“What should we talk about then?” he found himself saying.
“You should ask her about her interests.”
“Okay, tell me about your volunteer work.” He was interested in knowing everything about her.
She seemed to relax a little more. “The auction for the Boston Operatic League is coming up this weekend.”
He searched his brain. “The one where you were still looking for male volunteers to model the designer clothing?”
She gave him an innocent smile. “That’s right.”
He read her expression and sighed inwardly.
He’d just found what he’d been searching for—a way to score points with Lauren. The problem was he might become a laughingstock as a result.
Still, he wanted Lauren in his bed, and he’d be willing to wear flamingo pink if that’s what it took to get her there.
“So,” he said, resigned to his fate, “what’ll I be wearing? Sean John, or Joseph Abboud?”
Six
There were some things Lauren never thought she’d see in her life. Matthew Whittaker parading down a catwalk was one of them.
She took in the admiring female looks Matt was attracting as he came down the runway again—this time in, yes, a Sean John suit—and stomped down the jealous sparks those looks aroused.
Candace was right. Matt was pure beefcake. He was the embodiment of masculine sex appeal, but it was a subliminal message from underneath all that designer clothing.
Still, it was a message obviously received by the women at this afternoon’s event in the auditorium of the Boston Operatic League. Some were whispering to their friends, while others were throwing Matt looks of such open invitation she felt like jumping onto the catwalk herself and running interference.
And that was crazy. After all, she’d spent the past several weeks trying to achieve exactly this—getting Matt hooked up with a suitable woman. She’d first suggested participating today to Matt as a way for him to attract the right type of woman by promoting himself as someone who supported the arts.
Other organizers had recruited their husbands, fiancés or boyfriends to model in today’s show, but Matt was the only unattached bachelor participating, and the fact that one of Boston’s most desirable and wealthiest bachelors was strutting his substantial assets hadn’t been lost on the reporters in the audience.
Journalists from the Boston Sentinel, The Boston Globe and the Boston Herald, as well as smaller papers and magazines, were out in force and gobbling up this story like kids at a candy-dispensing machine.
She could see tomorrow’s news stories. Still, it was too late to put the genie back in the bottle.
Of course, Matt wasn’t helping matters. Every time he came down the runway, he looked straight at her, his gaze unwavering—hot, hard and full of promise.
She wondered how a man with the looks of a GQ model, the body of an athlete, and the gaze of a stripper could hide out under the guise of a dried-out corporate titan. She’d seen no glimpse of the man underneath five years ago. But now he heated her blood and sent her pulse racing.
She’d barely survived Valentine’s Day and their “practice” dinner date. The candlelight, wine and romantic ambiance, combined with Matt’s lambent gaze, had been a heady mix.
Only when Matt turned away to walk back up the makeshift runway was the spell between them broken.
Breathing more easily, Lauren scanned the audience and belatedly noticed the Whittakers sitting in the last row.
The Whittakers were staples on Boston’s society scene and charity circuit, known for their generous giving as well as their fabulous looks and in the case of the women, their fashion sense.
Matt’s oldest brother, Quentin, CEO of Whittaker Enterprises, was there with his wife, Elizabeth, an interior designer. Quentin was tall and dark haired, rivaling Matt in his taste for conservative suits, while his wife was curvaceous, auburn haired and striking. Lauren knew from the newspapers, and the occasions when she’d run into the Whittakers at one function or another, that Elizabeth and Quentin were parents to a little boy.
Quentin sat next to Matt’s younger brother, Noah, a VP at the family company and a former professional race car driver. He’d come with his wife, Kayla, herself a journalist with the Sentinel. With his coppery hair, Noah had defied the coloring shared by the other Whittakers, but he did share his brothers’ height, easily topping six feet. Kayla was his perfect foil, a cute blonde with hair falling in a curtain past her shoulders.
Making up the end of the row were Matt’s younger sister, Allison, whose cases as an Assistant District Attorney sometimes hit the papers, and her husband, Connor Rafferty, who owned his own security company.
Allison and Connor made an arresting couple, Lauren thought. Allison had the long dark hair, blue eyes and alabaster complexion of a china doll, and Connor had the sandy hair and manly good looks of an action hero.
Lauren hadn’t expected to see the Whittakers here, and she definitely didn’t expect them to descend on her once the show was over.
“Quent and I came as a show of support for Matt,” Noah said with a grin as they all joined her at the end of the show.
“Romans come to watch a gladiator do battle is more like it,” Allison countered.
Quentin smiled. “If your brothers aren’t entitled to do some ribbing, who is?”
“Poor Matt,” Kayla said.
Noah arched a brow. “Poor Matt, nothing. The guy has it coming to him.”
“Yeah,” Quentin put in, “I recall he was really sympathetic when Noah and I were having our own problems with women.”
Elizabeth blinked. “You needed sympathy?”
Quent slung an arm around his wife’s shoulders. “Er—only because I was in danger of losing the most wonderful woman in the world.”
Allison threw her brother an arch look.
“So how is Matt doing?” Connor asked.
“He was wonderful, don’t you think?” Lauren responded in what she hoped was an enthusiastic—but not too enthusiastic—voice. “I’m so glad he agreed to help us out today.”
Quent and Noah exchanged amused looks.
“That’s Matt,” Quentin said. “The epitome of charitable largesse, especially when it comes to doing a favor for a, ah, friend.”
“Yeah, our brother the male model,” Noah added with a laugh. “Matt’s hidden talents never fail to surprise.”
Allison rolled her eyes. “Oh, cut it out, you two.”