Lingerie Wars (Invertary 1)

“I know,” he said at last. “I intend to keep her.”

The girls fanned themselves as Rainne stared back at Alastair. There was no turning away. She was keeping her boy too.

CHAPTER TEN

Kirsty didn’t expect the fallout from the newspaper headlines to be so huge. All week she’d been answering phone calls from members of the press who wanted to do a follow-up story, or even an interview on camera. Unfortunately, without exception, they wanted to feature Lake in the article as well. Apparently the interesting part of the story wasn’t that she’d posed for the camera again, but that together the two shops made Invertary “InverTARTY”. Kirsty was torn. She either said yes to the publicity, and Lake benefited too. Or she said no, and shot herself in the foot. In the end, she compromised. She told everyone that there was a fashion show just before Christmas and they should contact Caroline to set up interviews. Let Caroline deal with it. It was the least she could do after going all “fair play” on her best friend.

“Have you seen Facebook?” Magenta said by way of hello.

She shrugged out of her black padded coat as she walked through the shop.

“Of course I’ve seen Facebook, who hasn’t?”

Magenta stopped and gave Kirsty a look that said she thought she was an idiot.

“I don’t mean the general network, I mean the specific images that are flooding it right now.”

“Oh, well, the answer is no.”

Magenta rolled her eyes and thrust her smartphone at Kirsty.

“Take a look at this,” she said.

Kirsty took the phone, as ordered by her grumpy assistant. Her lips pursed when she saw what was on the screen. She flicked through the images, each one almost identical—women from the town posing beside the cardboard cut-out of Lake.

“It’s gone viral. It’s everywhere. There are women writing poems to him.” Kirsty frowned at Magenta’s words. “Not women from Invertary,” Magenta told her. “Strange women.”

Kirsty didn’t know what to say. She held the phone and stared at Lake smiling up at her.

“They’ve even started a fan page for him. It’s called ‘Double Oh, licensed to thrill in InverTARTY’.”

“Double Oh Seven?”

“No,” Magenta said slowly. “Double Oh—orgasm.”

Kirsty screwed up her nose.

“That’s yucky.”

“You should read some of the comments on the page,” Magenta said. “I’m no prude but they make me blush. I bumped into Rainne on the way here. She said that Lake has had seventeen proposals of marriage since Saturday.”

“Has the world gone mad?” Kirsty handed back the phone.

“It appears so,” Magenta said solemnly. “Anyway, he’s started a website to maximise the sales from all this internet fame. He’s offering everyone who buys lingerie a chance to enter in a draw to join him here for the fashion show.”

Kirsty’s eyes shot to her feet.

“That’s wrong,” she said. “He can’t do that.” Her words faltered. “Can he?”

“He is.”

Kirsty started to pace in her office.

“How did he manage to get his website off the ground so fast?”

“Rainne said he got an old army mate to set up a template.”

“And what’s he going to do with this woman when she comes to town?” She felt her eyes go wide. “If they’re calling him double orgasm, will she be expecting...you know.”