Beauty Bites Read online

  I was shocked too. But I was also trained, and enough was enough. I needed him to stop, and not start up again. Which meant significantly altering his impression of my “wanting it, baby”. But his fingers were still tangled in my hair, so I couldn’t yank bodily away without tearing out a chunk.

  My brain went into overdrive, ala Downey’s Sherlock Holmes.

  Grab Little’s wrist to control distance.

  Fake a groin shot to open a gap.

  Make my point.

  Go. Grab, fake. He hopped back, still hanging onto my hair. It raised his upper arm, giving me the opening. I jabbed a spear hand into a pressure point in his armpit. The armpit shot was dangerous (don’t try this at home!) but I’d done it soft to minimize damage.

  He yelped and let go instantly. “What the fuck?”

  I snatched up Holiday’s coat and whipped it around me. “I said, I’m not that kind of woman. Whatever you think I’m built for, it isn’t you.”

  “You think it’s Ric?” Little sneered it, but he cupped his pit protectively. “Ric already screws tons of sluts like you every day. You’re nothing special, baby.”

  I hadn’t done anything to bring this on except exist. Not fair, but being achingly plain until puberty hadn’t been fair either. I ratcheted myself to my full height and glared down at him. “Let me make this crystal clear. If you can influence Ric I’m open to talking terms. But sex isn’t part of the offer.”

  “This isn’t over.” Glaring, Little flung open the door and stalked out.

  My neck tightened. I didn’t like making enemies and Charles Little struck me as the worst kind—backstabbing. I pinched Holiday’s coat closed and left as quickly as my cousin’s high heels let me, hyperaware all the way to the elevator. I punched the down button. A trilling ring from below said I’d have a wait; the elevator was being held.

  While I waited, I stewed. Dress up, Twyla said. Flirt a little, get us some information. Easy. Yeah, right. I took out my phone and hit redial.

  Twyla panted, “Hello?”

  “I don’t care what the mayor thinks. We can get someone else for the advertising campaign. Anyone other than Holiday.” I may have spit the name.

  “Whoa, wait. Calm down and tell me what happened.”

  “I am calm,” I said through teeth grinding their way to a dental appointment every bit as expensive as Charles Little’s. The elevator finally dinged its arrival. I ignored it. “I talked to Holiday. He said no. I talked to you. You said Holiday or nothing. Then in waltzes Naughty Vamprietta in a spaghetti noodle’s idea of a dress. Honestly, there was more material in that teeny top Holiday gave me.”

  “The top Holiday gave—Wait, what?”

  “Nothing.” My cheeks heated. I plowed on. “Holiday glides in after her and shuts the door with a very I-want-to-be-alone click. She’s all dahling this and dahling that, but I was there first so it wasn’t my fault Camille’s two’s company became a crowd.”

  Twyla hissed. “Camille? Skewer me with a palette knife.”

  “You know her?”

  “She’s a rat in a people’s suit. What did she want?”

  “To make us the Midwest’s Vegas.” I outlined Camille’s plan.

  Twyla started swearing—in Greek. She once told me Nikos was so taciturn she had to speak for both of them. At the time I’d thought it was exaggeration. Apparently not. Underneath her cussing was a low, ominous growl, more animal than human. Nikos got a little feral when his protective side came out, another thing that made me think v-thoughts.

  “This changes things,” Twyla said when she’d finally run out of cuss words. “We can’t let Camille get her red-nailed hookers into Holiday. This isn’t the first time she’s tried to ruin Meiers Corners, but while she’s only semi-competent on her own, Holiday is frighteningly good. With him as her tool, she could do it.”

  I pictured Holiday as a tool…a long and thick one…and tamped down a lusty shudder. “How are you going to keep her from hooking him?”

  There was a telling silence on her end.

  “No. Oh, no.”

  “Synnove, we’re desperate here.”

  “No, I tell you. I do not live by the accident of genetics and nutrition that makes my body. I am not saving Ric Holiday’s skin from Camille’s hookers by sinking my own short and sassies in. And in case that’s not plain enough—I am not sleeping with him!”

  “You don’t have to sleep with him. Just…seduce him a little.”

  “Seduce him a little? Is that like being a little bit pregnant? Dammit, Twyla, I’m a doctor, not a hooker!”

  She sighed. “You’ve changed since The Incident. Become all mistrusting.”

  “The Incident only clarified the truth.”

  “You say potato, I say mistrusting. Tell you what. Drive to the cabin and we’ll talk. Together we’ll think of something else.”

  Tension released. “Thanks. Especially if thinking includes alcohol.” I hit the down button with less force. The elevator dinged and started to open, not having gone anywhere. “How do I get there?”

  “Take I-94 east. Exit 24, turn north, then follow the signs for Chipmunk Lake Cabins. Call me if you get lost.”

  I tucked away my phone, stepped forward—and bounced, breasts-first, off a powerful, dark-suited arm barring my way.

  “What is The Incident?” Ric Holiday said.

  My mouth hung open but no words came out. My DDs tingled from where they’d air-bagged against his arm. Either he worked out a lot or he was built of granite. My nipples poked up for a look-see; yep, granite, mmm-mmm. “Did you know breasts are composed of terminal duct lobular units covered in subcutaneous adipose tissue?”

  I slapped a hand over my mouth.

  A tiny smile warmed his face. “Do you always quote Gray’s Anatomy when you’re nervous?”

  “I’m not n…nervous.” Damn. “Let me pass.”

  “It’s cute, you know.” He dropped his arm and schooled his face into an expression of serious inquiry. “What is The Incident, please?”

  “Direct, persistent and polite. You’re a trifecta of virtues, aren’t you?”

  “Why do I get the feeling that was sarcasm?”

  “Because you have a good ear?”

  “That’s not the only organ on me that’s good.” His lids lowered with lazy suggestion.

  I snorted. “You need work on your pickup lines.”

  That got a genuine smile out of him. Damn, still edible. I escaped into the elevator. “Goodbye, Holiday.” I hit door close.

  He slid through the gap with one effortless step. “Is The Incident why you gave up your residency berth?”

  My head jerked up. “How did you know that?” I hit the G button with more force than necessary. Hitting the G-spot…damn, what was it about Holiday that put sex on my brain? “That’s not common knowledge. Spying?”

  “Facebook. Same thing. Not your page, your cousin’s.”

  “Why me?” I glanced up, but no answer was written on ceiling or wall, unless the answer was Max Cap 15. “I have the only cousin in all of Meiers Corners who’s made it into the twenty-first century.”

  “Not her fault. She’s running a city trying to pull in tourists. Social media updates are part of her job. The Incident?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “I have time. Buy you coffee?”

  Damn, he was smart and persistent and sexy as hell, and the only male not trying to grope me in recent memory. Plus he wanted me to talk about myself.

  I blew a resigned breath. “All right. But we go Dutch.”

  As a young girl, I was plain and shy. Puberty added a patina of ugly, with lumpy breasts, frizzy hair and terminal acne. Before puberty I’d had a few girl friends. After, well, they were all interested in boys. I was interested too, but no boy would be caught dead with me.

  My friends drifted away and I found myself alone.

  Then, the weekend of my first homecoming, when all my friends had dates and I was alone again (naturally), m
y older sister Alexis took pity on me. We’d never connected much—I was fourteen and she was twenty-two—but she collected me that weekend and showed me college life, or the tamer parts of it.

  A first-year med student, she really didn’t have time for me. But she took time anyway, cheering me up, showing me that at least someone cared. Only one thing didn’t center around me that weekend—finishing her biology lab.

  As a prerequisite she hadn’t completed, she was taking advanced bio independent study. The lab had to be done or she’d fall hopelessly behind. She gave me the option to join her or not.

  I nearly didn’t. But she’d spent so much time cheering me up, the least I could do was make the effort. I went, sat down and prepared to be bored.

  But as she got absorbed in the work, well, it absorbed me too. As the afternoon progressed, she let me help. It was so engrossing I forgot my troubles, my loneliness. Forgot I was awkward and ugly.

  I discovered a new Synnove that day. One who was smart, who was capable. Who was wanted, even needed.

  Medicine was my salvation. I never looked back.

  Until The Incident.

  We got our coffees—I tried to pay for mine but Ric nudged a twenty into the barista’s hand before I even ordered—and made our way to a small café table. He didn’t confront me immediately about The Incident. I wasn’t reassured. It only meant he’d blindside me later. We sat.

  He leaned forward. “So. Why did you leave medicine?”

  I was his entire focus—my face, not my boobs. It was thrilling, him taking me seriously, looking directly into my eyes, into me. Maybe actually seeing me, seeing the human being inside the golden five-nine fashion doll.

  But while sexy, his intense gaze was also unnerving. I blurted, “The iris has two layers and both fibrovascular and epithelial are pigmented which is why some men have such startling eyes…uh, I mean…”

  He was smiling again. I sipped coffee to cover my confusion. Damn it, he was right; I did spout Gray’s when flustered. I didn’t remember doing that before meeting him. Maybe it was some special new disease he’d given me, Stupidous Vomitous or Synnutcase or Holidayammeritis.

  Foam tickled my upper lip. The coffee was Turkish, the good kind, the kind that you had to chew and that chewed right back. The heat was reassuring, the bite energizing. My neurons finally started firing and I recalled what he’d actually asked. “I haven’t exactly left medicine. Or, not yet.”

  “You withdrew from your residency. No residency, no specialty training, no MLE-3, no state exam, no license. You may be a doctor but you can’t practice.”

  “You know your medical education.”

  “I do my research.”

  “Or your spy does.”

  He smiled slightly. I was coming to see that he was a lot like Nikos in that his words didn’t communicate much content. But his smiles made up for it, as varied as snowflakes. This smile said he was enjoying our banter.

  Strangely, I was enjoying it too.

  He tore a packet of sugar into his coffee. “Your problem isn’t academic. You’re top of your class.”

  “No.” I sighed. “But it started in school.”

  “Explain.”

  And because he was looking at me and not my breasts, and because we were both enjoying this, I did. “It’s a long story, so I’ll give you just a few examples. My first year of med school, not one, not two, but five pairs of my panties were stolen from my dorm room. I put it down to freshman high jinks.”

  “I see,” Ric said.

  “Do you? Second year, in my organic chem lab, I isolated semen in my unknown. I put that down to kids under pressure, blowing off steam, screwing with other kids’ experiments.”

  “And the plot thickens.”

  “Not just the plot. That year my reproductive anatomy study group wanted hands-on experience. As in, wanting me to strip for a thorough exam. A third of us were women so I attributed that to high hormones and not enough sleep.”

  “Well,” Ric said doubtfully, “you’re certainly forgiving.”

  “Dense, you mean? A few sides short of a bedpan? Pumpkin positive?”

  “I haven’t heard that one.”

  “Shine a flashlight in her ear to light her eyes. That was just pre-clinical. During clinical, I’d give instructions to male patients staring south of my neck, who called back to ask for the same information from other doctors. I’d give instructions to women, who did the opposite of what I told them.”

  “Out of spite?”

  “At the time I thought it was stress and trauma making them forget what I said. And before sheer volume and repetition told me otherwise, it’d be time to move on to another specialty. But yeah. Probably they weren’t taking me seriously. Or hated me because of my looks.”

  When I grew silent, Ric said, “Their loss.”

  My heart warmed. “That’s when I started rethinking my career choice. What does a doctor have if she doesn’t have respect?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Competency? So general discontent made you give up your residency?”

  Something in his tone told me he already knew me better. That possibility of being known, of connecting, made me share something I’d never told anyone except Twyla. “No, there’s more.”

  I took a deep breath, cut my eyes away and started slow. “When Match Day came, I got the residency of my dreams. I was set to start this fall. But a few weeks ago at the clinic, the guy who’d put the semen in my lab experiment confessed. I laughed about how he’d tried to screw up my experiment. And he said he’d done it because he thought I was the sexiest thing he’d ever seen, and that my lab equipment was better than any girly magazine for jacking off.”

  “That was The Incident?”

  “No. But it woke me up. The semen, the panties theft, the constant sexual innuendo wasn’t accidental, none of it. There were no excuses.”

  No excuses.

  “My whole perspective shifted. Even stuff from before medical school, stuff I’d always thought was high jinks—it was because of my damned looks.” I looked up then, braced to see his eyes on my cleavage.

  His azure gaze, locked on mine, said I understand. He took my cold hands in his, warming them. His simple kindness freed something inside me for the first time since The Incident. Anger, frustration, fear…it all came pouring out. “Damn it, Holiday, I spent years honing my brain, dreaming of being a doctor and helping people. Of making life a little less unfair for the hurt, the sick, the injured. But now I knew—I knew no one took me seriously. I couldn’t help people because I looked like a damned porn star instead of a doctor.”

  “I’m so sorry.” He rubbed my hands. I realized I was trembling only after the shaking slowed.

  I took a deep breath, pressed it out and continued more calmly. “Once it clicked, I saw evidence everywhere. Or maybe I was raw and hadn’t built up the skin again. But everything set it off. I didn’t think it could be worse.”

  Ric’s thumb caressed the back of my hand, silent support.

  I took strength from his understanding and spilled it. “Last week during a surgery—during the entire surgery—the doctor stared at my breasts. I felt violated and angry. But worse, because he wasn’t paying enough attention, he screwed up the surgery. He caused permanent damage to the patient.” My eyes prickled. “All because of my damned body.”

  Gently, Ric said, “He isn’t much of a doctor then.”

  I shook my head, not willing to let myself off so easy. “Maybe. But it still happened because I was there.” I retrieved my hands and drank off my coffee. “Well, now you’ve had my whole sorry story.”

  He tilted his head. “There’s more.”

  I flushed. I hadn’t even told Twyla the horrific rest. How the hell could he know? “Isn’t that enough?” I crushed the coffee cup in one hand, wishing I could crush my pain. “I have to go. Better get back to your party. Your guests will be wondering where you are.” I started to stand.

  To my surprise he caught my hands and tugge
d me back down. “My guests can wait. I’m sorry you had to experience that harassment, but your looks are part of who you are. You shouldn’t leave medical school because other people can’t handle your appearance.”

  I warmed at that.

  “Especially when you can put your beauty to use.”

  Abruptly I chilled. “What do you mean?”

  His head tilted; he’d heard my tone shift. Carefully he said, “Attractiveness is important. It’s what gets politicians votes. Pulls customers into stores.”

  “Bullshit. Political issues get votes. Product quality gets customers.”

  Men don’t like being told they’re wrong but amazingly, a smile flashed over Ric’s lips. “Yes and no. Quality keeps the customers. But even there, appearance plays a role. We keep coming back to that which attracts us.”

  “What are you suggesting?”

  He leaned forward, engaged, amused and determined to win. I realized he thought this was more banter between us, a light argument as meaningful as an exercise in point-counterpoint. “I’m suggesting that you can use your looks to help people. To attract patients who need you—”

  “No.” I pulled my hands from his, stung. What he was saying went against everything I believed in.

  “I’m only trying to help you.” All amusement disappeared. Frustration furrowed his brow. “Brains are fine, but you’ve got more arrows in your quiver. Why not use them?”

  “Why not…?” I gaped at him. He’d seen the real, inner me? I was so gullible. I’d wanted to believe that, but he was a salesman at heart. “Sorry, it’s not your fault. Of course you’d say those things. You’re in the business of trying to make things look better than they are. It’s your business to lie.”

  He opened his mouth, closed it. Studied my face before saying, “I don’t lie.”

  “Spin the truth.” I waved my hand. “Whatever. It’s sizzle versus steak, and you’re on the side of sizzle and I’m on the side of steak. Although in my favor, eating sizzle isn’t very filling.”

  “Without sizzle, how do you even know there’s a steak to eat?” His half-smile said he knew we weren’t playing anymore, but he was still enjoying it at some level. “Plus, the sizzle adds to the pleasure of eating.”