His tawny gaze settled on her face. She regretted her dull-colored hair and oversize glasses, not to mention the deliberately unflattering makeup. Successful, gorgeous men like him didn’t much inhabit her grad-school world. Why couldn’t she have put on her sexy biker-girl disguise today instead of ugly-pregnant-woman?

Sam waited patiently. As if he had all the time in the world. As if he was used to people being reluctant to give up information.

“If you don’t want me to track down your boss, that’s your decision,” he said. “At least eat something. For the baby, if not for yourself.”

She really wished he would stop mentioning the pregnancy. Okay, so in all the years she’d been doing this sort of thing, she’d never once been put in a position of coming clean, but hey, this wasn’t her fault. She was being overwhelmed by guilt. Well, guilt and a more-than-mild attraction to a handsome guy.

“I’m not pregnant,” she said.

His gaze never left her face. One point for his side. She pulled off her glasses and tossed them on the table. It was a small gesture of vanity, but under the circumstance-wearing the world’s ugliest dress, sensible shoes, and an unflattering hairstyle-it was the best she could do.

“I’m a grad student studying social psychology. I observe how people react under different circumstances. In my work I’m trying to see if social standing, appearance, or gender influence behavior.”

Sam tucked his notepad back into his jacket pocket. One eyebrow rose slightly. “Will busy people eager to get home on a Friday afternoon stop and help a pregnant woman?”

“Exactly.”

His eyes narrowed as he studied her face. She wanted to say something stupid, like she cleaned up real well, but held back.

“What’s in the boxes?”

She cleared her throat. “Mixed paper recycling.”

“You deliberately chose to address them to a company that had recently closed?”