Erik shot his friend a frown. “And you were always an overgrown bully.”
“Now, Erik,” Buzz chided. “Surely by now you’ve forgiven me for shoving you buck naked into the girl’s locker room when we were in junior high?”
“Oh, I’ve forgiven you all right,” Erik replied dryly. “I just haven’t forgotten the incident. Nor will I.”
Chuckling, Buzz draped a companionable arm along Erik’s shoulders and turned to survey the room. “Mmm-mmm. Have you ever seen so many gorgeous babes gathered under one roof?”
Erik chose a bacon-wrapped mushroom from his plate and popped it into his mouth, not bothering to look up. “Yeah. One too many times.”
Buzz clasped a hand over his heart. “Oh, man. Don’t tell me the great Erik Thompson has lost his appetite for beautiful women?”
Erik lifted an indifferent shoulder. “If you’ve tasted one, you’ve tasted ’em all.”
“Then you haven’t been samplin’ from the same buffets I’ve been feedin’ from.” He dug an elbow into Erik’s ribs, then boomed another laugh when the dig sent Erik staggering sideways a step.
Frowning, Erik rubbed a hand over a rib he was sure would be sore the next day. “Why don’t you go beat up on somebody else for a while?”
“And leave you all alone?” Grinning, Buzz folded his arms across his chest and rocked back on his heels, trolling the room with his gaze again. “Caught that pesky hacker yet that’s been givin’ you grief?”
Irritated by the reminder, Erik plucked a filled champagne glass from the tray of a passing waiter. “No.” He tossed back half the bubbly liquid.
“Boy Wonder, isn’t it?” Buzz asked, angling his head to look at Erik for confirmation.
“Boy Worrywart, would be more like it. The guy’s becoming a royal pain in the ass, ducking in and out of systems, nosing around where he hasn’t any business.”
Buzz arched a thick brow, leveling a pointed look at Erik. “Sounds like a kid I used to know.”
In spite of the years that separated him from his crimes, Erik felt the heat crawl up his neck. “Yeah, but I was just a kid. Didn’t know any better.”
“Maybe Boy Wonder’s just a kid, too. His name suggests he might be.”
Erik’s frown deepened. “No kid is that good.”
“You ought to know,” Buzz replied, and turned his gaze back to the room. “You were the best.” He puckered his lips in a silent whistle. “Whooee. Would you look at that?” He gave the points of his bow tie a gleeful tug. “Ultimate babe at three o’clock.”
Erik rolled his eyes, amazed that a man Buzz’s age still reverted to locker-room lingo when confronted with a good-looking woman. “Are your hormones always on red alert?”
Buzz grinned as he headed toward the redhead who had caught his eye. “Wouldn’t want ’em any other way.”
In spite of himself, Erik found himself chuckling as he watched Buzz move in for the kill. He pitied the poor woman his buddy had zeroed in on. The woman didn’t know it yet, but she didn’t stand a snowball’s chance in hell of resisting Buzz’s killer charm. The man had more moves than a Ryder truck and more come-on lines than a drunk in a bar at closing time. Erik knew because he’d seen the man in action more times than he cared to remember.
Shaking his head, he started to turn for a second helping from the generous spread of hors d’oeuvres, but spun back, every muscle in his body tensed in denial.
No, he told himself as he stared at the woman smiling shyly up at Buzz. It couldn’t be. He took a step toward the couple, but stopped, sure that he was wrong.
No, he told himself again. The hair color was right, but the style was all wrong. Mouse wore her hair twisted up in a tight, spinsterish bun, not swinging at shoulder length and mussed as if she’d gone a fast round in bed with an overly zealous lover. And there was no way in hell that woman’s body could possibly belong to his secretary. Not that he had a clue what his secretary’s figure looked like. Not when he’d seen her in nothing but those stupid, sexless suits favored by so many executive-type women.
In spite of his doubts, he found himself taking another step toward the couple. Then another. And another until he’d reached Buzz’s side. He slapped a hand against his friend’s back. “Hey, Buzz,” he said, turning on a killer smile that he knew from experience most women found hard to resist. “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend?”
“And chance losing her to a smooth talker like you? Man, I’m not that—”
Whatever else Buzz had to say on the subject was lost to Erik as the woman turned to fully face him. “Damn,” he gasped weakly, bracing a hand against Buzz’s arm for support as he found himself staring into all-too-familiar green eyes. He dragged his gaze from her face and down her front, nearly choking when he encountered the mounds of creamy flesh that the bustier-style bodice pushed above the dress’s heart-shaped neckline. “Penny?” he asked, forcing his gaze back to her face. “Is that you?”
Though her smile remained in place, he saw the uncertainty in her eyes, recognized the level of nerves in the tremble of the fingers she smoothed down her thighs—thighs that the dress’s brief hemline barely covered.
“Yes,” she said, then caught her lower lip between her teeth and dropped her gaze, nearly making him groan at the provocativeness in the demure gesture. “I’m sorry I’m late,” she murmured. “I was…detained.” She peeked up at him through a web of lashes. “You aren’t upset with me, are you?”
“Upset?” he repeated, when upset was much too mild a word to use to describe his earlier dark mood. “No,” he lied. “I was just worried that you’d gotten lost or that something might have happened to you.”
She laid a hand on his arm. “I’m so sorry to have worried you,” she said with a contriteness that he would expect from the Penny he’d gotten to know over the last twenty-four hours. But he wasn’t sure he knew who this new Penny was…or if he even liked the change.
He frowned, eyeing her suspiciously. “What’d you do to your hair?”
She caught a lock between her fingers and twisted self-consciously. “I had it cut this afternoon. Do you like it?”
He deepened his frown. “It’s all right…I guess.”
Her disappointment was instantaneous and blatantly obvious, even to a man as self-possessed as people claimed Erik to be.
Buzz stepped between the two. “I like your new hairstyle just fine,” he assured Penny, then gallantly offered her his arm. “Now how ’bout that dance you promised me?”
Penny looked up at Buzz, her hesitancy to accept his invitation evident in her wide, green eyes. She glanced at Erik, then quickly away, and forced a smile as she slipped her arm through Buzz’s. “I’d love to.”
Erik stood where they had left him, watching the man he’d once considered his oldest and closest friend steer his secretary toward the dance floor. When they reached the area and Penny stepped into Buzz’s arms, Erik whirled for the bar, muttering curses under his breath about playboys and innocent lambs being led to the slaughter.
It was well after midnight when Erik unlocked the door to their hotel suite and gestured impatiently for Penny to enter before him.
Her cheeks flushed with excitement, she swept past him on ridiculously high heels, trailing a provocative scent that had Erik lifting his nose and sniffing the air, in spite of his current disgust with his secretary.
She tossed a glittery purse the size of a small envelope onto the sofa,