FORGET ME? NOT Harlequin Duets November 2000 EXCERPT Amanda Baldwin lifted her chin and encountered the wildest shirt she had ever seen. It was shot through with color and looked like an artist had taken a blank canvas and thrown paint at it. Above the shirt was a sun-bronzed face that contained the bluest, sunniest eyes and whitest teeth she had ever seen. He had a high, wide forehead, a dimple in his right cheek and a slight cleft in his chin. An unruly mop of brown hair with golden highlights completed an attractive package, one she was sure she had never seen before. Except that he had called her by name. “Do I know you?” She blinked a few times to dry the tears that had pooled in her eyes. One of them escaped and slid down her

cheek. She wiped it away, horrified that this man had caught her crying. She never cried. Not only was it undignified, but a waste of time where Reid was concerned.

“The name is Castelli,” he said, extending one of his hands. She stared at it, noting that it was attached to an arm that was as sun-kissed as his face. The arm, muscular and long, was sprinkled with tiny, golden hairs. “Zach Castelli.”“Do I know you?” she repeated, trying not to be amused at an introduction that had been stolen straight out of a James Bond film.

He grinned, tipping his head to the side with boyish charm, not at all insulted that she had ignored the hand he offered. If he'd perfected that look as a child, Amanda would bet his mother had never yelled at him for sticking his hand in the cookie jar.

“You know me now. I just introduced myself.”

His answer was as cheeky as his smile. Amanda temporarily forgot her misery as she stared at him open-mouthed.

“Look, Mr. Castinelli...”

“It's Castelli. But you can call me Zach. Everybody does.”

“Mr. Castelli,” she began again, but he interrupted again.

“Zach.”

“Okay, then, Zach,” she conceded, exasperated. “I was about to order dinner...”

He picked up one of the menus on the table and opened it. “Good. I haven't ordered yet either. Have you ever eaten here before? Maybe you can recommend something, as long as it doesn't have sprouts. I don't think I can make myself eat a sprout.”

She stared at him, wide-eyed with fury. Was the man dense or was he deliberately ignoring what she had just said? “Mr. Castelli...”

“Zach.” He peered at her from over the menu, his blue eyes twinkling. That convinced her that it was time to speak bluntly.

“Zach, I'm not in the mood for company. I'd prefer it if you’d leave.”

“I don't believe that,” he said, setting down the menu. “Nobody likes to eat alone. Take me, for example. I was supposed to meet my sister Marlee here. She's wonderful, even if people do find her a bit bizarre. That's probably because she's a body painter. Anyway, Marlee's great when it comes to the big picture. But she tends to forget details, like the time and place she was going to meet her brother for dinner. So that's why I'm alone. When I saw that you were alone, I thought why should we both be alone when we could be together?”

“You're deliberately misunder...” Amanda's voice trailed off before she could finish her thought when something belatedly registered in her mind. “Your sister paints people's bodies?”

He nodded, set down his menu and rested his elbows on the table, his chin on his knuckles. “Uh, huh. She has a little storefront on Hollywood Beach. She'll paint anything you want. A flower, a butterfly, a snake, a lion. She uses this special ink that wears off after a couple of washings. I'll take you there and you can see for yourself, maybe even get yourself painted.”

“I'm not the sort of woman who gets her body painted,” Amanda said, realizing that their conversation was growing more absurd by the minute. “And what do you mean you'll take...”

“I think a butterfly would look pretty right there,” he interrupted, reaching across the table and touching the hollow of her throat. Since she was wearing a tailored business suit, the scoop-necked cream blouse under it provided practically the only exposed area of skin.

His finger lingered for a moment, infusing the area with warmth, before he removed it. Amanda told herself that she hadn't swatted away his hand was because she was shocked by his boldness. She didn't realize that her fingers now covered the spot he had touched.

“Are you ready to order?”

The question came from the waitress who had recited a litany of specials to Amanda and Reid in what seemed a lifetime ago. She was grinning, her dark eyes moving from Zach to Amanda until they settled on Zach. He smiled back at her.

“I see you decided to stay for dinner after all,” she said.

“Yes. Amanda here has been kind enough to allow me to join her.”

His comment caused Amanda to realize that she hadn't agreed to anything of the sort. Before she could say so, he ordered a glass of draft beer along with a sproutless chicken dish. Since Amanda had yet to open a menu, it was easiest to say that she'd have what Zach was having when the waitress asked for her selection.

The waitress took the menus and walked away, leaving Amanda a bit bewildered. Zach's eyes hadn't left her face, and there was an amused glint in them.

“I just agreed to have dinner with you, didn't I?” she asked, still not sure how it had happened.

“You did,” he confirmed.

Amanda found herself thinking that there couldn't be any harm in sharing a meal with him. It was certainly preferable to sitting here alone, trying to figure out what had gone wrong between her and Reid. How could she mourn what might have been when she was with a man wearing a shirt as ridiculous as Zach's?

“That's some shirt.”

“Do you like it?” He seemed to assume that she did. “My nephew picked it out. He's four. He told his dad -- that's my brother Clay -- that it reminded him of me.”

“Is that a good thing?” she asked warily.

“Of course it is, Amanda.”

His use of her name brought up another issue, one that she had nearly forgotten amid the swirl of talk about body painters, inedible sprouts and psychedelic designs.

“You still haven't told me how you know my name.”

The corners of his mouth drooped, diluting his smile. His eyes shifted, and he paused a few seconds too long before he answered. “It was a lucky guess. You look like an Amanda.”

“You're a lousy liar.”

He sighed dramatically. “Tell me about it. You'd think that, after all these years, I'd learn not even to try. I bet your second-grade teacher didn't figure out that you were the one who put the frog into her desk drawer. All because I couldn't look her straight in the eye when she asked me if I did it.”

“I didn't put a frog in my second-grade teacher's desk drawer.”

“Well, then, you should have. The look on her face when that sucker jumped out was worth all those hours clapping erasers.”

Amanda frowned. How had they started talking about frogs? Hadn't she been questioning him about how he knew her name? This man Zach wasn't good at lying, but he was an expert at distraction. “We're getting off the subject. You were going to tell me how you knew my name was Amanda.”

“I was?”

She nodded solemnly, and he finally shrugged in resignation.

“Okay. I heard Reid call you by name

“You know Reid?” she asked, shocked. Zach's mouth twitched, his eyes shifted, his smile faded. Amanda had just met him, but even she could tell that another lie was coming.

“Well, yes. He and I are, er, cousins. Distant cousins, which is probably why he never told you about me.”

She shook her head slowly, amazed and a little amused that anyone could lie that poorly. Then the probable truth occurred to her, and she no longer found him so humorous.

“You were eavesdropping,” she accused.

He winced. “No. I wasn't eavesdropping. That would mean that I wanted to listen to what you were saying, and I didn't. I tried not to hear. I almost put my hands over my ears.”

“I can't believe this. That was a private conversation, not to mention one of the most humiliating experiences of my life. How could you possibly eavesdrop on something so personal?”

“I told you. I wasn't eavesdropping. And if it was such a private conversation, Reid should have picked a private place to have it.” He paused and stroked his chin. “Then again, he probably thought it was easier to break up with you in a public place so you wouldn't create a scene.”

“A scene?” Amanda's voice rose, and a few of the diners in an adjacent table glanced at her. She lowered her tone. “I've never created a scene in my life.”

“I didn't think that you had, which means that I'm giving you more of the benefit of the doubt than Reid did. If your engagement wasn't already broken, I'd suggest that you break it. Reid seems to have ice where his heart should be.”

Pain stabbed at Amanda. But she was surprised that she had forgotten about it. Since Zach Castelli had slid into the booth, she hadn't spared Reid and her broken engagement more than a passing thought. The harsh reality was that not only wasn't she getting married next month, but a ten-year relationship was over.

“He was cold-hearted about the whole thing, wasn't he?” she asked reflectively, and Zach nodded.

“You're well rid of him.”

“Oh, I am?” Again the pain faded as she considered the outrageous man in the equally outrageous shirt. Now he was dispensing advice on her love life!

“Yes, you are. What I'm trying to understand is why it took you ten years to figure it out.”

“Figure what out?”

“That you're well rid of him.”

“But I didn't say that I was. You did.”

“And I'm right.”

He smiled, and she had a crazy urge to smile back...