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“All right, the truth is, I want to be alone with you.” She let her gaze drift out the window to the ocean.
He looked sideways. “Be alone with me for what reason?”
“Use your imagination.”
“You’re serious?”
“Do I have to write it on the wall?”
He propped himself up and pulled back the covers, patting the mattress.
“No, I’m going to put breakfast on the table while you take a bath,” she said.
“I bathed last night.”
“You could use another one. A shave as well.”
He rubbed the stubble on his jaw. “Whatever makes you happy.”
She went into the kitchen and scraped pots and skillets on the stove until she heard the water running in the master bathroom. Then she called the hardware and building-supply store. “This is Mrs. Levy. I have an order on hold. I’d like you to deliver it now. Do you know where Mr. Arnold Beckman’s residence is? Would you set it on the back steps, please? You’re so kind.”
She set the table, making noise with the plates and knives and forks and crystal glasses, then brought coffee on a silver service to Arnold’s bathroom. He had just finished shaving and was seated in the tub, hot water pouring out of the gold-plated faucet, a bottle of bubble bath resting sideways in the soap dish.
“I fixed you café au lait, the way they do it in New Orleans,” she said.
“How much did I drink last night?” he said, taking the cup from the tray.
“You were a bit on the grog. It wasn’t a problem.” She glanced at the surface of the bathwater. “You’re showing. Let’s put a little more bubbly in.”
“Why should one be ashamed of his or her endowment? H
op in. The water is fine.”
When she didn’t answer, he drank his cup empty and held it out for a refill. “You wouldn’t try to put one over on me, would you, Maggie?”
“If that’s what you think, I’ll go.”
“You’re a practical woman. You have to look out for yourself. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
“I need a job. There are a lot of things I do well. Your strongest attributes are your confidence and your personal strength, Arnold. That’s what every woman wants in a man, even though she may not admit it. No man should ever underestimate a woman’s secret need.”
“Are you broke?”
“No. Do I want more money than I have? Guess.”
He smiled and scratched the corner of his eye. His skin was bronze and running with sweat, his knife scars as slick as snakes. “Wash my stomach?”
“Wash it yourself. And stop acting like an adolescent.”
“That’s my girl.”
She rolled a towel into a pad and placed it on the back rim of the tub. “Lean back and close your eyes.”
“What did I drink at the amusement pier?”
“A champagne cocktail or two. Or maybe three.”
“I must have had ten,” he said. “My head is hammering.”
