by Lynsay Sands
“Who’s a pretty puppy?”
Letting the door ease silently closed, he locked it and then started up the hall, passing the open door to the bathroom on the right and the closet on the left before the hall opened up to a large open space with the kitchen and dining area on his right and the living room on the left, both ending at a large wall of windows. What the building lacked in windows on the main floor, it made up for on the third and fourth floors. His apartment was one of two on the fourth floor. High, plate glass windows made up the outer wall here and in all the other apartments in the building. It made for a light, airy atmosphere that he usually enjoyed. But at the moment, he paid the view and the lighting little attention. Instead, his gaze found and fixed on the woman and dog in the open area between the gas fireplace and the coffee table in front of the couch.
H.D. was lying on his back on the large three-foot round dog bed. Ildaria was on her elbows and knees, her arm backs flat on the dog bed, cocooning H.D. between them, as she cooed, “Who’s a pretty puppy?” She then leaned down to nuzzle the happy dog around the cheeks and neck, then gave him a smacking kiss on his chest between his front legs before raising up to coo again, “Who’s a pretty puppy?”
H.D. was wriggling ecstatically, rolling his head from side to side with delight, and Ildaria’s bottom was waving about as she moved, her skirt pulled tight over her gorgeous butt.
G.G. had the mad urge to rush over, drop onto the floor before her and say, “I am, I’m a pretty puppy.” And beg her to hold and nuzzle him that way. Instead, he simply stood, watching her repeat the routine one final time, and then she ducked her head to nuzzle and kiss H.D. before scooping him up and suddenly rolling onto her back, taking H.D. with her so that he landed with his body on her chest and his face above hers. H.D. immediately set to licking her face with eager excitement, and Ildaria laughed and twisted her neck from side to side to keep him from getting her nose or mouth with his little, wet tongue. Her body was rolling back and forth during this exercise, her legs shifting and her pencil skirt sliding up her legs a bit more with each movement.
G.G. was watching its slow ride upward with breathless anticipation when H.D. suddenly stilled, his head jerking in his direction like a heat-seeking missile finding its target. In the next moment, the dog abandoned Ildaria with one leaping bound and raced toward G.G., ears flopping and fluffy tail wagging.
Disappointment pinched G.G. at the end to the game he’d been watching, but he forced it back and managed a smile as he knelt to greet his dog.
“Hey, buddy. Did you have a good night with Ildaria? Hmm?” he asked lightly, scooping up the little fur ball and cuddling and petting him as he straightened. His gaze slid back to Ildaria to find that she was on her feet, her skirt dropping to cover her shapely legs as she tugged her blouse back into place and then reached up to check her hair.
The neat bun she’d arrived in and managed to keep for the first eight hours that she’d worked in his office, had loosened and fallen. Most of her hair was a long black wave, ending at the part still caught in the knot. Grimacing, she tugged the fastener loose and let her hair fall free. She then moved toward him in a relaxed walk, a smile claiming her lips.
“All done for the night?”
“Yeah.” Hearing the husky sound to his voice, G.G. cleared his throat and nodded. “All done.”
“Great.” She beamed at him brightly and moved past him, giving H.D. a pat on the head. “I guess I’ll head back to Marguerite’s then. He was good, by the way. Didn’t eat a single thing he shouldn’t, or get into any trouble. What time do you want me back tomorrow?”
G.G. turned, watching as she scooped up her shoes, and bent to slip on one then the other. They were damned sexy shoes with a little black bow on each heel that he hadn’t noticed earlier.
“G.G.?”
He liked the way the nickname sounded on her lips, kind of husky and sweet. Then he realized she was waiting for an answer, and cleared his throat again. “The club doesn’t open until sunset. Half an hour before that is fine. I only had you come in early today so I could give you some pointers on the bookkeeping. But I can keep H.D. with me until the club opens.”
“Awesome.” She gave him a brilliant smile. “That means I have time for a nap before I go apartment hunting.”
“Apartment hunting?” His gaze had dropped to her legs and feet in the pretty little shoes again, but he lifted it back to her face with interest.
“Well, I can’t stay with Marguerite and Julius forever,” she pointed out with a wry smile. “I’ve felt guilty staying with them at all. And that’s on me, not because they’ve acted like I’m a burden,” she assured him, as if he might believe Marguerite had made her feel unwelcome. “They’ve been really kind, but I’m not used to depending on others. Fortunately, now that I have not one, but two full-time jobs, I don’t have to. I can use the money I’ve saved up for first and last months’ rent and save the money for my tuition out of my wages.” She shrugged. “So I’ll take a nap and then get up and start searching the internet for apartments.”
“Or you could stay here.” The words were out of his mouth before his brain could filter them. But when she stood with her mouth open, her eyes blinking in surprise, he mentally reviewed what he’d said and quickly added, “I mean in the building. This is one of four apartments above the club. There are two on the third floor and two on this floor. Sofia—she works the bar,” he paused to explain before continuing, “She has one of the apartments on the third floor, and I’m the only one on this floor. There are still two apartments available, one on each floor. I expected one of them would go to the bookkeeper and the other to the dog sitter if they didn’t already have a place in the city. But—” He shrugged wryly and pointed out, “You’re both the dog sitter and the bookkeeper so get your choice of apartments.”
When she didn’t respond right away, he added, “H.D.’s last sitter was mortal. I couldn’t find an immortal to do it, and had to make do with a mortal. Fortunately, she already lived in the city because I wouldn’t have been comfortable with offering her an apartment here. It was risky even having her around the building, but I was desperate. I did make it clear she was never to step foot in the Night Club though.”
He paused briefly, but her continued silence made him add, “Living here would solve your apartment problem, and the rent is cheap. Also, you wouldn’t need to commute to work, just head downstairs, and if an emergency crops up you’ll be nearby, and . . .” He let his voice trail away, not for lack of excuses to move her into the building, but because he realized he was yapping. G.G. wasn’t a yapper. Usually. He was a listener. Women loved to talk and he was always happy to listen. They revealed so much about themselves when talking and he’d always found women fascinating.
“Si, it would be handy,” Ildaria agreed finally, a small smile playing on her lips, and he could feel the wide, probably goofy smile, stretching his own lips. Damn, this woman affected him oddly.
“Well, can I see them?” she asked finally when a full minute had passed in silence.
“Oh, yes, of course,” he muttered, realizing while he’d stood there gaping at her, she’d been waiting for him to make the offer. Turning, he hurried into the kitchen to grab the keys to the empty apartments.
Rejoining her in the hall, he shifted H.D. under one arm and unlocked his apartment door, then held it for her to precede him into the corridor.
“As you know the Night Club takes up the first two floors of the building, but there are also a storage room and laundry room for the club on the third floor. So the two apartments there are smaller with just one bedroom each. The apartments on this floor are much larger and nicer and have two bedrooms each. Sofia was already in one of the third floor apartments when I took over the place. I offered her the chance to move up to the other larger apartment on this floor, but she didn’t want the hassle of moving,” he explained and then added, “Sofia usually works behind the bar. I think you met her tonight. Well, last nigh
t now,” he corrected, remembering that it was now morning. Working the hours that he did, it was hard to keep the days straight at times. To him, this was still yesterday and would be until he went to bed. For the rest of the world, it was already a new day.
“Si,” Ildaria said, distracting him from his thoughts. He could hear the smile in her voice as she added, “Sofia introduced herself to me. So did the other servers in the club; Char, Ruby, Ryia, Rowan, and Elijah. They all seemed nice.”
“Yeah. They are, and good at their jobs too,” G.G. said as he led her across the hall to the second apartment. As he unlocked that door, he added, “Lucern was good at choosing employees. Sofia is the only one who lives in the building though. She’s basically the manager. Runs the place when I’m not here and so on. The rest of the servers all share a house nearby. And, here we are,” he said as the door swung open.
Stepping aside, he let her enter and then followed, absently rubbing H.D. under the chin as he glanced around the large open space, trying to see what she was seeing and hoping she liked it.
“It’s huge. As big as your place,” Ildaria said with amazement as she looked around the living room area and the kitchen.
“Yeah. It’s the same size, the mirror image of my apartment,” he murmured, absently setting H.D. down when the dog kicked his feet, making it known he wanted to explore.
“Oh, G.G., it’s beautiful,” she breathed, staring at the wall of windows, before turning to move up the short hall to inspect the bedrooms.
He smiled wryly at the claim. It was a huge empty room really. Although there were appliances in the kitchen, a long island separating it from the living room, a fireplace in the living room, and a stacked washer and drier in a closet in the hall to the bedrooms. But other than that, it was an empty space waiting to be filled. Not what he would call beautiful.
“I couldn’t possibly afford this,” Ildaria said a moment later as she came back into the living room. She was shaking her head, her expression full of regret. “I mean, this place must cost an arm and a leg, and while you’re going to be paying me well . . .” She sighed unhappily. “If I didn’t need to finish my degree, I could afford it. But I have to—”
“I give employees a cut rate,” he said quickly, and it wasn’t a lie. He’d left Sofia’s rent at the same low rate it had been before he’d taken over the Night Club. And the house the others lived in was part of the Night Club sale. He’d left that rent alone too even though the rental rates for both the apartments and the house were probably a quarter of what he could get if he rented to mortals. But having mortals coming and going from the building that housed the Night Club was not a smart idea. Besides, happy employees were good employees to his mind, and giving them a safe, low priced place to live went a long way toward making them happy. So, G.G. told her the amount Sofia paid, added fifty bucks to it for the extra bedroom, and then held his breath, waiting for her decision. For some reason, he really, really wanted her to live in this apartment.
“You’re kidding?” she asked with disbelief. “That’s all?”
“That’s it,” he assured her.
Ildaria bit her lip and peered around the apartment silently, but then murmured, “I suppose I should at least look at the one-bedroom too.”
“Of course,” he said at once, and then on inspiration added, “I just thought this way you’d have a spare room for Vasco, or Jess and Raffaele to stay in if you wanted them to visit.”
That made her pause and her eyes widen, as she no doubt considered being able to invite people to visit. He was pretty sure she was struggling between fiscal responsibility—i.e. taking the less expensive one-bedroom apartment—and the freedom to have people over which was only fifty dollars more a month. Feeling oddly desperate to have her on this floor with him, he reminded her, “And I of course, will pay your university tuition now that you’re working for me.”
Ildaria had started to turn to survey the apartment again, but swung back at that, eyes wide and mouth agape. “What?”
“I pay half the tuition for the courses any of my employees want whether at college or university or just Dale Carnegie or something,” he informed her. “Both here and in the UK. In fact, Elijah’s taking courses at the university right now and I paid half his tuition.”
Ildaria frowned. “So you’d pay half mine too?”
“All of it,” he corrected. “I’d pay your full tuition.”
Ildaria had started to shake her head before he finished speaking. “Half is one thing if you do that with all your employees, but why would you offer to pay the full ride for me?”
“It’s a smart business move,” he assured her. “I was desperate for an accountant. I’ve been looking for one since the day I bought this place. Now that I’ve found you, I want you to keep working for me after you get your degree, not run off to work somewhere else,” he said, and that was the truth, but only part of it. He was desperate for an accountant, but he was also oddly desperate to have her live here, close to him, where he could see her every day, even on days she wasn’t working, and G.G. wasn’t sure why. At least . . . well, obviously he liked her. He liked that she cared enough about her friends that one of them being attacked had made her go vigilante. He liked that after being pulled from Montana and dragged down here, she’d risked getting in further trouble to help strangers in peril. And he respected her like hell for taking responsibility for her own actions and accepting the punishment for them rather than trying to blame someone else.
G.G. also liked her determination to get the education she wanted. A lot of people would have given up after being pulled from the same classes for the second time and losing the money they’d worked hard for and invested in those classes, but she was already signed up for the next semester. Angelina Ildaria Sophia Lupita Garcia Pimienta was smart, and brave and determined and he liked her. In fact, he already liked and respected her more than every one of the women he’d dated over the years.
Which was scary as hell when he thought about it. Ildaria was an immortal, and G.G. was a mortal who had no intention of turning. This could not end well.
Pushing that worry aside, he finished what he’d been saying by pointing out, “Many companies pay for upgrading skills or degrees of their employees. I’m happy to pay your full tuition.”
Ildaria bit her lip briefly, obviously considering the offer. But in the end she said, “Thank you, but no. I probably will continue to work for you after I get my degree. So far, it seems like a great working environment, but no. I’ll pay for my own education. All of it.” She hesitated and then added almost apologetically, “It’s something I have to do myself. A pride thing. I hope you understand.”
G.G. nodded slowly, getting it. It had been important to him to pay his parents back for the Night Club in England. He’d wanted to succeed on his own and suspected she felt much the same way. “Yeah. I understand.”
She relaxed and smiled as she added, “But I will take this apartment and not the one-bedroom. With what you’re paying me, I can afford it. In fact, it is much less than I expected to have to pay for an apartment. Less even than I thought I’d have to pay to share an apartment with someone. And it would be nice to be able to invite Jess and Raffaele here to visit.”
He noticed that she didn’t mention Vasco, and wondered about it, but before he could ponder it too hard, Ildaria said, “Well then, it looks like I don’t have to search for an apartment after all.” Grinning, she asked, “When can I move in?”
“Whenever you want. Here are the keys,” he said, unhooking this apartment’s key ring from the larger ring and offering them to her. “Bring some stuff back with you tonight, or hire a truck when you can to bring it all.”
“Thank you,” she said sincerely as she took the keys. “I’ll bring a cashier’s check for first and last months’ rent when I return tonight.”
G.G. shook his head. “Use that to buy furniture or anything else you might need. I’ll take first and last out of your first paycheck. Pa
yday is every two weeks, by the way.”
“Oh.” She beamed and then frowned by turn, and headed for the door, muttering, “I need to go shopping.”
G.G. smiled to himself and then glanced to where H.D. was nosing his way around the room. He whistled for the dog to come, and then followed Ildaria out of the apartment, the little fur ball chasing after him.
“You cannot sleep on a sleeping bag,” Marguerite said with exasperation. “Take your bed. It can be my housewarming gift to you.”
“That’s so sweet, Marguerite. But I bought a new bed on my way home,” Ildaria assured her. After hitting the furniture store for a new bed . . . well, really just a mattress and box spring, Ildaria had hit the dollar store as well as JYSK and Walmart to pick up a set of dishes, silverware, glasses, and cooking utensils. Everything she’d bought was on sale or pretty cheap to begin with and it would all do her just fine. Ildaria had also purchased towels, sheets, pillows, and a comforter, as well as toilet paper, and various kitchen items. Cheap as each item had been, in the end she’d spent a lot of money. It was amazing how quickly you went through money when having to furnish an apartment. She’d had nothing of her own to take except for her clothes and the small thirty-two-inch television she’d bought while in Montana. She’d purchased it for her bedroom there so that Jess and Raffaele could have the living room to themselves some nights. She’d brought it with her when she’d moved to Canada.
Ildaria still needed a couch, chairs, a dining room set, etc. But she’d get all that as she could. Sleep was the most important thing. She needed to be well rested for working with numbers. And really, she could sit and relax in bed until she had everything else, Ildaria thought and then noticed the concentration on Marguerite’s face, and realized the older woman was reading her mind. Marguerite obviously didn’t believe she’d bought a bed. Probably because she’d asked to borrow the sleeping bag, foolishly mentioning she planned to sleep on it.