he could do it again, if I let him. I just couldn’t let him.
I’d barely had time to take a sip of my tea when Jed called me on the radio—and, yay! He was using his radio!—to let me know the massage people were here. With a grunt, I whirled back around and headed for the guest house again. This time, I took the path around to the front entrance so I could brief the masseurs on the guests before they went inside. I passed Coop and his team, straightening out the riggings, and nodded to them, but I could see the masseurs unloading their tables and I headed straight over.
Even as I was going through what I wanted to say in my head, I stopped short. So short I almost bit my tongue.
Well, hell.
I should have known Carlo would be one of the masseurs. We’d worked together on a lot of corporate events up here in the Northwest. He was a little oily for my taste, and a bit too handsy, but I’ve heard he gives a great massage. Still, I’d learned to avoid him when possible. He had a tendency to cling. Like a limpet.
When he saw me, his eyes lit up and he jogged over and he pulled me into a hug—ick—and whispered in my ear, “After this. You and me. Alone. Together. Okay?”
Right. As though I didn’t already have enough to do.
I nearly went off on him—you know, in a bad way—but then I caught Cooper’s attention on moi, his dark frown at the sight of me in another man’s arms, and I decided to milk it a little. Just a little. Just for fun I gave Carlo an extra hug.
What could go wrong?
Well, I forgot one thing. I forgot how some men simply cannot receive any encouragement from a woman whatsoever. I’m talking beyond Ice-Princess frigidity, ladies. I totally blew it with that responding hug. I’d—egads—encouraged him. As a result, Carlo skulked around looking for me the rest of the afternoon. It took all my energy to avoid him.
And the next time I saw Coop, he wasn’t frowning. He was snickering.
* * *
During the massages, Wren, Olivia, and I circled the house to make sure all the guests who weren’t being massaged had what they needed, and I realized something about this Visit right away. It was like high school all over again.
All the girls—except one—assembled a cabal in Farley’s master suite to talk about the one who wasn’t there. And then they would all snigger when Eliza walked in.
Not to mention the fact that Farley sent her minion, Jaxon, on incessant missions to deliver messages to her boyfriend, Jamison, who had set up court in the billiards room with his boys. She sent love notes, random questions, and quizzes on how much he loved her. Of course she had to send Jaxon as go-between. The other side of the lodge was apparently too far for them to walk.
Then Bobby and Dion got into a fist fight over who’d seen Keiko first. That one broke a vase.
And all the boys all complained that the food we’d offered for lunch was too frou frou, and demanded steaks—even though they were all going out to dinner in an hour—and the girls all fretted about their carb intake, miserably crunching on raw veggies as they watched the others inhale their food.
In public, that was. When they were in private, it was a carb bacchanal.
One time I popped into Farley’s suite with a genial, “How is everything?”
Her response was, “Oh, could you have one of the servant people bring us some Doritos?”
Servant people?
“And sodas,” one of her posse reminded her.
“Yes. And sodas please. Diet only. Cold. Nothing off-brand,” Farley clarified.
“Certainly.”
“Oh. Ask her for green M&Ms.” Again, from the peanut gallery, this time from the young nymph with the Chihuahua on her lap and a bad case of resting sneer.
Farley’s brow wrinkled. “Why, Tressa? I don’t even like the green ones.”
Tressa sniffed. “Because then they have to go separate them out. Wouldn’t that be hilarious?”
“That’s just stupid.” Farley turned back to me. “Just the Doritos and soda.” She tipped her head to the side. “But you could also bring some M&Ms, I suppose. I can eat around the green ones.”
I was humbled by her generosity.
“Right away.” I hoped to God we had Doritos and M&Ms in the pantry.
It went on like this for the rest of the afternoon. Running errand after errand—while trying to avoid the attention of an overly