The Guy Most Likely To...: Underneath It All / Can't Get You Out of My Head / A Moment Like This

Then, ignoring the wide eyes of their audience, and the tiny gasp of what might have been dismay that he didn’t try to hide, she stalked through the lobby and back out the front door of this dubiously named resort.

“Celebrations,” hell. They ought to call it “Nightmares.”

WELL, THIS WAS GOING to be harder than he’d thought.

Seth hadn’t expected Lauren to welcome him with open arms, or to smile and melt against him the minute he looked her way. He had never imagined it would be easy to get her to give him another shot, if not romantically, at least in friendship. Not that friendship was what he really wanted from her. But reconnecting in any way was better than the decade of silence he’d just endured.

Still, he hadn’t expected the sweet, funny, sexy girl he’d known to tell him she hated him. That stung; he hadn’t even known Lauren was capable of that emotion. Then again, she didn’t look like the girl he’d known, either. The pretty, vivacious cheerleader had turned into a stunning woman. Her hair was still thick and golden-brown, with highlights that framed her face. Her eyes were still a stunning ice-blue. But the rest of her was all grown-up, intoxicating woman.

“I’d call that being let down hard,” said a commiserating voice.

Glancing over, he saw his kid sister, Emily, who had convinced him to come this weekend. Em worked for Celebrations, and she was the one who’d confirmed for him that Lauren would be attending. He hadn’t even bothered to let the organizers of the event know he was coming. He just came. Heck, he’d skipped out on prom and graduation, why not crash the reunion?

“Ya think?”

“You knew this wouldn’t be easy.”

“Nothing ever is,” he muttered. And it hadn’t been, for a long time. Not since the day of his senior prom, when his entire world had fallen apart.

“You’ve got the whole weekend. You’ll find a way to make her listen.”

“And if I don’t?”

Emily squeezed his arm. “Then she doesn’t deserve you.”

“Dude, you got served!” someone else said. The voice was familiar—as was the chortle.

“How’s it going, Boogie?” Seth replied with a weary sigh as the other man walked over. He wished he’d followed Lauren out the door. But there wasn’t much chance of avoiding the rest of his former classmates in his quest to finally make things right with Lauren, so he figured he might as well get the greetings over with. Besides, he had a few old friends to whom he owed apologies and explanations. Nobody as much as Lauren, but she hadn’t been the only one he’d disappointed with his disappearance all those years ago.

The other man—never a close friend—cast him a sheepish glance. “Hey, keep the Boogie on the down-low, man, my wife’s over there and she doesn’t know that was my nickname.”

Does she know you used to pick your nose and flick boogers on girls in our freshman biology class?

By their senior year, Billy “Boogie” Drake had liked to pretend he’d earned the name because of his mad dancing skills. Seriously, Boogie? Did we go to school in, like, 1978? Of course not. And anybody who’d known him since middle school knew the true origin of the unattractive nickname.

What the hell am I doing here? He could be home in L.A., hobnobbing with his clients, some of the wealthiest, most successful athletes in the country.

Then he thought about Lauren—the picture Emily had shown him of her standing alone on the stage at prom, with the crown on her head—and knew.

He was here to apologize, to explain. To gain forgiveness.

And maybe to see if there was any chance at all of something sparking between them again. Because, as crazy as it sounded, she was his Achilles’ heel. Sure, he’d dated plenty of women over the years, some seriously, but Lauren was the one he’d never completely gotten over.

He’d loved her at eighteen. Really loved her, even though, at the time, he probably hadn’t quite understood what a momentous thing that was. Now, at twenty-eight, having never loved anyone else, he got it. If only he could get her.

“Dude, I can’t believe Lauren Desantos didn’t spit in your face. I’ll never forget how she looked on prom night. Harsh!”

“I heard.”

“What the hell happened? You, like, dropped off the face of the earth! We thought you got busted or deported or something.”

Seth and his sister exchanged a glance, both undoubtedly thinking the same thing. Busted and deported—that wasn’t too far off the mark. But he didn’t owe those details to Boogie, he owed them to Lauren. And one way or another, he was going to get her to sit down and listen to them.

“Long story,” he said.

“Well, you should probably go see if they’ll take you as a walk-in,” Emily said, pushing him toward the front of the now-empty A–E line in which Lauren had been waiting. Then she whispered, “You’re both in the Homecoming Tower, your room’s about six doors down from hers, number 1424.”

Homecoming Tower? Was it next to the Old Gym Wing and the Principal’s Office Ballroom? Gag me.

“See you at the dinner tonight…or tomorrow at the carnival?” Boogie asked.

Seth lifted a brow. “Carnival?”

“It’s one of Celebrations’ specialties,” Emily explained. “We have a whole graduation carnival set up on the grounds.”

He wondered if it had been his sister’s suggestion. She’d been a Grease nut in middle school, with the school carnival at the end being her favorite scene. Personally, Seth had always wondered why the cute girl had to turn into a tramp to get the dude.

“There are rides, games,” she continued. “Everybody loves it.”

Thinking about it, he recalled there had been a carnival at their school many years ago. A fall one, complete with pumpkins, scarecrows and hayrides. He and Lauren had ridden the rides together, already the “power couple” of the senior class…a good seven months out from Seth’s family’s date with disaster.

He wondered if she remembered. More importantly, he wondered if she’d be there, or if she’d walked out the door, gotten into her car and left altogether.

He didn’t think she had. Lauren was furious at him, but she’d never been a coward. When she calmed down and let herself accept the fact that he was here, she’d probably come back ready to tell him off, having thought of a dozen zingers to fling at him.

He could hardly wait to hear them. Because at least it meant she’d be talking to him.

Keeping that thought in mind, he quickly registered, saying hello but not getting involved in any deep conversations. None of his few close friends from high school had checked in yet, which gave him time to go to his room and clean up for tonight’s dinner. Tomorrow would be a formal dance—prom for adults? God, at least there will be booze—but tonight was a more casual event in one of the private banquet rooms.

Not wanting to risk running into Lauren en route to the dinner, for fear she’d then skip it, he left his room a half hour before it was scheduled to start. He figured he’d kill some time in one of Celebrations many lounges—he’d seen a list of the themed places in his resort guide.

He’d taken a half-dozen long strides toward the elevator, his eyes on her closed door, when he saw that door begin to swing inward. Almost stumbling, he came to a sudden stop.

Praying it was a maid leaving after delivering some extra towels, he held his breath, spying a swish of pink fabric and a delicate bare foot.

Lauren. It had to be Lauren.

He was about to be busted as a freaking stalker.

2

“OH, SHIT,” SETH MUTTERED. It looked like it was game over. If she found out they were staying on the same floor in this massive place—which couldn’t possibly be an accident—not only would she not go to the dinner, she’d probably change rooms. Or leave the reunion altogether.

Not thinking about it, he leaped into a small alcove, trying to cram himself between a small decorative table and the wall. On the table stood a huge vase filled with plate-size flowers, peacock feathers and curly sticks of wood. As he tried to shove himself into the pretty pathetic hiding place, he accidentally set the vase in motion. Lunging, he grabbed the thing in both hands and yanked it toward his chest, hoping not only to steady it but to try to hide behind its fronds and branches.

This is ridiculous.

He was acting like…a high schooler. No, worse, a middle schooler, a stalker-y, wimpy kid being led around by his hormones, hoping to make a girl like him. Jesus, he was Seth Crowder, successful sports agent, named as one of L.A.’s most eligible bachelors in a West Coast magazine last year. Yet around Lauren Desantos, he’d become an absolute basket case. This reunion thing was taking all his rational brain cells and mashing them to bits. “I see you there, you moron.”