I took the moment of silence to check out her full pink lips and the perfect shape of her face. Her hair was pulled up in a bun, but it was the color of midnight. I wondered how long it was.
“I’m sorry,” she managed to squeak out, and my eyes went back to hers. She was really something. There was an exotic quality about her. It was like God had picked all the best pieces and put them together to create her.
“I’m not,” I replied. Not anymore. Who the hell needs sleep? Oh, yeah. I do.
“I didn’t know, uh . . . I thought the place was still empty. I mean, I didn’t know someone was staying here. There wasn’t a car outside, and I rang the doorbell, but no one answered, so I used the code and came on in.” She wasn’t Southern. Maybe Midwestern. I just knew she wasn’t from around here. She lacked the twang of the local accent. There was a softness to her voice.
“I flew in. Had a car drop me here,” I said.
She nodded and then looked back down at her feet. “I’ll be quiet. I can come back up and do this area later. I’ll just go downstairs and start there today.”
I nodded. “Thanks.”
Her cheeks flushed as she let her gaze drop to my bare chest. Then she turned and hurried away, leaving the vacuum behind in her escape. I watched, enjoying the way her bottom bounced. Damn, I hoped she cleaned several times a week. Next time, I wouldn’t be exhausted. Next time, I’d find out her name.
Once she was out of sight, I stepped back into the room and closed the door. A grin tugged at my lips when I thought about her face when she’d realized I was only wearing a sheet. How did Nan have a housecleaner who looked like that? The girl was gorgeous.
I lay back down and closed my eyes. The image of that freckle sitting right there under the plumpness came to mind. I really wanted to lick that freckle. Cutest fucking freckle I’d ever seen.
Reese
“Ohgod, ohgod, ohgod, ohgod,” I chanted as I sank down on the nearest sofa and covered my face with my hands.
I hadn’t realized someone was staying here. I’d woken him up. He seemed annoyed, I thought. Oh, God, I couldn’t tell. I’d been so nervous that he was going to fire me. This was my best-paying job, but I’d never met the owner. I worked for a cleaning service, and they got me the jobs. This was the biggest house I had, and the once-a-week cleaning paid the monthly rent on my apartment and all my utilities and food. The other houses I cleaned were smaller, so if I lost this house, it would take all those other jobs combined to pay my bills. I wouldn’t have anything left over to save. No safety net.
The image of his bare chest taunted me, and I closed my eyes tightly, pushing it out of my head. I didn’t trust men. Well, except for my neighbor Jimmy. He was the one who had hooked me up with the cleaning service. He liked men, not women, so I felt safe with him.
I also didn’t normally enjoy the view of a guy’s chest. But that chest . . . well, it was really nice. His arms were so thick and corded with muscles. What was I thinking? Yes, his body was beautiful, but men like him who lived in houses like this didn’t want someone like me for more than a booty call.
That man was rich and gorgeous and possibly had a woman in bed with him who was just as rich and gorgeous. In fact, I was sure he did. The largest bedroom upstairs had a walk-in closet full of the most beautiful clothing I had ever seen. I figured a woman lived here, and this guy could be her boyfriend. I just wasn’t sure why he’d be staying in a different room. But it wasn’t my business. So no matter how nice those arms and that chest were, or how chiseled his face was, even with several days’ worth of stubble, he was not safe to think about.
I had to make sure I didn’t lose this job. The place was usually pretty clean, because no one had lived here in the months since I’d been working, but I cleaned it weekly like it was filthy. No dust could be found anywhere, and I even went as far as organizing the pantry and the cleaning closet, scrubbing the cabinets and throwing out any expired food.
Standing up, I shook off my humiliation at having woken up the client by singing God knows how loudly and vacuuming right outside his door. When he saw how clean everything was, maybe he’d overlook my mistake.
Three hours later, the downstairs was immaculate. I had even wiped out the fridge and the freezer completely again, giving the client plenty of time to sleep. I went to the second floor and cleaned every room thoroughly until I couldn’t find anything else to clean, before I finally stood at the foot of the stairs and looked up to the third floor. It was one in the afternoon, and he was still in bed. I had three bedrooms and three full bathrooms to get to, plus a theater and a game room with a full bar. The game room was far enough away from his room that, if I was quiet, I could probably clean it without waking him.
I tiptoed up the stairs and eased past his room. When I was safely in the game room, I let out a sigh of relief. I closed the door behind me and turned to face the large, untouched room. The bar was stocked with every alcohol imaginable and so many different glasses I couldn’t even begin to figure out what went with what. I walked across the room and set my basket of cleaning supplies down on the floor. I decided today I would spend some extra time cleaning the windows. I grabbed a chair and covered it with a clean cloth before standing on it. The ceiling was at least twelve feet high, which made the windows hard to reach. Sometimes I brought a ladder in here, but it would make too much of a racket if I tried to bring it up today.
I had reached up with a cloth to begin scrubbing the windows from top to bottom when my cell phone rang. Crap! I always put the ringer on high when I was working so I could hear it around the house. I scrambled to get down, but my foot slipped. I winced in pain just before the chair turned over, and my arms shot out to grab for the closest thing next to me. A massive, ornate mirror.
The sound of breaking glass came just before my butt hit the floor with a resounding thud.
And my stupid cell phone was still blaring at top volume.
I turned and desperately reached for my phone but couldn’t grab it. The loud ringing continued as I wiggled over to it, my legs all twisted up.
The door swung open, and I froze in place.
Here I sat, with shattered glass all around me and an upturned chair. The only bright spot was that my phone had finally stopped ringing.
“What the hell happened? Are you OK?” he asked, as he stalked toward me in a pair of white boxer briefs. At least he wasn’t totally naked. I jerked my eyes away from him and his almost-naked body and sucked in a breath. I’d broken his mirror and woken him up again.
“I’m so sorry. I’ll pay you back for the mirror. I know it probably costs a lot, but you don’t have to pay me until it’s covered. I’ll even come in more than once a week for free.”
He frowned, and my stomach dropped. He wasn’t happy. “Are you bleeding? Shit, give me your hand.”
He dropped to his knees and took my left hand in his. Sure enough, there was a piece of glass in it, and blood was slowly trickling out around the shard.