chance indicated, but she saw no one. “Who?”

Chance blinked a couple of times, as if his eyes were playing tricks on him. “She was there a minute ago. If I find her, will you introduce us?”