AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Conference call,” he whispers, turning his back to me, a move designed to help him keep his conversation private but that serves better as a way for me to watch his ass without being observed.
I have been working with Will Lotham for a grand total of fifteen minutes and all I can think about is his mouth and his ass.
I am doomed.
I am so doomed.
When someone is this doomed, there is only one sane response.
I leave.
Packing up my purse, phone, and keys, I wave to Will as he talks on his boob-warmed phone. I get a flicker of acknowledgment from him that reminds me of the high school hallway.
Enough to say Hey, I know you.
But not enough to say Hey, you’re important.
Chapter Eight
The drive to 29 Maplecure Street takes exactly three minutes. I don’t even have time to decompress from that conversation with Will before I’m smacked in the face with more Will. This isn’t his childhood home. That address I’ve memorized and will know until the day I die.
I’ll be on my deathbed, overtaken by dementia, and while I won’t know the name of the current president, by God, I’ll know the exact time on Tuesday afternoons that Will had to mow the front lawn when they lived on Concordian Road and I got Mom to drive me past his house on the way to the mall. (2:30 p.m., before his lacrosse practice).
I pull up to 29 Maplecure Street and look at the house through new eyes.
Without a porn crew bustling about, it’s got a different feel.
Imposing. Manicured. Polished and sophisticated, this is the home of someone significant. This is a showplace, designed to send signals. Financial signals.
Power signals.
Most people buy a home because it’s what they can afford, or for a specific school district or neighborhood. Most people settle into an environment out of a desire for comfort. We use adjectives and phrases that actually contain the word home to describe emotions:
Homey
Make yourself at home
It’s like coming home
Home is where the heart is
But houses like 29 Maplecure Street aren’t about comfort.
They’re about prestige.
Homes talk. They might not be able to speak directly, but if you’re fluent in Space like I am, you can pick up what they’re putting down. When I came here last week for the fluffer job, I thought I was staging a television show set. I wasn’t looking at the house through the eyes of a space professional working on selling this place.
Now I am.
I grin.
Will Lotham is going to give up that one percent so, so soon.
At the thought of Will, my body tingles, heat pouring into my arms, legs, chest at the instant memory recall programmed into me. See, this is the problem with Will being back in my world: I’ve spent ten years chasing him out of my head.
I evicted him.
Turns out he’s been squatting in my heart.
