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“I don’t understand what’s going on,” she whispered.
“What’s happening is that we’re going for lunch. Now, you have five minutes to get changed. If you want to.”
“Or what?”
“Or you go as you are.”
She glanced down at herself. “I can’t go like this.”
“Why not?” Grady thought she looked cute. He’d noticed she liked sloths. And cute earrings. He added those to the list of things they needed to buy for Effie. He also noticed that they didn’t have a lot of stuff. It would make moving them to their place easier when the time came. But he wondered if there were things Brooks needed as well.
“I . . . I . . . these are my cleaning clothes.”
He just stared down at her, still not seeing the problem.
“Go get changed, Effie,” Steele told her in a low voice that held a hint of hardness. “We’ll wait for you. You don’t want to walk, I carry you. Got to get you in your coat first, though. And shoes. But we’re taking you out for lunch. Now, off you go.”
She just stared at him some more.
Then Steele made the next move. He drew her over to the bedroom door, then he gently but very deliberately patted her ass. “Go.”
And she went. Which Grady was surprised at. Because he felt for sure that she might freak out. Start talking about sexual harassment. Or just plain harassment.
He let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding.
Steele gazed over at him, then back to the bedroom door. “Think she’s getting dressed or sneaking out the window?”
“I have no clue.”
A grin twisted up the ends of Steele’s lips. “That’s half the fun.”
For him, maybe.
Grady liked a bit more predictability in his life. Well, not that every aspect of his life was predictable. It couldn’t be with the job he had and the life they led. But what he could keep the same, he did.
“Should I go around and check she isn’t climbing out the window?”
Steele shook his head. “Nah, Effie is a good girl. She won’t sneak out. It wouldn’t be polite.”
“How do we get her past that?”
“Over being polite all the time?”
“Yeah. It’s like she thinks she always has to be polite, and smile, and not make waves.” That seemed a stressful way to live.
“We just need to get her barriers down,” Steele said. “They were down last night. We need to keep them that way.”
“You’re saying she was the real Effie last night?”
“In part. She’s taking a while.” Steele moved closer to the door and knocked on it.
They both heard her squeal.
Wait. Did she keep her clothes in Brooks’ bedroom? Grady guessed she had to, it wasn’t like she had a closet out here.
Fuck, he hated this life for her.
He’d lived this life. And he’d had it worse. But he still really, really hated it for Effie.
