The shorts clung to her and were cut high enough to show the bottom of her butt. Tacky but effective. Her sandals had a spiked heel that was practically a weapon, but they made her legs look long-a serious trick for someone as short as her.

The halter was so low-cut that she’d had to hold it in place with double-sided tape. She had fresh highlights, sultry makeup and long, dangling earrings that almost touched her nearly bare shoulders.

If the guys back at her science lab could see her now, they would probably implode from shock. Around them she only wore tailored suits and lab jackets. But for the next month she was dressing as a sex kitten and she planned to enjoy every minute of it.

She deliberately sped up at the end of the hall, then stopped suddenly. Jack ran into her. He reached out to steady himself or maybe her. She’d planned that he would, so she turned and held in a grin as the palm of his hand landed exactly on her left breast.

He stiffened and pulled back so fast he almost fell. Meri tried to decide if she minded seeing him in a crumpled heap on the polished hardwood floor.

“Sorry,” he muttered.

“Jack,” she purred. “Are you coming on to me? I have to say, that’s not very subtle. I would have expected better.”

“I’m not coming on to you.”

“Really?” She put her hands on her hips as she faced him. “Why not? Aren’t I your type?”

He frowned. “What the hell is this all about?”

“So many things. I’m not sure where to start.”

“Try at the beginning. It usually works for me.”

The beginning? Where was that? At conception, where some quirk of the Palmer gene pool had decided to produce a child with an exceptional IQ? Or later, when Meri had first realized she was never going to fit in anywhere? Or perhaps that long-ago-but-never-forgotten-afternoon when the man she loved had so cruelly rejected her?