Stand-In Bride. Barbara Boswell

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СКАЧАТЬ immediately afterward, but this morning he seemed to be in a chatty mood. He lingered by her desk.

      “We had to bring two more people into the mail room to handle all this extra stuff.” Denny stared at the bulging sacks with a proprietary air. “I was put in charge of them, since I’ve been in the department for five years. We call ourselves the ‘Fortune bachelor team.’”

      “Ah,” said Julia. Were congratulations in order? She wasn’t quite sure.

      “Yep, we open every letter addressed to Mr. Fortune that don’t have the special company code on it.”

      She nodded. To distinguish Michael’s usual business correspondence from the mountain of letters inspired by the eligible-bachelor list, Julia had notified all his colleagues and associates nationally and worldwide to use a special code.

      “We even open the letters marked Personal. Mr. Fortune said to especially open those ones.” Denny leaned forward and lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Those are usually the ones with the really good stuff in ’em.”

      Julia winced.

      “You wouldn’t believe what we’ve been finding, Miss Chandler!” Denny exclaimed exuberantly. “Women send Mr. Fortune panties with their phone numbers written on them! And we’re not talking plain old underpants, either. These panties—”

      “I hope you’re donating any suitable items of clothing to charity,” Julia interjected, before he could go into detail.

      “Miss Chandler, no respectable charity would want them panties, I can tell you that,” Denny said with alacrity. “And then there’s the pictures being sent in! Wow!” His face reddened and he began to breathe heavily. “Mr. Fortune said we could have whatever is in the envelopes, so we divide up the pictures. Sometimes we trade ’em. Chuck actually bought one off of Jonesy for ten bucks! He offered me twenty for a really great one I got, but no way I’m selling!”

      Julia’s forced smile became even harder to maintain. She glanced at her watch, a time-honored cue of dismissal. “Uh-oh, I’m running late and have to—”

      “But my favorites are the videos the women send in!” Denny did not pick up on her cue. He was not interested in being dismissed. “Picture this, Miss Chandler. Women wearing these real sexy getups or else lying naked on rugs or on beds with candles lighted and music playing while they tell Mr. Fortune how and what they’re going to—”

      “I really have to—to get this document to Mr. Fortune for his signature.” Julia jumped to her feet, almost knocking over her desk chair. “It’s extremely urgent.”

      “Well, tell Mr. Fortune we followed his orders. There are only letters in the bags. We took care of the other stuff for him.” Smirking, Denny lumbered from the office.

      The other stuff. Julia imagined Denny and his cronies slavering over their newfound panty, photo and video collections, and shuddered.

      The door to Michael’s office opened, and he stood on the threshold, grim faced. His dark blue eyes focused immediately on the latest sack of mail. “Oh, Lord, not more!”

      “Denny wanted me to assure you that he and his crew have removed, uh, any accompanying paraphernalia, and that these sacks contain only letters.”

      “Only letters!” Michael echoed tightly. Exasperated, he ran his hand through his dark, thick hair, tousling it. “Do you have any idea of the content of those letters?”

      “A fairly good idea,” Julia admitted. She felt a totally unexpected, strange and disconcerting impulse to smooth his hair back into place, and she clasped her hands in her lap, as if to physically prevent herself from acting upon it. “From Denny. He’s extremely enthusiastic about your bachelor-list mail.”

      Michael groaned. “This is a nightmare!”

      He entered her office and began to pace. It wasn’t easy, since the big mail sacks took up most of the room. Nevertheless, Michael wound restlessly among them.

      “Ever since that damnable magazine hit the stands, I haven’t had a moment’s peace. I’m hounded unmercifully day and night by women. I’ve had to get an unlisted phone number. I have to sneak out of my apartment at odd hours and go skulking in and out of the building like a criminal on the run. I don’t dare go to a restaurant or a store or—or anywhere. Women come up to me and tell me the most incredibly intimate things, like their bra size or what they’ll do if I—”

      He broke off abruptly, a dark red flush staining his neck. Julia was both amazed and amused. Was Michael Fortune blushing?

      “I guess it’s a good thing Denny and his pals have taken custody of the pictures and videos your, er, fans have sent,” she murmured. “According to Denny, who’s become something of an expert in the field, they’re way beyond an R rating.”

      “Don’t be flippant, Julia!” Michael reprimanded sternly. “You have only to think about what has happened in the last five days to recognize what an upheaval that list has caused, not only to me personally but to the company!”

      “There was definitely an upheaval when the company’s entire computer system had a seizure because all the voice-mail boxes were overloaded with messages for you,” Julia agreed.

      “The whole system was down for hours on three separate days!” Michael was beside himself. “How can we possibly conduct business under those conditions? It’s a catastrophe!”

      “It certainly isn’t business as usual,” Julia affirmed mildly.

      Michael’s eyes glowed like blue flames. “When I told Kristina that having my name on that list constituted an atrocious invasion of privacy, I had no idea how bad it would actually be. The phones and fax machines are jammed with messages from women demanding to meet me. Every radio and TV station in Minneapolis and St. Paul calls at least once a day to schedule an interview with me. The newspapers—both in and out of state—want pictures and interviews, and those syndicated TV tabloid shows have actually sent people to try to get me to consent to appear on their programs. And then there are the talk shows who want to get the ten of us from that wretched list into their studios with an entire audience comprised of single women!”

      “That could get ugly,” Julia said dryly. “I have visions of the ten of you being torn limb from limb by your overly enthusiastic prospective brides.”

      “It’s not a far-fetched scene. After living through this, I can well believe that there are hundreds of women out there crazy enough to do anything to snare a man!”

      “If it’s any consolation, I’m sure the other nine eligible bachelors are being harassed, too.”

      “It isn’t any consolation at all!” Michael growled. “The situation is intolerable. I can’t live this way. Bad enough that I can hardly focus on my work with all the distractions and interruptions, but the entire company has been disrupted by this—this army of zealous women who—” Abruptly, he stopped talking, stopped walking and turned to face her. “I just don’t get it, Julia. Why are they doing this?”

      “The magazine said the ten eligible-bachelor picks were the ‘Prince Charmings of the ’90s’,” Julia said thoughtfully. “I guess they tapped into all the fairy-tale magic that surrounds—”

      “Fairy-tale magic!” Michael СКАЧАТЬ