Man Who Loved Pride and Prejudice by Abigail Reynolds Page A

fertile and when I'm not, and you may be certain it isn't something I would ignore, no matter how tempted I was." She wouldn't look at him.
       "Will you tell me, though, if anything should happen?"
       "Fine," she snapped, looking at his card as if it were a snake. "And I'll tell you if the tides don't turn, too. Now, if you don't mind, I have a lot to get done today."
       He was baffled by her anger. "I didn't mean to upset you," he said. "I just…" All he wanted was a chance to have her tease him and smile at him again, and to show her he did take his responsibilities seriously, but he couldn't say that. "I'm sorry."
       She forced herself to breathe deeply. "No, of course not; I'm fine. But very busy."
       He rose and pushed the stool back under the bench. "I won't bother you then. Good luck with your paper."
       "Thank you."
       Despite her tone of dismissal, he didn't move, and finally she looked up at him and met his eyes. It wasn't his fault she had made a mistake, or that he was from a different world. The least she could do was to be pleasant. "Good-bye, Calder."
       His dark eyes remained fixed on hers unreadably for a moment. Then he nodded and was gone.

    Jim stopped by her lab that night. "Working late again? I'm about to leave and thought I'd see if you wanted a ride."
       "Thanks, Jim, but I'm going to be here for a while yet." Cassie turned back to the journal article she was reading. She didn't want to sit at home alone with her thoughts any longer than she had to.
       Instead of leaving, he leaned back against the lab bench and crossed his arms. She looked up at him questioningly.
       "All right, Cassie, what's up?"
       "What do you mean?" she asked irritably.
       "Something's bothering you. What is it?"
       "I'm fine, Jim. Now stop being a mother hen and go home."
       "I've known you a long time, and I know when something is wrong. You haven't been yourself for a few days. You've been quiet, you don't smile, and you're working even harder than usual."
       She closed the journal with a snap and dropped it on her desk. "Have you decided to give up biology for psychology?"
       "How did you guess? It's my mid-life crisis. And you're trying to change the subject."
       "Jim, really," she said, exasperated.
       "Have you talked to Erin about whatever it is?"
       Cassie sighed and rubbed her forehead with her hand. It was hard to resist his gentle insistence. "No, not really."
       "So tell Uncle Jim all about it, or Rose will have my head. Take pity on an old man."
       She couldn't help smiling. "When did you get old? You were having a mid-life crisis a minute ago."
       "You're changing the subject again."
       She closed her eyes. "All right, all right. I made a stupid mistake."
       "We've all been known to do that. What was yours?"
       "I slept with a man."
       "And the mistake was…?"
       "He was the wrong man."
       He looked at her sympathetically. "Who was it? It's a small world here at the MBL."
       She shook her head silently.
       "You know I won't tell anyone, Cassie."
       She was quiet for a moment. Maybe if she talked about it, she could get it out of her head. It certainly couldn't make it worse. "It was Calder. The one who played Trivial Pursuit with us one night."
       "Calder? I thought his name was Stephen."
       She realized her slip. "Right, that's the one—Stephen."
       "He seemed nice enough, if kind of quiet."
       "He's the wrong sort of man. He'd never be seriously interested in someone like me. It was an impulsive thing on both our parts. I don't even like him most of the time. My problem is I can't let it go."
       "And what about him?"
       "Calder? He won't have any problem letting go of it."
       "Wait a minute. I'm getting confused. Is it Calder or Stephen?"
       "Calder," she said, feeling defeated. "I introduced him as Stephen as a joke, because I didn't want you to know