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She took a seat on one of the tall stools at the kitchen island while Russ set about making coffee.
"There are times I'm almost nostalgic for that time of my life," he said.
"I'll trade you."
He shook his head. "I wouldn't take the memories from you. It makes success all the sweeter."
She put her elbows on the counter and rested her chin in her palms. "Success. I begin to wonder if I'll ever find it."
"What type of firms did you interview at?"
"I have a master's degree in architecture. I'm trying to find an internship position."
He stared at her. "A master's degree?"
"So you wonder why I'm cleaning houses, don't you?"
"Yes. In a word."
"It was supposed to be temporary." She held up her fingers, counting off: "The money is okay, it takes no training, you don't have to give notice when you quit, I get to see inside a lot of houses and see both bad and good design, I can arrange my schedule to allow for interviews, and the work doesn't take any brain power, so I can save my thinking energy for things I care about."
She dropped her chin back into her hands. "Only the money turns out to be not quite good enough to cover a perfect storm of bills and circumstance."
"Why not take a regular job, if that's what it takes to make ends meet?"
"I'm afraid of getting sidetracked. I'm afraid I'll get lost in some other career, and architecture will become the thing I always wanted to do but didn't. And by the time I try to go back to it, it'll be too late. All my knowledge will be out of date and my ideas won't have evolved with the times. I won't be a wa
"So what are you going to do?" he asked, setting a mug of coffee in front of her. "Cream, sugar?"
"Both, thanks." She stirred her coffee and noticed him giving the same treatment to his own coffee. Heavy on the cream, heavy on the sugar, like a mug of hot coffee ice cream. "I don't know what I'm going to do. Try to get more work, I suppose." She sipped her coffee, thinking about Daphne moving in with Derek. Daphne said that Derek didn't want her to contribute toward his mortgage; that he wanted her there because he loved her, not because he wanted to save a few bucks.
"Do you know what I think sometimes?" Emma mused aloud.
He raised a brow. "No."
"I sometimes think that it would suit me perfectly fine to be a man's mistress."
His brows went up.
"I'm not the only woman to ever think it, you know," she said in mock-seriousness. "And I don't mean mistress in the sense of a married man's lover. I mean that sometimes it seems like it would be a pretty good deal to be a man's kept woman. Have him pay my living expenses in exchange for on-demand sex." She gri
"Could you do that? Emotionally?"
She shrugged, a half smile on her lips. He didn't think she was serious, did he? "Who knows? Maybe. If the situation was right."
Could she really do it? Probably not. Not unless it was someone like Russ, whom she wanted to sleep with anyway. She made a show of tapping her fingertips along her jaw and tilted her head, looking up at the ceiling as if considering. "I'd have to like the guy, or at least respect him. And I'd have to find him physically attractive." She slid a glance toward him and smiled wickedly.
He looked stu
She dropped her hands to the counter. "Oh, I do, but in a few years. Right now, I don't want my life to get swallowed up in a romantic relationship."
"Swallowed up?"
"I don't want my ambition to get diluted by attachment to a guy. I've got too much to do, too much to achieve, before I get wrapped up in a relationship."
The look on his face was one of utter befuddlement. "I don't think I've ever met a woman who felt the way you do about love and sex."
She waved her hand dismissively. "Don't take me seriously. The mistress stuff was just an idle thought. Surely you've had impractical fantasies too?"
He laughed. "You just described the perfect fantasy of a lot of men. A beautiful young woman who wants regular sex from him but no emotional entanglements."
She chuckled, feeling a bit better. "Well, there you go. And speaking of going, don't you have to go to work?"
"I have some things to do in my home office; then I'll go in."
She slid off the bar stool. "Well, thanks for the coffee and sympathy. I have another house to do after yours, so I'd better get cracking."
She was happy for an excuse to get away from him. God. What was wrong with her?
You want to get into his pants, that's what's wrong, her i
She shut her eyes, shaking her head in embarrassment. She'd outdone herself this time. She'd all but offered to be Russ's paid love slave. What must he think of her?
"Criminy," she said under her breath, borrowing a word from her deceased grandmother. The day just couldn't get any worse.
Russ answered e-mails in his home office, clearing the most pressing out of his in-box.
The distraction worked for a while, but then he heard Emma vacuuming the hall outside the office, working her way through the house toward his bedroom. He felt for her, trying to find her footing in the world, and wished he could help. Unfortunately, he didn't know any architects who he might ask to give her special consideration.
However, he did own an apartment downtown that he could rent to her for a pittance until she got back on her feet. He himself may have slept on the borrowed couches of friends, but he didn't like to think of a young woman doing that. Bad things could happen: a friend's boyfriend, drunk, finding Emma asleep and vulnerable and taking advantage of the opportunity. A single woman needed to keep herself out of danger.
His old apartment had been sitting empty for the three months since the last tenant moved out. He'd been meaning to put it on the market but hadn't gotten around to it.
He smiled. It was gratifying to have procrastination turn out to be fortuitous.
He could also hire her to cook and grocery shop, as she'd offered last week. He was sick of restaurant food and frozen di
He imagined the the smile, the relief on her face when he made the offers.
Then he frowned.
She would be relieved, wouldn't she? Or would she be offended? She might think he thought she couldn't take care of herself, that he thought her a charity case. She might see him as overprotective, trying to take away her independence.
Dammit, why wasn't anything ever easy?
Emma rapped on the door frame and stuck her head in. "Hi. I think I'm done, unless you want me to clean in here?"
"No, I'd never find anything again. You're done already?" Crap! He hadn't had time to think out how to make his offer.
Emma took a step into the office. "Yeah, the place is spotless. But it was nearly spotless before I got here. Are you always so neat, or did you clean before I arrived?"
At the look of guilt on his face, Emma bit the inside of her lip, trying not to giggle. "I've seen boy mess before, you know. I have a brother."