Play Thing

by Nicola Marsh

  She’s been playing it safe...

  But it’s time for a new game plan!

  Prim and proper Charlotte Baxter lets her naughty side run wild when she meets a hot stranger one night. She’s riding a high—until she discovers the mystery man is also her demanding new boss! With her career her top priority, an affair with Alex Bronson is forbidden...so why is she ready to risk it all for another scorching encounter?

  “DARE is Harlequin’s hottest line yet. Every book should come with a free fan. I dare you to try them!”

  —Tiffany Reisz, international bestselling author

  Nicola Marsh is a USA TODAY bestselling and multi-award-winning author who loves nothing better than losing herself in a story. A physiotherapist in a previous life, she now divides her time between raising two dashing heroes, whipping up delish meals, cheering on her footy team and writing—her dream job. And she chats on social media. A lot. Come say hi! Instagram, Twitter, Facebook—she’s there! Also find her at nicolamarsh.com.

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  If you liked Play Thing, why not try

  Look at Me by Cara Lockwood

  King’s Price by Jackie Ashenden

  Unleashed by Caitlin Crews

  Also by Nicola Marsh

  Hot Sydney Nights

  Sweet Thing

  Wild Thing

  Discover more at Harlequin.com.

  PLAY THING

  NICOLA MARSH

  For the strong, empowered women who embody the heroines I like to create.

  Know what you want and strive to get it. Be bold. Be courageous. Be true to yourself.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Excerpt from King’s Price by Jackie Ashenden

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHARLOTTE WAITED UNTIL the boss from hell hung up before slamming down the phone and sticking out her tongue. Childish, but it made her feel good.

  She glared at the phone, wishing it would disintegrate so she wouldn’t have to talk to him again. Yeah, like that would help. She also had an inbox full of emails from Mr Alexander Bronson, asshole extraordinaire.

  The guy was demanding, arrogant and clearly had been put on this earth to make her life a misery.

  As if to emphasise the point, an email pinged into her inbox with a gut-churning subject line: One last thing.

  Sighing, she opened the email. And stopped breathing.

  Forgot to mention, Charlie, I’ll be arriving at the Sydney office tomorrow to follow up on my ideas to reconfigure staff. I look forward to meeting you then.

  He didn’t sign off. He didn’t need to. Superior beings from other planets were above mere mortals.

  Alexander Bronson, here, in the flesh, tomorrow. Torturing her. Tormenting her. Teasing her.

  Charlie. No one ever called her that. She hated it. She’d told him so. Which ensured he never called her anything else. No Miss Baxter for him. Uh-uh. The CEO of countless accountancy firms around Australia, the wunderkind who took ailing companies and turned them around, had an informality about him that won friends and influenced lowly accountants like her.

  The kicker was, her boss might be demanding and expect perfection, yet she couldn’t help but admire his work ethos. She respected him for it, she identified with hard work. It was all she knew in her lacklustre life. Which made it all the more annoying that a small part of her looked forward to their daily phone calls and his infernal teasing.

  Could she be any more pathetic? The highlight of her day was talking to her cocky boss who seemed to make it his life’s work to tease some kind of response out of her.

  Her cell rang and she glanced at the screen, dithering about whether to take the call. She adored her Aunt Dee but she couldn’t cope with any outlandish requests today. She had to prepare for her imminent meeting with the charming Mr Bronson tomorrow.

  Mentally chastising her goody-two-shoes conscience, she picked up the cell and stabbed at the answer button.

  ‘Hey, Aunt Dee, I’m at work so can’t talk long—’

  ‘Dear girl, I know you’re at work.’ Her aunt sounded breathless, like she’d jogged up a flight of stairs. Unlikely, considering Dee equated exercise with the devil’s work. ‘But I need your help and it’s urgent.’

  Charlotte instantly felt guilty that she’d contemplated ignoring her aunt. Dee had raised her when her flaky parents couldn’t be bothered, preferring to travel the world in search of the next village in dire need of education. Dee rarely asked for favours so the fact she needed help meant this could be serious.

  ‘Sure, whatever you need. Is everything okay?’

  Dee inhaled a loud breath. ‘Not really. My friend Queenie has had a nasty fall and broken her hip. She’s alone, with no one to care for her animals, so I need to drive up to Byron Bay now. But the owner of the building where I keep stock for my business is coming to inspect it later today and I need to vacate the lease space.’

  Her heart sank. As if this day couldn’t get any worse. Sorting through her aunt’s questionable ‘stock’ for her kinky online business wasn’t one of her favourite activities on the planet. Aunt Dee had enlisted her help on more than one occasion to stuff envelopes for orders and Charlotte blushed just thinking about some of the apparatus people used in their sex lives.

  ‘You need me to pack everything up and store it at home?’

  Dee sighed in relief. ‘Could you, sweetie? It would mean I could be at Queenie’s today rather than tomorrow and she really needs me.’

  Charlotte’s inner child wanted to say ‘I need you’ but that was selfish and untrue. She’d learned from an early age to depend on no one but herself. She valued her independence, wore it like a badge of honour. Except that lately, her closest friends Abby and Mak had found great guys, leaving her to ponder whether being alone was something she cherished because she could or because she had to.

  Shaking off her melancholy, she said, ‘Leave everything to me.’

  ‘You’re a lifesaver, Charlotte.’ Dee made smooching sounds. ‘Not sure how long I’ll be gone, maybe a few weeks. I’ll let you know.’

  ‘Okay—’ but Dee had already hung up, leaving Charlotte to face the inevitable.

  An afternoon of packing up vibrators, nipple clamps and edible underwear.

  Oh, goody.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ALEXANDER BRONSON HADN’T been back in Sydney for a year and as he traversed the Harbour Bridge he couldn’t help but glance at the Opera House on his left and remember the first time he’d been there
. The first time he’d felt like he’d finally broken free of the shackles of his past.

  Sydney had a unique vibe, far removed from his claustrophobic upbringing in outback New South Wales. It was the city where he’d studied, where he’d launched his career, where he’d ensured he’d never have to end up like his father.

  His unofficial home, a boutique hotel in the Central Business District, beckoned. But first he had to check out his last property for the day, a warehouse on the outskirts of the glitzy eastern suburbs. He’d already been to Manly, Mosman and Balmoral Beach today, ensuring his investments were running smoothly. This last warehouse had to be cleared asap for a new tenant to move in tomorrow and his manager had informed him there’d been some kind of hold-up.

  He didn’t suffer incompetence lightly. He liked order in all aspects of life. Which was why he’d sort out this complication today and face the shake-up at The Number Makers tomorrow.

  Crazy name for an accountancy firm. Then again, considering the mess the initial owner had made of the business, it didn’t surprise him. Thank goodness for workers like Charlotte Baxter. Working offsite could be tough, but she’d made everything much easier than expected. He admired her work ethic, the way she questioned him and proposed solutions to problems he might not have anticipated.

  He also liked the way she brought out the worst in him.

  She sounded so prim and proper, so damned disapproving, he couldn’t help but tease her.

  He shouldn’t make assumptions but he knew her type. Conservative wardrobe. Conservative views. Conservative life. She probably had an equally reserved husband, well-behaved kids and knitted on her lunch break. Though this was at odds with the fact that he’d registered her marital status as single when he’d dug deeper into his rising-star employee.

  He’d deliberately called her Charlie during their first call and she hadn’t hesitated in reprimanding him—ensuring he never called her anything but. Because there was an underlying hint of playfulness in her sharp reprimands and retorts, as if she wanted to cut loose but didn’t know how.

  Not that he was the guy to help her do it, but if he could make his work environment more pleasant, he was all for it. He’d had enough of morose, stifled environments back home to ensure he went out of his way to foster the opposite in all aspects of his life ever since.

  Oh, yeah, he was looking forward to meeting the woman who’d smoothed his entry into the company. He had grand plans for her. Management plans. Because The Number Makers needed to be turned into a profitable business again and that meant appointing qualified staff. Staff like his introverted Charlie.

  He couldn’t wait to meet her.

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHARLOTTE STEPPED INTO her aunt’s rented space in a cavernous warehouse and immediately wished she’d said no to helping out.

  She wasn’t a prude, but seeing evidence of how much fun other people had in their sex lives always made her feel lacking somehow.

  Her aunt’s online business, Dee’s Delights, did a roaring trade in all things sexy. From dildos to condoms, beads to fetish wear, her aunt dealt in it all. And if the lavish lifestyle her aunt enjoyed was any indication, many people were return customers.

  Dee had told her about the business when Charlotte turned eighteen. Initially mortified that her aunt even knew what a cock ring was, Charlotte had studiously ignored anything to do with her aunt’s line of work. Now, at the ripe old age of twenty-five, and never having had a long-term boyfriend, Charlotte wondered if having to handle all this stuff today was the universe’s way of telling her to lighten the hell up.

  Thankfully, most of the raunchier stuff still resided in boxes, leaving her to pack only the vibrators, handcuffs and lingerie. She’d booked a courier for six tonight, meaning she had three hours to get every box filled and taped.

  As she held up a pair of fluffy fuchsia handcuffs and smirked, she glimpsed a full-length mirror on the inside of a partially open wardrobe door. Probably a remnant of the last tenant—she couldn’t imagine her aunt wanting to try on any of her merchandise and didn’t want to—but the moment the idea of trying stuff on popped into her head she couldn’t dislodge it.

  Her gaze fell on the lingerie. A turquoise chemise with lace overlay. A purple halter baby-doll. A wet-look corset. A pink body stocking. An ebony faux-leather bustier and thong.

  Heat flushed her cheeks as she picked up the latter and held it up. Would her sedate life change if she wore stuff like this? Not that anybody would see it, but it might give her more confidence to shake things up a little. And she wanted that, craved that, with every cell in her lonely body.

  Her flatmate Mak had jetted off to New York with her delectable guy Hudson last week, leaving her more alone than ever. Charlotte rarely dated, didn’t go out clubbing and preferred reading to sexting. On the odd occasion she dipped her toes into the dating pool, she went for boring guys like...her. Because ultimately, that was the kind of guy she could see herself marrying, having kids with and with whom she could build the kind of life she’d never had. Secure and happy, with a house she could grow old in, surrounded by a family of her own making.

  She’d found the house but wasn’t having much luck with the guy.

  Before she could second-guess her crazy decision she pulled the elastic off her ponytail and ran her fingers through her hair. She took off her glasses, toed off her flat pumps, unbuttoned her white shirt and unzipped her grey pencil skirt. The warehouse air had a chill, making her skin pebble as she stripped off her sensible cotton underwear. Or maybe her goosebumps had more to do with the naughty thrill of slipping on the thong and bungling her way into the bustier with detachable lace collar.

  When she’d done up the last hook, she took a deep breath and padded over to the wardrobe. Opened the door wider. Took a peek in the mirror. And gasped.

  Her reflection didn’t shock her as much as the sight of a tall gorgeous guy in a suit staring at her with obvious appreciation.

  ‘Who the hell are you and what are you doing here?’ She spun around, covering her bits even though they weren’t really exposed.

  Her handbag and cell were on the table laden with boxes, too far away to make an emergency call if she had to.

  Damn, why had she been so stupid? She could’ve dressed up—or undressed in this case—in her flat where she’d be storing the boxes, not here where any pervert could wander in.

  ‘I could ask you the same question,’ the handsome stranger said, stepping inside the room and closing the door.

  Uh-oh.

  Being alone in an empty warehouse in raunchy underwear with a man, no matter how attractive, wasn’t good. She had more sense than this. She blamed her stupid impulsiveness on the realisation that her life was so empty she actually looked forward to verbally sparring with her irritating boss daily.

  She’d wanted to cut loose for just one moment. To feel what other women felt wearing underwear like this. She hadn’t banked on having an audience for a foolish moment of bravado.

  ‘Get out,’ she yelled, sidling towards her clothes, fear making her heart pound in her ears.

  ‘I own this place so that’s not going to happen.’ His curious gaze fell on the table, where the vibrators and lingerie lay scattered. ‘You, on the other hand, need to tell me what you’re doing here and why my warehouse has turned into a sex shop.’

  There was something vaguely familiar about his condescending tone and she hoped to God he wasn’t a client whose taxes she’d done.

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, this isn’t a sex shop. My aunt rents this space, from you apparently, for her online business and she asked me to pack everything up so the new tenant can move in tomorrow.’ She gestured at the merchandise, belatedly realising she’d left herself exposed when a glimmer of interest lit his gaze. ‘So if you leave me to it, I’ll be out of here in a few hours.’

  ‘Well, aren’t you the little h
elper,’ he drawled, his gaze starting at her toes and working its way upward, a slow, leisurely perusal that made her nipples harden.

  Her body’s reaction startled her. She’d never reacted to any man like this before, let alone a stranger. She read about this kind of thing in the romance novels she devoured by the boxful: the shy woman instantly attracted to the commanding man. It was a seduction game she fantasised about but knew could never happen to her. They called those novels fiction for a reason.

  Yet here she was, standing in front of a guy she didn’t know, letting him look his fill. And enjoying it.

  When he reached her eyes, what she saw made her knees wobble a tad. Desire. Passion. Lust. The kind of lust she’d never, ever seen in a man’s eyes when they looked at her.

  ‘Is trying on every outfit part of you helping out?’

  His obvious desire discombobulated her and when he grinned the smug smile of a guy who knew exactly the effect he had on her, she made an impulsive decision to make him pay. She might be inexperienced and naive when it came to sparring with a man but that didn’t mean he could toy with her.

  ‘My old corsets and bustiers are worn out so I thought I’d replenish my stocks.’ A blush heated her cheeks at the blatant lie but once she started she couldn’t stop. ‘It’s a tough job looking this good for the men of Sydney but somebody’s gotta do it.’

  He laughed, a rich, deep rumble that reached down into her chest and filled the lonely ache that resided there.

  ‘Does that include me, considering I’m a man and I’m in Sydney?’

  Charlotte had never played games with any guy. She didn’t flirt and she didn’t elicit grand passion in them. But something about this stranger made her feel like she could do both.

  ‘Why, do you think I look good?’ She rested her hands on her hips in a blatant invitation for him to look his fill again, wondering what magic powers the lingerie held to make her this bold.

  ‘Honey, you have no idea.’ He stalked towards her and her newfound bravado fled. She edged towards the table, needing her cell within reach. But like an eternal klutz she stumbled and would have fallen if he hadn’t been by her side in a second. Strong hands steadied her, held her upright, made her yearn for things she had no right to crave.