“Off-limits,” Nigel said. “Now please, Mr. Caldwell, go eat before you accidentally catch fire.”
“Nigel, I just…”
“Master Tanner, your guest has arrived for breakfast,” Nigel said super loudly.
Normally I’d be distracted by the amazing view of Central Park from Tanner’s open floor plan. But it was rather hard to look at the view when Tanner was sitting at the far end of a long dining room table being fed grapes by two topless women. His silk robe didn’t look like it had been closed properly and I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if one of those women had just had something other than a grape in her mouth.
One of them giggled as she plopped another grape in Tanner’s mouth.
It honestly wasn’t the strangest thing I’d ever walked in on Tanner doing. It didn’t even make the top ten list. I was just surprised the women weren’t decked out in weird lederhosen like Nigel.
“Good morning, Matt,” Tanner said. “Did you sleep alright?” The stupid grin on his face made me think that Tanner probably had a hand in Nigel’s antics this morning. The blonde to his left ceremoniously plopped another grape into his mouth.
“That depends on if you think waking up to a terrible chorus of bells and finding out a houseboy stripped you in the middle of the night…”
Tanner started laughing. “I thought you’d find that funny.”
“My headache begs to differ.”
“Well, I didn’t give him much time to practice.” He turned to his houseboy. “Good heavens, Nigel, what are you wearing?”
Nigel looked down at his ridiculous costume. “I’m wearing what I always wear. Just like you insisted last night when you and Mr. Caldwell got lost in the wine cellar.”
“No, you’re supposed to wear the other costume when Matt…” Tanner’s voice trailed off.
Nigel and Tanner both looked like they’d been caught in some weird lie.
“How many costumes does he have?” I asked.
Tanner cleared his throat. “Just that one. Like Nigel said. He’s always wearing that.”
“No, he’s usually wearing that weird Victorian butler outfit…”
“Nonsense,” Tanner said. “Nigel always wears lederhosen. Don’t you Nigel?”
“Why, yes, Master Tanner. These are my favorite…pant. Pants? Shorts? I don’t really know what this is. And it’s rather itchy.”
“That’s quite enough, Nigel. Please leave us to eat.”
Nigel hurried off.
“And girls, would you wait for me in my room?” Tanner said. “I need a word with Matt in private before he goes to work.” He whispered something in one of their ears as he slapped the other girl on the butt. They both giggled and went off down the hall I’d just come from.
Tanner stabbed his fork into some strange looking sausage. “Help yourself to whatever you’d like.”
I looked at the huge spread of food on the table. Did he have ten more women waiting for him in his bedroom? Because this was way too much for just the two of us. But there were only two chairs. The one where Tanner was sitting at the other end of the table and the one at this end which I assumed was for me. Why were we so spread out? We were going to have to shout at each other.
“Sit, sit,” Tanner said. “I’ve been cooking all morning.”
“You made all this?”
Tanner laughed. “Gotcha. No. Of course not. Nigel’s been up for hours. He insisted that he knew all your favorites and wanted to cater to you.”
How on earth would Nigel know all my favorites? And why did this weird little man seem hellbent on catering to me?
“He even made protein pancakes.” Tanner pointed to a plate full of them.
I did love protein pancakes. I grabbed a plate and started to fill it up.
“And make sure to drink that green juice. It has a few secret ingredients to cure hangovers. Nigel’s top-secret elixir.”
I couldn’t argue with that. I grabbed one of the glasses of green juice too and sat down. One bite of pancakes and I was a little less pissed at Nigel. These were amazing. “You’ll have to let Nigel know these are great. What kind of plant protein is this?”
“I’m not sure, I’ll have to ask him. But he’ll be happy to hear that you enjoyed them. Speaking of Nigel. About his uniform. Forgive him, he’s forgetful.”
“Or maybe you are. He’s definitely never worn that before.”
“Of course he has. Because it’s what he always wears. Regardless, are you excited to execute the plan?”
“The plan?” Honestly, I’d had too much to drink last night. Nigel had said something about getting lost in