Nerds Are From Mars

Table of Contents

Title Page

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

About the Author

Coming Soon

Nerds Are From Mars

by

Vicki Lewis Thompson

A late bloomer comes into his own . . .

Darcie Ingram was Nolan Bradbury’s secret high school crush, but back then he was a short, skinny nerd and Darcie ran with the popular crowd. He’s no longer short or skinny, and billionaire Fagan Harcourt has tapped the talented astrophysicist to head up a ten-year-project to colonize Mars. Nolan’s at the top of his game, yet when Darcie shows up for his Mars lecture at an LA Space Expo, he reverts to his old awkward self.

A professional astrologer and intuitive, Darcie discovers that Nolan’s a hot geek with serious sex appeal and his nervousness with her makes him even more adorable. She admired him in high school for daring to be himself, while she hid her metaphysical abilities for fear of being ridiculed. When she senses Nolan’s in danger from a jealous colleague, she offers her intuitive skills to help him.

Nolan’s not into “woo-woo stuff,” but unless he can accept views different from his own, he’ll put himself at risk . . . and the woman he loves.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

NERDS ARE FROM MARS

All Rights Reserved © 2013 by Vicki Lewis Thompson

ISBN: 978-1-940515-06-9

No part of this book may be used or reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage or retrieval system,  without the written permission of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Cover design by Hot Damn Designs

http://www.hotdamndesigns.com/

Formatting by Heart to Hard Drive

http://hearttoharddrive.com/

Ebook edition published November 2013 by Vicki Lewis Thompson

Dedication

For astrologer extraordinaire Juliana Rose Teal, founder of Hawkflight Astrology, intuitive, licensed pilot, and friend.  Thank you for creating such awesome charts for Darcie and Nolan.  Any astrological mistakes are all mine!

And for
Big Bang Theory
creators Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady for giving us more nerds to love.

.

Also Available in the “Nerd” Series

Talk Nerdy to Me

Gone with the Nerd

The Nerd Who Loved Me

Nerds Like It Hot

Nerd in Shining Armor

Chapter One

Nostalgia swamped Nolan Bradbury as he navigated a conference hallway filled with super heroes, Wookies, and Klingons. Combining fantasy and reality for this year’s Space Expo in L.A. had been a stroke of genius. Attendance was through the roof. He spotted a famous astronaut posing for a picture with a
Star Trek
cast member, and a well-known astronomer was in deep discussion with a woman wearing a Princess Leia costume.

Nolan almost wished he could be an anonymous attendee at this event instead of a main speaker. His Captain Kirk outfit was stuffed in the back of his closet and he’d briefly considered hauling it out, at least for the banquet. But he’d nixed the idea. He wasn’t here to dress up and relive his nerdy Comic-Con days. Fagan Harcourt expected him to dazzle attendees with Harcourt’s Mars colonization project, which meant adopting the serious persona of Dr. Nolan Bradbury, research team leader and brilliant astrophysicist.

But that didn’t keep him from spreading his fingers and returning a Vulcan greeting from someone in a Spock costume. Every scientist on the planet knew that hand signal. He grinned as he remembered the old days. He was no Chris Pine, but when he took off his glasses, he looked enough like a young William Shatner to pull off a decent James T. Kirk impersonation.

When he walked into his assigned lecture room five minutes before starting time, every seat was filled. The ratio was about half costumed and half not, but he’d planned for that. With luck, his talk would appeal to those who’d come for the science and those who’d come for the movie stars.

He recognized one of his team members, Bill Jenson, and stopped to thank him for showing up to support him. Short and stocky with thick glasses, Bill was a devoted family man and a crackerjack aerospace engineer. Harcourt had wooed him away from Jet Propulsion Labs by doubling his JPL salary, and the guy was worth every penny.

The college student who’d volunteered to moderate the session stood near the podium talking with an attendee in a wrinkled-forehead Klingon mask. Their body language suggested the Klingon was her boyfriend. As Nolan absorbed the sounds of a room humming with conversation and occasional laughter, he compared it with other years when the atmosphere had been more scholarly and subdued. Sometimes boring, too, although he hated to admit that. The mixed venue had definitely spiced things up.

Nolan mounted the podium and walked over to the lectern. He’d checked the room thirty minutes ago to make sure his laptop was synced to the projector, the lapel mike worked, and the PowerPoint was running okay. Once he’d convinced himself there would be no glitches, he’d asked the moderator to keep an eye on things so he could grab a quick cup of coffee.

Last night he’d sat in the bar with Harcourt until two in the morning even though they’d both known he had this presentation at nine a.m. Harcourt didn’t like to drink alone, and Nolan had been perfectly willing to hang out with him. The billionaire had given him the chance of a lifetime by hiring him for the Mars project. Besides, Harcourt had a fascinating mind and a thirst for knowledge in a dozen fields. Nolan was never bored in his company.

Feeling much better after his caffeine run, he checked to make sure everything was in place. It was, but someone had left a folded note on the lectern with his name on it. Maybe the organizers had some last-minute instructions. He unfolded the note.

The typed message had to be a joke.
Terminate the Mars project or be vaporized
. Nolan didn’t find that particularly funny, but somewhere in the audience a nerd was probably cracking up. He scanned the room looking for someone dressed in a villain costume. Darth Vader would be a good guess, or maybe Khan. Even the Klingon boyfriend talking to the moderator might have done it.

He didn’t see any likely costumed suspects in the audience, but he did see a person who gave him a jolt of adrenaline he hadn’t felt since high school. It couldn’t be her, though. He glanced away, not wanting to stare, but then he allowed his attention to drift back casually to the third row, fifth seat from the center aisle.

His pulse leaped again. Damn. If it wasn’t Darcie Ingram, then her doppelganger had bought a ticket to Space Expo. Same long brown hair, straight and silky, same adorable chin, same full lips, same electric blue eyes.

She met his gaze and lifted her hand in a subtle wave. He almost choked on his own spit. The crazy note left by some jokester no longer mattered. Darcie Ingram, his high school crush, was in the building.

And just like that, his self-confidence evaporated exactly the way it used to when he’d pass her in the hall or end up behind her in the cafeteria line. And that was
stupid
, because he wasn’t a short, skinny nerd anymore.

Well, okay, he was still a nerd, but he’d shot up and filled out. He was an award-winning astronomer who’d earned a Ph.D in astrophysics and landed a prestigious job working for Fagan Harcourt. He was a goddamn
main speaker
at Space Expo, an event held at one of L.A.’s swankiest resorts, an event that featured Hollywood A-list dudes.

None of that seemed to matter at the moment. Apparently Darcie Ingram had the power to rocket him straight back to the days when he’d been a pathetic loser who’d lusted after the coolest girl in school. Painful memories surfaced, times when he’d made visual contact and she’d
rolled her eyes
before turning away. She’d left his psychic blood on the floor of the cafeteria more times than he could count.

Yet here she was, attending his presentation. He couldn’t imagine why. Surely she wouldn’t have paid the hefty conference fee in order to mock his ass, especially after fourteen years. But even though he told himself that, his insides quivered in a sickeningly familiar way. Just by being here, she’d thrown him off his game.

“Dr. Bradbury?”

He glanced to his right and discovered his young moderator standing next to him. “Yes?”

“It’s three minutes past nine. Shall we get started?”

“Of course.”
Late
. Maybe it was only three minutes, but he prided himself on his timing. He snatched the lapel mike from the lectern and stepped away to allow the moderator to introduce him. He fumbled the job of securing the mike, and because it was on, the noise of his fumbling interfered with the introduction.
Shit
. He’d given dozens of lectures without freaking out. Darcie Ingram shouldn’t affect him this way.

She did, though. Fortunately applause drowned out his tortured breathing as he stepped up to the lectern. As a kid he’d practiced a kind of Ninja breath control, and he used it now out of desperation. He hadn’t needed to rely on that trick since . . . twelfth grade.

Standing in front of the room full of expectant conference goers, a room which happened to include
Darcie Ingram
, he struggled to remember the joke he’d planned to tell, the joke he hadn’t written into his notes because he hadn’t thought it necessary. His brain went on autopilot. “Black holes,” he said. “Can’t live with ‘em, can’t enjoy a good supernova without ‘em.”

It wasn’t a great line, but the audience tittered. He refused to look at Darcie. He had another joke that started out with
Three Martians walk into a bar
, but he didn’t have the nerve to use it and risk blowing the punch line. He’d be better off getting on with his presentation for which he had copious notes.

“If men are from Mars,” he said, “and women are from Venus, then the guys got the better end of the deal, because men . . . and women . . . have a really good shot at inhabiting Mars, whereas nobody’s gonna live happily ever after on Venus. Let me explain why.”

He felt the attendees settle in, ready to be educated and entertained. Okay. He could do this, even with Darcie Ingram sitting in the third row, fifth seat from the center aisle. Using his PowerPoint slides, he illustrated Fagan Harcourt’s dream through artistic renderings and some plausible science.