Robert turned away from them when the phone in his hand buzzed, and he talked in hushed tones.

“You’re part of the romance convention?” Walt asked, already knowing she was.

Dakota removed a stack of papers from her bag and tapped the edges together to align them. “You say ‘romance convention’ as if it’s a disease, Dr. . . . Eddy, is it?”

“Walt. And I didn’t know they had conventions based on bodice-ripping novels.”

The blonde’s agreeable grin slid and Dakota blew out a sigh. Her lips kept her snarky grin, but Walt knew his words dug deep. His own mother wore that look whenever his father said something just to piss Mom off.

“What are you presenting today, Dr. Eddy?” Dakota stood tall, her shoulders back with a chin out in defiance.

“I’m sharing the art of improvising medical tools and equipment when all you have is dental floss and a toothpick. What about you?”

Her eyes would be classified as brown, but damn they looked nearly black when she was ticked. And although Walt didn’t know her well . . . he knew enough to know she didn’t look happy. In a second, those eyes took on a softer shade, almost liquid chocolate mixed with honey. A wicked smile tilted one side of her lips.

Walt had to remind himself not to lick his own in response.

“The art of crafting a gratifying sexual love scene.”

Walt did lick his lips . . . blinked twice, and drew his brows together. “Excuse me?” He pulled on his collar, knew the room wasn’t warm.

Dakota relaxed a hip against the table that separated them and leaned in just enough for him to see the depth of her cleavage.

“I write bodice rippers, as you so eloquently labeled them, Dr. Eddy. Safe to say there are a couple of satisfying ripping of bodices in them . . . don’t you think?”

He pointed to the door. “And all those women are in line to hear you talk about that?”

Instead of answering, Dakota Laurens lifted one eyebrow and smiled.

For one brief moment, they stared at each other.

Stalemate.

Or maybe it was just her way of holding power . . . didn’t matter, and Walt wouldn’t call her on it. He’d probably say something that would embarrass him eternally.

Robert returned to their side, shoved his phone in his pocket. “We found a room . . .”

The doors to the room opened and women shoved inside to capture a front-row seat.

Fascinated, Walt stood back and watched as a few women nudged past him and shoved books on the table in front of Miss Dakota Laurens.

“Can you sign this?”

Dakota pulled away from the table and scooted into the chair. She scooted the book into her hands while the blonde beside her handed over a pen.

“What’s your name?”

Walt didn’t hear it . . . he only noticed when Dakota glanced at him and squeezed her eyes together as if to say, you can kiss my ass.

Damn if Walt didn’t want a chance to try.

Walt? Was that short for Walter? And what parent named their kid Walter?

Stuffy, Dakota decided. Parents that were stuffy and stuck on tradition. She would lay her next advance on the line to say that Dr. Walt Eddy’s parents were doctors themselves . . . or at the very least, pompous elite who named their son after some long-dead beloved grandfather. Probably both.

Make that her next two advances.

What was that upper-crust lip about bodice rippers?

Screw him. And his strong-jawed, short-haired, hazel-eyed loveliness. Didn’t matter that he filled out the suit he wore as if he weren’t a stuffy doctor, but maybe a closet bodybuilder instead. Shoulders like his should come with a warning label.

She knew better than to be attracted to a man like him. The night before in the bar she noticed him briefly before he was joined by a beautiful blonde and a man who had to be her husband or at the very least an attentive lover.

What would his pickup line have been? She wondered then . . . wondered it even more now.

Damn if he wasn’t fun. Getting under his skin had been invigorating.

After her class on the fine art of crafting meaningful sexy intimacy concluded, Dakota signed more books and moved along with the stream of women rushing to their next class, to meet their next author-crush in person.

She had two more appointments for the day . . . a meeting with her editor, another with a boatload of her author friends to get pissing drunk in the hotel bar. But that wasn’t until much later.

“Dakota?”

Behind her, Mary called her name and Dakota slowed her steps.

“You’re in an awfully big hurry,” her friend said as she hoisted the conference-issue bag up onto her shoulder a little higher.

“I need coffee.” She did. Not the watered-down stuff the hotel liked to give in the massive urns stationed at a few watering stations along the convention floor. A shot or two of espresso might help fight the fatigue nipping at her eyelids. The Starbucks on the ground floor was calling her name.

Mary fell in step alongside Dakota as the halls emptied, the women at the conference streaming into individual rooms like water in a multitude of funnels.

“I don’t know how you manage any sleep with all the caffeine you consume at these things.”

Dakota offered a short laugh. “That would be the whiskey chasers with dinner.” They rounded the corner to the escalators and she stepped on the one leading up to the third floor.

“I thought you wanted coffee.” Mary stepped alongside her and glanced at the level they’d just left.