Selling Grace: A Light Romance Novel (Art of Grace Book 1) (43 page)

Sanford shook his head. "I cook, but I don't bake."

"Well, lucky for you that you found me!" I exclaimed, watching closely as he served up two nice, big portions of his prepared food. That was one thing I liked about Sanford - he didn't skimp on the portion sizes, as if I was some size zero blonde bimbo. "I'm great at baking! Say the right things, and maybe I'll whip up something tasty after dinner!"

"With whipped cream?" he asked. He sounded a little too eager, perhaps, but I didn't see the trap until I'd already put my foot in it.

"Sure, I can do whipped cream!"

Sanford turned around and set my bowl of food in front of me, and I nearly passed out with delight as the smell wafted up and warmed my face. "You'll need to make extra, then."

"Why?"

"Because I plan on putting it all over you, and then slowly licking it off afterward." He took a satisfied bite of his food, grinning as I nearly choked to death on my own mouthful at his words.

Of course, after he challenged me like that, I couldn't even consider backing out. After all, this was a power play from the man, seeing how far he could push me. I wasn't going to let him win out. I was just as willing to get down and dirty and naked with him as he was with me, and I'd show him, even if that meant getting whipped cream in all sorts of interesting new places I'd never thought of applying food before.

Okay, maybe it wasn't such a big sacrifice for me, after all.

By the time we finished eating, baking, and then having fun exploring each other's bodies with the sugar rush that came from wolfing down a dozen cookies each, with whipped cream forming the center of cookie sandwiches, it was pitch black outside. As soon as I got up to head home, however, Sanford rolled out of bed and started pulling on his pants.

"What are you doing?" I asked him.

"Walking you home, of course," he answered immediately, fumbling as he pulled a shirt over his head and momentarily obscured his vision.

"Why? You do remember that I live right next door, don't you?"

"I just want to make sure you get home safe," was all he'd say, but he went out with me, made sure that I didn't fall in the two hundred feet that I needed to traverse to reach my front door, and then followed me inside.

Next thing I knew, he was sleeping beside me, his big, warm arm draped over me and the soft, deep sound of his breathing lulling me off to sleep.

We didn't talk about the relationship, about what exactly was happening between the two of us. I sensed that, if I pushed the issue, he'd back away and wouldn't want to commit to anything. But I also knew that the bond between the two of us was growing deeper, and that he couldn't deny that fact. Sooner or later, I told myself, something would happen to change the dynamic between us, and we'd need to talk things over.

But until then, I could relax, keep my mind clear, and just focus on enjoying myself.

The only thorn in my side was that I couldn't tell Della about any of this, as desperately as I wanted to spill the beans.

"So, what are you going to do when this is over?"

"What? It's going to be over?" I started, jarred back to reality by Della's words.

She frowned at me from where she stood on the other side of the counter. "Well, I'd hope so! After all, don't you want to collect that big paycheck? Usually, you need to finish a job before you get paid for it!"

Right, the job. Not my relationship, the part that Della didn't know about. "I guess I'm not sure what I'll do once I've finished the job," I said after a minute, shrugging. "I haven't really thought that far ahead yet."

"If I were you, I'd take a vacation," Della said, sounding like a seer announcing a prophecy. "After all, you've been stuck here too long, and you're not getting any younger - or meeting anyone new. Sanford was nice to you, but I just can't bring myself to advise you to stick around and hope that something happens between the two of you."

"What? You don't think that something could happen between him and me?" I asked, surprised that she'd devoted any thought to this.

"Aww, honey, I'm sorry." Della reached out and patted my hand. "But the man's probably got a long distance girlfriend or fiancee who's one of those skinny stick models from the big city, one who is dating him for all that money in his bank account. He knows what society expects to see next to him, now that he's successful, and that's probably what he's after."

I blinked, and Della pulled her hand back. "I'm really sorry if you didn't want to hear this," she said, looking concerned, like she might need to hurry around the side of the counter to come give me a hug if I broke down in tears.

"No, it's good to hear what you think," I said back to her. "And yes, maybe a vacation would be a good thing to do." For just a moment, I thought of Sanford and myself out on a private beach somewhere, far away from Truckee, Illinois, him kissing me on a towel beneath the warm tropical sun, the waves lapping at my toes...

"And maybe on a vacation, you could meet someone nice, too!" Della went on, glad that I hadn't collapsed from her harsh words of truth to me. "Someone who really appreciates you, who gets along with you and likes the same things!"

Sanford and I didn't like the same things. He'd spent more time out in his garage of late, where he had a frightening array of power tools. I didn't venture out to watch, scared off by the loud sounds of blades and grinding wheels cutting into things, but I assumed that he was probably working on a car or something. I'd tried to describe all the intricacies and history of some of the furniture in his house, but he just shrugged and grunted. History didn't hold the same allure for him as for me.

Did we get along? In our own way, perhaps. We weren't mixing like two cups of water, but neither did we stay separated like water and oil. No, if anything we were like oil and fire, explosive and hot when we came together, never content to just sit still. I couldn't see Sanford relaxing on a couch on a lazy Sunday, cuddling up and just loafing around beneath a blanket as we watched television together.

And that was what I wanted, wasn't it? That's how Della seemed to see me, at least. And that's how I'd always viewed myself, to be honest. I might go out and have fun every now and then, but in the end, I just would always end up at my house, sitting around on my couch and watching television, Whiskers curled up at my feet.

"Listen, I should probably get back - I've still got more work to do," I said to Della, pushing a few bills across the counter for my drink.

She slid the money right back to me. "Hey, you don't owe me anything. I'll call this 'cleaning out old supply.' Just come back once you return from your vacation, all tan and with your new man!"

At some point, Sanford and I would need to come clean to her, I knew. Briefly, I smiled as I imagined her reaction. Man, her eyes might pop all the way out of her head!

Chapter Twenty-Three

*

"Today's the last day - here we go!" I sang out as I woke up. Since Sanford wasn't here, I knew that Whiskers would be hanging out near me, trusting that I'd be willing to provide him with his normal breakfast in Sanford's absence.

Yesterday afternoon, Sanford had come upstairs halfway through my post-lunch work session, grabbing a suitcase out of his closet. "I've got a sudden matter that came up in the city," he explained to me as he dumped clothes into the suitcase. "I should just be gone for a couple of days. You've got keys to the place, and Winston will still be around to help out with anything you need."

"He can't help out with everything I need," I replied, leaning in and blinking soulfully up at the man. "Not unless he's got a much younger body under that tuxedo than he lets on!"

Sanford grimaced at the image that I had summoned up in his head. "Everything related to work. I'll be back pretty soon, promise."

So that evening, yesterday night, I went back to my cottage and made my own dinner, eating for one instead of for two. It felt rather strange, even though Sanford and I had only really been together for a couple of weeks. Already, going up to my bed, I missed the comforting warmth of him beside me, the relaxing, steady sound of his deep breathing.

Still, even without Sanford next to me, I felt a rush of excitement course through me as I sat up this morning. I'd finally tackled the last of the little antiques that cluttered up the upstairs bedrooms and the room that Sanford had turned into a study of sorts. Today, I could go over and do one last walkthrough of the house, making sure that I'd accounted for everything on my several-pages-long bill!

I'd need to wait for Sanford to come back, of course, before I could hand the bill over. I knew that he'd want to go through every line item on the bill with me, making sure that I wasn't daring to overcharge him anywhere, and he wouldn't be content to leave the bill to Winston to settle in his stead.

A little part of me wondered what might happen next. Would he want to have a serious talk about our relationship? I still could continue working for him if he wanted to sell off any of these pieces - and I suspected that he would be easily persuaded to do so, at least for a lot of the smaller little curios. That would equal more commission for me, plus more time to hang around with him. Maybe, instead, he'd be interested in Della's vacation idea, whisking me off to somewhere sun-drenched and exotic.

I climbed out of bed, got dressed, and gave Whiskers his usual bowl of cat food. In an effort to try and cut down on the amount of food that he ingested, I'd started dumping the can of cat food out into a bowl, and then putting a spoonful back into the can before placing the bowl down on the floor. So far, Whiskers hadn't noticed the slight decrease in serving portion, but hopefully it would help him shed a couple of pounds.

Making sure that my bill and laptop were tucked into my shoulder bag, I snagged the key to Sanford's house from the hook next to my front door and headed over to the mansion. I made my way up to the front door, but I heard someone moving on the other side as I started to slide the key into the lock.

Winston? I pulled my key out of the lock, just in time as the door opened up from the other side.

But the person on the other side of the door, when it opened, was definitely not the elderly butler.

"Who are you?" asked the woman standing inside the Winterhearst mansion as she glared out at me, a slight Southern accent coloring her words.

I stared back at her, wondering the very same question. "Uh, I'm Elaine Dean, furniture and antiques appraiser," I said, reverting to my default greeting. "Who are-"

"Ah, the appraiser! Sandy did mention that he was hiring one of those," the woman interrupted me, her frown lessening. "And you must be the one who's put these sticky notes everywhere. I suppose he's just granted you the run of the house, has he?"

I blinked, still feeling like I was off balance as I tried to figure out who this woman was. She certainly didn't look like hired help. She'd called him Sandy??

I guessed that she stood close to six feet tall, possibly only an inch or two shorter than Sanford himself. A solid inch of that height was her hair, platinum blonde and rolling down in gorgeous, movie-star level waves. She looked like a movie star, I had to admit, or like she'd had several stylists working on her for hours to get her into perfect runway condition. She wore a tight little off-the-shoulder dress that I'd never be able to pull off in a million years, in part because it clung to her body like gauze and revealed the absence of a single pound of body fat. Sequins glittered around the hem, matched by the light glinting off of the diamond studs in the woman's ears, a gold necklace that wrapped around her graceful, swan-like neck, and a gigantic rock that dazzled from her ring finger.

Just standing next to her, on the doorstep, made me especially self-conscious. I'd chosen to wear a particularly stained tee shirt this morning, since Sanford wouldn't be around to see it, and my jeans had a big white splotch on the butt from where I'd once accidentally sat down on a bench that still had wet paint drying on it. Next to this blonde creature, I felt like a caterpillar looking up at a fully transformed and gorgeous butterfly.

"Um, what?" I asked, dimly aware that she'd asked me a question. "Sorry, but who are you?"

"Oh, of course! How silly of me, forgetting to introduce myself!" The blonde woman threw her head back and let out a laugh that seemed more for show than out of any real amusement. "I'm Valencia, of course." She held her hand out to me.

That didn't help. "Valencia?" I repeated, not yet moving to take the offered hand. Valencia, or whoever she was, held her hand out to me with the palm facing down, tilting her fingers forward as if she expected me to bend down and kiss them. That massive diamond ring glittered up at me, and I sensed that she'd held out her hand this way to make sure that I didn't miss the size of the gem.

"Well, yes - hasn't Sandy talked about me?" When my expression didn't change, she let out another one of those fake laughs. "Oh, he's so quiet and repressive. I'm Valencia O'Hara." She paused for an instant, as if to lend more impact to her next words. "His fiancee."

I felt as though she'd just socked me in the gut. "His what?"

"Why, his fiancee, of course!" she repeated. "I've been wrapping up most of the matters in the city, but he had to go up today to sign the last paperwork on closing up the old place. Now that we're moving in here, there's no reason to pay two sets of cleaning staff, is there?"