Mr. Right Now. Kate Hoffmann

      

      â€œYou just have to learn the lingo.”

      Nina looked at her friend Lizbeth, puzzled. “Lingo?”

      â€œYeah, take this ad,” Lizbeth said, pointing to the magazine. “This guy wants someone who’s ‘commitment-minded’ and ‘independent.’ That means you’d be willing to clean his apartment and you won’t mind spending hours in a bar with his friends watching football on the big screen.” Lizbeth ran her finger down the page. “All the rest of the stuff in this ad just means the guy will never remember to put the seat down. What you need is a man who enjoys golfing, sailing, theater and working out. That means he’ll be self-employed, wealthy, intelligent and buff.”

      Nina shook her head, smiling. “Come on, they can’t all be that bad. Here’s one that looks pretty good. ‘Friendly—’” she read.

      â€œHorny.”

      â€œLikes to cuddle?”

      â€œWants sex,” Lizbeth translated.

      â€œSo what’s wrong with that?” Nina quipped. “At least I know we have something in common.”

      Dear Reader,

      I’ve always loved to read the personal ads. Even though I’ve never answered one, as a single woman I’ve never given up hope that someday I might come across an ad that just cries out for a response. Perhaps a man from my past is looking for me, or maybe it will be one of those missed connections, where I meet a stranger’s eyes across a crowded freeway.

      That’s where the idea behind THE PERSONAL TOUCH! came from—five different couples brought together through five very different personal ads. In Mr. Right Now, Nina Forrester still holds out hope that there’s a Mr. Right just waiting for her. And if she isn’t meant to meet him yet, she’ll settle for Mr. Right Now. But when she meets dynamic Cameron Ryder, she soon finds out there’s a third alternative—falling in love with Mr. Completely Wrong!

      I hope you enjoy my twentieth Temptation novel. And to all my readers who’ve been with me since that very first book in 1993, a special thank-you for your support and enthusiasm.

      All my best,

      Kate Hoffmann

      P.S. I love to hear from my readers. You can reach me c/o Harlequin Books, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, M3B 3K9, Canada.

      Books by Kate Hoffmann

      HARLEQUIN TEMPTATION

      758—ONCE A HERO

      762—ALWAYS A HERO

      795—ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT

      Mr. Right Now

      Kate Hoffmann

       www.millsandboon.co.uk

      To Birgit Davis-Todd and Brenda Chin, for their continued encouragement, unerring instincts and editorial wisdom.

      Contents

       Chapter 1

       Chapter 2

       Chapter 3

       Chapter 4

       Chapter 5

       Chapter 6

       Chapter 7

       Chapter 8

       Chapter 9

      1

      â€œI LIVE IN A CITY of seven million people. Three and a half million of them are men. Of those, there have to be at least a half million who are single. And out of those, there must be a few thousand who are decent guys.”

      Nina Forrester leaned over the counter and held her coffee mug under the stream of just-brewed coffee. When her mug was full, she shoved the pot back in its place and took a careful sip, moaning softly as the caffeine seeped into her bloodstream. Though she hadn’t had a drop of wine all weekend, she had inhaled a two-pound bag of peanut M&Ms last night and the chocolate hangover was killing her. “Why can’t I meet just one of those guys?”

      â€œBad weekend?” Lizbeth drawled, feigning sympathy.

      Nina peered over the rim of the mug at her friend and co-worker, Lizbeth Gordon. Bad weekend? Not if crying through Out of Africa six times, gulping down handfuls of M&Ms, and waxing her bikini line qualified as bad. She’d had worse. There was that time she ate an entire frozen Sara Lee triple-layer fudge cake during the first hour of Titanic. And the Saturday she spent rearranging her underwear drawer, first by color, then by fabric, then by age. “I didn’t even leave my apartment,” Nina admitted. “And I’m starting to have sexual fantasies about the Chinese restaurant delivery man.”

      Lizbeth slipped her arm around Nina’s shoulders and clucked her tongue. “Honey, don’t you think it’s about time you found yourself a nice stallion and went for a little ride? It’s been a long time since you’ve visited the stable.” From anyone else, the suggestion might have sounded ridiculous, but intoned in Lizbeth’s lazy Southern accent, it sounded perfectly reasonable.

      â€œWhat is it about you and horses?” Nina asked, pulling away and stalking out of the coffee room toward her office. “Last week you were telling me to get back in the saddle. When did Mr. Ed suddenly become your personal sex guru? According to you, National Velvet and My Friend Flicka are subversive sex manuals.” She stopped at her office door. “Those were my favorite books when I was a kid,” Nina said wistfully. “My life was all about horses. I didn’t even look at boys.”

      â€œHuge, powerful, muscular, well-hung horses,” Lizbeth said, fanning her face with her hand. “Gawd, I used to love those books, too.” She giggled and pressed her fingers to her lips. “If Mama only knew she’d have burned them all.”

      Nina laughed. “You were perverse even back then!”

      â€œAnd you were flat as a board and had a mouthful of braces.” Lizbeth shuddered, tossing back her dark hair and smoothing her hands over her slender figure. “Admit it, you’d never want to go back to that time. Me? I was slightly chubby, a little shy and everything I wore was made of a petroleum by-product. It’s a pure wonder I turned out as well as I did.”

      â€œGee, and I thought you were born wearing a cashmere diaper and silk booties, dressed to seduce every boy baby in the nursery,” Nina muttered.

      If they hadn’t been best friends, Nina was certain she’d hate Lizbeth. Any girl would. Lizbeth was stunningly beautiful. Nina was…cute. Lizbeth had three or four boyfriends dangling on any given day of the month, while the pints of Häagen-Dazs in Nina’s freezer lasted longer than most of the men in her life.

      And if personal humiliation wasn’t enough, Nina had to face her professional inadequacies as well. As the lowly fact checker for Attitudes magazine, Nina spent most of her workday on the Internet or on the phone or at the library, checking the veracity of every article that passed through her office. Lizbeth had charmed her way into