Dear Cupid

First published by St. Martin's Paperbacks, July 2001

eBook edition Julie Ortolon Copyright 2011

Cover Photo Copyright 2007 Yuri Arcurs at
BigStock.com

Formatted by Pam Headrick of
A Thirsty Mind

Cover Design Julie Ortolon Copyright 2011

eBook Edition Published by Julie Ortolon, Copyright Julie Ortolon 2011

All right reserved. No part of this may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Julie Ortolon.

Dear Reader,

Preparing
Dear Cupid
for its ebook release was a great joy for me. The original paperback edition, published by St. Martin’s Press, came out exactly ten years ago, in 2001. It received a Top Pick review from
Romantic Times Magazine
and made the
USA Today
bestseller list. While rereading it, I was delighted to find I still love these characters and the story is as fresh and fun as it was when I wrote it.

Technology, on the other hand, has come a ways in just ten years. Things like animation, Web sites, and even the newspaper industry have changed. I did a bit of updating but for the most part wanted to leave the story as is because romance is always timeless. Just keep in mind as you’re reading that the story is set in 2001.

I hope you enjoy Kate and Mike.

Julie Ortolon

Learn more about Julie and her books at her
Website JulieOrtolon
.

Sign up for Julie's Newsletter or send her an email at
http://www.julieortolon.com/contact
.

Included at the end of this ebook:

Chapter One of
Falling For You
, book one in the Pearl Island trilogy

Chapter One of
Almost Perfect
, book one of the Perfect trilogy

About the Author

Dear Cupid,

Do you believe in love at first sight?

Seriously Smitten

Dear Seriously Smitten,

Absolutely! But then I always enjoy a good fairy tale.

In the real world, things take a bit longer. What appears to be love at first sight is actually a subconscious recognition of a potentially compatible mate, a premonition, so to speak, of what could be. Only time will tell if the premonition comes true.

Cupid

KATE
needed a man. Any man. Well, maybe not any man, she amended as she glanced about the gate area of the Los Angeles airport. The businessman pacing before the window looked too edgy; the grandfather with the armload of Disney souvenirs too old; and the two men in the corner appeared a little too interested in each other for her purpose.

What she needed was a nice, reasonably attractive sort of man. Someone friendly. Approachable. Someone with whom she could flirt. That was all. Just flirt.

The last thing in the world she wanted was the emotional turmoil of a serious relationship. Romance, on the other hand, was an entirely different matter. Her job required a certain amount of romance in her life, or so she’d been informed that very morning by Gwen, the owner of
Gwendolyn
’
s Garden
, the on-line magazine that ran her advice column.

She still couldn’t believe Gwen had threatened to cancel her. She was Cupid, for goodness’ sake! They couldn’t cancel Cupid. Her column generated thousands of hits a month for the e-zine. Or at least it used to. As Gwen had pointed out, her popularity was dwindling—because her column simply wasn’t fun anymore.

Now, however, was not the time for anger or self-pity. She needed to take control, to recapture the carefree spirit she’d somehow lost in recent years.

Turning her head, she saw a new passenger stroll into the gate area. Her skin prickled with interest at the sight of him, an odd occurrence since he wasn’t her usual type. In the past, she’d gone for dark-haired men in Armani suits who wore power as easily as other men wore denim. That description, however, matched her ex-husband a little too close for comfort.

Which made this man perfect.

He had the sun-streaked hair and rich tan of someone who spent a lot of time relaxing in sunny places. The Hawaiian shirt and khaki pants gave him a casual, lived-in look that surprisingly appealed to her. As for his luggage, he carried a duffel bag: an old-fashioned, army-green duffel bag.

When he reached the ticket counter, he lifted his blue-mirrored sunglasses and smiled at the ticket agent. Kate’s heart did something it hadn’t done in years; it gave one hard thump against her ribs. The man had a devastating smile with perfect white teeth. Generous laugh lines winged outward from his eyes, marking him as older than she’d first thought. Late thirties, perhaps. As for his body, she couldn’t quite tell if muscle or flab moved beneath the baggy clothes, but the shape had definite appeal, with broad shoulders that tapered down to narrow hips.

Just looking at him made some long dormant part of her stir to life. Her smile spread as he took a seat off to himself. She’d found her man. Now, all she had to do was catch his eye and prove she could still do what she’d once done as naturally as breathing. Flirt his pants off—figuratively speaking.

~ ~ ~

Mike pulled off his sunglasses and stowed them in his duffel bag as he collapsed on a hard plastic chair. Dropping the bag at his feet, he took a moment to make sure his computer rested safely on top. Then he sank down in the seat to wait for his flight

Exhaustion pulled his head back and closed his eyes. He was getting too old to put in these sixteen-hour workdays for weeks on end. What he wouldn’t give to just pass out for the duration of the flight. Unfortunately, he had too much on his mind to give in to sleep—like the big gaping hole in his life where a wife and some children should be.

Settling deeper in the chair, he let his mind drift back to the twenty-year high school reunion he’d attended while in L.A. What a reality check that had been! He still couldn’t believe his former classmates had children in college, while he had yet to even get married. One of these days, he really needed to look into doing something about his lack of a personal life.

The problem was, he enjoyed his job a little too much. Make that way too much. As a special effects movie animator, he loved everything about his work ... well, except the demanding schedule that left him little time for things like dating.

As his mind searched for possible solutions to the problem, a jangling thud sounded right before him. He tuned it out easily. Working on movie sets for the past twenty-odd years had taught him to tune out all manner of chaos. The bump on his leg, however, wasn’t as easy to ignore.

“I’m so sorry,” an anxious voice insisted. “Please excuse me.”

He opened his eyes and found a woman crouched before him as she reached beneath his seat.

“How terribly clumsy of me,” she said. With her head bent, her long, coppery curls brushed his knee. Bending sideways, he saw her purse had fallen and spilled its contents at his feet. He leaned forward, intending to help her on her way as expediently as possible.

“I swear, I’m such a klutz today,” she rushed on, gathering up pens and breath mints, a paperback novel, a pair of reading glasses, some loose change, a set of keys, and several business cards.

Shaking his head, he reached for a runaway tube of lipstick only to have his hand collide with hers. The lipstick tried to skitter away, but he grabbed it before it made good its escape.

“Gotcha,” he said, chuckling. He lifted his head to address the lipstick’s owner and found himself face-to-face with the most enchanting woman he’d ever seen. She had a heart-shaped face with an impish nose, stubborn chin, and pouty lips that begged to be tasted. Gazing into her shamrock-green eyes, he felt his insides swirl, as if he were falling forward into a field of clover—a field where a man could lie back and rest with a woman snuggled to his side as he lazily watched the clouds float by. A smile slowly turned up the corners of her lips, and he realized her eyes tipped up at the corners as well.

“I really am terribly sorry,” she said in a breathy voice that reached inside him and tied his stomach into knots of pure desire. “It’s the flying, you see.” She placed a hand over her chest. “Planes make me very ... nervous.”

His gaze dropped to her hand, which rested right at the point of her V-collared red suit. He would never have guessed a woman with orange hair could look that good in red, but on her the combination staggered the senses. Or, perhaps his light-headedness came from staring at the breasts beneath her hand.

From what he could see, she had great breasts. Perfect breasts. The kind of breasts that could incite a man’s lust, pillow his head. Or nurture his child.

His gaze snapped back to hers. She gave him a patient little smile—as if waiting for him to say something in return. Only, he couldn’t remember her last comment, much less form a suitable response.

She laughed lightly. “Not that I’m stingy or anything, but I really don’t think it’s your shade.”

“My shade?” he repeated, wondering what shade her breasts could possibly be that wouldn’t suit him just fine.

“No, actually that’s my shade,” she said. “As in my shade of lipstick?”

She rose slowly to stand before him. The red suit hugged the kind of figure that had been in style back in the forties: full breasts, nipped-in waist, generous hips. Staring at that body, he wondered why fashion designers tried to convince women they should look like anorexic clothes hangers. This was what men wanted: Woman in her most powerful, elemental form.

When he continued to stare at her, she pointed to his hand. “You’re holding my lipstick.”

He glanced down. “So I am.”

She started to reach for it. “How gallant of you to rescue it for me.”

“Not so fast.” He snatched the tube out of her reach. “How do I know it’s yours?”

She raised a brow at such an obvious ploy, but her eyes sparkled with mischief. “Now, that is a dilemma.”

“Let’s see ...” He drew the words out, enjoying the game, anything to keep her near. “I suppose I could have you describe it for me.”

“All right.” She tossed her head and his fingers twitched with the temptation to bury themselves deep within her fiery curls. Would her hair feel as hot as it looked? When she met his gaze head-on, her eyelids dropped to half-mast. “It’s round,” she said huskily. “And it’s hard. And it’s the color of passionate peaches.”

All the blood rushed from his head right to his groin. God, what he wouldn’t give to pounce on her right there in the airport. Numbly, he opened his palm and read the label on the end of the tube. Passionate Peach. “So it is,” he muttered.

Her fingertips brushed his palm as she took the lipstick from him. Was that her hand trembling, or his? “I don’t know how I’ll ever thank you,” she said.