Lingerie Wars (The Invertary books)

by henderson, janet elizabeth

  "You're a snake, Lake Benson," she told him.

  Lake cocked his head to the side in agreement.

  "What are you doing here, anyway?" she said.

  "It's a pub," he said by way of explanation.

  She pulled on the green coat he'd seen her wear before. Yet again she was covered from chin to ankle, and although it was cold, he was certain she must have been sweltering in the heat of the pub. She frowned at him.

  "I know it's a pub, dimwit. Why are you here? Shouldn't you be renovating? Painting something? Planning world domination?"

  "The world domination plan is in the bag. My evening is free."

  He stepped to the side of the door. Now her way was clear if she wanted to go. She made no attempt to run. Instead she dug her fists into the pockets of her coat, making it pull on her shoulders.

  "Why don't you go back to the army and leave us all in peace?" she asked. "Wouldn't that be easier? You can't possibly want to run a lingerie shop. Sell the thing and be done with it."

  "Oh, would that I could," he said.

  Unfortunately, no one would buy a business that hadn't made a profit in ten years. Well, no one except his clueless sister.

  She rolled her eyes.

  "Betty the troll and that loony contract of hers," Kirsty said.

  Lake didn't correct her. If she wanted to think it was the contract that stopped him and not the state of the business, then that was fine with him. The fewer people who knew it was a mess, the better. That way it would be easier to sell once he got it back in the black.

  "I'd love to get my hands on her nephew." Kirsty's voice broke into his thoughts. "That man needs a good hiding."

  It took a minute for Lake to catch up with the conversation, and when he did a flush of heat worked up from his stomach to his head.

  "If you want to get your hands on a man," he told her, "I'm available."

  Her eyes widened.

  "That's not going to happen," she said tightly.

  Lake shrugged.

  "I'm not even suggesting that I get you out of that underwear you're so attached to. I'm just saying that I'm here. If you want me. To do with as you will."

  Her mouth opened and closed like a hooked fish. Lake smiled confidently, aware that every time she saw him she'd replay his words. He'd wear her down by default.

  "It's no big deal," he said as he took a step closer to her, lowering his voice under the din of the bar. "Lovers by night. Enemies by day. It's in all the best spy movies."

  "I don't want to be your lover." It would have been slightly more convincing if she hadn't stumbled over the word and flushed bright pink at the same time.

  Lake cocked an eyebrow, feeling pretty pleased with himself. Kirsty frowned.

  "Don't think you can wear me down, either. Guys with a lot more finesse than you've shown have chased after me. If I can resist them, I sure as heck can resist you."

  "I don't plan to mention it again. I'm just going to wait. I'll be right in front of you. Watching you think about me. Watching you think about what we could do together. How we could be together. I won't need to say anything. It's all going to happen in your head."

  She threw up her hands in exasperation.

  "I'll tell you something. All of this"—she waved her hand in front of him to signal that she meant him, not her—"is happening in your head, not mine. My head is empty, thank you very much."

  Lake grinned widely.

  "Auch, I mean..." She poked him in the chest. "You know what I mean."

  "Yeah. You want me."

  "In your dreams."

  "Yep, there too."

  "You are the most annoying man I've ever met and I don't have time to deal with your many psychological problems. I'm going home."

  With that, she was gone. Lake found himself grinning at the door as it swung shut behind her.

  After a large plate of fish and chips and a cold beer, Lake was in fine spirits. The cheery bustle around him improved his mood no end. He sat at a table near the bar flicking through images on his iPad. He had intended to relax while he caught up on news and sport. Instead, his time with Kirsty made him curious and reminded him that he'd yet to run a background check on his enemy. Around him the buzz of the busy pub acted like white noise to block out his day. It helped soothe him, which was good because Kirsty's story made for grim reading.

  Lake traced his index finger over the image of Kirsty on a runway in Italy. Her tall, lean body curved in all the right places, accentuated by silver mirrored underwear the likes of which he'd never seen before. She was smiling into the camera, with a naughty look in her eye that made you want to tease her, just to see her laugh. Long, red, wavy hair flowed over her shoulder. He wanted to run his hands through it, but the pixie cut she sported now made that impossible.

  "Why are you looking at our Kirsty?" Dougal said as he picked up the empty plates.

  As owner of the pub, Dougal behaved like it was his right to poke his nose into everyone's business. Lake wasn't surprised. There was no such thing as privacy in Invertary. Lake let Dougal clear the table in front of him. As usual, the self-appointed town mayor's ample belly was barely covered by a green tartan waistcoat. This time it was worn over a pink shirt. Lake made a note to bring sunglasses next time he visited the pub.

  "Well, son, why are you reading about Kirsty?" Dougal's loud voice boomed, making heads turn his way. "Is this because of that story in the paper? The war thing you're playing at? What is it you lads say—know your enemy?"

  Lake was surprised at how close Dougal had come to his motivation, but he didn't let it show.

  "Just curious," Lake said, keeping his voice low and soft.

  "Why are you whispering, son? Everybody knows the story anyway. It was in all the papers."

  Lake looked around as those who could hear over the din nodded.

  "You're English, so you might not know," Dougal said, although it was clear Lake did know as he'd just been reading about it.

  There was obviously no stopping the man, so Lake sat back in his chair. Dougal smoothed his perfectly groomed—and snow white—beard and moustache. Taking a deep breath, he scanned the room to make sure people were paying attention to him.

  "Kirsty," Dougal said with an air of importance, "was a lingerie model, very successful. Not one of those angel girls, but close."

  Dougal took a breath and a guy behind Lake said, "He means Victoria's Secret."

  Dougal frowned at the man for interrupting.

  "She was always gallivanting off to some shoot or other, all over the world." Dougal continued, pleased that people were turning to listen. "She got engaged to her manager, all teeth whitener and limp handshake. They were in a car in Spain, on the high roads."

  "'Round Seville," someone behind him said. "Treacherous roads. You drive on a cliff edge."

  More nodding.

  "Anyway," Dougal said in a tone that made it clear he was the one telling the story, not them. "He lost control of his flash car and it plummeted down a gully."

  "Cliff."

  "Ravine."

  Dougal stared at the crowd until they shut up.

  "He walked away," he said with disgust. "Bruises and a broken arm, that was all. At least he called for help. They had to cut our Kirsty out. She lost a kidney—"

  "Head injury, too, poor dear," said a woman to his left.

  "They had to cut off her lovely hair," said the woman's friend.

  "The worst part," said an old guy behind him, "was the scars."

  "Yes," said his wife. "They go from her neck right down her body. Terrible, it is."

  "Have you ever seen them?" boomed Dougal.

  "No." The woman was flustered. "But I've heard."

  "If you haven't seen them, then you don't know how bad they are, do you?" Dougal told her.

  After a few seconds of giving her the evil eye, he turned back to Lake.

  "That wasn't the end of it. While Kirsty was in hospital, that devil fiancé of hers ran away with all her
money. They think he's in Brazil."

  "Probably living with that guy who robbed the train," someone called.

  Dougal gave up pretending to collect the dishes. He was holding court now. Lake quietly sipped his drink. In his experience, if you were silent long enough, people always told you everything you wanted to know and often more—as he was learning the hard way with Betty.

  "So," Dougal said with a flourish, "poor Kirsty had no choice but to come home here and start again. Her mum lent her the money to buy her shop and now she's working hard to get ahead again."

  As one the group nodded solemnly. Suddenly, Dougal realised who he was talking to.

  "You're not going to use this information to harm our Kirsty, are you?" Dougal shouted.

  Lake could feel the mood of the pub shift against him. They were talking about a treasured child of Invertary and he was the outsider. The English outsider, lest he should forget.

  "Why would I do that?" he said calmly.

  "To make her shut her shop," Dougal said, as though Lake was the idiot.

  "Dougal," Lake said in a conciliatory tone. "What happened to Kirsty has nothing to do with this competition between our shops. They are two different things. I'm not going to use this to shut her down."

  There was silence in the pub for a second before Dougal spoke.

  "Good, because we'll have none of that around here," he declared.

  The noise resumed. As Dougal bustled away with Lake's empty plate, Lake reread the information on Kirsty. Nope, it wasn't any use for winning the war, but it might come in handy for charming her out of her underwear.

  Something Dougal said made Lake's trained suspicions stand to attention. He flicked through the photos of the accident until he came to the one he wanted. His lips thinned as he magnified the image as much as possible. There was definitely another set of tyre tracks on the road where Kirsty's car had plunged down the ravine. He punched a number into his phone and waited.

  "John," he said by way of hello. "I need you to look into something for me."

  Kirsty marched back up the hill from the pub to her flat, all the while cursing the audacity of Lake Benson. As she crossed the road to her home, she spotted something move in the lane between Betty's shop and the fishing tackle shop. Curiosity got the better of her, so she detoured to see what was going on.

  "Billy!" she said when he spotted the plumber.

  He jumped straight up in the air.

  "Kirsty, I almost died."

  Billy grabbed his chest with his hand and huffed.

  "Too many pies and cakes." Kirsty pointed at him.

  "Here I was thinking it was stress from being blackmailed into illegal activity."

  Kirsty wandered up the narrow alley towards him. His tool kit was open at his feet and there was a huge wrench thing hanging from a pipe.

  "Blackmailed?"

  He gave her a look that said he wasn't fooled by her profession of ignorance.

  "Don't pretend you don't know, Kirsty Campbell. Mum's got a bug in her ear as big as the Loch Ness monster. All I'm hearing is that we're at war with the English. I think she's making badges in her basement with the other women in the knitting group. Apparently they're mobilising!"

  Kirsty felt the hair on her neck stand on end. If the Knit Or Die group were sneaking around that meant only one thing—her mother was involved in her war. Come morning she'd be having a word with Margaret Campbell.

  "But blackmail?" she asked as Billy fidgeted with the pipe.

  "Mum said she'll tell Mandy that I went to a football game, when I told her I was doing a job in Glasgow."

  "Ah," Kirsty said.

  She had to bite the inside of her cheek to stop from telling him that the whole town, including his wife Mandy, already knew he'd been at the game. Mandy used the time he was gone to get her hair done and buy some lingerie. As Billy's mother well knew—she was the one who babysat.

  "So, what are you doing?" she said instead.

  "I'm making sure that your English guy doesn't have any water in the morning. Or for the rest of the week." He pointed at some valve thing in the wall. "This here is the thing you turn when you want to shut off the water to the house."

  "Does everyone have one of those?" Kirsty said as she studied it.

  "Yes. They do." There was a very silent "idiot" attached to the end of that sentence.

  "And you're doing what to it?"

  "I've turned it off and I'm making sure it stays off. If he wants it fixed he's going to need a blowtorch and some extra piping."

  "Fantastic."

  She thumped her old classmate on the back. She hadn't been the one to instigate the illegal activity, but she sure as heck wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Or whatever that stupid saying was.

  "I don't like this," Billy told her. "It's probably illegal, but definitely childish."

  "Thanks for the reprimand. It isn't your business at stake."

  "It will be if anyone finds out that I'm using my powers for evil and not for good."

  "He's English," she said, as though that excused all sorts of questionable behaviour.

  "I also heard that he's ex-army. Don't those guys have muscles? Big muscles. And aren't they trained to kill? I'm taking my life in my hands here. If it wasn't for the fact that Mandy would nag me about the game, I wouldn't be here. I don't have a death wish."

  "Point taken," Kirsty said. "Seriously, though, I doubt Lake is any threat to anyone. Sure he has muscles, but they don't look anywhere near as big as Sylvester Stallone's, and Stallone is an old guy. Plus, aren't there all sorts of army guys? He might be one of the ones that drove trucks, or worked in the kitchen. I think you can breathe easy. I'm pretty sure your life isn't under threat. I mean, who even knows you're here?"

  "I do," said a voice behind her.

  Kirsty and Billy froze.

  "Want to come out here and tell me what's going on?"

  "Crap. It's Caroline. Bloody hell."

  "I heard that," Caroline snapped. "Watch your language, Billy."

  "Oh no, she knows it's me. I'm out of here," Billy hissed at Kirsty.

  "I'm waiting," Caroline told them.

  "Are you done? I can stall," Kirsty hissed.

  "Done. You take the wicked witch, I'll take the back door."

  With a sigh, Kirsty walked towards Caroline while Billy packed up his tools in a rush and ran for the back of the building.

  "You've scared the life out of Billy," she told her best friend. "Again."

  Caroline smiled primly.

  "That's what happens when you skulk." She cocked her head to the side, making her shoulder-length, straw-coloured bob sway. "You've got colour in your cheeks. You must be up to no good."

  Kirsty smiled at her friend—the self-appointed morality police of Invertary.

  "Come on, I'll make you a cup of tea."

  They walked back across the road and up the stairs to the flat above Kirsty's shop. As soon as she opened the door she could feel the tension ease from her. Lavender-coloured walls, pale blue sofas and soft grey cushions. The whole flat was done in a variety of muted, cold colours, from the dusky pink in the kitchen to the soft blue in the bedroom. It was soothing.

  "What's Billy up to, anyway?" Caroline said behind her.

  "I'm not sure I should tell you. You'd feel obligated to do something about it."

  "Something illegal, then," Caroline said with disappointment.

  "Not really."

  "How can it be not really illegal?"

  Kirsty smiled at her friend. All through their childhood, Caroline's tendency to see the world in black and white got her into a lot of trouble. People like to be in the grey area, and they don't want someone who disapproves hanging around to see them do it. She led Caroline into the kitchen and flicked on the kettle.

  "Mum and her cronies have mobilised and are sabotaging Lake on my behalf," she said.

  Caroline's hand flew to her mouth at the shock of it all.

  "That's just
wrong," she said.

  "Probably," Kirsty told her. "But not quite illegal."

  "Are you going to talk to her about it, stop it?"

  "I was thinking I'd ignore it for a wee while. I mean, why ruin her fun? She probably sees herself as the leader of the resistance or something."

  "But it's not right."

  "Try not to think about it," Kirsty told her.

  That one sentence was what got Caroline through school without someone beating on her. It took a long time to convince her that the world wasn't going to live her way, no matter how much she approved, or disapproved, of it.

  "Fine. It's your war. I'll mind my own business." Kirsty couldn't help but hear a very loud "for now" at the end of that statement. It made her smile.

  "I was looking for you," Caroline said as she sat perched on the edge of one of the kitchen stools. "Since the story was in the paper I've been hearing all sorts of things about Lake Benson, and I'm worried. What's going on with this man? Do I need to do something?"

  "Like what?" Kirsty smiled as she reached for the mugs. "Ban him from the library?"

  Caroline pursed her lips.

  "I can get a petition together and run him out of town. Or I can look into his permits to make sure that everything he's doing is above board. I've never considered it before now, but I'm pretty sure that if I dig deep enough I'll find some historical significance in that horrific building of Betty's to stop him from renovating."

  Kirsty gave her friend a quick hug as she waited for the kettle to boil.

  "Thanks, Caroline," she said. "I keep forgetting that in the land of paperwork you are queen."

  Caroline frowned, obviously worried.

  "I want to help. I don't like the things I'm hearing. There was a lot of gossip in the library this morning, I had to say 'shush' about a million times."

  "Gossip about what?"

  Kirsty reached for the biscuit tin, which she kept on the top shelf to dissuade herself from opening it. It wasn't working. She needed a higher shelf. Caroline's neck was red now, too.