Mixed-Up Matrimony. Diana Mars

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СКАЧАТЬ which he’d been draped to come to her side.

      “Have you ever read the Rules of the Game?”

      His rude, superior tone incensed Tamara. He was the dark-haired boor from the parking lot. His arrogance extended not only to taking other people’s parking spots—next time she’d make sure not to bother extracting a bothersome eyelash until a space was safely under her wheels—but also to instructing hapless onlookers.

      Well, she could teach him a thing or two about the rules of the game—and not only in tennis.

      “Oh, you mean as in the rules of parking? As in the unspoken rules of etiquette? Well, I guess according to you, take your eye off a parking spot for a millisecond, and voilè...it’s gone!”

      The transformation in the man’s expression would have been funny had Tamara not been so incensed. His next words did nothing to make the day any brighter.

      “Oh, you’re the girl—woman—from the parking lot. You’re a lot older than I thought....”

      Had Tamara not gone through an emotional wringer for the past few hours, her customary sense of humor might have come to the fore. But this cretin had picked the wrong day to antagonize and insult her.

      “And charming to boot,” she told him icily as she straightened to her full five feet six inches.

      A dull red tinged the man’s chiseled cheekbones.

      “What I meant to say was, I thought you were a teenager, a college student—”

      “Oh, and rudeness to young people is excusable?”

      “No, what I meant was—” Flustered, Bronson tried to recover lost ground. “If you would do your makeup before you leave the house—”

      “My makeup!” That tore it. Not only did Tamara not use makeup—to Sabrina’s eternal dismay—but she would never sit in a car admiring her face in a mirror. Luckily, good genes had provided her with the youthful, blooming quality of a woman ten years younger than her thirty-nine.

      “I bet you use your big frame to crowd your way to the front of the line at sport events, or buffets, or bathroom lines. If I’m not mistaken, you also go through the express checkout with thirty items, and pop out a checkbook or credit card.”

      His gaze narrowed. “Listen, if I wasn’t busy watching this match—”

      “Practice match,” Tamara interrupted. “And apparently you weren’t too damn busy to come over and complain.” Tamara didn’t care if she sounded rude. This man really did rub her the wrong way, and it wasn’t only because he was as good-looking as her ex-husband. She had sworn off handsome men, and this Neanderthal would be on her blacklist...right at the top.

      “You should talk,” the man shot back. His eyes kept going back to the match, and he told her, “I’d love to spar with you some more—”

      “Don’t bother!”

      “—but I’ve better things to do.”

      As he turned to leave, Tamara asked sweetly, “Oh, you mean you finally remembered you were scouting that rather mediocre young man?”

      Six feet of muscled, lean flesh whipped around on a dime.

      “I’m not watching the little guy. I’m watching the six-foot-two genius.”

      “You call that genius?” Tamara kept her voice low, because the two teenagers had not noticed their presence, so engrossed were they in their practice match. “He’s just passable—good one-handed backhand, adequate slice and serve, good retriever. That’s about it.”

      “Good retriever?” The man once again approached Tamara. “That boy has excellent speed, and a great backhand volley and groundie. His serve clocks in at almost one hundred and twenty an hour on flat ones—and he still has not finished growing!”

      Since Sabrina was only five-two—although she’d been projected to grow to a respectable five-seven in the next year or two—height was a sore subject with Tamara.

      “Being bigger and more powerful is the only thing your ‘genius’ has over his opponent, because he loses in the raw talent and creativity department.”

      “‘Raw’ is the right adjective,” the man said condescendingly. “And when a player does not possess a complete game, he can afford to be fearless...after all, what pressure is there on an inferior player to beat a superior opponent?”

      “Inferior? Are you so blind you can’t spot true talent?”

      “True talent? What’s the matter with you? Are you—?” Suddenly a crafty look came over the man’s face. His wide forehead smoothed out, and the two laugh lines bracketing his sensual mouth deepened. “I get it. You’re an opposing scout, and are trying to psyche me out. Don’t worry...I’m not in the game of recruiting. You can have Christopher.”

      Was there no end to the conceit of this man?

      “Were I in the business of recruiting, you wouldn’t stand a chance,” Tamara threw at him. “Besides, I’d do a lot better than that overgrown orangutan down there—”

      “You are really something,” the man said with a smile that suddenly caused Tamara’s hormones to zing. He turned his head to glance at the kids.

      Tamara breathed a sigh of relief. “They’re done.”

      She looked down on the courts from the open balcony. Ordinarily she would have been on the upstairs viewing area, but this goon had kept her from assuming her normal vantage point.

      Now she looked on as both Christopher and Sabrina toweled off, coming together as if drawn by a magnet, their bodies almost touching. She wasn’t sure how they could even dry off with so little space between them.

      Her stomach knotted. She was sure Sabrina had given her an ulcer, something her high-powered career had not managed to accomplish.

      So lost was Tamara in grim thoughts that she had missed part of what the odious man was saying. He’d grabbed her arm and propelled her forward.

      Leaning over the balcony, his anger temporarily on hold, Bronson called out, “Christopher, come meet this woman coach. She’s really—”

      Bronson stopped in midsentence at the horrified look on the youngsters’ faces.

      Both teenagers dropped their towels, their expressions mirror images of shock.

      “Dad!”

      “Mom! What are you doing here?”

      Two

      The shock passed from children to parents.

      Tamara and Bronson swung toward each other as if suspended by the same puppeteer.

      “You’re—”

      “You’ve got to be kidding!”

      Sabrina СКАЧАТЬ