Here's the good news about Michael Ward: You don't have to hate him because he's handsome.

Don't begrudge him because he's buff. Those cheekbones are not his fault. You can even let it slide that he drives a Porsche.

To his credit, the 6-foot-tall Ward is low-key and modest. He knows what it's like to be, if not quite the ugly duckling, then the nerdy, overlooked one in high school.

But dreamy cover model? On a romance novel? That takes some explaining.

Ward, 49, a technology writer in the public affairs office at California State University, Sacramento, has mixed feelings about the whole thing. He's proud but a tad embarrassed.

Turns out, the modeling venture marks the final chapter of his transformation from   more »