Читать книгу Tutoring Tucker - Debrah Morris, Debrah Morris - Страница 12

Briny Tucker glanced up from the magazine he was too nervous to read. The financial planner’s receptionist was staring at him. Again. She smiled, and he smiled back in what he hoped was a friendly yet discouraging manner. He didn’t want to hurt the poor girl’s feelings, but all the calf-eyed looks she kept shooting his way made him as jumpy as a tick on a hot rock.

He rubbed his sweaty palms on his jeans and eyed the door to Malcolm O’Neal’s inner office. What was taking so long? His errant gaze tangled with the receptionist’s again, and they danced through the smiley face routine one more time. Behaving like a gentleman could be a nuisance. He had accepted the coffee she offered when he didn’t want any, and he had tried to make small talk when he didn’t know how. He had even slipped the piece of paper containing her home phone number into his pocket, knowing he’d never give her a call.

Yeah, he sure enough needed lessons in how to be a gentleman.

He stroked his mustache and snapped his gum, two nervous habits he couldn’t seem to break. Normally he would be flattered by a pretty girl coming on to him, but wide-eyed, fluffy-haired Tina with her silky outfit and shiny nails was obviously out of his league. He was accustomed to dating girls who dressed up in rhinestone-studded T-shirts. Tina probably went out with men who wore ties every day and knew why a guy needed more than one fork. For the first time in his life he wondered if her interest was in him or his money.

Money? As in Who Wants To Be a Millionaire. Whoa! Hard to believe, but Briny Tucker really was one. About fifty times over. He still had trouble wrapping his mind around that amazing fact. Practicing the words in front of the hotel mirror last night had paid off—he could finally string them together in his thoughts without laughing out loud. Or looking around to see who else, besides God, was in on the joke.

Recent events did not seem real. Briny Tucker a millionaire. And all because he’d lucked out and finally picked the right string of numbers. Even after Uncle Sam’s sizable cut, he had more cash than any man had a right to bank in one lifetime.

But being rich wasn’t all fun and games. That’s why he’d asked around until he’d learned who handled his employer’s money. Anyone good enough for Prudence Burrell was good enough for him. The burden to do something meaningful with his windfall was a heavy weight that burned his gut and twisted his heart until getting out from under the responsibility was all he could think about. That’s why he was here. Trying to do the smart thing. He had a lot to learn before he could live up to the responsibility that had been heaped on his shoulders.

Careful not to let his gaze tangle with Tina’s, he angled a quick peek at the door leading to O’Neal’s office. His classy would-be tutor had disappeared through there when she barreled by a while ago. The financial planner said he needed a few minutes alone with Miss Burrell to explain the position Briny had to offer. What was taking so long? He checked his watch, the case scratched and battered from working on the oil rigs. Half an hour. Explaining must have turned into convincing. Or arm twisting.

Maybe he was wasting his time. The fact that Dorian Burrell was heir to the very company that Briny had worked for, up until a week ago, had seemed like another lucky coincidence when O’Neal first mentioned what he had in mind. Now that he’d had a second look at the pampered petroleum princess, he wasn’t sure she was the best hand for the job. Oh, the cool, blond, trust-fund baby could teach him what he needed to know in order to run with society’s big dogs—Dorian Burrell had flounced into the world with a sterling silver spoon clamped firmly between her perfect, pearly white teeth—that was not the problem.

Unlike the moony young receptionist, the hoity-toity oil heiress had looked at him down that pretty nose of hers as if he was something she’d stepped in while crossing the corral.

Briny didn’t know much about the world beyond the oil fields, but he was pretty sure flat-out scorn wouldn’t help him achieve his goals. The tutoring process was meant to increase his confidence, not blast it into fifty million pieces.

“If you have a better idea, Dorian, please share.” Malcolm O’Neal leaned back in his ergonomically engineered leather desk chair and adjusted his glasses. “This job didn’t fall into your lap out of pure dumb luck, you know. It’s definitely a miracle. I should probably notify the Vatican.”

“Very funny,” she muttered. Her overwrought fingers drummed a steady tattoo on the arm of her chair. Just because she’d had time to adjust to the fact of her impoverishment, didn’t mean she had to like the idea. “I’m glad you find my misfortune so amusing.”

“Dorian, as your financial manager, I highly recommend you take the job. I rather doubt you’ll find anyone in the universe willing to pay one-tenth of what my client has offered for your services, or any job better suited to your particular, ah, talents.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Malcolm.” Dorian knew he was right. She just hated that he was. Thirty thousand dollars was a lot of money for three months’ work. What was she worried about? She could handle this. Malcolm said she wouldn’t have to teach the nouveau riche Neanderthal everything. She could concentrate on appearance, etiquette, culture and the finer points of social grace while coordinating the numerous instructors, classes and training courses Briny Tucker would need to bring him up to millionaire-socialite speed.

Briny. What kind of name was that?

“As chief miracle worker, I get to call the shots, right? Run the show? Be the boss?” Otherwise she wanted nothing to do with this real-life Technicolor episode of the Beverly Hillbillies.

“Of course. Mr. Tucker has agreed to defer to your judgment in all things pertaining to his, ah, grooming.”

“Do I have to sign anything?”

“Just a standard business contract outlining your duties and terms of the agreement. Nothing to worry about.” He dismissed her concern with a hand flap and avoided making eye contact as he pushed a piece of legal-size paper across the desk. “I took the liberty of having this drawn up before you arrived.”

“Pretty darned sure of yourself, weren’t you?”

“Like I said, if you have a better idea…”

“I don’t know.” Signing a contract was a bigger commitment than Dorian had ever made before. A contract sounded official, binding. Scary.

“Three months isn’t such a long time.” Malcolm clearly wanted to close the deal, but Dorian refused to be rushed.

“Maybe not to someone with money coming in,” she snapped. The eighty dollars in her purse wouldn’t last through tomorrow afternoon. And if Malcolm thought she’d give the money back because he’d found her a job, he was in for a surprise. She glanced at the contract to confirm the figure he’d quoted her. “This Tucker person is really willing to pay that amount?”

“It’s all spelled out in black-and-white.” Malcolm slid a fancy platinum pen toward her. “Just sign, and we can move on.”

She was sorely tempted. As an ex-debutante with no employment history, minimal prospects, and if truth be told, no marketable skills whatsoever, she knew exactly how miraculous the offer was. Almost too good to be true. A ready solution to an unexpected cash flow problem. And far more palatable than bagging burgers at a fast-food counter.

She would definitely not look her best in a cardboard hat.

“What’s more, he’s willing to pay one month’s wages in advance.” This time Malcolm slid a check across the desk. “As his financial manager, I’ve been authorized to offer you the first payment today.”

“Oh, you have, have you?” This out-of-the-blue, too-easy solution smelled like a trap. She should kick off her new Ferragamo pumps and sprint to the nearest exit before she did something stupid. She had to be crazy. Why else would she even consider spending the next few months in forced proximity to a totally unsuitable man with whom she had nothing in common? One whose physical presence had made her aware of his inappropriateness in the most alarming way both times she’d passed him in Malcolm’s waiting room.

“He is an altogether intriguing, ingenuous young man,” Malcolm went on. “You’ll like him, if you give him half a chance. And I think Pru will agree, this may be a growth experience for you as well as him. She’ll be pleased you solved your problem and impressed by your resourcefulness.”

Anything to get back into Granny Pru’s good graces. “Oh, all right. I’ll sign.” Without bothering to read the fine print, Dorian grabbed the contract and scribbled her name across the bottom before she changed her mind. She tucked the check into her purse before Malcolm changed his. Growth experience or not, she was not sure she could ever forgive her grandmother for thrusting her into this horrible position.

Malcolm rubbed his hands together in satisfaction and rocked forward in his chair. “Excellent.” He punched the desk intercom. “Tina, please show Mr. Tucker in.”

Dorian groaned. “And please show me where you keep the Valium.”

Five minutes of Mr. Tucker’s company told Dorian ninety days would not be nearly enough time to buck Darwin’s theory and polish the hairy missing link into something remotely resembling a socialite. She had expected him to be rough around the edges. She was wrong. Tucker was a gum-chewing, hobnailed yokel of staggering proportions, who readily admitted he studied “rich folks” by watching Dallas reruns on satellite television. Raw and unpolished to the core. An unlikely, mustachioed blip on Lady Luck’s radar.

Dorian assessed the new millionaire. “Given time constraints and the current state of technology, complete molecular reconstruction is out. So to achieve positive results, the transformation process will have to be intense.”

“Whatever you say, ma’am. Like I told Mr. O’Neal, you’re the boss.”

For maximum effect, and for her own convenience, which she prized above all things, Dorian suggested her student move out of the hotel where he currently resided and into her West End apartment. “If not for the duration, at least until I can help you find a suitable place to live.”

“I don’t know about that, ma’am.” Tucker’s baritone was marred by a west Texas drawl. “Doesn’t seem quite right. Me living with you and all. I’d hate to get underfoot.”

His polite demurral possessed a certain Jed Clampett-esque charm, but a dialect coach would rid his speech of its twangy nuances soon enough. One of the first things Dorian had learned in her snooty Connecticut boarding school was the inverse relationship between regional dialect and perceived IQ. The stronger the accent, the less intelligent people thought you were.

“Don’t be foolish,” she told him. “We need a base of operations for your studies, and I prefer to have you close at hand. I can’t promise results if you’re not fully immersed in your new lifestyle, 24/7.”

“But—”

“My apartment is quite large, and I have three extra bedrooms. You will hardly be underfoot, I assure you.”

“Well.” She winced as he drew the word out into two syllables. “I see your point, ma’am, but sharing living quarters doesn’t seem quite proper.”

“If you’re worried about impropriety, don’t trouble yourself. I promise not to compromise you in any way.” Surely her frosty tone let him know she would not touch him if provided with a ready supply of ten-foot poles.

“Oh, I’m not worried about that, ma’am.” His grin morphed into an embarrassed grimace. “I was thinking about your reputation.”

Her reputation? How gallant and provincial. Who considered such things these days?

Tucker gave Dorian a long, assessing look, his bristly brows bunched in indecision. Malcolm gave him an encouraging nod, and he said, “I suppose if Mr. O’Neal thinks it’s all right.”

“I’ll vouch for Ms. Burrell’s sincerity when she says you have nothing to fear in that area,” Malcolm said solemnly.

Tucker shrugged. “Okay, then. I guess I’ll move in with you. Truth is, it’s kind of a relief. Hotel living’s getting expensive, and Reba really hates staying there.”

“Reba?” Dorian blinked, startled by the unexpected revelation. Malcolm failed to mention the bumpkin had brought a bumpkiness along for the ride. “Your wife?”

“My dog. We’ve been together so long, I couldn’t bear to leave her behind in Slapdown. She would’ve pined away.”

“I see. How touching.” He must have greased quite a few palms to keep an animal at the Fairmont. She couldn’t decide which was more confusing. His loyalty to his dog or his willingness to pay to keep the mutt near. Maybe there was more to the man than met the eye.

What was she thinking? Of course there was more to him. Fifty million dollars more.

With Malcolm overseeing, they concluded their arrangements. Dorian gave Tucker her address, and he promised to present himself promptly at ten o’clock the following morning to begin the makeover process. They stood, and she extended her hand to close the deal. The suddenly rich former oil rig foreman engulfed her small, manicured hand in both of his, infusing her skin with electrifying warmth as he pumped up and down.

“I sure thank you for taking me on like this, Miss Burrell. I need all the help I can get, and with a lady like you, well, I know I’ll learn from the best.”

“I’ll certainly try to be of assistance to you, Mr. Tucker.” Dorian wanted to break the connection between them, to reclaim both her hand and her sense of control, yet couldn’t summon the strength. She was trapped, pinned in the vivid blue headlights of Briny Tucker’s long-lashed eyes. Eyes that looked deep into her and reflected more than she knew was there.

“See,” he continued, oblivious to his startling effect on her, “I won this money for a reason. Well, I didn’t really win anything. I was singled out for a gift from above and I’m supposed to do something meaningful with what I’ve been given.”

“Is that so?”

“Why, sure. What good is money, if money doesn’t do good?”

Was this guy for real? He was either the biggest fraud or the most chillingly earnest man she had ever encountered. “Who said that?” She didn’t recognize the quotation.

“I did. I made a promise, if I ever hit the jackpot, I’d use the money to make a difference in the world. See what I’m saying?”

“Who did you promise?” Her words were necessarily breathy, since the unprecedented drop in oxygen level. What was sucking all the air out of the room?

He grinned, and another wave of unidentified emotion washed over her. He had the sweetest, purest smile Dorian had ever seen on anyone not officially a member of the seraphim or cherubim.

“Why, I promised me.” Tucker’s eyes turned heavenward. “And Him.”

“And you believe a promise is a promise.” Dorian wasn’t sure she’d ever met anyone who shared that ideal. In her experience promises were easily made and easily broken, when keeping them became difficult or inconvenient. How long had she clung to her mother’s many promises before realizing they were nothing but empty words?

“Well, sure.” He exhaled, as though deeply relieved. “Boy howdy, I’m glad you understand where I’m coming from, Miss Burrell.”

But did she? Tucker clearly kept his promises. She had the unwelcome thought that any woman on the receiving end of so much sincerity would be lucky indeed. That confused her more than ever. Could the man she’d written off as a simpleton actually have layers? “I’m not sure I do understand.” He squeezed her hand. Longing to feel that rare tingling warmth more intensely, she fought the shocking urge to fall into his arms.

“I don’t want to be just another blustering redneck in hand-tooled boots, with a big truck and a double-wide.” His voice was slow, deep, hypnotic. “Why, a man like that is no more than a clown. Smart, powerful people would take advantage of him. He doesn’t deserve a gift.”

“What do you want, Mr. Tucker?” she whispered. Better question, what was he doing to her?

He looked at her intently, his gentle expression melting some of the ice inside her until she questioned her sanity again. “I want smart, powerful people to respect me. It’s the only way I can accomplish what I’m setting out to do. I know I have to earn their regard, and that’s where you come in.”

“Me?” The sound was more gulp than word.

“Yep. I’m not worried about what’s in here.” He patted his chest with one hand while clutching hers with the other. “Or here.” He tapped his head.

“I know what I have to do. But I need you to teach me how to act the part so people will believe in me.”

“That’s an admirable ambition.” And one heck of an assignment. Dorian slipped her hand free and gradually regained the power of thought she had lost when Tucker touched her. What was the matter with her? She didn’t do warm and tingly. Something was very wrong here. She would have to keep a tighter rein on all her body parts when this guy was around.

She crossed the room and opened the door, hoping he would take the hint and leave so she could pull herself together. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“Oh, I’ll be there, Miss Burrell, ma’am.” He gave her a quick wink. “With bells on.”

Then he smiled again, and the heat slipped past her reserve to warm the cold corners of her heart. What had Malcolm called the man? Intriguing and ingenuous. Yes, he was those things. He was something else, too, something she was unfamiliar with and couldn’t quite name.

Not until his lanky form disappeared through the door and down the hall did she realize what set him apart from every other man she’d ever met.

The man was sincerity personified. There was nothing fake or phony or devious about him. She closed Malcolm’s office door and leaned against it. Lord help her. Briny Tucker, the only millionaire in Slapdown, Texas, was the genuine article.

And she was charged with changing him.

The doorbell rang as Dorian stepped out of the shower. Great. Leave it to Slapdown to be on time. She wrapped a thick towel around her wet hair and pulled on a short satin robe, which she cinched at the waist.

“First lesson of the day,” she admonished as she yanked open the door. “Never show up at the agreed-upon time. It’s extremely bad form.”

“Oh, yeah?”

Her gaze took in his grinning face, then dropped lower to settle on a most disturbing sight. “Omigod!”

“What’s wrong?” Tucker was startled by her one-word assessment of the companion panting at his side.

“You said you had a dog.” She looked accusingly at the quivering mass of flopping ears, drooping jowls and bloodshot eyes. “Is that supposed to be a dog?”

“Yes, ma’am.” He swept off his cowboy hat and tried valiantly not to acknowledge her state of undress. His awkward gaze swept down to her bare feet, up her legs, over her chest and back up to the towel on her head.

His efforts at not noticing made Dorian more aware of her nakedness beneath the thin layer of sapphire satin. She clutched the lapels of her robe together. “Are you sure?”

Gentleman that he was, he did not allow his eyes to wander. “Miss Burrell, meet Reba. She’s just about the sweetest old bloodhound in Texas. She was the best tracker in the county until she lost her nose.”

Dorian eyed the so-called dog and the damp slime trail of saliva on the foyer’s one-hundred-dollar-a-yard carpet. “That beast cannot live here.” She blocked the doorway, in case the motley pair decided to rush her, though the redoubtable Reba didn’t look up to rushing anything. “There are kennels, you know.”

Briny reached down and scratched the hound’s head. She looked up at him, her rheumy eyes filled with adoration. “Oh, no, ma’am. I couldn’t leave Reba with strangers. I understand if you’re not an animal lover, Miss Burrell, but my dog and I are a team. C’mon, girl, let’s go back to the hotel.” He picked up his ancient suitcase and turned to go.

“Wait!” She would live to regret offering these two a temporary home. But she didn’t want Tucker to think she was one of those promise breakers he held in such contempt. “Is she housebroken?”

“Sure thing. Reba’s trained. And quiet as a mouse, too. She’s so old, she mostly just sleeps. You’ll never know she’s around.”

“I don’t know about that.” Dorian sniffed. “She reeks to high heaven.”

“I guess the old girl could use a bath.” Tucker placed one hand on the doorjamb and swayed toward Dorian with a wide grin. “There’s nothing like a warm tub of bubbles to make a female smell good.”

She flung open the door and stepped back, to escape his thought-numbing nearness, and put an end to the unwelcome vision of him in a bubble bath. “Oh, stay, Mr. Tucker,” she said with resignation. “I wouldn’t want to come between a boy and his dog.”

He shook his head. “I can’t seem to get used to answering to Mr. Tucker. Since we’ll be living in each other’s hip pocket, I’d sure appreciate you calling me Briny.”

She wrinkled her nose in distaste. “I’m sorry. I can’t, in good conscience, do that.”

“Why not?”

“Because Briny is not an acceptable name.”

“What do you mean?” He stepped closer, his smiling face darkened by a frown, like a cloud passing over on a sunny day.

Dorian backed up. He had an exasperating way of invading her personal space. “For one thing, Briny simply is not suitable for a man in your position. It’s a good name for a child. Or for the buffoon in the double-wide you mentioned yesterday. But not for a man of substance.”

His frown melted, replaced by a wounded-puppy look. Dorian’s throat tightened with an unfamiliar urge to reassure him, but she didn’t know how. She had little experience with compassion. Life had taught her to inflict hurt, but she didn’t know how to soothe the pain she caused. So why did she feel like she’d just kicked old Reba in the ribs?

She was being ridiculous. She had accepted a job which came with responsibilities. One of which was speaking plainly even if doing so seemed harsh. “Briny is a cartoon character’s name,” she told him. “Do you understand why it simply won’t do?”

“Not really.”

“Is there another name you can adopt? We can invent one if we have to.”

“Funny,” he said softly. “I always figured the good a man did in the world was more important than what he called himself.”

“Your name is the first impression people have of you,” she explained. “You do want to make a favorable impression, don’t you?”

He nodded, but was clearly unconvinced. “Well, my mama named me Brindon Zachary Tucker. That’s Brindon with an i not an e.”

“Hmm.”

“I gotta tell you though, no one has called me that since she died quite a few years ago.”

“Brindon?” Dorian tried out the sound, repeating the name several times until she could visualize it splashed across the society pages of the Dallas Morning News. “Brindon Z. Tucker. Yes. That will do. Briny is gone forever. From now on, you’re to answer to Brindon and nothing else.”

He shrugged. “I don’t see what difference a name makes, but you’re the one with all the experience living on the upper crust. Since I’m paying you good money to whip me into shape, I won’t argue the matter.”

“Good. We’ll get along much better if you don’t.”

“Since we’re getting so friendly, do I get to call you Dori?”

She chuckled dryly. “No one has ever called me Dori.”

“Not even your mama?”

“Especially not my mama.” He had an exasperating way of cutting through conventions. Why would he want to give her a cutesy nickname when no one had ever done so before? “Sit down, make yourself comfortable. It’ll take me a while to get ready.” She eyed the melancholy Reba who promptly made herself comfortable by collapsing on the floor at her master’s feet. “I’ll set up an appointment with a dog groomer, and we can drop her off on our way.”

“Nice place you got here.” He turned in a slow circle, taking in the airy apartment decorated in the bright French-country style she loved.

“Thank you.” Brindon looked even more masculine among the dried hydrangeas, the blue-and-white porcelain plates, the antique furniture and the chintz fabrics than he had in Malcolm’s office.

“On our way to where?” His curiosity was mild for a man about to embark on a life-altering adventure.

“Our first stop is Neiman’s to pick you up a few casual things from the racks.” She eyed the toned, hard-muscled length of his legs encased in tight denim. His turn around the apartment had provided her a nerve-jangling view of his body. He might have a little too much hair, but he possessed a physique male underwear models would envy.

“What are you? A forty-two long?” she asked. He nodded. “I made an appointment with a tailor for later in the week. Having your measurements taken will save time when we visit the designers for suits and tuxedos.”

“Tuxedos? As in more than one?”

“You’ll need a variety of evening wear for different occasions. I assume you don’t own formal clothes.”

“A corduroy sports coat is about as formal as I ever got. And that was just for weddings and funerals.”

“You’ll need black tie, white tie.” She surveyed him with a critical eye that quickly turned appreciative. With his wide chest, broad shoulders and trim hips and waist, he was the kind of man designers had in mind when they sat down to create. He’d look so good when she got through with him, rich bored women would close in on him like sharks on chum.

An image she found particularly disturbing. “Yes, you’ll definitely do justice to designer clothes.”

“I don’t really need specially made stuff. Do I? Can’t we just go to the mall and pick up some duds?”

Her gaze swept over his snug, faded-to-white-in-all-the-right-places jeans and plain cotton shirt, stiffly starched by the hotel laundry. Tucker looked comfortable in those clothes, so who was she to try and change him? Oh, right. She was his highly paid image consultant.

“Lesson number two. Clothes make the man. Buying from chain stores may be what you’re accustomed to, but millionaires do not shop in malls. Walking the walk and talking the talk are not enough. You have to look the part.” He had to sound the part, too, but they’d work on the drawl later.

His piercing blue gaze met and held hers. “So what you’re saying is, wearing fancy clothes will make people take me more seriously?”

Put that way, the idea sounded absurd. But Brindon’s raw, what-you-see-is-what-you-get honesty went against everything Dorian believed in. “Of course.”

“Whatever you say.” He cocked his head to one side like a curious cocker spaniel, and his bright eyes widened as if he’d just noticed she was naked under the thin robe. A chivalrous blush tinged his tan cheeks, which only made Dorian more conscious of her careless state of dishabille. She shivered and her nipples hardened as she turned away. She should have grabbed her thick, chenille robe. Unless he had superpowers, he couldn’t see through that.

“What else you got planned for me today?” His words rolled over her like warm honey. An easy grin spread from his lips to his eyes. How could a grown man look both innocent and provocative at the same time?

Or maybe she had imagined the provocative part. Dorian swallowed hard, unnerved by a fleeting fantasy of luring the newly christened Brindon’s blushing, work-hardened, testosterone-riddled body into her four-poster canopy bed and having her way with him on cool Egyptian cotton sheets.

Repeatedly.

Lord! Where had that come from? She shook her head, hoping to banish the lascivious thoughts from her mind. This was ridiculous and not like her at all. Nothing, no one, had excited her for a very long time.

“You do have plans for me, don’t you?”

His question snapped her back to the moment, but she couldn’t look him in the eye after that steamy little scenario. “After a quick stop at the mall, we’re off to Emilio’s.”

She’d called the exclusive suburban day spa and salon the day before, alerting the talented staff to clear their schedules and man the battle stations. She was bringing them a challenge, a client to sorely test their professional makeover skills.

“Emilio’s, huh? What’s that? A Mexican restaurant?” Brindon settled among the cushions on one of the overstuffed sunshine-colored sofas. He stretched both arms along the back and braced a booted foot across his knee. “’Cause I could sure go for some chili relleños.”

Right. Dorian expelled a deep breath. What in heaven’s name had she gotten herself into? How was she going to survive ninety days with this man? “Sorry, but Emilio’s is not a restaurant.”

“What is it, then?” He looked up, his blue eyes so trusting she wanted to urge him to flee before she succeeded at her job and changed him, and his life, forever.

“A surprise.” Dorian dashed for the relative safety of her dressing room and ducked inside before she could blurt out the warning screaming in her mind.

How could she explain a day spa to an innocent like Tucker? She’d thought the hard part would be getting him to sit still for his first manicure. But justifying the transformation of a rare, sweetly honorable man into another rich, jaded playboy was worse.

Obviously, when she’d signed the devil’s contract, she’d underestimated the consequences.

For both of them.