Cam came upon Suzette in the living room as she was talking on the phone. He imagined she got pretty good tips because she was one hot woman. She had a curvy little ass that kept drawing his eye, and her teeny tiny titties were novel and kind of adorable. With her brown hair up in a messy ponytail, he could see a small tattoo of a dewy pink rosebud at the nape of her neck, a neck that looked very lickable.
A text came in from Max. Did the maid show up yet? What color lingerie is she wearing?
“So,” Suzette said to him, drawing his attention away from his phone. “I’m cleared to stay.”
“Thank God,” he said. “You have no idea how much I appreciate this.”
His phone rang. It was Max, of course.
“I want to come over and see her,” Max said by way of a greeting.
“Hello to you too,” Cam said.
“Is she pretty?” Max asked. “Because not all of the Eye Candy girls are.”
“No, she’s beautiful.”
At that, Suzette turned to him a question in her eyes.
“Er, my buddy—the one who, er, arranged for you to come over wants to meet you.”
She shook her head. “That’s strictly forbidden in the contract you were supposed to read. You still haven’t read it?”
Cam gave her a rueful shrug.
“Send me a picture,” Max said. “I don’t believe you.”
“Now he wants a picture.”
Suzette shook her head again. “No way,” she said, directing her voice toward his phone. “Pictures aren’t allowed either.”
“Let me talk to her,” Max said.
“He wants to talk to you,” Cam said.
Apparently amused, Suzette held her hand out and took the phone. She and Max spoke quietly for a minute or so, then she said good-bye and hung up.
“Well?” Cam said.
“Okay. One picture that is not to be shared with anyone but Max.”
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea. You don’t know him like I know him. He’s a total Instagram and Twitter whore and will do anything for likes.”
Dakota shrugged. “Yes, he told me. So number one, he gave me his word he wouldn’t share it and I told him I was going to check his social media and make sure. Number two, we’re going to take it from the back so I can’t be identified. And number three, he promised to schedule me two hours a week for the next month.”
Cam obviously couldn’t tell Suzette what to do, but Max could be a sexist jerk and even though she was the one who chose to be a sexy maid, Cam didn’t like the idea of Max ogling her like a piece of meat. He still took the photo. Suzette insisted because she wanted a new profile picture for the Eye Candy Maid website.
After he sent the chosen picture to Suzette’s phone, she headed for the kitchen to start on the floors. “You stay in there and start picking stuff up in there. Maybe start with the dog toys.”
Drumming up some much needed motivation, he surveyed the living room. He hadn’t really noticed how many dog toys there were on the floor and on the furniture. The more he looked around the more he realized some of this stuff wasn’t even his. It was junk left by guests. Jackets, sunglasses, shoes and other articles of clothing.
He went to the kitchen where she was going at the floor with a scrubbing brush he didn’t know he owned and a bucket of soapy water. Oddly, it was an intensely provocative sight. Sure, she was cleaning his floor, but her ass looked great and the rhythmic motion of her scrubbing was suggestive. He forced his gaze away.
“Done already?” she asked without pausing in her task.
He stepped behind the counter, just in case she glanced back. He did not want to get caught with a partial erection.
“Not quite. I know I’m supposed to pick them up, can you tell me what to do with them after that?”
“Putting them away would be a good idea,” she said, continuing with her scrubbing.
“Put them away, where?”
Stopping, she blinked at him. “You don’t have a designated place for them? A box, a drawer, a plastic bin?”
He shook his head, feeling stupid. He knew this was something people did—have places for things to go. He just didn’t do it.
She got to her feet. There were dirty smudges on her stockings where she’d been kneeling.
“Let’s use that,” she said, walking over to a gift basket that had long ago been cleaned out of all the good stuff. All that was left was a package of tea, some chili-dusted mixed nuts and a wine glass. “Do you want any of this stuff?”
“No.”
She dumped it in a trash bag, then handed him the basket. “Put all the toys you want to keep in here. The rest go in the trash.”
Her tone was commanding and he imagined this was the same tone she used with her little niece. Oddly, he didn’t mind. She was helping him after all and what she said made sense. How she knew he had too many dog toys, he had no idea. However, culling them proved to be difficult. As he walked through the house collecting the toys, he didn’t see any that he wanted to throw in the garbage. Some of them seemed practically new. When he returned to the kitchen again, his basket overflowing, he saw she’d finished the floor and was organizing his refrigerator.
“It smells in there,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “That means there is or was something rotten and we have to get rid of it.”
“Yeah, good idea. The video people always look in the fridge so the fans can see what we eat and drink. And it always looks all organized.”
Touching rotten food was right near the top of his “Disgusting Things I Avoid” list. He had no problem throwing down the gloves with anyone in the league, splitting a lip or an eyebrow or breaking a finger or even losing teeth. He would ride that fucking VO2 endurance bike until he threw up. But slimy things in his fridge freaked him the fuck out.
“Did you get rid of any toys at all?” she asked, nodding toward his basket.
He winced. “I just hate the idea of them going into the trash. It seems like such a waste.”
“Then donate them to a dog shelter,” she said, fishing out a package of hot dogs that were a color no hot dog should ever be. “I bet they could use them.”
He brightened. “Hey, that’s a great idea. Thanks.”
Her suggestion actually made it a lot easier to separate the toys. Five minutes later, the basket held about ten of his dogs’ favorites. All the rest he put into a bag for the shelter.
It turned out that wasn’t the only brilliant idea Suzette had. She’d surmised that one of the reasons he was so messy was because he didn’t have a system for storing things.
“There was a sock in your silverware drawer, a soccer ball and a bottle of deodorant in your pantry and two six-packs of Red Bull in the foyer. Did you ever hear the saying ‘A place for everything and everything in its place’?”
“Yes, but I never really thought about it as a lifestyle.”
“Holy crap. Well, you should,” she said. “Otherwise everything we do today will be undone in under a week.”
“That’s okay with me,” he said. “I’m never going to have a film crew in here again.”
“Really, dude? Really? I’m busting my ass today to make your house look gorgeous and you don’t give a crap if it’s all destroyed a few days later?” She frowned at him. “You should have pride in your home. It’s so beautiful—at least it will be when we’re done with it. It’s as much a part of you as…as your slapshot.”
“You’re a hockey fan,” he said, more pleased about this than he should have been.
“Not really. But I know hockey has slapshots.”
He felt like a kid whose balloon had just been popped. Damn.
Hours later, his trash bin was overflowing but he was extremely pleased with the results. He’d worked his tail off, putting stuff away. Granted, a lot of it was stuffed in the mother-in-law suite above the attached garage but while the film crew was here, he would just tell them that room was off limits.
“If my friend Max saw this place right now—the one who arranged this whole thing—he’d shit his pants. Thank you, Suzette. You are a miracle worker.”
“You aren’t too bad yourself. If you just applied yourself to keeping…” She smiled. “Never mind. It’s hard to teach an old dog new tricks.”
“Hey, I’m only twenty-eight.”
Smiling, she shook her head. “Like I said.”
“It doesn’t matter anyway,” he said. “Because I wouldn’t mind making this a regular deal. In fact, I’ll just take over the hours Max was going to use you, except we won’t stop after a month.”
“I’m fine with coming every week.” She pulled out a business card and handed it to him. “Call Gwen and she’ll set it up, but I’m still going to clean for your friend. I need the money.”
After Suzette left, Cam surveyed his domain and smiled. The place hadn’t looked this good since…well, ever.