Page 63 of Making Over Maris

Jack cringed. Crap. Kat.

He fixed his lips into a smile and spun around, trying not to think about the look of death she’d sent him when she was in Sara’s office and he’d been, okay, flirting with Jenny.

He’d always secretly suspected women had some form of superpower they’d all agreed not to tell men about, but with Kat it went way beyond suspicion. He knew.

She could look right through a guy and see his soul. Could tell when he was being naughty, or even thinking about it. He couldn’t imagine how Adam could take it day in and day out—

She closed the door.

Uh oh. Double crap.

“What are you doing, Jack?”

“Um, working on the variances for the—”

“That’s not what I mean and you know it. What are you doing with Sara?”

He firmed his jaw. “That’s private.”

Kat smiled. It was a truly horrifying smile. She sat on the chair next to his desk with her elbows on her knees, her fingers linked in a deceivingly casual pose. Jack had the sense she was holding her hands to keep from throttling him. “No,” she hissed. “It’s not. It’s not private. Because Sara’s my best friend and she’s been hurt before and I’ll be damned if I’ll let you toy with her only to toss her aside when you get bored.”

Holy hell. Her tone, at the end there, reminded him of The Exorcist.

“It’s not like that, Kat.”

“The hell it’s not.” She stood and paced the room. Turned and paced again. “Do you think I don’t see what’s happening here? You’ve gone from being the guy no one noticed to,” she waved her hand at him disdainfully, “this.”

“This?”

“You look hot, Jack. And you damn well know it. I suppose it’s natural—when all of a sudden women see you as a man, when out of the blue they’re coming on to you—to want to flit from flower to flower. But you have no idea how much damage that can cause. Especially for someone as fragile as Sara.”

“Sara’s not fragile.”

Kat whirled on him. “You have no idea.” She poked him in the chest with her finger. One poke per word. He counted. “She was practically in tears watching you flirt with Jenny.”

“I wasn’t flirting.” But yeah. He kind of was. But he’d only been doing it to make Sara realize— “She was in tears?” Shit. He hadn’t meant to do that.

“What were you doing, Jack?”

He blinked. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“No.” Holy crap, Kat could snarl.

“I was playing hard to get.”

“What?” A combination of horror and revulsion flashed across her features. Jack ignored it. Ignored the expression and the way it made him want to cringe.

He knew he was right. Knew this was how it had to go.

He had to be that hero. The cold, standoffish hero. The one all the books Sara loved told him to be.

Otherwise he might lose ground.

Might lose her.

“Women like men who are mysterious and distant and hard to get.”

“Where on earth did you get that idea?”