How To Get Your Man

Chapter Three

“Every three minutes, guys think about sex. Take advantage of that.”

—Dalton Price

“No.”

“No?”

“No way.”

Bonnie stopped in the lobby of the building in front of Dalton and Elissa. “No way what?” she asked Dalton.

“That outfit.”

“What now?” Bonnie looked down at herself. “I bought this at Laura Ashley in London! It’s one of my favorite dresses. It cost a fortune.”

Dalton and Elissa exchanged glances.

“Mrs. Malone has one like that,” Elissa said, with a small frown. “But she’s a lot older than you.”

Dalton laughed and patted her shoulder. “Out of the mouths of babes.”

“I’m not a baby, Dad.”

“There she is!” An older woman with white hair and a shapeless flower-print dress shuffled out of the stairwell. Nelly Malone. “Ready to go, Lissy?”

Elissa nodded. Bonnie could tell she didn’t like the nickname, but, thank goodness, she was too polite to say anything.

Nelly put her arm around the girl’s shoulder and they began to walk toward the front door. “We’ll see you two later.”

“Have fun,” Bonnie said, watching them go.

“Bye, Dad. Bye Bonnie,” Elissa said.

“Bye, baby. Be smart in school today,” Dalton told her with a proud smile.

“I’m sure she’s always smart in school,” Bonnie said and Elissa giggled. When the two had gone out the front door, Bonnie turned back to Dalton. “Mrs. Malone’s dress was almost exactly like mine.”

He laughed and gave a broad shrug. “Did you notice that, too?”

Bonnie looked at her watch. She had five minutes. Five minutes to change into something suitably alluring for her lunch with Mark today.

Dalton watched her, and said, as if reading her mind, “I’ll give you a ride into the city. I have to go anyway.”

“Are you sure?”

He nodded. “No problem. I go in a couple of times a week anyhow.”

“All right. I’ll be right back.” She started to go, then stopped and turned back to him. “What should I wear?”

He looked blank. “Beats me. I’m no fashion expert. I just know what’s bad when I see it.”

“Do you know what’s good when you see it?”

“Sure.”

In for a penny, in for a pound. Bonnie decided to try this Dalton’s way, at least this week. She hurried over to him, took his arm and pulled him toward the stairwell. “Then come with me.”

He’d been in her apartment just two days ago, but he’d barely taken a glance at the place. He was in and out in a matter of half an hour, fixing the shower.

Dalton wasn’t the type to snoop around.

Now, with Bonnie in it, the whole apartment came vibrantly to life, making him wonder how he’d managed to miss so much. He hadn’t noticed the quirky little stone tabletop fountain in the foyer before. Or the cheap framed watercolors of Atlantic City on her bedroom walls. He knew the shop they’d come from. It had carried velvet black light posters in the early 1980s.

She stopped at the old-fashioned phone by the kitchen and called her friend Paula to tell her she wasn’t going to be meeting her at the bus, then she led Dalton into her bedroom.

“Okay, wait here a sec,” Bonnie told him, while she went into the walk-in closet. “I think I’ve got something you’ll approve of.”

He sat down on top of the embroidered spread on her bed, and thought immediately of being in it with her. He remembered what it felt like to have her in his arms. He remembered her kiss. It was a sweet thing. Something he’d had a hard time completely forgetting over the years. Not that he’d obsessed about it or anything, but Bonnie had lingered in his mind. Of course, that probably had more to do with the fact that they’d only been together the one time than because of any sort of woo-woo fate drawing them together.

So it made sense that he would help her find the man of her dreams. He cared about her, he wanted her to be happy, but it wasn’t as if he could be the one to make her happy. As a matter of fact, given her description of the guy she was interested in, they were complete opposites. Which made it his duty, as a friend and an upstanding guy, to help her move on. Even though, at the moment, it sort of irritated him.

“What do you think?” She emerged from the closet in a deep red body-hugging sweater dress with a low V in the front. Every curve was hugged by the knit, and she looked like a bombshell.

“You look awesome,” Dalton said, his mouth dry. He’d forgotten what an amazing body she had. How had he forgotten that? She must have been wearing those frumpy Nelly Malone clothes longer than he’d realized.

“Yeah?” She flushed.

He nodded. “A guy would have to be blind to overlook you in that.”

She stepped in front of a full-length mirror and looked at her reflection skeptically. “I’ve never worn it before.”

“So today’s probably not the day to start. You don’t want to look like you’re trying too hard.”

She looked relieved. “That’s what I thought. Let me find something else.”

“Make sure it doesn’t make you look like Mrs. Malone,” he cautioned. “You’ve got a lot of those outfits.”

She poked her head out of the closet. “Cute, Dalton.”

He shrugged. “Look, every three minutes a guy thinks about sex. So do you want him looking at you and thinking about sex with someone’s grandmother, or do you want him to look at you and think about—”

“Got it,” she called. “I want him to think about me. You don’t have to go into graphic detail.” A few minutes later she emerged again. “Okay, what about this?”

He looked up as Bonnie stepped out of the closet, wearing a tailored black skirt suit that revealed about a mile of leg and dipped tantalizingly low at the neck, showing a flash of skin. Skin he once knew the scent and taste of, skin he had run his hands over that hot summer night so long ago.

For just a moment, Dalton didn’t breathe.

“I suppose this is more what you had in mind.” She buttoned one of the buttons so the neckline wasn’t quite so low, then looked at him. “Yes? Sort of sexy but still businesslike.”

“Pretty good,” he understated. “I say go with that one.”

“That figures, because I’m really not comfortable in this.” She buttoned another button, covering more skin.

“And you won’t be until it makes you look like a nun,” Dalton commented. “Next you’ll be putting on long pants underneath it.”

“The thought did occur to me.”

“When did you become such a prude?”

“I’ve always been a prude, Dalton, you know that.”

“Well, you’re going to have to stop if you want to hijack this guy’s attention.”

She stopped buttoning and looked at him. “This might be a mistake.”

“Exactly. Unbutton at least one.” It wasn’t that he had personal reasons for wanting her to do it. He just wanted to make sure she’d look as hot as he was sure she would. For her own sake, of course.

“Not that, this.” She gestured between the two of them. “You and me doing this. Or, rather, me doing this.” She walked over to the bed and plopped down on the side of it, next to him. “Maybe I don’t want a guy I have to do this for.”

Dalton watched her and nodded. “Maybe you don’t want the guy you have to dress like an army man for either.”

She gave a dry laugh. “Well, Mark Ford isn’t a guy I have to dress like that for. He hated it.”

Even though he’d never met him, Dalton wasn’t feeling too lenient toward Mark Ford. “A guy should accept you for who you are.”

She gave him a dry look. “So says the guy who’s telling me to unbutton my shirt and hike up my skirt.”

“Hey, we did not talk about the worthiness of the guy you wanted to attract. Our deal was not to help you find the man of your dreams, whoever that might be, it was to help you get one guy, the one who doesn’t know you exist.” He shook his head. “I never said it would be worth it.”

She sighed and dropped her head into her hands. “But he would be worth it.” She stood up, pulled her skirt slightly lower, and gave a firm nod. “He would be worth it.”

“If you say so.”

“You sound skeptical.”

“Me? I’m always skeptical.”

She eyed him for a moment, then said, “Okay.”

“Let’s go. You don’t want to be late. We can talk about dinner in the car.”

“Dinner?”

They started down the steps. “The dinner you’re going to make for me tonight.”

“Tonight?”

He didn’t break his stride. “We made a deal.”

“I know, but I figured you’d at least give me some notice.”

“I am. Ten hours of it.” He stopped at the front door and turned to look at her. “You got better plans tonight?”

She rolled her eyes. “No, but I hope to.”

“I’m telling you, if he asks you out, you have to be unavailable.” He opened the door and ushered her out, then followed. “And you have to make me spaghetti and meatballs.”

She stopped again and looked back at him, impatience etched into her features. “Spaghetti and meatballs.”

He shrugged. “My kid loves the stuff.”

“I see. Well, in that case, I’ll make it. For Elissa’s sake.” She walked toward his car and he smiled, watching the unintentional sway of her hips.

She was always at her best when she was completely unaware of her allure.

How could he teach her that?

By the time they were in the car, Dalton was starting to think maybe it wasn’t right for him to be teaching Bonnie anything about winning over a man. Because men were pretty much jerks. Especially this guy if he’d somehow managed to miss or ignore Bonnie’s attentions.

Dalton had been a jerk himself in his former life, he was willing to admit that, but now he could see that Bonnie was compromising herself in ways that clearly weren’t comfortable for her. For a guy who couldn’t possibly be worth that kind of sacrifice. Part of Dalton thought maybe he shouldn’t be assisting her with that.

Then again, she was a grown woman. She could take care of herself. In fact, given the barbs she’d been throwing at him for the past twenty years or so, she’d always been more than able to take care of herself.

Plus, Dalton had never really known her to compromise her values. Not when it came down to it. Like in seventh grade when she refused—flat out refused—to dissect a frog in Mrs. Rhodes’s science class, she’d told the teacher in front of God and everyone that she was willing to take a failing grade rather than give in and dissect.

And in the end, she’d gotten her way.

But she’d missed out on one of the coolest science projects they did in all of junior high.

Maybe all he had to do was help her win over this unworthy creep, so she could see for herself that it wasn’t what she wanted.

“We’ve got fifteen minutes,” Bonnie said, bringing him out of his thoughts. “There’s no way you’re going to get me to work on time.”

“I’ll get you there.”

“I don’t know about that.” She clucked her tongue against her teeth. “Look at this traffic!”

“I’ve dealt with worse,” he said, smoothly steering the old Toyota around a cab. He ignored the subsequent blaring horns and the alarmed look on Bonnie’s face.

She checked the connection of her seat belt.

Dalton held back a laugh.

“Not funny, Dalton. If I wet my pants from fear, I don’t think it’s going to be too sexy.”

“Not to the right kind of guy,” he agreed, letting up on the gas.

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