An Appetite for Passion by Cynthia MacGregor Page B

progressed, Jeff and Jennifer, from best-friendship to romance. Jeff had always believed your mate should be your friend. Not every friend could, or should, be a lover, of course, but it was good if any serious lover was also a friend.
    Kari, of course, had a boyfriend—she had said as much. So that seemed to eliminate her as a potential romantic interest...at least, as long as the boyfriend remained on the scene. Too bad. But they could still be good friends. Jennifer and he had been good friends even before they started dating.
    As Jeff returned to his work in the campaign office, he wondered what Kari’s boyfriend was like. Was he rotund, ultra-skinny, or something closer to average? More importantly, did he appreciate Kari?
    Did he realize how special she was? Creative, industrious, upbeat, friendly, trusting, and all that other good stuff...Kari had a lot going for her. Did this boyfriend know it?
    As Jeff worked, his mind wandered. Kari had taken up residence in his brain. He realized, with guilt, that half of him was rooting for Kari’s boyfriend to let her down.
    He already considered Kari a friend. And part of him was cheering that friend on, wanting her to find satisfaction with the boyfriend she had mentioned. But another part of him—he had to be honest with himself—was hoping things didn’t go well with the boyfriend, leaving Jeff a clear field to become something more than a friend, as he had done with Jennifer.
    Working away, Jeff suddenly felt as if he were being scrutinized. If he looked up, he imagined he’d see everyone staring at him, wanting to see what he’d sabotage next. Damn!
    To prove to himself that he was just being paranoid, he raised his head from his work abruptly...and found that Eileen and one of the newer volunteers actually were looking at him. Of course, that didn’t absolutely prove what they were thinking, but the fact that they looked away as he looked up and caught them seemed pretty incriminating.
    Suddenly, Jeff felt very insecure. He’d been a vital person in the headquarters since the start of the campaign. The others had looked up to him, in part because of his knowledge, in part because of his personality, and in part because of the sheer number of hours he donated to the cause. Now, suddenly, they were looking at him in a different way...with suspicion.
    Jeff felt very alone. He even entertained fleeting thoughts of abandoning his work on the campaign. They could get along without him. There were plenty of other causes that could use his services.
    No! He believed in Larrimore. He wanted to see the man get elected. And he was not going to let the other volunteers’ suspicions drive him away from working for a cause he believed in.
    But he wished they weren’t all convinced he was behind the recent skullduggery. Again, the feeling of aloneness swept over him.
    And again, he thought wistfully of Kari.

 
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 11
     
    When she first awakened on Friday, Kari was freezing. Though it was still dark out, and she couldn’t see if it was fair or cloudy, the weather had unquestionably turned colder. At first Kari thought that was what had caused her to wake up even before her rooster alarm went off, and she huddled deeper under the covers, seeking warmth even if she couldn’t go back to sleep.
    Then she remembered—Max would be here tonight! Springing from her bed despite the chill of the room, she closed the cracked-open window and selected a different outfit from the one she’d laid out the night before...something more appropriate to the evident wintry temperatures than to the October date on the calendar.
    Kari tried to remember if the paper had predicted the temperature plummeting this way. Finally, she decided she’d been too caught up in Max’s eagerly awaited visit to focus on the paper, had read very little of it, absorbed even less, and had probably bypassed the weather altogether.
    Dressing more rapidly than usual, she raced down the