G.I. BABY (31 page)
Authors: Eve Montelibano
I was away from it all now though and I loved my new home. The Twyman's had an old plantation style home that had belonged to a grandmother and it had been the first property I had visited, but I fell in love with it. They had no use for it as their family all had their own homes, so they'd decided to rent it out with a view to the renter buying it if they were interested. I had my nest egg from working and I could easily afford to buy the three bedroomed property, but I wanted to get a feel for the area first and make sure that this was it for me. I hadn't expected to fall in love with the quaint town and the lovely people who lived there, nor had I expected to fall in love with the house itself, and I definitely hadn’t expected to fall in lust with some random guy that I'd seen in town, but that wasn't important. I felt happy here, and there had been such a huge interest in my business and doing work on not only homes, but offices and stores; Piersville was the best thing to happen to me.
We’d moved from country to country all of my life until I was sent to a boarding school in Washington with my sister Lucy. I will always look at my childhood as a gift as I’d experienced so many cultures and had seen so much of the world, but because of it I didn’t even have a proper American accent, it was a mixture of accents, and because of that and all of the moves, I’d never felt that I belonged and was used to people assuming I was bragging about my childhood when I tried to explain about it, so setting down the roots, that had been impossible growing up, was very important to me and I just knew I’d be able to do that here.
I turned up at Colette Townsend's house and gasped at the size and beauty of it. It was old and had been looked after well. In the distance I could see other large houses dotted around and I realized that those were probably the ones that I was being hired to decorate. Damn, I'd give my left arm to decorate this beautiful place in front of me. With a sigh, I opened the car door and jumped out into the heat. How could this family work outside on the ranch in this heat and humidity?
I could hear mens voices coming from inside the house as I knocked on the door and did a final check of my outfit to make sure that my white roll up sleeve shirt was still tucked neatly into my high waisted grey pencil skirt. I heard a woman say something and then the door opened and I was face to face with a petite beautiful woman with brown hair pulled into a ponytail and a face that didn't look any older than 30. What was this woman's secret because I could have sworn my cousins told me that she had four kids, with the eldest being 27 or 28?
"Hey beautiful girl,” she said putting her hands either side of my face and looking into my eyes. I must have been 7 inches taller than her so I automatically stooped when I saw her raising her hands. Coming from the city, I wasn't really used to being
that
much taller than people, but here all the women seemed so delicate and petite and I felt like a giant in comparison.
"Hello Mrs Townsend, thank you for inviting me out here to look at your properties. Your home is just beautiful!" I caught a glimpse of the inside over her shoulder and immediately started to take notes for future reference — i.e. for my own home. Regardless of my profession, I could still find ideas from other homes.
"Call me Colette sweetie, and it’s me who should be thanking you. You'll see what I mean once you see the properties,” she said rolling her eyes and pulling me through the door. "Maybe while you're looking at the other houses, you could have a look here and tell me what I could do to make it look better?" She gestured to follow her as she walked through the living room towards what I assumed was the kitchen.
I looked around and almost tripped a couple of times at how beautiful and classy yet homely Colette had made the place look. The walls were a bright white and had the odd picture here and there, the furniture was brown leather and glass and totally minimalistic, but it was the oak floor boards that really made me drool. "Oh my God, are these reclaimed floor boards or the original?” I breathed as I stopped and stared.
"Ah, they're the originals. No one realized they were there because my great grandfather in law had, for some reason, put pine boards over them which he had then stained. When we moved in here, one of the boards was loose so I lifted it and found these babies underneath. At the time I was nesting because I was six months pregnant with my eldest Renwick, but I started tearing up those pine boards like a mad woman and went and bought some varnish from the store and would have done it if my Jack hadn't come in from the ranch when he did. I'll never forget when he walked in and saw all these floor boards thrown outside and me sanding the floor with this massive bump in the way." She said laughing hard; I couldn't help but also laugh at the mental picture she'd painted for me.
"Well, you've done a beautiful job; honestly, this is like my ideal home. You've mixed the old with the new and blended them together perfectly and it’s classy but homely at the same time. I love it!"
"Thank you, I love this place too. Now if only we can get my wayward kids to make their houses into homes too,” she rolled her eyes again. "Let me introduce you to them. Two of my boys are in the kitchen this way. My other babies are in different states at the moment, but they’ve agreed to meet with you later to work on their homes; thank the Lord!” She started back towards the direction we'd been headed before I started drooling over this home perfection.
I heard the deep voices coming from the kitchen and walked in to find the hottie from the store and the cute guy I’d seen at the bar last night.
Seriously, why was my luck so damned bad?
I thought tipping my head back to look at the ceiling for a second before I looked back at the visual heaven that were the Townsend brothers. My usual taste would have been the shorter of the two, but I couldn't stop looking back at the taller one that I'd seen in the grocery store.
"Ren, Cole, this is Maya Price the designer. Maya these are two of my troublemaking boys, Cole on the left and Ren on the right." Ok, so my store sex God was called Ren. If you didn't think of Ren and Stimpy, Ren was a hot guys name so it figured that he'd be given it. Cole stepped
towards me drawing my attention back to him and pulled me in for a hug scaring the shit out of me.
"So, we meet again," he said as his eyes skimmed my face, making me feel just a wee bitty uncomfortable, especially since we technically hadn’t ‘met’ last night as I’d been leaving when he arrived.
"Uh yeah, nice to meet you formally Cole.” I heard a deep growl from over his shoulder and all of a sudden Ren's face filled my vision as he pulled Cole off of me, and then softly stroked a finger down my face following its path with his gorgeous gray eyes.
"Hey baby, nice to finally meet you,” he rumbled in the deepest sexiest voice I’d ever heard. I tried my best not to flinch at his use of the word
baby
, but 9 months with my ex had taught me a couple things — like the fact men used the word baby for girls to basically land them by making them feel special, when in actuality it was so they didn't mess up their name or have to remember it. He caught my flinch and frowned and I could see the question in his eyes, but I powered through it.
"Uh hey Ren, nice to meet you both too and thanks for letting me look at your homes,” I said trying to pull myself back to being professional and remembering exactly why I was here.
"That's ok gorgeous! We were just talking about how Ren's left his wood bare for too long and how its at risk of rotting now,” Cole’s voice sounded from behind Ren. I couldn't help but take a step away from Ren and shoot a quick glance down at his crotch.
Well, that's a damn shame
I thought to myself.
"Jesus christ Cole, shut the fuck up!" Ren snarled, scowling at his brother. "FYI there is absolutely nothing wrong with my wood nor have I ever left it bare. This guy is just being a little bitch.”
Well, I definitely feel better knowing that his wood isn't rotting off, not that it would make a difference to me because I was going nowhere near Ren's ‘wood’. God why is this all so dirty all of a sudden? Houses Maya, walls, decorating, wood.......no steer clear of the wood thoughts.
I felt my cheeks heating and was relieved when Colette interrupted, "Both of you shut up. I swear I brought them up better than this Maya. It’s their father's genes that I sadly thought were sexy beyond belief, and still do, but that he's passed down to our son's," she scolded with her hands on her hips.
"Sorry ma!” Cole said casting his mom an innocent look that I bet worked on every female on the receiving end of it.
"Sorry ma" Ren grumbled from beside me, still shooting Cole dirty looks.
——*************************——
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2
“They were just leaving.”
Miranda eyed them with annoyance clear on her face. “I believe I told you that she wouldn’t be ready to speak with you until after she was given the all clear. What part of ‘head trauma’ and ‘is under strict order to not be upset in any way,’ did you not understand?”
Gulver stepped forward, palms up, while he spoke to her. “It’s important that we speak to the victim of the crime as soon as they are conscious. So much information is still fresh—”
“Knock it off, Officer. You and I both know the procedure…not my first merry-go-round. If the doctor or I say that you need to wait, you wait until the patient is physically and mentally prepared to do so. Their well-being should be top priority.”
“We understand, but she has—”
“She,” Maya sneered at them, hand clutching mine in a tight grip, “is right here, and would appreciate it if you would stop speaking about her as if she has no say in the matter.” The machine beside her beeped, and all eyes inside the room shifted. Her blood pressure was rising and rapidly.
Fuck this.
“We will speak to you after I get her cleaned up and she has eaten, and not a second sooner. Janice and Brian won’t disappear while she takes care of her needs.”