THE HUSBAND HOTEL Harlequin Duets January 2002 EXCERPT Tara fought to keep her balance as Sadie Mae dragged her down the hallway that led to the fitness room and indoor pool. When she wrenched open the door, Tara saw bubbles -- the foaming, frothing kind that children blew at birthday parties. Only these bubbles weren't coming from plastic wands. They were overflowing from the hot tub in great boiling masses that covered half the pool deck. "Oh, my gosh." Tara let go of Sadie Mae's grip and slip-slided toward the hot tub. "There are bubbles everywhere!" "That's what I said," Sadie Mae added. "Bubbles." Even if Tara could see the hot tub, she wasn't certain how the controls operated and someone had to turn the blasted thing off. The maintenance man. He knew how to do it.

"Quick, go get Wilbur," she instructed as one of her legs slid forward in a semi-split that tore a rip up the side of her skirt. Bubbles instantly covered the length of leg the rip exposed.

"Wilbur quit two days ago," Sadie Mae reminded her. "Remember, he said there wasn't room enough in the hotel for both me and him."

Tara groaned, moving forward through the froth of bubbles on her hands and knees. How could she have forgotten the way Sadie Mae had knocked over Wilbur's bucket of paint and kicked over the ladder he was standing on? It turned out Wilbur didn't have any patience for incompetence even if Sadie Mae was only trying to help.

Who would have guessed it would be so hard to find another maintenance man? Tara's classified ad had produced no viable candidate, but she hoped to have better luck that afternoon when she interviewed the poor jobless soul her father had recommended. Too bad she hadn't already hired him.

The bad news about being a manager in a hotel that got by with the sparest of staffs is that she was the backup in every emergency.

What she wouldn't give right about now for a man wearing a tool belt.

"Can I help?"

A deep-pitched male voice called out from across the pool deck, and Tara looked toward the source. A particularly large bubble floated in front of her eyes, and she squinted, the better to see through it.

A blurred Adonis strode in her direction on long, jeans-clad legs. He had thick, dark hair and a face so compelling her mouth dropped open and she tasted foam. His forehead was high and broad, his cheekbones slashing, his jaw strong.

He confidently moved past Sadie Mae and entered the sea of foam with a determined set to his mouth. His body in motion was a lovely thing to behold, his broad shoulders rolling and his muscles bunching as he closed in on the hot tub.

Was that a tool belt dangling from his narrow hips? Oh, she hoped she wasn't seeing things because of the bubbles in her eyes.

"T.P., do something!" Sadie Mae yelled, and Tara realized the bubbles were spreading.

Panicked, she turned away from the man and moved her hand forward, expecting to brace it on more deck. Instead she hit water.

"Help," she called to the advancing savior before she disappeared into the water. She had barely enough time to draw in a breath before the whole of her body was submerged.

It hardly registered that she'd gone and fallen in the hot tub before strong hands gripped her under the arms and yanked her to the surface. Then he was hauling her out of the tub as though she weighed nothing and setting her in front of him on the deck.

"Towels. I'll go get towels," Sadie Mae said and dashed off.

"Are you all right?" the man asked. The French twist she usually wore had come loose, and he brushed her dripping hair back from her face as his beautiful eyes examined her. They were a light brown that reminded her of cream soda, her favorite soft drink.

Was she all right? She'd just been rescued by a man with cream-soda eyes who'd braved danger for her. Well, okay, pseudo danger. If that didn't make a woman go weak in the knees, what would? Perhaps, the sane part of her brain replied, a man who knew how to operate a hot tub.

"The bubbles," she sputtered. "Can you turn them off?"

"Well, yeah," he said, reaching down into the water. He located the power switch with unerring accuracy, and Tara heard the slight whine of the hydrojet propellers decrease as the water in the tub stopped churning.

He straightened, and her eyes raised to meet his. She'd lost her shoes during the ordeal, which subtracted the extra inches her high heels provided to make up for the fact that she was five feet four. He was much taller, easily two or three inches over six feet, and so sexy a pulse pounded in the base of her throat.

With hair that nearly brushed his collar, a brawny build and workman's clothes, he was a refreshing change from the businessmen who crammed the hotel. One of his dark, arching brows had a thin white line of scar tissue through it, making him look a little dangerous. The water in the spa had been hot, but wherever he touched her, she was hotter.

"Who are you?" she breathed . . .