Men For Hire (17 page)

Chapter Three

W
hen Jennifer walked wearily through her front door later that evening, she started. There was a smell of food coming from the kitchen.

What on earth?

Usually, she came home to an empty house. She was lucky if Rob managed to make it home before she went to bed.

“Is that you, Jen?”

Oh my God. I forgot to contact Rob.

She suddenly felt faint and leaned back against the door until her vision cleared. It had been her intention to call him immediately after that idiot, Gemma, had told her she sent the email, but it went clean out of her head when a very demanding client had phoned to complain about the man they requested not turning up. Jennifer winced. It had probably been because the client was the bitch from hell, but she was a regular client, so Jennifer couldn’t afford to turn her custom down and had spent the rest of the morning ringing around trying to find someone who was available immediately to walk Mrs. Glenn’s four dogs. To her frustration, everyone was booked up—or, at least, unwilling to do the job!

In the end, Jennifer had dashed out of the office and did the job herself, leaving Gemma to try to find a replacement for the following day. The dogs had been very unruly, causing her to trip over at one point and ladder her tights—which were now in the bin. Of course, a tight skirt suit and high heels were not the best clothes in which to walk dogs, but she did as needs must.

Hesitantly walking down the corridor, she summoned up the courage to confront her husband and apologize. Well, grovel.

Rob was standing at the counter wearing a frilly apron. Jennifer drank in the sight of her own husband—tall, if slender, dark-haired, with a wicked sense of humor. She then noticed the state of the kitchen. There were dishes everywhere as if he had used every piece of crockery and cutlery they owned, not to mention every pan. He turned with a smile on his face holding plates of steaming food. It looked like a risotto of some sort.

“Excellent, you’re home on time. As requested, I have taken a week’s leave, although I was due some anyway, and have made you a delicious meal. That’s what you meant by ‘marital duties,’ isn’t it?” He moved away to put the plates on the table and sat down, still wearing the apron.

Jennifer stood for a moment unable to comprehend the situation. Was he not angry after all? She frowned staring at the back of his head, curious about his rather innocent tone of voice. Well, he was home early. From the sound of it, he had taken some time off. And, quite amazingly, he had even cooked her a meal.

He waved her to her seat. “Come on, darling. Eat it before it gets cold.”

She smiled and sauntered slowly to the table, undoing her top two blouse buttons as she moved. Jennifer stroked Rob’s neck as she passed, lingering on his shoulder, hoping he would snake an arm out to hug her close, slightly disappointed when he didn’t. She sat down. “So, you’re not upset about the email my assistant sent? Which was a mistake, by the way. I never meant her to actually send it—or even to see it. It was a silly joke.”

Rob leaned over and gave her a quick peck on the lips. Nothing more than one would get from a family member and certainly nothing to arouse her, before he went back to his own meal. She narrowed her eyes. He seemed to be avoiding her eyes.

“Of course, I wasn’t angry. I quite understand. I’ve been neglecting things around the house lately. This gives me the perfect opportunity to do them.”

She considered him a moment. His smile seemed a little too bright. Noticing that she was not eating, he gestured at her food.

“Eat, eat. It’s delicious, even if I say so myself.”

She ignored the voice in her head that said, “He’s up to something,” and leant her elbows on the table. It rocked a little.

“Ah. Sorry about that. I was going to mend it, but I couldn’t find the tools.”

Jennifer chuckled. In all the time she’d known him, she couldn’t remember Rob ever using a screwdriver. She stood up, reaching into a drawer to pull out the tool and quickly tightened the loose screw, pushing at the table to affirm its steadiness.

“There. All done.” She sat down again.

“Terrific. Now, what do you think of the sauce on this dish? I used the recipe book your mother gave us last Christmas after she complained that we always seemed to buy ready-made meals.”

She made a face at that memory, even if it was true. Cooking a meal from scratch wasn’t something either of them did very often. Probably because they were so busy, they didn’t want to spend the evening a slave to the kitchen.

Taking a mouthful, there was one thing for sure. It certainly was wonderful. She wondered how long he’d been home.

They spent the rest of the meal calmly chatting about the food. Whenever she got the chance, Jennifer stroked her hand over his arm or face, brushing away a crumb from his lips, even squeezing his thigh at one stage, and got an enigmatic smile from him every time she did. She was
soooo
looking forward to that evening.

As they finished their meal and Jennifer stood up, her excitement rising within her at what the rest of the evening would bring.

“No, leave the dishes. I’ll do them.” He started to usher her out of the kitchen. It startled her. It hadn’t been her intention to do them at all but leave them until the next day.

Jennifer wrapped her arms around his waist. “Shall we ignore them and clean up in the morning?”

He unwrapped her arms and pushed her upright. “Absolutely not. You wanted me to do more jobs around the house, so go and rest in the lounge while I clear away.”

Well, that wasn’t exactly what she wanted him to do at all, but she grinned and grabbing their wine glasses, Jennifer took them into the other room. Throwing her jacket onto the chair, she slipped her shoes off, undid a few more buttons and lay full-length on the sofa. Pulling her skirt further up her thighs, she tried to appear enticing as she listened to Rob humming in the kitchen, as he clattered about cleaning up as he said he would.

She closed her eyes, finally beginning to relax, glad that he wasn’t angry about the ‘job.’

* * * *

When she woke up some hours later, her neck was stiff.

“Ouch.” It was dark outside. The only light was from the table lamp. Stumbling to the door, she looked up and down the hall corridor. Where was Rob?

A quick glance showed her the kitchen was in darkness so Jennifer swiftly climbed the stairs and frowned when the upstairs rooms appeared to be equally dark.

“Where the hell is he?”

Walking into their bedroom, she came to a sudden halt. Rob was fast asleep—and snoring—in their bed!

Jennifer groaned.

Damn him
!

She bit her lip as she debated waking him up but knew he never ‘got it up’ when he was awoken by someone or something, so she sighed and walked wearily into the bathroom.

“Never mind,” she said to herself in the mirror. “There is still the rest of the week. I’ll take tomorrow off and we can have a lie-in.” Waving her toothbrush at her reflection, she continued, “And I don’t mean lie-in as ‘get more sleep.’”

Chapter Four

R
ob grinned. All week he had watched Jennifer get more and more frustrated going to bed before him as he finished off his household duties.

He thought back to his activities earlier in the week and idly rubbed his backside. The day after he’d been sent the job contract, he had to persuade her to go to work saying he intended to clean the house from top to bottom. The look on her face when he escorted her to the bathroom to get ready for work, closing the door in her face, had been a picture of astonishment. So much so, he’d had to hold back the belly-aching laughter that came over him.

She clearly didn’t believe him as she had a suspicious look on her face throughout breakfast and only when he pulled the vacuum cleaner out of the cupboard did she give a huff and stomp out of the house.

Running into the front room, he surreptitiously peered through the window, watching her walk quickly down the path, slamming the gate shut as she strode to the station to catch the train into town. She was so beautiful when she was angry.

Great! He ignored the cleaner and wandered into the kitchen, calmly making a cup of coffee, drinking it as he read the newspaper. He could get used to this lifestyle!

It was some time later when he put down the paper.

“I suppose being a ‘house husband’ I should do the cleaning I promised.”

He hadn’t quite anticipated it being so exhausting lugging the vacuum cleaner up the stairs.
Surely there must be easier ways of doing this?

Jennifer arrived home when he was clearing out the cupboard under the stairs where everything that didn’t have a home got thrown in. It was all in a heap in the corridor when she arrived. Rob has been so intent on untangling some string that got bound around a basket he hadn’t realized she was there until he felt a sting on his backside.

Sitting back abruptly and clasping his hurt butt, he looked up and saw her smiling at him.

“Sorry, darling. Couldn’t resist it. Such a wonderful bottom. I was tempted.”

Rob huffed. Well, he’d done it often enough to her—particularly when they were first married. Any other time, he would tackle her to the floor and have sex in the hallway, regardless of potential visitors looking through the glass. He sighed.

Meanwhile, Jennifer peered around the cupboard door to see what he was up to. “Whatever are you doing, Rob? It looks like you’ve got out everything we own and thrown it along the corridor.”

“This cupboard is a total and utter mess. I decided it needed clearing out.”

She laughed. “Okay. But where are you going to put it all? It will have to go back in there afterward.”

Rob kept a grin off his face. He knew this, but it was part of his plan to keep her off guard and give a reason why he couldn’t just jump into bed with her—even though he really wanted to. “Why do we keep such stuff?”

“Well, looks like most of it is yours.”

That’s true. There was his garden equipment, his fishing rod, his stack of motoring magazines, amongst others.

Her laughter didn’t last long when he sighed. “Too true. It’s going to take me all evening to sort it out.” And he made sure it did take him all evening while Jennifer took a bath. Actually, he envied her and considered giving up his plans and join her.

Instead, he kept to his original idea, even telling her after her bath, that there was salad and cold meat in the fridge for her dinner. Rob knew she’d hate eating alone so he had deliberately had his meal earlier. Meanwhile, he continued to ignore her and worked his way deeper into the cupboard.

He heard her turn on her heel, making her way into the kitchen for a lonely meal. He waited until she went to bed later, declaring she was having an early night, before he wearily stood up, threw everything back in the cupboard haphazardly, and took himself off to the bathroom to soak his aching back. It was a long soak.

The next day, he was in the study at the computer with papers strewn all over the room when she came home.

“What on earth are you doing now?”

This time he had heard her enter so her arrival in the room wasn’t a surprise. Rob decided to tease her a little and pulled her onto his lap. Jennifer squealed, but was silenced when he gave her a kiss. He only intended it to be quick, but once he got his lips over hers and felt their usual spark, he couldn’t help himself. His tongue pushed into her mouth relishing the taste of Jennifer that he loved so much. Rob knew he was in trouble and finished it quickly.

“Hmm, what did you say, darling? Oh, I’m updating our accounts. I hadn’t realized we’d got so far behind.” Rob abruptly pushed her off his lap, not looking up at her face in case he gave in. “Dinner is in the oven. Don’t think I’ll be finished anytime soon.”

It hadn’t actually taken him too long to finish the accounts earlier, although it took a while to gather every bill and receipt from various places around the house. Nope. He’d spent much of the day reading each and every one of his old magazines. About an hour before he expected her home he had artfully placed all the paperwork around the study, trying to make it look like it was utter chaos, even taking some older items out of the filing cabinet, nodding at the wonderful display it made.

She stood for a moment. He saw out of the corner of his eye, her expression of shock and her hands clenching into fists.

“Oh before you go, I can’t get the printer to work.”

Jennifer gave a slight growl and stormed over to the faulty machine, and angrily flipped the switch off.

Rob looked up. “Why did you do that?”

She gave him a look and turned it back on. It stirred to life. “Turning it on and off usually works. Some things work better if you do it both ways rather than keep it off constantly, or even keeping it on all the time.”

Struggling not to laugh, Rob managed to give her a look of astonishment as Jennifer’s face tightened and she left the room unable to contain her anger.

Day four of his plan went just as well. Having spent the morning enjoying himself working in the garden, he deliberately made a mess in the kitchen leaving compost and plant pots all over the table and muddy footprints down the corridor and up the stairs. Although he sighed when he remembered, he would have to get the vacuum out again to clean it up afterward.

His strategy was for her to find him in the bathroom installing a new showerhead that he’d bought, the old one being clogged up with limescale. But when she came into the bathroom he was wrestling with the showerhead unable to get it off.

“What the hell is going on, Rob? The place looks like a bomb has hit it.”

“Oh yes. I was doing some gardening and decided to take a shower but forgot the head was full of limescale so I went out to the DIY shop to get another, but I can’t find a spanner to change it.”

She growled at him. “It’s in the fucking toolbox in the cupboard under the bloody stairs. Or did you throw it out when you decided to clear out the damn place?”