Ugly Ducklings Finish First (2 page)

Knowing devil-may-care, love-’em-and-leave-’em Wiley “the Coyote” Sharpe, Payton was sure that was the case.

She never should have come back.

Those irresistible grooves deepened, and she had an insane urge to trace them with her tongue. “Let me guess. You don’t remember me.”

As if forgetting him was even a possibility. “Wiley Sharpe.” In a fascination she couldn’t help, Payton watched those eyes darken with surprise and a simple, almost erotic pleasure. Damn, the man was hotter than the surface of Mercury and he wasn’t even trying. “I remember you very well.”

That sensual pleasure spilled into his smile. “Really?”

“Really. I could never forget someone so determined to be nothing more than a dumb jock.”

As she’d hoped, that smile was replaced by the consternated frown he’d always seemed to reserve just for her. “Sweet-tempered Payton Pruitt. You haven’t changed a bit.”

“You must need glasses in your old age.” She wasn’t the same, Payton wanted to shout, overwhelmed by the irrational desire to check her appearance in the mirror. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve grown up.”

“There’s a difference on the surface, maybe.” His gaze traveled all the way down to her French-pedicured, toe-ringed feet before running back up the same path, the visual inspection as thorough as any doctor’s. But the appreciative glitter in his gaze was anything but clinical. “Scratch that. No maybes about it. There’s a stunning difference on the surface.”

To her horror, his perusal made her suddenly sensitized nipples push against the fabric of her dress. “I, uh... Thank you.”
Wow
,
smooth.

“But it is still just on the surface. Beneath it all, you’re the same know-it-all brat who always has to have the last word.”

Her melting defenses did an instant flash-freeze. “If I seemed like a know-it-all to you, it was only because you refused to use your brain for anything other than an ear separator. Furthermore—”

“See what I mean? Always the last word.”

Payton opened her mouth, then shut it on a chagrined half laugh. “You jerk. You always could push my buttons.”

“Ah, but then there are so many from which to choose.”

“I guess I haven’t changed, at that.”

“Not in that respect.” He took her hands and squeezed them in such a friendly manner she couldn’t find the strength to pull away. “But I’d be willing to bet there have been quite a few interesting changes in you.”

“That’s what happens when you grow up.” He was the exact same lady-killer she remembered, Payton reflected on a sigh. Though to her, Wiley had shown another side—the not so attractive side of impatience, grudging tolerance, resentment and, at times, open hostility.

Lucky her.

Not once had he looked at her in that special
Coyote
way. The only consolation she’d had was that he’d never shown his countless fangirls who he really was beneath the mask. When his father died from a massive coronary, it was Payton to whom Wiley had come for comfort. He’d trusted her enough to let her see the imperfect person he really was, and she’d told herself how lucky she was to have that trust. It had almost been enough to cover the hurt that he’d never looked at her through the eyes of the playboy.

Almost.

“Well.” Unsettled by that long-ago yearning, Payton pulled her hands from his. “One other thing that hasn’t changed about me is that I’m not a big fan of crowds.”

“You’re not leaving?” Undaunted by her retreat, Wiley caught her fingers once more. “You just got here.”

“I didn’t intend on staying long.”

“Ten minutes isn’t long.”

“Then yay for me, I’ll succeed in my objective.” This time she didn’t bother with subtlety when she pulled her hands away. “Don’t sweat it, no one’s going to miss me.”

“I wouldn’t bet on that.”

Before she could come up with a suitable reply, he reached around her to hold the gymnasium door’s push-bar handle closed, his arms like steel bands on either side of her. The irritated glare she shot him was answered with an angelic smile. “Come on, Payton, you can’t leave yet. We haven’t even had the chance to swap lies about how great our lives are now.”

“I wouldn’t be lying.” Flustered, she tried pulling in a breath he wouldn’t hear, but that was almost impossible with him parked right up front in her personal space. It was insane how claustrophobic he made her feel; it wasn’t like she was trapped and running out of air, after all.

It just felt like she was.

“Wiley, please.” Payton crossed her arms, so annoyed she could almost overlook the heat beginning to pulse between her legs. While horrifying, the pure physiological reaction wasn’t exactly unexpected. The man had her caught in a heart-stopping non-embrace, the solid wall of his body mere inches from the tips of her breasts. His eyes kept her pinned to the spot, and the warmth radiating from him was so heady she gave serious thought to swooning. “I didn’t come here to play games.”

“Yeah? Why did you come here?”

“Um, let’s think. I was invited?”

“You could have stayed away, but you didn’t. Why?”

Jeez
. “Wiley—”

“Why?”

“Stop badgering me!” Frazzled, Payton shot him an exasperated look. “I had to come here to prove something to myself, okay?”

He tilted his golden head in what looked like understanding. “What was it that you needed to prove?”

“Wow. It’s amazing how you think any of this is your business.”

“I’m that special combination of nosy and unable to take a hint. What did you need to prove?”

“That I’m as good as anyone here.” Then she shook her head. She had to be out of her mind to blurt out a decade-old insecurity he’d helped build up. “It’s no biggie, okay? I just had to face all the childhood traumas so I could finally put it behind me.”

“Payton.” His expression softened with a compassion she had only glimpsed in the boy she’d known a decade ago. “I can understand that.”

A disbelieving scoff escaped her. “Right. Sure you do.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Think about it, Wiley—you were literally the most popular person in school. You never dreaded lunch hour, because that was when an entire table would clear out if you happened to sit there. You never had to suffer the humiliation of never being asked to dance. You can’t imagine how crushing it was to be laughed at by the older girls because I hadn’t yet begun to wear a real bra. You were never chosen last in gym class or called nasty, ugly names, or had your locker vandalized every other week, or had your school desk moved out into the hall because no one wanted to sit next to you. I don’t think you can comprehend just how difficult it was to force myself to walk through these doors again.”

His eyes narrowed, and an emotion she couldn’t define darkened his expression. “From your point of view, I guess I do lack the basic intelligence to understand the pain you suffered, and maybe you’re right in thinking that.”

She blinked, baffled. That wasn’t what she meant at all. “No—”

“But I do understand.” With his expression once more lightening, he straightened away from her. “And while I can’t erase those past hurts, I can remedy at least one of them.”

Still baffled, she stared at him. “Remedy...?”

He smiled with patented Coyote charm and held out a hand. “May I have this dance, Payton?”

She started to raise her hand before she ruthlessly checked it. “I’m all grown up now.”

“I’m seriously aware of that. So?”

“So I don’t need your pity.”

“Believe me, pity is the last thing I’m feeling. Unless, of course, you can’t dance.”

“Watch it, pal. I haven’t been a wallflower my entire life.”

“Prove it.”

Those pesky buttons. Payton sighed. She had never been able to resist a challenge and damn it, he knew that all too well.

Wiley
,
you stinker.
You haven’t changed a bit.

Bidding a fond farewell to the plan of leaving the reunion and the past behind for all time, Payton slid her hand into his and gave the point to him. “Lead the way.”

Chapter Two

Wiley had always prided himself in his capacity to enjoy life’s simple pleasures. An ice-cold beer after a sweltering midsummer pickup basketball game with his best friend Donovan. The hot-blooded speed of his ’63 Corvette. Winning a difficult case after sweating bullets over a legal strategy.

But holding a soft, sweet-scented woman tall enough to fit his lanky frame in all the important places had to be the greatest pleasure of all.

Even if that woman was Payton Pruitt.

Resting his cheek against her hair, Wiley breathed in her scent of roses and smiled. Who would have thought he’d enjoy holding Payton, former tutor and thorn in his side? But it went even further than mere enjoyment. From the moment he spied her across the gymnasium, with those whoa-nelly legs and a body graced with subtle curves, he’d forgotten all about his problems. From that moment, getting her into his arms had become his only mission in life.

Now, with that exquisite body pressed against his, he couldn’t help but wonder what other missions he could accomplish.

“I can feel you smiling.”

Payton’s familiar dry tone pushed his smile into an all-out grin, and he shifted to look into her dark eyes. “I was thinking this evening wouldn’t have been complete if you hadn’t shown up.”

The dubious lift of her brow told him she wasn’t buying it. “I almost didn’t come, actually. Would you believe I threw away that stupid invitation seven times?”

He whistled, impressed. “That has to be some kind of record.”

“If there hadn’t been a convention in San Antonio all this week, I wouldn’t have come.”

“Convention?”

“Medical convention.” She let her gaze drift around the crowded gym. Discomfited without knowing why, Wiley squeezed her hand to bring her attention back to him. “I’m scheduled to give a lecture on the importance of outfitting every trauma center, emergency room and clinic with child-sized instruments as standard equipment.”

“So you made it.” He’d never doubted it for a moment. “You’re a doctor now.”

“Specializing in family care and pediatrics.” Payton nodded, her expression so serious he caught a glimpse of the solemn girl she’d once been. “That was always the plan.”

“I remember.” Strangely enough, he was remembering a lot about her. About them. He’d resented the hell out of Payton—or, more accurately, he’d resented he’d needed her help. But as they’d gotten to know each other, they had forged a rapport he’d never found with anyone else. There had never been any pressure to put on a dog-and-pony show for Payton, or dazzle her with the Coyote charm. With her intellect she would have seen right through it anyway, so he’d never bothered. Of course, that meant there were times when she’d seen him at his worst, but even that was okay. She’d accepted him anyway.

How would Payton react now, if she saw him at his best?

Wiley’s mouth curled again, this time without humor. What he was thinking—what the feel of her warm, willowy body swaying like an erotic fantasy against his was making him think—was out of the question.
Way
out. Dr. Payton Pruitt, child prodigy and certified genius, wasn’t the kind of person who could take playing around in stride. Unlike so many of the women he’d known, Payton had always been the epitome of
serious
, and he respected that. Too bad for him that made her untouchable.

If only she didn’t feel so damn good against him.

To distract himself from the heaviness coiling behind his zipper, Wiley tried to focus on a little harmless conversation. “What happened to you after college? The last I heard, it took you three years to go through premed at Baylor.”

She nodded. “After that, I went to Houston to study medicine. That’s where I live now,” she added with a shrug that lifted her breasts against his chest. Electricity jolted through him so hard and hot he almost lost the ability to understand the language she was speaking. “On my twenty-fifth birthday I was accepted into a private medical group with a promise of partnership within two years. Quite a present, wouldn’t you say?”

“Outstanding.” Lord, she was a stunner. Had her dark eyes always been so bedroom-hot seductive? “Do you still wear glasses?”

“Glasses? Yes, for reading and other close work.”

“Good.”

Her laugh held bewilderment. “Good?”

“It reminds me of the old Payton I knew.” Wiley smiled to mask the dangerous sexual awareness closing around him like a fist. What Payton was making him feel—the breathless excitement that made his skin too tight for comfort—was coming at him like a sucker punch, and he didn’t have a clue how to handle it. This wasn’t some random woman he could amuse himself with for the night, only to send her on her merry way with a kiss and a vague promise to call. This was
Payton
, for God’s sake. Best to think of her as the Baby Brain he’d once known, rather than a hot-as-hell seductress who could make him hard from all the way across the gym.

No, damn it. He wouldn’t think of that. And he wouldn’t let himself feel it, either. Payton was out of his reach, and that was all there was to it.

He just had to keep remembering that.

* * *

The beat of a bluesy tune twined around the couples crowding the dance floor, but Payton never noticed. She was so wrapped up in the man who held her, they might as well have been locked in an isolation chamber. On a desert island. In the exact geographic middle of nowhere.

Wiley Sharpe.

The hysterical urge to laugh bubbled up, and Payton had to work at wrestling it back down. Back in the day Wiley had been her nemesis, her secret fantasy and her only acquaintance in Bitterthorn High. She refused point-blank to call him a
friend
. Even now that label was far too anemic for what he’d eventually come to represent in her life. And with that realization came another—she had told Wiley she’d come back for herself, and while that was true, it wasn’t the
whole
truth. As Wiley’s thighs brushed against hers in an illusion of seduction, she could secretly cop to another reason.

She’d come back for him.

“So.” She backed away on the excuse of looking up at him, when her real goal was to avoid that brain-melting friction of thigh against thigh. “Now that I’ve impressed you with my life’s resume, let’s talk about you.”

He grimaced, and it was as charming as his smile. “Boring subject.”

“Not to me.”

He looked around the room as if he would find the answers there. “I doubt you’ll believe me.”

“Why? Are you going to lie?”

“Of course not.”

“Then I’ll believe you.”

“Fine. I’m a lawyer. Really,” he added defensively and stared hard at her, as if daring her to laugh.

“Oh, my. Wiley, that’s
wonderful
.” She threw her arms around his neck and pressed a smacking kiss to his clean-shaven cheek before she could stop herself. “I always knew you had it in you.”

“Yeah?” Smiling in apparent bemusement, he raised an absent hand to his cheek. “You’re not surprised?”

“Should I be?”

“Everyone else is.”

The resentment threading through his words made her smile. “They don’t know you as well as they thought they did.”

“But you do?”

Her heart executed a Baryshnikov-level pirouette when his tone lowered to a purring intimacy, and she hated herself for it.
Intimacy
with the Coyote was the last thing a smart woman needed, and if she was one thing, she was smart. “I guess I did know you, a decade ago. But remember, I haven’t seen you since I left for college.”

“Not true.” Another couple bumped into them, oblivious to everyone but each other. Wiley’s arms curled around her back to shield her, bringing them together in one long line of heat. “I saw you the day of your father’s funeral.”

“Oh.” Payton’s brain stumbled to a halt the moment his body pressed flush against hers. Alarm bells went off while a crazy quilt of surprise, desperation and a pulsating, primitive awareness smothered her thought processes until only one thing was left to echo through the sudden stillness of her mind.

Oh man
,
what a body.

Scrabbling for composure and trying not to drool, she struggled not to notice how the beat of his heart thudded against her breasts. “I don’t remember seeing you that day.”

“I’m not surprised. We barely had time to speak, but I remember it like it was yesterday.”

“It was seven years ago, Wiley. With that much time separating us, we could qualify as strangers.”

“A stranger wouldn’t know you have a habit of chewing on your necklace when you’re wound up.” His gaze dropped to her mouth, tracing it with an intensity that made his eyes glitter. “It took me a couple of seconds, but I recognized you.”

“Still, I’m surprised.” She had to consciously stop herself from licking her lips to sample the lush heat ignited by his heavy-lidded gaze. “I didn’t think anyone would recognize me.”

“When I first saw you standing alone by the doors, I thought you were someone’s date. I couldn’t believe some guy would be stupid enough to leave your side, even for a second.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Absolutely not. For instance,
I
never would have left you alone.”

A heady surge of pleasure bubbled through her, but the weight of reality smashed it flat a second later. Wiley Sharpe practically shot out of the womb bringing the female population to its knees with his charm, but it didn’t actually mean anything. It never did.

Her smile was little more than a wry twist. “Don’t waste your flattery on me, pal. It won’t work.”

“It’s not flattery when it’s the truth.”

“Uh-huh. So my nervous habit gave me away?”

“Pretty much.” To her surprise he hooked a finger around her neck chain and lifted it to her lips. “The way you work your mouth when you’re concentrating is...unforgettable.”

“I see.” The feathery brush of the chain against her sensitive lips made her shiver, and his words made her imagine all sorts of things she could do with her mouth. But to think that while in the arms of the legendary Coyote of Bitterthorn was akin to playing with fire, so when the music wound down to a sensuous close she couldn’t quite stifle her sigh of relief. “Well. Thank you for the dance. I told you I was good.”

“So you did.” He didn’t return her smile, instead tightening his hand on hers before she could pull away. “How about we find a seat and talk?”

“Like I said, I’m giving a presentation tomorrow morning. I should be going.”

“Are you staying with your mother?”

“No.” The word came out more sharply than she intended, and she cleared her throat to ease its sudden tightness. “I’m staying in San Antonio, at the hotel where the convention’s being held.”

“Ah.” Wiley tilted his head, as if to view her from another perspective. “I take it things are still tense between you two?”

“It’s not that bad. Wiley—”

“Does she know you’re in town?”

With a hiss, Payton jerked her hand away. “That is none of your business.”

“I’ll take that as a no.”

“Take it any way you like,” she said snippily. “I’m leaving.”

“We both are.”

Before Payton had a chance to dodge, he took her by the elbow and guided her toward the doors. A few people called to him, and a sheriff’s deputy by the main doors tipped his hat as they passed. Raising his free hand, Wiley offered smiling nods of farewell, but he didn’t stop. Just like royalty, she thought with a resigned sigh. She was only surprised his adoring fans didn’t throw flowers at his feet.

“Slow down,” Payton ordered as Wiley dragged her through the nearest exit. With her ears ringing from the loud music, she took in a breath of cool night air that carried the unmistakable perfume of spring. “Wiley, stop pulling on me.”

His unrelenting pace eased up a fraction. “You’re a doctor. If I pull something loose, you can always put it back in place.”

“Funny, I don’t remember you being this much of a jerk,” she muttered as they headed into the parking lot. “Where are we going?”

“Someplace where we can talk.”

“Has it occurred to you that I’m not interested in talking?”

“Nope.” He scanned the lot as if looking for enemy troops before he made a beeline for a vintage Corvette two-seater. “We’re going to have a nice little chat, you and I, and get all caught up like the old friends we are.”

“Please, we were never what I’d call
friends
.”

He stopped in his tracks between a heavy-duty pickup and a late-model luxury coupe so abruptly she almost ran into him. “What do you mean, we were never friends? Don’t you remember—”

“I remember the first time I spoke to you. The question is, do you?”

His eyes narrowed, as if he sensed a trap. “Tell me.”

“After I had been given the assignment to tutor you, I had to make an appointment with you to schedule our study times. The mere thought of talking to you... Seriously, you don’t know how it terrified me.” With a rocky laugh, Payton raked a hand through her hair. “There I was, the ugliest, most unpopular geek in school, maybe in Bitterthorn history, being forced to talk to the most popular boy. I’m surprised I didn’t throw up. Or faint. Or both.”

“It didn’t seem that way to me.” A vertical line appeared between his brows, and she wanted to groan out loud when it made him appear poetic. Her frowns only made her look crabby. “No sooner had I heard I’d been assigned a tutor, there you were, wanting to talk about study schedules.”

She fought a cringe as the painful memory welled up. “I’d decided to get it over with as soon as I saw you. Sort of a social version of ripping off a bandage.”

“I had no idea it was so hard for you.”

“It only got harder from there.”

His frown sharpened. “What do you mean?”

“The first time I saw you that day was in the cafeteria. You were surrounded by your usual entourage of admirers. Laurie Beeson was your girlfriend for that week. For some reason I remember she was sitting on your lap, sort of...bouncing all over the place.”

Wiley snorted. “She did that.”

“Yes, she did.” Laurie Beeson had always bounced, which no doubt explained her attraction for every male who had managed the momentous accomplishment of reaching puberty. “Watching her with you, I felt so scrawny and little-girlish. Inadequate. But I had a job to do, and there was no way to get out of it. So even though I felt like a Christian facing a pride of lions, I stopped at your table.”