“What’s wrong?” he asked. “You can tell me.” Then he could fix her problem before takingoff to fix his.
Her long lashes swept up, and for just a second she looked at him as if she wanted to confide. Then her face fell into polite lines, betrayed by the tired tilt of her head. “There’s nothing wrong. I’m just busy, like everyone else.” She shifted uneasily in the chair as he continued to study her.
Yeah, he’d used that look to break a terrorist once. He might have every fault in the book, but patience was his weapon. Well, one of them.
She sighed. “Fine. The storm woke me up last night, and then the power was out and Trudy was scared. For some reason I couldn’t get back to sleep. It’s silly.” She pressed the heel of her palm against her forehead. “Sosilly. Really.”
The woman in front of him was anything but silly. “Did the power return?” he asked.
“Yes.” She rolled her eyes. “The breaker had flipped, so I went downstairs and had to move the switches back into place.”
His heart warmed. Man, she was cute when she let down that guard. More than cute. Beautiful. “If you ever need help, call me.” He dug into his pack for a pen and wrote his cell phone number on a napkin before pushing it across the table.
It was telling that she accepted it. “Thanks.” She twirled it around, watching thenumbers move.
“Yours?” he asked, wondering ifshe’d give it.
She blushed a light peach and then rattled off her number, which he memorized instantly.
“Dr. Hanson?” A tall grad student in a very tight blue sweater rocked back on her heelsnear the table.
“Hi, Sharon,” Jethro said, keeping his gaze above her chin.
“I was hoping you’d have extra office hours this week. I’m really struggling with the Kierkegaard assignment and could use some help.” She smiled and wiggled her hips.
Jethro kept his smile in place. “No extra hours, and I’d suggest you work with your assigned study group. Dora Jefferty is in your group, and she has an excellent grasp of Kierkegaard. Have a nice day.”
Pouting, Sharonflounced away.
Gemma snorted. “What are you?Indiana Jones?”
Now she was downright appealing. “Something like that.” Heshook his head.
“Well, you handled that very nicely, especially for an orange throat.” She finally picked up her fork and stabbed at her boring-looking salad.
He chuckled. “Orange throat? Forgetting the fact that you just called me a lizard, I’m a blue throat all the way.” In game theory, the side-blotched lizard was a favorite example of a cyclical game, which meant it might not ever end, where the orange-throat lizard was represented as an alpha with many females, the yellow throat a beta sneaking among the females, and the blue throat a true alpha with only one female.
She chewed thoughtfully. “A one-female lizard type of guy, huh? Wouldn’t have thought that of you.”
He eased into the joking, enjoying the chance to exchange game theory quips with an intelligent and rather sexy woman. “You’re violating the Nash equilibrium, Professor.”
She coughed and took a drink of her hot chocolate. “How am I deviating from my present strategy? Wait a minute. What’s my present strategy?”
“Freezing me out and keeping me at a distance,” he said easily. “If you’re going to deviate, so am I.”
She paused, as if thinking about it. “I’m justbeing cordial.”
“You being cordial makes me friendly.” He was actually flirting with her. Well, a little bit. “Don’t dart off like a dove, now.”
She shook her head, amusement dancing across her features. “That would make you the hawk?” She blew out air. “Figures you’d like the hawk-dove model.”
He could do this all day with her. “Actually, game theory is a secondary interest to me. You into philosophy?”
“Enough to know that your friend Sharon should just let it be.” She grinned at her own joke.
He laughed out loud.
“All right.” She sipped her drink. “Here’s a mathematical puzzle for you. Take a closed room in a basement with a locked window and a washer and dryer against the wall. A small puddle is on the floor, away from the washer and dryer, with no connection to the window. How didit get there?”
