evening,” Karen told her. “They’re here in Boulder, so there’s no travel involved.” She flipped to another page. “I arranged a phone interview for you with a regional magazine in Charleston. The reporter will e-mail you tomorrow to set up a time. And I booked you for a Friday evening Internet chat with a reader’s group in Spokane.”
Sara made a few notes. “Wow. You’re keeping me busy.”
Karen smiled. “Busy is good. It won’t be long before your name is a household word.”
Sara didn’t doubt that. Her friend’s PR wizardry was a big reason the book had been successful so far. Karen knew just which newspapers and magazines to target with advance reading copies to garner the most articles and reviews. She’d brought Sara untold numbers of new readers by suggesting she pair a minilecture with book signings. She’d gotten her a cameo in Cosmopolitan. All that publicity had put Sara on the fast track to success, but still it was hard for her to believe that she’d barely turned thirty and already her dream was coming true.
Not that she’d intended for things to work out the way they had. She’d initially envisioned the book as an expansion of her dissertation, a serious examination of the psychological, social and emotional reasons women make poor choices in men. But one year, three edits and a show-stopping cover later, it had become a shorter, slicker book with a pop psychology tone and a title that made her cringe: Chasing the Bad Boy.
Sara was still hiding her face over that, but she couldn’t argue with success. The book was heading for its third printing, her editor wanted another book and Sara’s message was getting out in a way that never would have happened through her private psychology practice or her seminars alone.
“Oh, yeah,” Karen said. “One more thing. I called the program director at KZAP this morning.”
Sara came to attention. “What for?”
“To book you on a radio show.”
Sara felt a surge of apprehension. “Radio? No. I don’t want to do radio.”
“But you can reach a lot of people on a radio show. And it has an advantage that advertising doesn’t.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s free.”
“No. Radio is unpredictable. It’s too easy to say the wrong thing and get embarrassed.”
“Come on, Sara. You’re in front of audiences all the time.”
“Right. Doing seminars. It’s friendly territory. I have notes, and I’m in control. I don’t like open-ended situations. They’re recipes for disaster.”
“You know your subject, and you’re a great speaker. What is there to worry about?”
“I just don’t want—” Sara stopped short. “Wait a minute. KZAP? Isn’t that the station with Dr. Frieda?”
“Yeah.”
Okay. Now, maybe that wouldn’t be so bad. Discussing her book with a medical doctor, maybe getting into the physiological aspects of attraction, taking questions from her listeners…how tough could that be?
“But I booked you on Nick Chandler’s show,” Karen said.
For the count of three, Sara’s voice deserted her, and when it finally returned, still she could barely get words out without choking.
“What did you say?”
“Now, I knew you were going to freak out. But—”
“There is no ‘but’ here. I’m not getting within ten miles of that man.”
“But it’ll be great publicity.”
“Promoting my book on his show? Are you kidding me?”
“Okay. I know it sounds a little weird, but—”
“A little weird? Do you know he once interviewed a man who claimed he’d had sex with a thousand women and has the notches in his bedpost to prove it?”
“Well, yeah, but—”
“And a woman who tends bar in a topless club? Topless?”
“Yeah, I heard that one. But—”
“And a man who has a Web site dedicated to teaching other men how to score with chicks?”
Karen held up her palm. “I know. I know. It’s a lot of testosterone all in one place, but—”
“I’ve read the gossip columns. I know Nick Chandler’s reputation in this town.”
Karen shrugged. “So he gets around a little.”
“A little? The guy with the thousand notches in his bedpost is an amateur compared to him!”
“And that’s exactly the reason I booked you on his show.”
Sara took a deep breath and tried to calm down, but it was a hard-won battle. Publicity was a good thing, but Nick Chandler wasn’t. The man was so Neanderthal that his knuckles had to drag the ground. Sara shuddered. He probably had back hair and bad posture and drew pictures of bison on his apartment walls.
“Sorry, Karen. I’m not doing a show like that. Call the producer back and tell him to forget it.”
“Even if Nick Chandler has a hundred thousand listeners?”
Sara’s lower jaw fell halfway to her lap. “Are you telling me that a hundred thousand people tune in to hear that kind of programming?”
“Yep.”
“But none of them are going to want to hear about my book. His audience is all men.”
“Hell it is. Thirty-two percent women, demographic eighteen to thirty-five. That’s thirty-two thousand women who are going to be tuning in Thursday afternoon whether you’re there or not.”
“Why? So they can be objectified?”
“Sweetie,” Karen said, “they tune in for Nick Chandler.”
“Come on, Karen! What could a woman possibly find attractive about a man like him?”
“I believe you answered that question in your book.”
“Okay, yes, but—”
“I’m guessing you’ve never seen him.”
“No. I haven’t had the pleasure.”
Karen reached down to Sara’s laptop sitting on the coffee table in front of the sofa. She tapped a few keys. A few moments later she turned the computer toward Sara, who looked at the screen and froze.
Holy mother of God.
Right there on the index page of the KZAP Web site sat Nick Chandler, lounging in a chair in the studio, the microphone tugged over to his lips, wearing a warm, open smile that was engaging beyond belief. His rich coffee-brown hair just brushed his collar in the back, and his eyes were such a brilliant shade of blue that gemstones all over the world had to be crying with jealousy. But Sara wasn’t fooled. Even as his roguish charm oozed right off the screen, she sensed a hint of overbearing overconfidence that gave away the truth: where women were concerned, he played hard and expected to win.
But although she could tell he was every bit the smooth-talking, women-stalking, commitment-mocking man his reputation said he was, she didn’t delude herself. A single glance at him could be hazardous to a woman’s heart.
She looked away. “He’s…decent-looking.”
Karen slumped against the back of the sofa. “Are you kidding me? I’d trade every sex toy in my nightstand drawer for fifteen minutes with a man like him.”
“Oh, yeah? And what would you have in the sixteenth minute?”
“One hell of an afterglow.”
Sara