CHAPTER 1

I first met Daisy while a graduate student in college. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that she met me as she was the dominant driving force through most of our relationship. You see, I was a nerd, still am for that matter. I wasn't ugly or fat, or even a sloppy, smelly person. I was tall at six feet three inches and thin as a rail at 165 pounds. I still have a full head of light brown hair at thirty-eight, but I have filled out a bit, the result of sitting on my ass most days at work.

In all my five-plus years at the university I'd never gone on even a single date. As smart as I was, that's just how shy I was when around the opposite sex so I was shell-shocked as well as tongue tied when Daisy sat opposite me in the library that cold day in early December. She was my exact opposite—beautiful and gregarious, the kind of woman who attracts men the way flowers attract bees and butterflies. She had the most beautiful eyes—sparkling blue—and light brown hair with not a strand out of place. Her face was a perfect oval with skin like fine bone china. Her body? It was the kind of body most guys masturbated to. I know I did…almost every night.

Daisy was a sorority girl—popular, effervescent, the life of every party. I had never even been to a party, not a real one and certainly not one at a sorority or fraternity. My social life revolved around the chess club and university bridge tournaments. I'd been a university champion for two years running with Phil Jorgenson until he graduated and left school. I had also graduated early, but unlike Phil I had stayed as a graduate assistant while picking up my PhD. in Computer Engineering. Daisy was majoring in psychology, one of the easiest and most useless majors in my opinion.

I was so into a programming exercise on my laptop that I hadn't noticed her presence until she spoke. "Um…You're John, aren't you?" She had to repeat it twice before I realized that she was talking to me. She giggled when I finally looked up. "Boy, you sure do concentrate."

My response was a guttural gurgle of unintelligible sounds. "You ARE John, right? Don't be nervous. I'm just another girl."

"Yeah, right," I thought. "In order to be just another girl there would have had to be someone else first, but there wasn't." There had never been any other.

"Uh…what do you want?"

"Can I speak to you for a few minutes? I hear you're a real math whiz and I'm having a problem in algebra. Think you can help me? Please?" She batted those deep blue eyes at me and I melted.

"To be honest, I haven't taken algebra since high school, but I should be able to figure it out. What did you have in mind?"

She laughed as she replied, "So you can speak, after all. Could you possibly spend an hour here with me, say Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoons? I have finals in three weeks. Please? If I flunk this course I won't graduate on time. How would I explain this to my Grandma and Poppa?"

I smiled—just a small one—when I replied, "It wouldn't upset your grandparents, would it? I think I can fit you into my tight social calendar. How is two o'clock for you?"

"Perfect!" She jumped up and kissed my cheek. "I'll see you here tomorrow. Don't forget!" She wasted her words. I never forgot anything, thanks to a photographic memory I'd been cursed with and there was no way I'd forget my first on-campus contact with a genuine girl. I finished my work and packed up my backpack. I was back in the dorm an hour later, just in time to clean up before dinner.

I had just returned from the bathroom when my roommate Rob walked in. "You will never believe who approached me in the library this afternoon, Rob."

"Well, I know it wasn't a girl."

"Actually, it was—none other than Daisy O'Neill. She wants tutoring help in algebra, of all things." Rob gave me a funny look, but remained silent. We walked out into the chilly night a few minutes later. Our cafeteria was almost a quarter mile away. We usually chatted, but tonight Rob was silent. He was a grad student in math so I was going to suggest that he tutor Daisy and, in fact, that's exactly what I said once we were back in the dorm.

"What you said earlier had me confused. I want to access the class's records. Professor Newton teaches that course and I work with him quite often. I have his access code so I can enter grades from tests and homework. Hold on a second." We waited for the course database to load then it was only a few seconds before Rob found the grades he was looking for. His face suddenly turned sour, as though he had sucked on a lemon.

"What's wrong, Rob?"

"Take a look for yourself. She seems to be doing quite well for someone who is afraid she'll flunk the course. It looks like she has about a B+ average."

"Maybe she's just afraid of the exam."

"I don't think so; she aced the mid-term. Something's up, John; give me a day or two to snoop around." I shrugged my shoulders and went back to work. One of the good things about majoring in computer science was that I could work anywhere. My programs and records were on the university server. I could access them from anywhere in the world.

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Daisy was right on time the next afternoon and for a so-called failing student she showed a real aptitude for the work. She left after an hour to return to her sorority. I stayed to do more work on my dissertation. My professor had told me it was ground-breaking work that could lead to big bucks once I had graduated. He had introduced me to a patent attorney almost a year ago who agreed with his assessment. I had already paid him $10,000 to begin the patent process.

Rob's face was even more upset when I saw him before dinner that afternoon. "You'd better sit down, John. Here's the scoop. I overheard her and a few of her friends talking between classes. These girls are so self-absorbed that they never even noticed me standing less than ten feet away. I pretended that I was playing with my phone, but I could hear every word they said, not that they were very quiet about it. She's looking for a meal ticket, John. She said that she realizes her Bachelor's in Psych is basically useless. She wants a husband who's going to strike it rich and that's going to be you."

I laughed. I couldn't help myself. I laughed for almost ten minutes, rolling onto my bed before I stopped. "I can't believe it, Rob. Of all the people on this campus she picked me? I believe you, but either she's crazy or she's the best actress ever."

"What are you going to do?"

"Do? Nothing; I'm going to do absolutely nothing. I'm glad you told me. I'll just wait to see how she plays this out. She is right about one thing; Professor Eastman says my thesis could be worth millions. I wonder how she learned about that." We talked for a few more minutes before leaving for dinner.