How To Pleasure A Playboy(11)

"You already said that."

Lacey shook her head as she left. If she couldn't wipe the relaxed look  off his face, what hope did she have of winning the bet? She stopped in  the hallway with her hand on the front door handle, and whipped out her  phone again.

No coffee for #PamperedPlayboy this morning. He's learning how the other half live. #TheBaxterGames

She waited, silent, to hear his reaction. Nothing. As if he really  didn't care that his day in her cheerless apartment would be dismal.  Frustrated, she typed in another tweet.

Headed to the warm library, leaving #PamperedPlayboy in the cold. #TheBaxterGames

Still nothing.

She shut the front door behind her harder than she'd intended. Her phone didn't beep until she was walking out of the building.

#LovelyLacey looks even better in white than she does in red. #SexyLibrarian #WhoNeedsCoffee?

Bastard. He was undermining her by making her readers think there must be something sexual going on. That had to be it.

In the bus on the way to her father's, she called Ally. "Help," she  said. "I need to think of a way to make my apartment so horrible,  Bronson won't be able to stand it."

"I thought you did that already?" asked Ally.

"Yeah." She sighed. "You'd think falling through the floor and almost dying might do the trick."

"You … what?"

"You haven't seen my tweets yet? Anyway, point is, it wasn't enough. I need something worse."

There was a short silence on the other end. Then Ally said, "I'm not  sure what more you can do. But I've designed some caps and T-shirts.  This whole thing is blowing up, way more than I'd hoped. Have you seen  the numbers? They're huge. And our readers want merchandise."

Lacey blinked. "What do you mean? What kind of T-shirts?"

"I've posted an ad for them on the blog, so take a look and tell me what you think."

"This afternoon, when I get to the library." Lacey peered out the  window. She was almost at her Dad's hospice. "I've got to go. Call me  back if you come up with anything to get Bronson out, okay? It's  important."         

     



 

"If he sticks it out a few more days, it'll be great for our numbers,"  said Ally, before she could hang up. "How about you let him stay and get  comfortable, so he relaxes his guard. At the end of the week, hit him  with something so awful it makes him leave right away. It'd be the  perfect scenario for the blog."

"That'd be a dangerous game. It's my dad's home we're playing with,  remember? And Bronson's far more resilient than I'd have guessed."

"Okay. Well, just a suggestion. Worth thinking about, though, right?"





Nine





It was too cold to walk around the house in his underwear, so Bronson  stayed in Lacey's bed, working through his emails on his phone, until  Carla turned up with his clothes.

"This place is a lot worse than I thought," she called to him, looking  around the living room while he got dressed in the bedroom. "I checked  out the photos on Lacey's blog yesterday, but they don't capture the  smell, or the dampness. And it's filthy. There's dirt everywhere. How  can she live like this?"

"She doesn't, usually. You'd better organize a house cleaning service."  He pulled on the warmest of the clothes she'd brought, easing a  long-sleeved top and sweater over his sore ribs. "See if you can get  them to come right away, and have some heaters delivered as well. I'll  also need a coffee machine, and groceries."

"I can have a chef prepare your meals and deliver them."

"Just get groceries." Bronson sat to put on his shoes. "This is the  first holiday from the social scene I've had in a long time. I'll be  online, of course, but I want a break from eating restaurant food."

"Not quite the holiday I was hoping you'd take." Her voice was drily amused. "But anything's better than nothing."

"I'd forgotten how much I like cooking."

"You cooked?"

Fully dressed, he joined her in the living room. "Why is that surprising?"

She shook her head, her expression still bemused. "The doctor's coming  at eleven." Tilting her head to one side, she hesitated a moment. "Are  you going to tell me how you got the bruises? I know I shouldn't ask,  but I'm about to burst."

"Lacey's already made the photos public, so half of Sydney knows." He  opened the door to the spare room and gestured to the devastation. "I  took a tumble."

Her eyes widened and she drew in a loud breath. "Don't tell me you fell  through the floor? Bronson, you could have died." Her gaze went to her  feet and she stepped back nervously. "How bad is the rest of it? Is the  whole building about to collapse?"

"That room was the worst, but the sooner the tenants are out, the  better. I'm going to pay a visit to the ones who are still living here.  Whatever it costs, I'll make sure they move out right away."

"What about you? You're going to risk your life here for a whole week?"

"Short of physically carrying Lacey out and boarding the place up behind  her, it's the only way I'll get her to leave." He stared grimly at the  hole. "I could bring in an entire team of experts to tell her the  building was too far gone to save, and it wouldn't do a bit of good."

"According to her articles, her father wants to come home to die," said  Carla. "I feel for her. But surely she's got to realize she can't bring  him here?"

"She knows what she wants, and she's determined to get it. I have to  admire that she won't take no for an answer." Bronson tested the room's  light switches. "Get someone to come and check the wiring, make sure the  building's not going to burn down in the next week. And the toilet's  broken, so get it replaced."

"Top of the list," she promised with a grimace.

"I'll need someone to take a proper look at the woodwork, in case any  more support beams are rotted through. And I want the chimney checked,  to see if we can get the fireplace working. It'll warm the place up and  help it dry out."

"It's a gorgeous fireplace." Carla peered at it. "The old tiles are so  intricately done. Unusual to have something like this in an apartment  building. A real feature."

He shot her a look. "I've already got Lacey talking up the historic value of the place."

"Sorry, boss." She walked over to peer into the fish tank under the window. "What's in here?"

"Nothing. Whatever it was must have died." He paused a moment, thinking  through what else he needed. "You'd better organize for a small bed.  Some kind of camping bed or stretcher."         

     



 

"You think it'll fit in here?" She looked over at the enormous bookcase,  its dehumidifier still humming under the plastic covering. "Is that  thing holding an entire library? It's taking up half the room."

Bronson walked over to it. Most of the shelves were filled with large,  dense-looking volumes. Biographies about Karl Marx, Stalin, Vladimir  Lenin, and Fidel Castro. Others had titles like Socialism for a  Sceptical Age, and The Encyclopaedia of Activism and Social Justice.  Strangely enough, while most shelves were packed tight with books, one  shelf was completely empty.

"We'll squeeze the bed in," he said. "At least I should get a few more hours of sleep than I normally do."

"Some people go to the beach to relax. You camp out in a building that  could collapse on your head." She leaned against the back of the couch  for a moment, then wrinkled her nose and brushed dust from her skirt.  "Looking on the bright side, Lacey's doing a great job of publicizing  your bet. I've had calls from all kinds of people wanting to know more.  Even my mother's heard about it. She said it was all anyone talked about  at her indoor bowls club."

Bronson nodded. "The extra publicity should be good for the clubs. I'll  check in with the PR team and make sure we're making the most of it. If  we tease the question of whether I'm going to back out of the bet and  turn up at Play tonight, we could get a big crowd waiting to find out."

"Remember, you promised to relax this week. In between making sure this  place isn't going to collapse, I mean. Plenty of time to get back to  work once you've won the bet." Carla glanced sideways at the hole. "If  you survive that long."

"Actually, the more I think about having a week away from the clubs, the  more I like the idea. I'll have time to plan, and work through some of  the numbers. I'm also going to follow up with the private detective. For  the last three years, he's given me a progress report at the same time  every month, and this is the first time I haven't heard from him. Maybe  that's a good sign and he's finally got a lead on where my brother went  after Thailand."

"Why don't you lie around in your pyjamas and read a good thriller? I'll  pick up a Lee Child, or one of those John Milton novels, shall I?"