Undercover Passion (5 page)

So why was he looking forward to that seminar more than ever?

A
bby turned her back to her full-length mirror in the bedroom of the apartment she shared with a sleek black cat named Ming. Looking over her shoulder, she frowned at her own reflection in the glass. Was she getting fat?

Her mother's voice sounded in her head. “Now, Abigail, you stay away from mirrors. Looking at yourself too much will only bring on shallow thinking. There are more important things in the world than looking pretty.”

She frowned, shaking her head. She'd listened
to her mother and avoided shallow thinking and spent her high school years winning all the awards but looking like a drowned cat most of the time. Thinking back now, she realized that a little more balance might have been useful.

“Just a little shallow thinking,” she murmured to herself. “And not quite so much killing myself with homework and piano lessons and science club.”

She'd made her parents proud as peacocks, but she hadn't had a date to the senior prom.

It had only been in the last few years that she had learned how to make herself look good. And her mother still didn't trust it. She grinned, thinking of her.

“Too bad, Mom,” she muttered. “You've got Daddy. How am I supposed to get a man of my own if I don't do what has to be done to get one?”

At first she'd attacked a beauty regimen as a project to be mastered, just like she did everything. She was one of the few people in the world who studied hairstyles and lip gloss the way astronomers studied the stars. For a while, she was maniacal at self-improvement.

But that didn't last all that long. Very quickly
her intrinsic sense of proportion took over and she relaxed a bit. The natural look was more her mode anyway—as long as natural didn't mean unkempt and careless.

She'd seen a response in male interest right away and she'd actually dated a bit. But the men she'd met that way hadn't exactly rung her chimes. Nice men—but no violins, no flight to the moon on gossamer wings.

And yet, a yearning had begun to grow in her. And she had to admit, deep in her heart, that this was one of the reasons she'd gone after the job for Dr. Richie the way she had. She'd met him at a Chamber of Commerce meeting where she'd been gamely trying to drum up some business for her flagging public relations firm.

He'd been very friendly to her. In fact, he had a way of talking that had made her feel as though she was the only person in the room, the only person he cared about at all. It was sort of thrilling, actually, to have this famous media star act as though he was interested in her and her alone. She'd felt lighter than air that day.

She'd overheard him complaining about his PR team and she'd immediately begun to think
about going after the job. It had helped a lot to restore some of her wavering confidence when he'd seemed so impressed with her work.

“The man pretty much saved my life,” she admitted to herself, reaching into the closet to pull out the blue silk suit she wanted to wear to the seminar. “Well, my professional life, anyway.”

She paused, staring into space. Did that mean she had a…“thing” for Dr. Richie? She wasn't sure. For some crazy reason, Daniel O'Callahan flashed into her mind at exactly the moment she started to conjure up a picture of the good doctor.

“Ugh!”

She shook that image away. Why was that man cluttering up her brain? He was annoying, obnoxious and just plain infuriating. And he seemed to take such pleasure in being a jerk.

Okay, so maybe he was sort of good-looking in a hard and dangerous way. And maybe he had made her laugh a time or two. Still, the way he always seemed to be looking for motives behind everything she did was downright offensive. She was going to avoid him like the plague from now on.

She slid the blue silk skirt up around her hips,
wondering why it seemed to be more of an effort than usual. And then the zipper stuck. Looking into the mirror, she noticed the way the fabric was pulling and groaned. She
was
gaining weight. And she was going to have to find something else to wear.

“Ming, I'm fat,” she told her cat, who was busy laying down a carpet of black cat hairs in the middle of her white bedspread.

Ming looked up, narrowed her eyes critically, but didn't comment.

Tugging the skirt off, Abby began to look around for an alternative, and her gaze fell on the jar of NoWait, the new weight-reduction oil Dr. Richie had developed, sitting on her dresser.

She hesitated. Should she try it? Dr. Richie had given her a sample to use in order to get acquainted with the product and its effects, but she'd thought she might just pass on that. Still, it was true that she ought to know all about what she promoted. Maybe it was time to do exactly that.

She picked up the jar and curled her fingers around it. The feel was nice, hefty and smooth, and the look was inviting. Carefully, she twisted
off the top. The scent that drifted up was fresh, a sort of musky citrus that had an exotic allure.

“Why not?” she murmured. Using her forefinger, she dabbed some behind one ear. It felt cool on her skin. She did the same behind the other ear, then closed the jar and looked at herself expectantly in the dresser mirror.

Well, what now? She didn't feel any different.

Shrugging, she turned to her closet to find something else to wear. Time would tell and she didn't have any of that left for lollygaging. The seminar was due to start in a little over an hour and she should really be there early to help set up.

A mint-green silk suit replaced the blue one. The skirt was a little snug, too, but not as bad as the other, and she was dressed and ready to go in no time.

“Wish me luck,” she said to her cat as she pulled out her car keys and started for the garage. “I'm jumping into the deep end tonight.”

Ming regarded her with a complete lack of interest in her golden eyes. In fact, she stretched out her leg and began cleaning it intently, just to prove she wasn't going to waste any more of her valuable time on someone who wasn't handing out food.

Abby laughed and opened the door. A balmy breeze was blowing, and something about it filled her with a sense of anticipation. Suddenly she was sure good things were coming her way tonight. As she walked toward her car, she found herself singing a silly love song, and she laughed again.

Life, it seemed, was exceptionally good.

 

An hour later Abby was at the microphone, getting the overflow crowd into the proper mood for Dr. Richie's speech. Expectations were running high. She could feel the energy behind all the faces turned up toward her, and it filled her with excitement. She wanted to know and touch every one of them. She'd never felt this way before—as though she were involved in something big, something important, something that had the potential to change a lot of lives. It was wonderful.

A ripple went through the crowd. She turned. Yes. Here he came, marching like a glorious champion, head high.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” she said into the microphone. “Please welcome the man who has taken the Pacific Northwest fitness community by storm, Dr. Richard Strong.”

Applause shook the rafters, rolling in waves as he walked, smiling and reaching out to take the hands that stretched toward him. Excitement grew as he emerged from the crowd and mounted the stage, taking the podium.

The consummate performer, she thought as she watched him, overwhelmed with affection and pride. He was perfect. Any woman would be lucky to end up with a man like him. She sighed as he looked over at her with an approving smile.

Any woman at all.

 

Daniel was standing in the shadows watching Abby and Dr. Richie interact. It was pretty depressing stuff. What did women see in the jerk, anyway? Did he have some sort of spell he cast over them? Looking around the room, seeing the fervent looks on some faces, he felt repelled more than anything else. Strange. He'd never understood the appeal of the man himself.

He did get the appeal of Abby, however. His gaze kept straying her way.

Her long shining hair hung down her back like a sweep of silk and her dark eyes looked huge in the stage lighting. She stood with her weight
evenly balanced and her hips thrust a bit forward, making her look as if she was ready to dance at any moment. But most strikingly, her face was radiating happiness.

She looked, he decided, like someone at a revival who had just seen the light. He wasn't sure what it meant, but he was afraid a part of it was complete infatuation with the slick doctor at the podium. And that was enough to make him a little crazy.

Richie Strong was speaking and the crowd was drinking him in as though he held the secret to life.

“When actually,” Daniel said to himself, “what he holds is the secret to hypnotizing a crowd.”

You're jealous, a voice whispered in his ear. You're green with envy. You want to be the one Abby is sending those adoring looks to. Don't you?

He shrugged. Maybe. Just a little. But it never paid to be jealous of a media sensation.

From what he'd been able to glean from casual sources, Dr. Richie was the current star in the pantheon of fitness gurus who often burst upon the scene, spread their glory across the sky and
burned out in a spectacular crash of raised hopes, or else faded away into obscurity as the people turned to someone else. Where had he come from? How had he arrived at this exalted status so quickly?

Those details were sketchy at best. It seemed he had suddenly appeared as a hugely popular motivational speaker, touting his fitness and lifestyle seminars all over the Pacific Northwest. Now he'd taken over the clinic here at Portland General and it was widely assumed he would use it as a base from which to launch an even more powerful enterprise. The man was the latest thing. The sky was the limit.

Why wouldn't Abby worship him? Everyone in the room seemed to feel the same way. From the looks he saw on their faces, they were all in the bag. Except for Daniel.

But that wasn't what he was here for. As he tuned in to the lecture, he found it more a sales pitch than anything else.

“No, my friends. This is not magic. Though you may think it is once you've experienced the speed and strength of the effects. My formula is based on sound scientific principles. There are
certain immutable precepts in the foundation of nutritional studies. They are ageless and never change. What I have done is found a new way to work within the same framework that everyone else must work in. I've picked up on elements others have missed, made new combinations, seen things in a new light. And what I've come up with has proven to be one of the most exciting discoveries ever in the field of weight management. And that is what I have to share with you tonight.”

“A hell of a lot of words saying basically nothing,” Daniel murmured dispassionately, starting toward a chair in the back row that had suddenly opened up.

Unfortunately, a middle-aged blond woman had started toward the same chair at the same time and they collided.

“Oh. Sorry.”

But instead of recoiling, the woman clung to his arm, searching his face.

“What was that you were saying?” she asked in a low voice, staring up at him.

He gave her a rueful smile. “I don't think I'd better repeat it,” he said. “I might get lynched.”

She nodded, biting her lip. “I thought I heard
you right,” she whispered after someone shushed them both.

He gestured toward the chair. “You go ahead and take the seat. I'd rather stand anyway.”

“No, no.” She shook her head, looking toward the stage with sad blue eyes that struck him strongly. “You take it. I don't think I'll stay.” She sighed, shaking her head. “I'm thinking of going out and getting myself a gallon of chocolate mint ice cream, anyway. And I plan to eat it very slowly.”

They both pulled back into the shadows to get away from the angry looks.

“My name's Daniel O'Callahan,” he said, offering his hand.

“Carrie Martin,” she responded, shaking it and looking up at him with a direct gaze.

“I take it you're not here for the powerful weight maintenance program?” he said, curious about her. “Not under the spell?”

“The spell?”

“Of Dr. Richie.”

She laughed shortly. “No. I may be a thick-headed, stubborn fool but I did learn my lesson. Too bad it had to be the hard way.”

“So then, what are you here for?”

She looked at him for a long moment, almost as though weighing the consequences of telling him the truth. Then she punted, shrugging. “I'm just watching.”

He shrugged, too. “So am I.”

She sighed, looking back at the doctor at the podium. “I'm watching my past and throwing away my future,” she murmured.

He didn't answer. He had a feeling that wasn't really meant for him to hear, and sure enough, she turned and began to wander away with only a slight smile over her shoulder in taking her leave. But he had a sense he would be seeing her again. She was the only other person in the room immune to the sales pitch. From what she'd said, he would assume that she knew something the rest didn't. That she'd actually had dealings with Dr. Richie in the past. And he had an even stronger intuition that she would provide him with some missing parts of the puzzle eventually.

He had an urge to follow her, try to get information out of her right now, but he resisted it. Some things had to be left to develop in their own time. Pushing too hard could ruin everything. He'd
learned that by bitter experience time and time again.

He turned his attention back to the meeting at hand. Dr. Richie was still extolling the wonders of his new oil.

“Unwanted pounds seem to evaporate in just a few hours,” he was saying. “Of course, a strict regimen of diet and exercise must accompany the use of the oil for any extended effects to be felt, but that becomes second nature once the results start coming in. You won't believe how easy it all becomes.”