The Walk-In (4 page)

I laughed to hide my discomfort. “Rich people are fucked up.”

He laughed heartily. “I’ll say.” He pointed to the door. “Go on up to the house. Grace is in the kitchen, and the buzzer in there isn’t very loud.” He gestured to his ear. “Ol’ Grace’s hearing isn’t what it used to be.”

I stepped away, then turned back. For an instant, I imagined jumping up on the strong-looking gardener and wrapping my legs around his waist. He could kiss my neck and hike up my skirt while he unfastened those jeans, which had a lovely bulge in them.

“Yes, Miss?”

“Does Mr. Thorne have … a Mrs. Thorne? Or a girlfriend?”

The gardener chuckled. “You mean has he been tamed? The answer is no. He’s all yours if you want him.”

I felt my cheeks burn with embarrassment. Why did I have to be so obvious? Mr. Thorne was way out of my league. He was a billionaire, for crying out loud, and I was a college dropout from a small town. Guys like him dated supermodels and actresses. The gardener was more my speed.

I surveyed the man’s package once more. Yes, the gardener was definitely my type. Oh, that mouth. Thick lips, the type you could suck on for days.

Before I embarrassed myself further, I thanked the gardener and ran up to the door.

Inside, I did find Grace in the kitchen, struggling to put stuffing into a turkey.

“Oh, good. You’re here,” she said.

“Why are you fisting that poor bird?”

Grace snapped at me, “Because she likes it that way. Mind your own damn business.”

“Sorry, just making a little joke.”

Grace’s face softened. “Right. Jokes. I remember those.” She sighed heavily.

“Did they move Thanksgiving up by a few months and nobody told me?”

Grace grabbed some more bread crumbs and jammed them into the bird’s open orifice. “Mr. Thorne’s been having unusual cravings.”

I leaned on the kitchen island—the island that was bigger than my entire kitchen. “What do you mean, unusual cravings?”

“Mr. Thorne has his struggles, like the rest of us. Nothing that millions of people don’t deal with every day.”

I frowned at the turkey, wondering what it could be. Grace’s lips tightened, so I knew she wouldn’t be telling me.

“So, I’m done the walk-in closet and the office. What’s the plan for day number three? Pantry?”

Grace grabbed a stalk of celery and crunched off a bite. After she finished chewing, she said, “I’d like you to do that
feng shui
thing in the bedroom.”

“Really?” My pulse throbbed between my legs at the mention of the word
bedroom
.

She said, “I want you to do the exact opposite of what you usually do.”

I studied her expression for clues, but found little to go on in her lightly-lined but still attractive face. She continued, “Your company makes rooms romantic and sexy, and I’d like you to do the opposite for Mr. Thorne’s room. I don’t care what you do. Move the bed, put it on a weird angle, put garlic in the light fixtures. I want that room two hundred percent less sexy.”

“I can do that,” I said nonchalantly. “All I need is an eight by ten photo of his mother.”

Grace nearly choked on the celery she was chewing. “No. No. We need to reduce the sexuality, not kill him.”

“I can do that,” I said confidently.

She washed off her hands and brought me up to the bedroom.

The room was, as expected, adjoining the walk-in closet. The door to the closet was open, so I took a quick peek at my recent handiwork. Yes, everything was perfectly organized. A place for everything and everything in its place, as it should be.

A sensation pulled at me, below my belly.
I also have a place for something, yes I do.

“I’ll need some privacy,” I told Grace. “The bedroom
feng shui
is more of an intuition thing.”

She nodded.

Intuition?
Actually, it’s more of a bullshit thing, but people love to get the story. Oh, I’ve read the books about
feng shui
, studied the diagrams. Put a mirror on this, have some fluffy pillows on that. Ninety percent of it is just common sense. I mean, who puts a cactus next to the bed?

“You have four hours,” she said. “Nobody will interrupt you. Mr. Thorne is off on business somewhere, and I’ll be battling turkey and yams downstairs.”

“I may need …”

She pointed to a toolbox that was already in the room. “You should have everything here to move whichever artworks and mirrors you must. Please be careful with this one.” She pointed to a painting that was thick with lush flowers, and strangely erotic, for a garden. “It’s
not
a reproduction.”

“I’ll be careful, plus we’re insured,” I said.

“So are we, but this one has sentimental value for Mr. Thorne.”

“Oh.” I stared at the painting, wondering what it meant.

Grace backed out of the room and closed the door. The woman had the perfect name, because she really was the epitome of grace.

The bedroom, now, was another story.

The bedroom was the epitome of sex.

Not in a tacky way, like one of those Love Motels you see in foreign movies, rented by the hour to young couples not lucky enough to have even a compact car in which to get their freak on.

No, the bedroom was sexy in the way that only Egyptian Cotton with Infinity Thread Count can be. The duvet cover practically melted under my touch. I flopped on the bed and pressed my cheek against the pillow, careful not to contact the surface with my lips. I’d put on minimal makeup that morning, but I didn’t want to mar the gorgeous linens with my pink lip gloss. It would be a crime!

I pulled one of the pillows between my knees and hugged another one. Breathing deeply, I ascertained that the linens had been changed that morning. I found no scent of a man, and, under the covers, none of those telltale hairs they leave behind.

I lay on my back and surveyed the sexy room.

Who was that girl on the bed?

Oh, it was me!

“Look at that, a mirror on the ceiling,” I said as I waved up at myself. “Hey, Lexie. Is that your real name? Sounds like
sexy
. Come on, you just made that name up.” I blew kisses up at myself. Damn, my face and body looked good from the ceiling down, with my dark hair fanned out around my head.

Obviously, the mirror over the bed had to go. Grace had left me a step ladder along with the tool box, but I didn’t relish the idea of getting all sweaty, grunting to take down a mirror from the ceiling. The thing could be heavy, and it could even kill me! My untimely demise would certainly hamper my plans to spend that roll of money I was going to get as a bonus.

I could leave the mirror and just move the bed.

“Sounds like a plan,” I said to myself, and I got started rearranging furniture. I slipped off my shoes and left them in the corner.

I’d done a lot of unusual jobs in my three and a half years (I’d say
seven years
only if I was trying to impress a new client) as a professional organizer. In the early days, I helped hoarders—which is a little like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, if you ask me, but … to each their own! I always figure if they’re not harming themselves or others, some people simply enjoy having and rearranging their stuff. The only problem was, they always seemed so disappointed at the end of a job, either because you made some progress, or because you didn’t.

My boss, Suzanne, upped our rates about two years into the business, which weeded out a lot of the hoarders. We still got a few, but they were the richer ones, who had entire rooms for gift wrapping. My third-most unusual job was organizing a gift wrap room. It took an entire week. No lie.

My second-most unusual job was for a guy who videotaped everything. We came up with an organization system for his physical copies of recordings, and a digital backup as well. That may not sound too strange, but he videotaped the two of us working the entire two days. I imagined some future organizer filing away the recordings of me, filing away the recordings of the previous organizer.

Make a bedroom less sexy? That was definitely my
most
unusual job. Number one on the list.

Why did Grace hire me to do such a thing?

The gardener had said Mr. Thorne had no wife or girlfriend, so it wasn’t at the request of a lover.

As I rearranged the reading chairs, two-seater sofa, and bed to be less cozy, I concocted a theory. Mr. Thorne was a business man, and single. On the phone the day before, he’d said he had just closed a billion-dollar deal. Therefore, he probably had a lot of business things on his mind, and didn’t want any distractions in his life.

That must have been why he called a phone sex line, and seemed to be a regular. I could understand that. Why take a risk on dating someone and trying to seduce them, only to find out after all that time that you’re not compatible? Something quick and simple like a phone sex line made sense.

I rolled up a red area rug and shoved it in a linen closet, then pushed the bed so that two sides were against the walls, which was a no-brainer. Immediately, the room was less sexy.

In
feng shui
, both sides of the bed should be easily accessible. You have to pity people in tiny apartments, who don’t have the option. Even with mirrors in the right spots, candles, and live, soft plants, their sex lives will suffer. One person always feels trapped by the other, and not in the good way.

A little trapping and constriction can feel good
, I thought as I held my wrists together behind my back and leaned over a round table I’d moved far away from the window.

I wiggled my butt and imagined one of those big, thick-fingered hands I’d seen on Mr. Thorne, smacking my bottom.

The thought gave me a tingle. The more I thought about the tickling, tingling sensation around my openings, the greater the sensation got. I arched my back, pushing my butt higher into the air. The tingling moved down, circling around my folds and nub, pulsating now with every heartbeat.

Again?

I’d just gotten off the day before. When I was a teen, I was a once-or-twice-a-day kinda gal, but until recently, I’d been working up an orgasm maybe every two days, going the occasional dry spell for a week.

The room could wait, I decided. And besides, I was nearly finished.

I dragged myself off table and draped my body across the two-seater sofa. My skirt slid up easily, and I threw one leg over the back of the sofa.

I gazed up at the ceiling, at the mirror. I’d moved the bed away from the mirror, yes, but now the sofa was directly underneath the reflective surface, and there was the girl, red-cheeked with sexual excitement and staring down at me.

I ran one finger down the front of my body, giving myself a shiver that I not only felt, but saw, in the mirror. No wonder men were so obsessed with mirrors and visuals! For a moment, I understood their perspective just a bit better.

My blouse practically unbuttoned itself, and I took a good look at my breasts, cupped in the bright pink bra.

Had I locked the door?

Oh, who cares
, I thought, running my hands over my pink panties. I could have slipped them off, revealing even more pink to the mirror above me, but I felt strangely shy, so I kept them on and stuck my hand inside, which felt naughtier anyway.

No sooner had I got my fingers where they wanted to go, as I realized I was being watched. Someone was at one of the windows.

He didn’t know I saw him, because he didn’t move away, but I closed my eyelids nearly all the way and turned my head slowly to get a better look.

It was the man in the hat, the sexy gardener who’d let me in. He must have been up on a ladder, perhaps using the excuse of cleaning leaves, or washing windows.

Let him watch
, I thought, and the naughtiness of it all gave me a shiver that nearly sent me over the edge way sooner than I wanted.

So he stayed there, watching, and I arched my back and writhed around on the sofa, giving him the show of his life. He didn’t move. Why wasn’t he doing anything? He should have come to his senses and climbed back down, or something.

I rubbed harder with my fingers, but the area was going numb, because my mind was distracted.

I was annoyed. Who did he think he was? Standing out there on his ladder, getting a free show, and worst of all, not helping me in any way.

Nothing was happening in my downstairs zone, so I stopped and rolled onto my side with a sigh. Tomorrow was another day, and, besides, I still had work to do in the room, including moving a few of the paintings.

I stared at the garden painting, wondering what it might be worth.

Someone tapped on the window. Gently at first, then with more conviction.

The gardener. I’d almost forgotten about him. He waved when I looked over at him.

I stood, pulled my skirt down, and walked over to the window, my blouse still open.

The darn window had a complicated latch, and the gardener was pointing at the latch and laughing at me when I got the thing open.

“Thanks for nothing,” I said to him. “Don’t you know spying on someone like this is a crime?”

He looked down at his feet, on the ladder. “You going to sue me?”