Feels Like the First Time. Tawny Weber

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      “I talked, I asked. I’m trying, okay?” Zoe’s irritated tone was in strong contrast to the underlying panic in her sister-in-law’s voice. Zoe sucked in a breath and tried for calm. “Don’t stress so much, okay? If the guy is here, I’ll find out.” Zoe recalled the twin’s assertion about Teresa Roberts, but dismissed the idea. Gandalf had to be a guy.

      “What’s your first step? What’re you doing tonight?”

      Zoe winced. She’d been hoping Meghan wouldn’t ask that. She hated I-told-you-so moments. Hoping to avoid this one, she talked fast. “I figured I’d hang out in my room tonight. You know, do a little online research, touch base with a few people in the industry and see if they have any leads. And I still need to figure out how to convince this guy to work for Zach once we find him. I’ve got a few ideas, but I need to polish them before I run them by Zach since it’s his company and money.”

      “No,” Meghan broke in. “Wait to talk to Zach until you’ve found Gandalf.”

      Zoe snickered. “Hiding this little venture, are we?”

      Meghan’s huff blew through the phone, making Zoe laugh out loud. “Why aren’t you attending the reunion’s costume party tonight?” Meghan asked. That shut up Zoe’s laughter.

      “You were right,” she admitted with a sigh. “Costumes are mandatory to attend the event. Dressing up in a costume that represents your career is part of the whole reunion game plan. They’ve created all these events during the week to force people to get to know each other again.” Zoe kept her As if I care to to herself, figuring Meghan would launch into her lecture again.

      “You need to go.”

      “No, I don’t,” Zoe argued, figuring Meghan would pitch the idea of her going in her pajamas if she left even the tiniest opening for argument.

      “You do. You have to. This is the perfect way to eliminate the reunion members from your search. Just check out their costumes, right? So you have to go. And to make sure you do, I took care of everything,” Meghan said in a bossy yet begging sort of tone that pushed all Zoe’s guilt buttons. “I ordered you a costume. It should be delivered any time.”

      With a sigh, Zoe expressed her reluctant gratitude as she unpacked her laptop and powered it up. Two clicks and she’d pulled up her e-mail.

      “Awesome,” she exclaimed, all visions of stupid costumes fleeing from her mind.

      “What? Your costume is there?” Meghan exclaimed.

      Zoe grinned, pleasure surging through her as she plopped cross-legged on the bed and pulled her computer close.

      “No. Even better. Dex is here.”

      “What’s a Dex?”

      “My lifeline to sanity,” Zoe said, leaning back onto the cushy pile of pillows as memories washed over her. “We used to hang out. He was as much of a geek as I was, totally obsessed with Dungeons and Dragons, role-playing, that kind of thing. His parents own this hotel.”

      She scanned his note again and told Meghan, “I guess he’s here this week to help out. That’s how he got my e-mail addy, from the registration.”

      “So what’re you going to do? Get some sexy times in? Don’t you have enough on your plate already without dishing up distractions, too?”

      An image of the hottie in the lobby flashed through Zoe’s mind. That guy was all about sexy times. But Dex? She snickered. He’d been three inches shorter than her, shy to the point of stuttering and given his obsession with playing dress-up with other men, quite possibly gay. Do Dex? Hardly.

      “Nah, Dex and I are just friends,” she told Meghan, avoiding the sexual distraction rebuke. After all, she was quite capable of juggling two things at once. Especially if one of them had shoulders like the guy in the lobby.

      “Dex rocks,” she told Meghan. “I was bummed when we lost touch after I left school. It’ll be great to catch up with him, see what he’s been up to.”

      She scanned the e-mail again, noting that he said he was visiting. That meant he’d left town, too. They’d have a lot of show-and-tell to share.

      “Just don’t lose sight of why you’re there,” Meghan chided. Then she started reiterating suggestions on how to find Gandalf. Zoe listened with half an ear as she did a Web search, trying to find out what Dex had been up to the past ten years.

      A knock sounded. She set the laptop aside and told Meghan to hold on as she went to answer the door. The bellboy handed her a large box with a wicked grin. Zoe glanced at the label, Dressed to Thrill and rolled her eyes.

      “Costume party,” she told the snickering deliveryman.

      “Uh-huh,” he said as he pocketed his tip and sauntered away.

      Zoe wrinkled her nose at his retreating back, wanting to point out that if she was in the market for thrills, they’d hardly show up in a brown cardboard box. Before she could, though, she heard Meghan’s shout over the phone.

      “Is it there? Is that the costume?”

      Looking at the label again, Zoe shut the door and lugged the box over to the bed. “You’ve got to be kidding. You went through a place called Dressed to Thrill? Do I really want to open this, Meghan?”

      “As tempting as it was to get you something wicked and fun like a spy costume, I went with Betty Boop,” Meghan said with a laugh. “I figured that was your favorite cartoon. Betty’s sexy and fun, and she’s always involved in lots of different things. And she might shoot down those virgin rumors you are so obsessed with.”

      Zoe rolled her eyes again and ignored the insult as she pulled her metal nail file out of her purse and started cutting through the packing tape. She pulled a large white garment bag out of the packing container and tossed what looked like a note and invoice back in the box, which she then shoved on the floor so she could lay out the bag.

      “So how do I turn Betty Boop into a riddle that says career consultant-slash-business manager-slash-troubleshooter-with-commitment issues?” she asked as she unzipped the bag.

      Meghan snorted. “I didn’t know about the career requirement when I ordered it. But in your case, you can just wear sneakers and carry your BlackBerry and a cap gun.”

      Zoe’s grin faded to a frown when her fingers encountered leather. Betty didn’t wear leather, did she? She pulled the hanger from the bag, holding the outfit out at arm’s length.

      “Holy shit.” She dropped the hanger and jumped back a foot, staring in openmouthed horror at the slinky mound of black leather on her bed. Her eyes shifted to the rest of the outfit which had fallen from the bag when she pulled out the costume. A studded collar, black mask and riding crop.

      Shock, fascination and an insane urge to giggle fluttered in Zoe’s stomach as she stared.

      “You should have gone with the spy costume. There’s no way in hell I’m going down there in this.” Zoe eyed the black leather again and couldn’t hold back her laugh. “Although I have to admit, nobody would ever call me as a virgin again after I walked in dressed like a dominatrix.”

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