Match Me If You Can

along with a creepy ex who used to yell at her if she didn't disinfect their doorknobs every day. Heath finally joined them. Annabelle introduced him and began to rise only to have his hand settle hard on her bare thigh.

She didn't know which was more annoying, the jolt of sexual electricity that shot through her or the realization that he expected her to stay, but the pressure on her thigh didn't ease.

Melanie fiddled with her purse, looking uncomfortable again. This wasn't her fault, and Annabelle retrenched.

'Melanie has such an interesting background.' In the spirit of fair play, she emphasized Melanie's Junior League charity work and fashion training. Although she mentioned Melanie's son, she said nothing about the creepy ex. She'd barely finished, however, before Heath's cell rang. He glanced at it, apologized with all kinds of sincerity, and excused himself.

Annabelle glared at his back. 'My hardest-working employee. Incredibly conscientious.'

'I can see that.'

Annabelle decided to take advantage of Melanie's fashion expertise by soliciting her opinion about the best jeans for short women with a tendency toward full hips. Melanie replied graciously-medium low rise, boot cut to the ankle. Then she complimented Annabelle on her hair. 'The color is so unusual. There's a lot of gold in it. I'd kill for hair like yours.'

Annabelle's hair had always attracted a lot of attention, but she took the compliments she received with a grain of salt, suspecting that people were so startled by the mess they felt they had to say something. Heath returned, apologized again, and got down to business with Melanie. He leaned in when she spoke, smiled in all the right places, asked good questions, and seemed genuinely interested in everything she said. Finally, his hand settled on Annabelle's thigh, but this time she didn't let herself get worked up about it. He was signaling that Melanie's time was over.

After she left, he shot a look at his watch. 'Terrific woman, but disappointing.'

'How can she be terrific and disappointing? She's nice.'

'Very nice. I enjoyed talking with her. But we had no chemistry, and I don't want to marry her.'

'Chemistry takes more than twenty minutes to develop. She's smart, and she's a heck of a lot more courteous than you and your cell deserve. She also has that class thing going you say you want. Give her another chance.'

'Just a suggestion. I'll bet you could get further in your business by pushing your own candidates instead of somebody else's.'

'I know, but I like her.' She frowned at him. 'Although I couldn't help but notice that she seemed to blame me for breaking up the evening, which is so unfair.'

'You'll also go further if you at least pretend to suck up to me.'

'Here's what's sad. I have been sucking up.'

That country boy mouth crooked at the corner. 'The best you can do, huh?'

'I know. Depressing, isn't it.'

His amusement turned to suspicion. 'What did Melanie mean when she said you should give me a raise?'

'No idea.' Her stomach rumbled. 'I don't suppose you'd consider feeding me?'

'We don't have time. The next one will be here in ten minutes. I'll buy you another drink instead.'

'The next one?'

He pulled out his BlackBerry in a blatant attempt to ignore her, but she wasn't having it. 'Portia Powers can babysit her own introductions. I'm not doing it.'

'Yet only six days ago, you were in my office on your knees telling me you'd do anything to land me as a client.'

'I was young and stupid.'

'Here's the difference between us… The reason I'm running a multimillion-dollar business and you're not. I give my clients what they want. You give your clients grief.'

'Not all of them. Just you. Okay, and sometimes Mr. Bron-icki, but you can't imagine what I'm up against there.'

'Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about.'

'I'd settle for a breadstick.'

'Last week I was on the phone with a client who plays for the Bills. He just bought his first house, and he mentioned that he liked my taste and wished I could help him pick out some furniture. Now I'm his agent, not his interior decorator. Hell, I don't know jack about decorating; I haven't even furnished my own place. But the guy broke up with his girlfriend, he's lonely, and two hours later, I was on a plane to Buffalo. I didn't blow him off. I didn't send a lackey. I went myself. And do you know why?'

'A newly discovered passion for country French?'

He arched an eyebrow. 'No. Because I want my clients to understand I'm. always there for them. When they sign a contract with me, they sign with someone who cares about every aspect of their lives. Not just when times are good, but when things get rough, too.'

'What if you don't like them?' She'd intended the question as a small dig-implying she didn't like him-but he took her seriously, which was just as well. This weird compulsion to put him in his place had to stop. Her future depended on making him happy, not alienating him.

'I'd never sign a client I didn't like,' he said.

'You like them all? Every single one of those demanding, egotistical, overpaid, self- indulgent jocks? I don't believe you.'

'I love them like they're my brothers,' he replied, with unflinching sincerity.

'You are such a bullshitter.'

'Am I?' He gave her an inscrutable smile then rose to his feet as Portia Powers's second socialite of the evening made her appearance.

Don't you have it memorized yet?' Portia jumped at the sound of a deep and very threatening male voice. She spun around from her spot on the sidewalk in front of Sienna's window and took in the man who'd come up next to her. It was only a little after ten, and people still strolled the side-walk, but she felt as though she'd been sucked into a dark alley at midnight. He was a goon, huge and menacing, with a shaved head and a serial killer's translucent blue eyes. An intimidating display of tribal tattoos decorated the ropy muscles visible beneath the sleeves of his tightly fitted black T-shirt, and his thick, muscular neck belonged to a man who'd done hard time.

'Didn't anybody tell you spying on people isn't nice?' he said.

For the past hour, she'd been circling the block, stopping each time she passed the restaurant to pretend to study the menu. If she looked over the top, she could see the table where Heath was sitting, along with Annabelle Granger and the two women Portia had arranged for him to meet tonight. Normally Portia wouldn't have thought of being present during an initial introduction-only a few clients had ever requested it-except she'd learned he wanted Granger there, and Portia couldn't tolerate that.

'Who are you?' she said, pretending a bravado she didn't feel.

'Bodie Gray, Champion's bodyguard. And he sure will be interested to hear what you've been up to tonight.'

The muscles in the small of her back cramped. This was beyond humiliating. 'I haven't been up to a thing.'

'That's not what it looks like to me.'

'But then you're hardly an authority on matchmaking, are you?' She regarded him coldly, doing her best to stare him down. 'How about minding your own business and letting me mind mine?'

Her assistants would have dived for cover, but he didn't even blink. 'Champion's business is my business.'

'My, my… Quite the dedicated gofer.'

'Everybody should have one.' He grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the curb.

She gave a hiss of dismay. 'What are you doing?' She tried to wrench away, but he didn't let go.

'I'm going to buy you a beer so Mr. Champion can finish his business in private.'

'It's my business, too, and I'm not-'

'Yeah, you really are.' He steered her between two parked cars. 'But if you make nice, you might be able to convince me to keep my mouth shut.'