Surrender To A Playboy. Renee Roszel

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СКАЧАТЬ grinned. “Nice butt.”

      He supposed he shouldn’t have been surprised by the comment, but he was. Barely containing his exasperation, he reminded himself she needed approval badly, poor thing. He would be polite if it killed him, but he would give her no hope of a romance in either word or deed.

      Even so, he was supposed to be Bonner Wittering, the womanizing playboy. For the ruse to ring true he had to be somewhat glib. Without smiling, he lifted his coffee mug in a mock salute. “If I only had a dime for every time I’ve heard that.”

      Her wicked laughter was bold, a lusty invitation. Even if he had been the charred tree stump Mary O’Mara made him feel like, he couldn’t have missed the fact that Pauline Bordo had a fixation on the “playboy” label that was part of the town’s folklore about their most infamous native son.

      She planted her fists on her hips causing one of the shirt button that Mary had fastened to pop open. He wondered if she practiced that move to be able to undo buttons on demand. “You surprise me, handsome.”

      Today hadn’t been one of his best, and except for meeting Miz Witty, it was getting worse by the minute. Working to retain his polite facade, he glanced at the door and took a step in that direction. “I surprise you?” he repeated.

      She must have nodded, since he didn’t hear a response. “I figured I’d pitch and you’d catch, if you get my drift.”

      He did. She was about as subtle as her red underwear. He felt a headache coming on and wouldn’t be surprised if the veins in his forehead were standing out like cords. He glanced in her direction.

      “I’ve been pitching like a major leaguer, and you stand there like some cool-as-a-cucumber prince doing nothing but holding a cup of coffee.” She smiled slyly. “I have to hand it to you big city playboys. You really know how to play a fish!” She winked again. She’d done it so often in the past five minutes, it was beginning to look like a facial tic. “Okay, pretty man, I’ll play along. That smoldering I-don’t-care act of yours is makin’ me hot!”

      She’d pegged the I-don’t-care part, but smoldering? Taggart had a hard time suppressing his irritation. He felt sorry for her, but there was a limit. Striding toward the exit, he quipped, “Then my job here is done.”

      Pauline’s lusty guffaws trailed him down the hall.

      Taggart hadn’t realized he’d fallen asleep until the melodious warble of his cell phone woke him. Groggy, he fumbled in the darkness for the bedside table. After grabbing his travel alarm, then his billfold, he blundered into his cell. Flipping it open, he muttered, “Lancaster.”

      “Wrong, Tag, old man. You’re not supposed to be using your real name,” came the familiar voice on the other end. “I hope nobody’s sleeping with you.”

      Taggart couldn’t mistake Bonn’s voice. He rubbed his eyes and yawned. “Just the usual, a couple of supermodels.”

      “Slow day?”

      Taggart was strung tight, but Bonn’s joke had an effect. Even as aggravated as he was, he grunted out a half chuckle. “Maybe a little slow for Bonner Wittering, but I’m only pretending to be you. Why in Hades are you calling me at…” He squinted at the fluorescent dial on his travel alarm. “Nearly one-thirty in the morning? It must be, what? Almost three-thirty there?” He had a horrible thought and drew up on one elbow. “Tell me you’re not in jail!”

      Bonner’s laughter rang through the phone. “Stop being an old woman. I’m a regular choirboy, sitting here in my condo watching a fascinating infomercial. Did you know you can buy a belt with electrodes that will exercise your abs while you sleep?”

      Taggart didn’t need this right now. “Great. Order one and go to bed.”

      Bonn laughed, his unquenchable good nature magically taking Taggart’s annoyance down another notch. “Okay, okay, I’ll get to the point,” he said. “I just wondered how it’s going. When you didn’t call, I decided I’d better check on you—see if they’d strung you up.”

      Taggart swung his legs over the side of the bed and sat up. “I’m still breathing. But I have a feeling Mary O’Mara has a hanging on her agenda.”

      There was a pause. “She’s an old busybody with a bad attitude. Ignore her.”

      Taggart ran a hand through his hair. “Why didn’t I think of that?”

      Another pause. “I know it’ll be hard, with her right there underfoot.”

      “Yeah. That, too,” Taggart muttered, pushing the memory of a pair of smoke-gray eyes from his mind.

      “Huh?”

      “Nothing.”

      “Well, tell me about ol’ Miz Witty. She swallowed it, right? Hook, line and sinker?”

      “I guess so.” Taggart hunched forward, resting a forearm on his thigh. “She’s not very deaf or blind. Was that your embroidery or Miss O’Mara’s?”

      Another pause. “Miss? Is she a Miss?” Bonn asked, sounding like his playboy antenna was up and operational. “Is she pretty? Nah, probably one of those hateful, old-maid-types, right?”

      Here we go again! “Try to focus, Bonn,” Taggart said, pained at the reminder of how very pretty—and, as far as he was concerned—hateful, she was. “Did you lie about the deaf and blind thing or was it Mary?”

      “Okay, okay. Let’s see. I guess—maybe a little of both.” He chuckled, sounding sheepish. “You know my motto: life’s no fun if you can’t embellish.”

      Taggart wished he could reach through the phone and throttle his friend, but he fought the urge. “You’re damn lucky it’s been a long time since she’s seen you.”

      “But she really is sick, right? Mary told me she’d had a couple of strokes, and something else. I forget.”

      “Pneumonia. She can’t walk, due to the strokes, but she seems to be on the mend. I’m no doctor, but she doesn’t look like a woman on her death bed. Personally, I’m glad, because she’s a nice lady.” He paused, then decided he had to add, “You’re a dirtbag for the way you’ve treated her.”

      “Look, I know that,” Bonn said, sounding contrite. “I’m trying to make up for it, aren’t I?”

      Taggart frowned, took the phone from his ear and stared at it, astonished at Bonn’s view of the situation. When he put the phone back to his ear, he grumbled, “You are sitting in your Boston condominium watching an infomercial about an electric belt. I am in Colorado, trying to make it up to her.”

      “Sure, sure. You’re right,” Bonn said. “You’re doing—a lot. And I love you for it, bro.” His apologetic tone sounded sincere. “Remember, it’s her seventy-fifth birthday. That’s a milestone. She is in fragile health, and I am stuck here, a slave to my bail bondsman. None of that’s a lie. What you’re doing is above and beyond the call.”

      “Yes, it is.” Taggart needed sleep, and didn’t want to start the same shopworn lecture over again, but by now it was such a reflex, he found himself saying, “You’ve got to start giving more thought to the consequences СКАЧАТЬ