Professor Love (11 page)

He looked out over the audience, careful to avoid Sophy’s questioning expression. His collar felt tight suddenly and he wondered if there was more water nearby.

“A mythical, canonical love which allows a woman to...” he trailed off, losing his place as he accidentally met her gaze again.

She stared at him, eyes bright with curiosity and something else he couldn’t identify. Anger, perhaps. Disappointment? Probably. He glanced down at his notes and blinked a few times.

“Uh, which allows a woman to change a man. Some scholars have referred to it as ‘taming,’ in fact.” He blinked again, his throat suddenly tight with bitter realization. “Convincing him of the therapeutic powers of love.”

It doesn’t feel very therapeutic right now,
he thought to himself.

Slowly, he raised his gaze from his notes to meet Sophy’s stunned expression and something inside of him clenched and burst.

Either he was in love with her, or he was having an aneurysm. After a few eternal seconds, Max had not lost consciousness, so decided it was the former affliction. It would have been easier if he were having an aneurysm.

I’m in love with her
.

The revelation astonished him. He was in love with her. With her romantic delusions and her stubborn idealism. With the twisted curls of her not quite blonde hair and the flashes in her not quite green eyes. Sophy had a warmth and innocence and a
passion
that Trisha had never possessed, not even when she hurled a two-carat diamond at his car. It was intoxicating.

He ignored his notes and stared at Sophy, his voice echoing hollowly over the speaker system. “Passion
is
true love... in these books.” Their silent connection was broken as Sophy blinked suddenly and looked away.

She thrust her arms into her jacket and climbed over several indignant students to get to the aisle. Her tote bag smacked someone in the head and she reddened. Murmuring something to the student rubbing his forehead, she made it to the aisle and practically ran to the back door. She only turned once, as she pushed open the door. Her expression was unreadable.

“True love is passion,” Max said flatly, and she disappeared into the autumn afternoon.

The rest of the talk was a blur. He barely remembered the polite applause and banal follow up questions. The image of Sophy’s sad eyes was stamped on his brain, and Max had never felt so lost in his life. He had really screwed up this time.

Love was turning out to be even more complicated than passion, he realized.

A
fter the auditorium had emptied
, Max headed back to his office. His chair creaked as he leaned back in it, his fingers linked behind his head. His gaze wandered over to the old tweed blazer hanging from the coatrack and his mouth twitched at the memory of the long ago wine and cheese, and that ridiculous Regency costume.

He remembered the sound of Sophy’s laughter and the admiration shining in her eyes as she had sat in front of him on the empty stage. She had looked at him as though he were really her hero, in the flesh.

The chair screeched violently in protest as Max shot forward and slapped his hands on his desk. That was it! She wanted a hero; she always had. He could be a hero, if that was what it took.

When Trisha had wanted him to join her father’s investment firm, he had balked. When his parents had wanted him to go to medical school, he had refused, and disappointed them all.

He was through disappointing people. If Sophy wanted him to be a hero, he would be a hero. Or die trying.

T
he next day
, Max was reconsidering his romantic flight of fancy.

“This here’s the gentlest mount we got.”

A wiry man with a bulbous nose and granite jaw tugged at a button on his dusty denim shirt and eyed Max nervously. His lips quivered and his nostrils flared in tandem with the horse’s as Max stepped into the box.

“I’m sure he’ll be fine.”

The horse was enormous, and even though it was placidly chewing hay right now, Max knew that it could squash him like a bug within seconds, given the chance.

The man rocked back and forth on his boots and grinned broadly. “He’s a she. Name’s Pansy.”

“Pansy?” Was he kidding?

“Yep.” The boards creaked under the man’s boots as his toe and then his heel rapped rhythmically against the wood. Then he stilled and shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. “You’ll be wanting an English saddle, I guess,” he remarked, his lips twitching uncontrollably.

Max tensed, feeling heat rush up his face.

The snug Regency-style coat didn’t allow for slouching, holding his back straight, and he felt completely exposed in the skintight breeches. His cravat had come undone from the haphazard knot he had attempted and had the irritating habit of flapping up against his chin whenever the brisk autumn breeze changed direction, as it did now. He reached up and shoved the piece of silk back down into his linen shirt and, for the first time, wished that Sophy wrote
contemporary
romance.

The stable’s owner peered at him curiously. “Have you ever ridden English-style?”

“No,” Max said, and stepped carefully around a pile of manure. His boots, along with the rest of his costume, were on loan from the university’s drama department, and he had promised the wardrobe mistress he wouldn’t damage them. The well-placed rip in the last pair of breeches had been difficult enough to live down; he wasn’t about to return this pair covered in crud.

“Have you ever ridden at
all
?”

Max was losing his patience. He only had this get-up for three hours, and it would take at least two of those hours to convince Sophy he hadn’t completely lost his marbles.

“Yes,” he hissed. “I’ve ridden before.”

He tried to sound affronted, and hoped the stable owner wouldn’t guess that the last time he sat on a horse was at the county fair as a kid. The only thing he had been jockeying for the last ten years was a desk chair. And desk chairs didn’t move of their own accord, at least not in his experience.

The man eyed him warily, then relaxed. “Uh huh. Well, I’ll get you set up. Why don’t you go over to the office and fill out the paperwork? Pansy’s yours for the next three hours.”

“Fantastic,” Max said tonelessly.

Twenty minutes later Pansy was ready to go. Max was somewhat less prepared. The stable owner helped him mount the beast, and much to Max’s relief, his breeches didn’t split in the process. He could feel the warmth of the animal between his legs and clutched the reins as the horse lurched forward.

“Whoa there.” The stable owner reached up and held the bridle as Max adjusted himself in the heavy leather saddle. “Sure you’ll be okay?”

“Positive,” Max promised, trying to sound more confident than he felt. He slipped his boots into the stirrups and tugged on the reins carefully, turning the horse around in the direction of Sophy’s apartment. Thankfully it was only a dozen blocks away; the stable was housed in a city park.

“You’re sure you’ll be okay?” Pansy’s owner was looking less than thrilled.

Max nodded. “
Fine
.” He looped the reins around his wrists and clucked softly to the mare.

She bolted into a canter and covered almost a block before Max could slow her down to a trot and stop his teeth from rattling.

By the time they got to Sophy’s place, Max was sure that every vertebra in his spine had been displaced and sweat was trickling down his back. But somehow he had managed to stay on the beast. He was starting to develop a tremendous respect for Sophy’s fictional heroes, and he thanked heaven she didn’t write pirate romances. It would have been a lot harder to commandeer a ship.

And it was much easier to appear heroic with snorting and pawing horseflesh beneath him than with a parrot clawing at his shoulder and threatening to stain his jacket.

He reined Pansy in ten feet away from Sophy’s apartment building. Her car was parked out front and the windows of her second floor suite were open. Max could make out some smoky jazz drifting out and a flash of a dark blonde head. After a quick survey and pep talk, he realized that the street was empty—it was now or never.

“Sophy!”

He couldn’t detect any movement inside, but the music suddenly stopped. He called out her name again and within seconds her head poked out one of the windows.

“Max?” She paled underneath the remnants of her summer tan, her eyes widening. “
Max
?”

He stretched out an arm in what he hoped was a gallant gesture and attempted a bow from his seat on Pansy. “My lady.”

She gaped at him. “What on earth are you doing?”

Pansy rocked to the left and Max jerked on the reins. “Whoa. Wooing you,” he called. “Or trying, at least.”

“Have you completely lost your mind?”

Max gave up trying to convince Pansy that the front lawn was not a grazing pasture and loosened his grip on the reins. She grunted her thanks, heading for the hydrangea bushes at the side of the building.

“Max?”

He tilted his head back. “Yes, I’ve completely lost my mind. I’m head over heels in love with you. Now are you coming out here or not?”

S
ophy’s jaw
went slack and she closed her eyes briefly. Head over heels in love? He
was
insane. She jerked her head out of the window and dropped to a cross-legged position on the carpet.

“Sophy!” Max’s tone was forceful with an underlying note of panic. She wondered if perhaps the overweight horse had thrown him.
Lucky horse
, she thought. “Did you hear me?” he shouted. “I said
I love you
!”

She yelled in the direction of the open window, “The whole neighborhood heard you, Max!”

Sighing, she rose to her feet and headed for the door.
That man.

He was still frowning at her window when she sidled up to him. The horse raised her head in curiosity, then turned its attention to the closest window box.

He swore under his breath, then jumped as she touched his leg. His head jerked down and he saw her. His expression softened as he smiled down at her.

“What are you doing to that poor horse, Max?”

He snorted and waved a hand at the beheaded geraniums. “That
poor horse
has stripped every shrub in the last two blocks. It looks like winter’s already here!”

Sophy stroked the horse’s warm flank gently. “What’s his name? Midnight? Mephistopheles?”

“Her name is Pansy.”

Sophy stifled her laughter. “What do you want, Max?” She tried to make her voice sound strong and disapproving, but it wavered.

“You,” he said simply. “Passion. True love.”

“You don’t believe in true love,” she reminded him.

His eyes darkened as he gazed down at her. “I don’t know what I believe anymore. And I’m starting to get that it’s pretty common where I work. But I
do
know that I love the way you remind me to tip my soup bowl away from me and my salad bowl towards me when I eat. And the way you actually get disappointed when you don’t win the lottery. And the taste of your skin.”

Sophy’s face burned as she stared at the nearly defoliated hydrangea bush.

Max continued, “I love the way you make me feel ten feet tall when you look at me. And I love your stubborn belief in the sanctity of marriage. And the way you yell at other drivers on the highway who can’t possibly hear you. And the talent you have for creating ridiculous situations.”

He pulled a limp piece of cream-colored silk from around his neck and handed it to her.

“And the way,” he added softly, “my heart breaks when you cry.”

She took the cravat and scrubbed her cheeks with it. “You
have
lost your mind,” she whispered brokenly, salty tears pooling in the corners of her mouth. But she was very afraid she had as well. “Is this one of those ridiculous situations you were talking about?”

Max rolled his eyes disdainfully towards the horse. “What do
you
think?”

She sniffed, her response slow in coming. “I think... that you must love me, if you’re willing to make a fool out of yourself like this.”

This was the man she fell in love with, not the mythical earl. This man who, deep down, was willing to take chances and fall flat on his face; who made her laugh and made her crazy with anticipation.

The corners of his mouth turned down and he let out an exaggerated sigh. “And here I thought I was being heroic.”

Sophy’s gaze wandered up his leg. “Oh, I don’t know. From this angle you look
very
heroic.”

He leered at her. “Come up here and say that.”

“Later. You still have some groveling to do, Dr. Wright. What you did at that wedding was appalling. Unforgivable.”

“
Mr
. Right.” He grinned. “And you started it.”

“I know.”

“I already apologized to the bride and groom, their respective irate parents and the priest. But I think we’ll still have to find somewhere else to get married.”

“I was banned from that church for that little shoe-throwing incident.” She decided not to mention that the owner of the traumatized doves was thinking about suing her as well. His words slowly filtered into her brain and she stopped dead. “What did you say?”

Max jerked on the reins as his mount finished eating her second planter. “Maybe the university chapel? I think it’s non-denominational,” he added.

Her heart jerked in her chest, then finally started thumping again. “Married?” she squeaked.

He frowned at her. “Sure. Isn’t that the way it always ends in your books?”

“Max, you’re doing it again.”

“What?”

“Being arrogant and presumptuous. I haven’t said I’ll marry you. I haven’t even said I
love
you!”

She crossed her arms over her chest, trying to find it in herself to be angry with him and failing miserably. Hell, she couldn’t even work up a decent scowl right now.

The breath whooshed out of her chest as he reached down awkwardly and hauled her up on the saddle facing him. He had a surprisingly strong upper body for a professor.

He looked her straight in the eye with strength and promise.