Mydoor's unlocked? What's the matter with me? Damn. I forgot to call Tom and cancel.And then the little psychologist in my head suggested, "Maybe you didn't want to cancel."

"I'll be down in a minute," I yelled.

I heard footsteps tromping up the stairs and then Tom poked his head into the bathroom, beaming a toothpaste commercial smile.

Same old obnoxious Tom.

Surprised and highly annoyed, I sat up in the water, pulled a couple of big clumps of bubbles toward me and raised my knees up to my chest. "Hey! I'm taking a bath here. I wasn't expecting you so early. Why don't you wait for me downstairs?"

Why am I being polite to this jerk?

He ambled over, lowered the toilet lid, sat down and made himself comfortable. "No. I enjoy having you as a captive au-dience. And besides, I've seen you naked hundreds of times."

He was right about that. From the first moment I laid eyes on him during our internship at the psychiatric hospital, I was putty in his hands. All he had to do was give me one of those dazzling smiles or glance at me with his bedroom eyes and I'd follow him anywhere.

Okay. So I'd led a sheltered life.

Tom had been the first man that I'd had a sexual re-lationship with. Oh, sure, I'd fumbled around in the back seats of cars with various high school and college dates, and I even managed to find a willing participant to initiate me into womanhood when I determined the time was right. But until Tom, I'd been an emotional virgin.

He was eight years older than I and he taught me things about the sexual arts I never knew existed. We spent four years together and amassed quite a collection of sexual aids, books, toys, and videos.

Unfortunately, while it was all about pleasure and orgasms for Tom, it was all about love for me. He'd been so disappointed that I'd muddied the waters.

I gathered more bubbles around me."That's ancient history," I sneered. Unfortunately, I realized too late that it's hard to pull off an effective sneer while sitting naked in a foamy tub.

He perched there watching me, making no effort to hide the fact his eyes were lingering on certain parts of my body and he was enjoying the view. I remembered that wicked ex-pression on his face and I felt a tightening low in my body-as if my libido had sent out an invitation that went into the mail before my brain could retrieve it.

"Is the water getting cold?" He leered at my breasts and smiled.

I followed his gaze down and noticed my nipples were large and hard.

ShitApparently my body didn't get the memo about this lusting after Tom thing He smiled. "I always appreciated how quickly your body got aroused. It was very exciting to watch you respond to me in such an obvious way."

He stood, moved a step closer to the bathtub and laid his hand on his zipper. "Look," he said, rubbing his hand up and down the front of his pants, showing me his erection. "See what you do to me?"

Geez.It had been two years since I'd had sex and my body was screamingyes ! Despite his heartless rejection and empty promises, I still wanted him inside me. Even though he was the poster boy for superficiality, I still lusted after him. I was torn between being disgusted with myself and being overwhelmingly aroused. I started to suggest that we move into my bedroom when he uttered the immortal words, "Tell me how bad you want it."

Yuck.

I'd been expecting a sensual seduction scene and instead he gave me a worn out line from one of the porn movies he collected. His words hit me like a cold shower, putting out the flames of my romantic fantasy. All of my desire for him immediately evaporated in the crystal clear realization that he'd never been who I imagined him to be and I'd been fool-ing myself all those years.

I raised my voice and gave it a cutting edge.

"Very tacky, Dr. Radcliffe.Tell me. Does that approach usually work for you these days? Are more women respond-ing to 'Mr. Macho' than responded to 'Mr. Sensitivity'? Hand me a towel and get out."

With a shocked expression on his face, he reached over, picked up a towel and handed it to me.I stood and slowly wrapped the towel around myself, no-ticing he was still enjoying the show. "There's some wine downstairs. Go help yourself. Get out."

He opened and closed his mouth a couple of times but no words emerged. Thecolor had drained from his face, and his expression veered back and forth between confusion and disbelief. He finally turned and silently retreated.

After he left, I stepped out of the tub and stood in front of the mirror. My cheeks were flushed and my eyes were shining. At least it was good to know that my body was still capable of sexual arousal. I'd started to wonder. But it was clear that anything personal between the two of us was fin-ished. I was actually glad Tom had shown up, because who knew how long I might have carried the torch if he hadn't re-minded me of who he really was.

Love truly was blind.

"If I promise to go back to being Mr. Sensitivity, can I come up and talk to you while you put your makeup on? I always enjoyed watching you do that, plus I'm getting lonesome down here," Tom crooned, standing at the foot of the stairs.

I shook my head and smiled. He was trying toschmooze me again, but it wasn't going to work. I had come to my senses.

"Sure. You can come up, but I'm almost done. Bring the wine bottle with you."

I might need a weapon.He came upstairs and leaned against the door to the bathroom, lowered the bottle down onto the counter by the sink and stood there quietly, sipping his wine.

He shrugged his shoulders. "I feel as if I should apol-ogize, but you can't really blame a guy for trying.

We've got such a long history together. You've gotten even prettier since we split up."

"Ican blame a guy for trying, so feel free to come up with one of your brilliant, meaningless apologies. I'm all ears."

I'd pulled my hair up into one of those large hair clips so it wouldn't get wet in the bath, and I released it, letting the curls cascade down my back.

He reached out and picked up one of the wavy clumps. "Was your hair always this long? It's very sexy."

He cocked his head and inspected the band-aid on my neck. "What's this?'" He touched it with one finger.

I smacked his hand away.

"A nasty hickey, if you must know. Nothing I'd want my clients to see."

He raised his eyebrows, smiled.

"A hickey, eh?Someone claiming his territory?"

"You, Dr. Radcliffe, are a sexist pig."

He trailed a finger across the top of my breast, and gave me his "Aren't I a naughty boy" face I remembered so well.

I guess you really can't teachan oldhorndog new tricks .

I smiled and grabbed the offending finger and bent it backward, causing him to yelp with pain.

He rubbed his wounded digit and rambled about how ir-rational I was being, how women were all so emotional, and how he was just showing me that he found me appealing.

I didn't address anything he said, because I knew what he was up to, and I was already tired of his games. He just couldn't believe that a woman would turn him down-that his routine hadn't worked. I remember being jealous for most of the time we'd been together because Tom just couldn't resist flirting with every waitress, clerk, or secretary he en-countered. Why hadn't I noticed his pitiful insecurity before? And why had I blamed myself?

"A friend is coming by pretty soon and we're going out to a club downtown. I meant to call you and cancel for tonight, but I forgot," I mumbled, my face close to the mirror so I could finish putting on my mascara without smudging it.

And, right on cue, there was a knock at the door.

Tom turned and raced down the stairs, yelling, "I'll get it." I'd put money on the fact that he assumed my friend would be female.

The sound carried easily in my small townhouse.

"Is Kismet here?" Alan asked, giving each syllable a slightly higher pitch, as if he momentarily thought he'd come to the wrong door.

I didn't hear anything for a few seconds and then Tom obviously recovered from his dashed expectationsand re-claimed his innate pomposity. "Yes, of course, please come in. I'm an old friend of hers. Tom.

Tom Radcliffe."

I called down the stairs. "I'll be right there, Alan. Just give me a few minutes. Get him something to drink, Tom."

I went into my bedroom and put on the outfit I'd laid out for the evening,then went back into the bathroom for some finishing touches to my makeup and hair. I even squirted on a hint of the perfume a friend had sent me fromParis on her last trip.

Feeling rather excited about the evening, I came down the stairs and joined them in the living room.

"Wow, you look great," Alan said."Positively edible. And you smell wonderful."

"Yes, you really do," echoed Tom.

I said a silent "thank you" to the helpful sales clerk who'd talked me into buying some brightcolors and current fash-ions. Maybe it was time for me to go visit her again.

I hadn't known what to wear to a dance club because I hadn't been to one in years, but I figured jeans would prob-ably work. I had an expensive pair that I'd bought a few months back and hadn't worn yet, and the length was great for the high heels on myfavorite black boots. I'd be even taller than usual tonight, but I felt like taking up space.

It was great to have an excuse to wear one of my new shirts. It was thecolor of a summer sky, form-fitting, and low-cut. I'd had to buy a special bra for this top because none of my regular undergarments were skimpy enough. I'd briefly considered getting a Wonder Bra, but found that the extra padding and lift were overkill.

Going out gave me a chance to put on the beautiful azure, Victorian drop necklace and earring set that I'd bought for myself as a birthday present last year. They matched my eyes perfectly and made me feel feminine.An unfamiliar feeling.I felt pretty good, and I had to admit I was enjoying the appreciative expressions on their faces. It had been a long time since I'd dressed up on purpose. It was nice to see that my efforts had paid off. Hell. It had been a long time since I'd had two handsome men paying attention to me.A long time? Try never.

Alan continued staring at me, and I frowned. "What?"

He laughed. "I'm just amazed by the transformation. I came to pick up Kismet Knight, Ph.D., conservative scien-tist, and instead I findXena , Warrior Princess. Not that I'm complaining."

I laughed, too, feeling surprisingly light-hearted. Evi-dently, kicking Tom's metaphorical butt had perked me right up. "You don't know me yet. Who can say what other per-sonalities might be hiding in here?"

"I'm looking forward to finding out." His eyes moved down my body.

I could swear I physically felt the movement of his eyes.Oh, my. Either the wine is going to my head, or my pilot light just got turned up .

"Ahem," Tom said, drawing my attention back to him. "I'm surprised, Kismet. It used to be worse than pulling teeth to get you to attend a dance club with me. You never enjoyed them. What's special about this one?"

Wellwell . Dr.Cliche is jealous.

"'We're doing some research. Alan is also a psycholo-gist, and he's introducing me to a subculture I'm interested in writing about."

"Hey, that's terrific. Can I go?" Tom asked.

I turned my head to Alan and he shrugged his shoulders. "It's okay with me."What are you up to, Tom?

"Are you sure, Tom? Because it will probably be field study-just observation-and I remember how you felt about that in grad school. You thought it was boring."

But I could almost see the wheels turning in his mind as he imagined the sweet, young, scantily dressed subjects he'd be observing. No. Not boring at all.

"I'm sure it will be fun," Tom asserted, flashing another of his game show host smiles. He ran his fingers through his abundant hair and wiggled his eyebrows at me.

"Okay," I sighed. "Who wants to drive?"

We wound up taking Alan's Jeep Cherokee because Tom and I had already sampled the fruit of the vine.

On the drive over Tom queried from the back seat, his tone disdainful," What kind of subculture is it that we're ob-serving tonight?"

Alan and I glanced at each other, smiled and voiced in unison, "Vampires."

Tom fumbled madly with the clasp of his seatbelt, making a frenzied effort to extricate himself from the restraining de-vice. The fastener apparently put up great resistance, because he snorted, swore and made grunting sounds as he proceeded to pound the offending hardware into submission.

Tom always did have a short fuse.

I'm shallow enough to admit that I loved hearing every pitiful, Three Stooges second of it.

Go ahead and struggle with it, you moron. Come to think of it, you never did have much finesse with any hands-on activities, did you? Maybe someday you'll grow up and figure out the benefits of a tender touch .

Either my thought burrowed its way into his brain, or he simply exhausted his temper tantrum, because after a few seconds of quiet, I heard the "snick" of the clasp opening. He scooted forward and hurled himself against the front seat.

"Excuse me?Vampires?"

I had to give Alan points for keeping his eyes on the road and not laughing in Tom's face.

I half turned within the confines of my seatbelt, fixed my eyes on Tom and gave him my best blank face.

"Yes.Vampires."

He rested his hand on my shoulder. "Please tell me you're not serious."

My tone of voice raised its chin, and I shook off his hand. "I've stumbled across a group of people who believe they're vampires, and I'm going to write about them. I think it's a valid topic for research."

I sounded way more defensive than I meant to. As if I dared him to contradict me. I didn't know why I felt the need to explain my work to Tom, but I did. Or maybe it was me I was trying to convince.

Tom shook his head slowly, exaggerating the theatrical back and forth motion, his lips tightly compressed.

"Kismet, Kismet. You had so much potential. You could have gone toCalifornia with me and shared the lime-light. You could have been interviewed by Leno. You could have taken a meeting with Dr. Phil. But here you are, study-ing pathetic fringe elements in Cow Town. I had no idea my breaking up with you would hit you so hard."

I straightened rigidly in my seat, kept my eyes riveted directly in front of me and took a deep breath. My hands automatically fisted in my lap and I bit my lower lip to hold back the avalanche of words gathering there. I wasn't going to allow the only female psychologist in the group to have a public meltdown. I wouldn't let him push me over the edge.