Part 1

The Blonde Theory: A Novel
by Kristin Harmel

Do gentlemen really prefer blondes? Not according to Harper Roberts.

Harper is the youngest attorney in her firm to make partner and, at thirty-five, the oldest one to remain unmarried. It seems the more successful she gets, the faster men run for the door. What to do? Apply her very expensive law school education to the problem, of course!

Precept #1: Harper is blonde. Harper is smart. Harper is successful. Harper is not having fun. Therefore, it's not really true that blondes have more fun, because right now she's really being kinda cranky.

Precept #2: If Harper were... say... an NBA dancer instead of a partner at a prestigious New York firm, would she be on a date right now? Survey says: Yes!

Precept #3: There is only one way to prove Precepts #1 and #2: Send Harper out into the world acting a lot dumber than she is. Luckily, she comes by the blonde naturally. Thank you, Universe, for your assistance in this matter.

Precept #4: Harper has just informed us that we are misusing the word "precept." Which means we have a lot of work to do...

Chapter 1

I didn't know when it happened that it would be my last chance at finding love. I mean, who thinks like that? Sure, we agonize over breakups, cry with our girlfriends, drown our sorrows in too many pints of mint chocolate chip or too many martinis. But in the back of our minds, even as our hearts are breaking, we know there will be someone else. Maybe not right away, but eventually. There's always someone else just around the corner.

At least that's what I thought then. Sure, I was devastated when Peter left. It broke my heart when I came home one evening after a long deposition three years ago and found him in the final stages of packing his old suitcases. Another half an hour and I think I would have missed him entirely. I think he would have left without saying good-bye.

"Harper, I can't do this anymore," he said while I stared at him blankly, trying my best to formulate some sort of rebuttal. But I didn't know what to say. My brain was too busy trying to wrap itself around the fact that he was leaving.

I hadn't had even the slightest clue that anything was wrong. After all, we had just celebrated our two-year anniversary two weeks before with champagne, strawberries, a night of cuddling up, and drunken mumblings about spending forever together. He had introduced me to his parents less than six months earlier. We had been talking about moving into a bigger apartment when our lease was up in the spring.

"What...what...why?" I finally stammered, hoping that it was something along the lines of an appropriate response. I stared at his broad back, which was turned to me as he bent over the battered brown leather suitcase he had placed on the bed we'd shared for the last two years. I tried not to think about the last time we'd made love there, but that was awfully difficult, since it had been just four days ago, the day before my law firm announced I'd made partner-the youngest partner the old-school Booth, Fitzpatrick & McMahon had ever had. Thirty-two-year-old women weren't supposed to make partner. Not at one of the most prestigious firms in the Northeast. But in the last two years, I had quadrupled their patent business and brought in more than two million dollars' worth on my own. I'd finally had the courage to approach the partners and threaten to leave the firm if I wasn't made a junior partner by year's end. They had conferenced about it and agreed, a move that had made news all over New York's legal community. I should have been the happiest I'd ever been in my life. Peter should have been happy for me.

Instead, he was packing. To leave. To leave me.

"Why?" I repeated, this time my voice a mere whisper. He turned to me finally and sighed in what sounded like exasperation, as if I was simply supposed to know exactly why he was leaving. As if me asking him was simply some tedious formality that he had to be subjected to on his way out the door. His dark brown hair, I noticed as I stared at him, was still wet, as if he'd just emerged from the shower, and its little ends, which sorely needed a trip to the barber, were starting to curl up, the way they always did when they dried. He was fresh-shaven, so his square jaw was missing that day-old-stubble look I always found so sexy. His hazel eyes looked bright, brighter than they would have been had he any regrets about leaving. Apparently, he didn't. His posture was just as relaxed and comfortable as usual, which, in my opinion, wasn't how one should look if he was walking out on the woman to whom he'd been proclaiming his undying love less than a week earlier.

"I just can't do this anymore," he repeated, shrugging as if the situation were beyond his control, as if forces greater than he were making him decide to leave, making him pack his suitcase, making him coldly turn his back to me. "I just can't."

"I don't understand," I said, finally able to control my voice again. He turned his back again, returning to his packing as if I weren't there. I crossed the room and stood beside him, trying my best to refrain from throwing myself at his feet and hanging on to his ankles so that he'd have to take me with him wherever he was going. Because that would just be pathetic, wouldn't it? Instead, I just stood beside him, breathing hard, waiting for him to look at me. Finally he did. "Why?" I repeated.

He didn't meet my eyes. He wouldn't. But he stopped packing long enough to mumble the answer that has been ringing in my ears ever since.

"I just can't be with a woman who puts her career before our relationship," he had said, gazing straight down at his toes. All the air went out of me in a whoosh, and suddenly I felt like I couldn't breathe. I didn't understand. When had I put my career before our relationship? He worked just as hard as I did. And if he really felt that way, why hadn't he said so before? In fact, I had tried in every way I could to let him know that he was at the center of my universe. I probably could have made partner even sooner if I hadn't been so worried about making Peter feel wanted. But I had wanted to be a good girlfriend as much as I'd wanted to be a successful attorney. Until that moment, I thought I had juggled both roles just fine.

Evidently, I was mistaken.

"What do you mean?" I asked weakly, feeling more bewildered than I ever had before. Peter paused before going back to his packing. "I don't do that," I whispered. Surely I didn't, did I?

"Yes, you do," Peter said slowly, folding the last of his crisp button-up shirts, which he wore to work at Sullivan & Foley-a law firm that had once been nearly as prestigious as mine but had filed for bankruptcy last year and fired half its staff. Peter had stayed on, but he'd been forced to take a pay cut. "Besides," he added with a quick glance in my direction, snapping his suitcase shut with a resounding bang that sounded ominous and final, "we agreed when we started dating that we would never compete with each other. And now you seem determined to beat me at whatever you do. I'm just tired of it."

There were no words left. After all, I knew I had never purposely tried to compete with him or beat him. It wasn't my fault that I'd had an easier time climbing the ladder at my firm. It wasn't my fault that his firm had screwed up a few major cases, come under investigation by the SEC, and been forced into its drastic measures. Peter's career had once looked even more promising than mine, but things had changed. I just stared at him, bewildered, while tears rolled down my cheeks. So that was it. I had made partner, and it had come with a sizable raise. It apparently also came with a surprise breakup. No one at Booth, Fitzpatrick & McMahon had warned me about this.

Copyright © 2007 by Kristin Harmel

About the Author

Kristin Harmel is a contributor for People magazine where she has interviewed numerous celebrities. She has been an adjunct journalism instructor at the University of Florida and has lived in Paris, New York, Boston, Tampa Bay, and Miami. She currently lives in Orlando and is working on her second novel.