“Come inside, spinster, and get dressed. And then you can tell me what you think I ought to do with the house.”
She nodded. “Swimming has relaxed my brain. The ideas are bound to flow.”
Using the downstairs bathroom, she showered while he showered and shaved upstairs. He met her in the breakfast room off the kitchen, where she had decided to linger for a view of the lovely garden.
She turned when she heard him behind her. “I’m wondering how attached you are to your white furniture?”
He pulled out a chair at the table for her. “Not at all. Mercia chose it.” Whenever he said Mercia, his face closed off.
She understood that he loved and missed his wife and that she would only be a comfortable substitute sex partner, but after all that had happened last night and this morning she didn’t want to be reminded. “Well, starting on the hall—I think you ought to keep the marble tiling. This house had marble floors there originally because the hall used to be used as a reception room when the Reynolds had balls. Color on the walls would warm the area, and rugs on the floor. I love the Persian rugs you have in your study. That sort of thing would be nice. And a few paintings.”
He nodded. “What do you think of the study?”
“I think it’s perfect. I wouldn’t change anything there. In the rest of the house, you have a lot of white furniture. It’s lovely, but your idea of adding a few antiques would make the house look more relaxed.” She looked away, not wanting to criticize Mercia’s taste, but Hagen had asked for a change and a change he would have with Marigold’s input or without.
“What about my bedroom?”
“The same. We could go to auctions to choose the furniture. Or save time rather than money and use an antique dealer. If you get rid of some of the white furniture, what do you plan to do with it?”
He shrugged. “Donate it to charity.”
“What about Mercia’s family? Would they like keepsakes?”
“I hadn’t thought of that. Good idea. I could ring around and find out.” Keeping his gaze on hers, he dragged his phone out of his pocket. “I have her parents’ number—and her brother’s number.”
“You don’t waste time, do you, when you have a plan?”
He offered a lazy grin. “No. My motto is do it now. Good morning, Eddie, Hagen here. Yes, yes, I’m well. I was wondering if you or any other member of your family would like something to remember Mercia?”
He listened. “I was thinking furniture. The white pieces.”
He nodded. “I remembered you liked the dining room, the table and chairs, the dresser. If you come and get them, they’re yours.”
He glanced at Marigold. “No. I think her things should go to her family, the cabinets, the hall table, the chandeliers, mirrors. Her bed. Whatever you like. Could you do me a favor and arrange this with the rest of your family?”
He stared at his fingers on the table. “I’m sure you understand why I don’t think I should keep her furniture, Eddie.” He sounded stiff. Eddie spoke. Hagen moistened his lips. “It’s only right.”
He nodded again. “Let me know, Eddie. Bye. Done,” he said to Marigold. He threaded his fingers together across his upper chest and leaned back in the chair. “Do you want to do a little antique shopping after lunch?”
She glanced at him, surprised. “Do it now,” she quoted. “Do they want everything?”
“They’ll take everything and work out what to do with it.”
“You made it sound as if it’s their duty to take it.”
“Well done, me. Look, if I had sent it to a charity, they never would have known. If they know a worthy cause or if they want it, it lets me off the hook.” He sounded hard, and she wondered about his relationship with his wife’s family.
“Don’t you like them?”
“They’re good people but not my relations any longer.”
Which told her nothing at all. “So, lunch. Do you have any food here?”
“Nothing much. Imelda caters for me on weekdays, and I buy food or go out on weekends. I’ll buy a couple of sandwiches and then we can spend more time shopping.”
After confronting his choice of expensively filled wholemeal sandwiches, and eating her fair share, she drove off with him to Magill Road, where antiques and secondhand furniture mingled with coffee and cake shops. In the first place they tried, she spotted an ornately carved mahogany credenza with a white marble top. “What do you think of this for the hall? It would match the floor.”
He shrugged. “Do you like it?”
“I like the color of the wood, and having a marble top is a good idea if you plan to decorate with vases of flowers. No water stains to worry about. But it’s up to you.”
“I plan to decorate with flowers.” He grinned. “Probably. I’ll get this, and we’ll move on.”
Farther down Magill Road in a larger antique shop, she found a mahogany dining table with two extensions. “This seats ten without the extensions and twenty with them.”
Hagen bought it. “What about chairs?” he asked the dealer.
“I could find something for you,” the dealer said, trying to look casual. Marigold assumed he already knew where, and he was mentally assessing the highest price he thought Hagen might be convinced to pay.
“I think it might be an idea to check out modern chairs first.” Marigold tried to sound apologetic. Although she didn’t want to burst the dealer’s money bubble, older chairs were often too uncomfortable to sit in for extended periods and with the entertaining Hagen did, he had to see to the needs of his guests first. Plus, she liked the look of old with new.
Hagen left both options open, disappointing no one. After exhaustive searches in every other possible shop on the strip for antique beds, Marigold chewed on her thumbnail. “There’s a shop on Unley Road that lets me borrow furniture for the houses I prepare for sale. His stuff is half trash, half treasure. We probably won’t find anything there expensive enough to suit you, but do you want to look anyway?”
“I’m known as a spendthrift, am I?” He raised his eyebrows.
“I have never listened to gossip about you,” she answered in a superior voice. As a matter of fact, she had rarely been offered any gossip about him; only snippets about Mercia. “But I’ve judged you recently and seen that you are not afraid to spend. You buy lunch when you could make it and the same with breakfast.”
“Do you want me to save money?”
“What you do with your money is none of my business except when you ask me what you should buy.”
“How novel,” he said, but when she glanced at him, he didn’t look at all supercilious. Instead, he looked indulgent. He pushed his hands into his pockets and raised his eyebrows at her.
Mentally shrugging, she slid into his car again, realizing the dreadful snob inside her loved being in his luxurious car. The dreadful snob also loved stepping out of the car in front of the enormous warehouse full of all the auction rejects.
Bill, the tall, slim, musty owner of the shop offered her one of his shy smiles. Although an astute businessman, he had a kind heart hidden under his unassuming manner. “Another house to do?” he asked her, lifting his shaggy gray eyebrows.
“Today I’m with a bona fide buyer, Bill. This is my friend Hagen. Hagen, Bill Evans.”
Hagen shook the older man’s hand. “You have set me up for hours of exploration time in here, Bill.”
Bill’s eyelids crinkled. “You won’t see everything in one trip, that’s for sure.”
“I’ve never made it to the end of the space, either,” Marigold said, laughing up at Hagen. “You could start at one end, and I’ll start at the other. I’ll meet you in the middle.”
Hagen nodded and began to walk to the far end. That’s the sort of man he was, methodical. She started at the beginning. That’s the sort of woman she was. Hopeful. She found a coup
le of bedside cabinets that she pulled out for Hagen to inspect. Antique bedside cabinets didn’t exist. Commodes were commonly used and some people repurposed them, but this pair had been quality carved from mahogany; modern replicas in bad condition. While she mentally contemplated a re-polish, Hagen loomed beside her. “I’ve found a treasure.” He looked smug.
“Oh, what?”
“A headboard I think will be perfect.”
“First look at these bedside cabinets. Polished up, they would look special. What do you think?”
“We’ll get them polished.”
She liked hearing him say we. “Let’s have a look at your headboard.” She followed him to the back of the shop, evading strings of dusty cobwebs.
He had dragged out an enormous slab of carved wood, clearly not an old English antique. “This looks rather exotic,” she said disappointed.
“That’s the word, either that or erotic. Look at the carvings.”
She peered and saw figures carved in the wood and a closer look revealed nakedness and group sex involving enormous phalluses and animals. “Don’t tell me you like that,” she said, half-shocked. She splayed her hand on the top of her chest, in a mercy-me gesture.
“I like it, yes. If it’s in my bedroom, it won’t be on display. I want it.”
She lifted her eyebrows. “It might be an antique, but I doubt it has any value other than as a curiosity.”
He shrugged. “It called to me.”
“It did not.”
He grinned. “Where would I find anything else like this?”
She crossed her arms. “In a brothel. That’s probably where it came from.”
Hagen stood his ground. Forced to relent, Marigold led the way to Bill’s porcelain crowded sanctuary at the front of the shop. She could barely look him in the eye when she told him that Hagen wanted the headboard.
“Where did you find it?” She tried to look purely professional.
“That carving has a story. A few years back, one of the old shops in Rundle Street underwent a restoration. They found this in the roof space. I reckon someone hid it. Those Victorians were mighty staid. The rest of the four-poster was rotten. I got this pretty cheap. Quite a bit of it is sandalwood. Like it, do you, Marigold?”
She glanced at Hagen who seemed to be staring off into the distance. “Help me here,” she said to him.
“She loves it.” He slung an arm around her shoulders, drew her to him, and kissed her forehead. “I wouldn’t normally look at anything so shocking but how could I resist her blandishments.”
She sighed. “We’ve known each other since school days,” she said to Bill.
“That explains it.” Bill gave one of his long slow smiles. “Want the bedside tables, too?”
Marigold nodded.
“Four-hundred dollars for the lot?” Bill raised his eyebrows in question.
“Feel free to spend my limited income any way you see fit, Marigold.” Hagen used a long-suffering voice.
She sent him a glance of reproof. “Four hundred it is.” She shook Bill’s hand. “Plus fifty dollars for delivery. Pass over your credit card, Hagen, and write down your address.” When she left the shop with Hagen, she said, “You’re right. We ought to have a budget. I can order a bed base for you tomorrow. What size do you want?”
“King size, what else? Mercia’s brother will have the white one removed tomorrow. I can be set up, minus the bed cabinets, by Tuesday.” He sounded pleased. “How long will it take to have the cabinets polished?”
“A couple of weeks, I would guess, at best.”
“I’ll use lamp tables in the meantime. I’ll take them out of one of the guest bedrooms. I think I can get the Allbrook painting team on to repainting the bedroom tomorrow. What color?”
“What color do you want?”
“I asked first.”
She wrinkled up her face, thinking. “A darker shade of gray than your carpet. Everything will match with that. That should give you time to think what accent color you would like.”
“Marigold,” he said using his patient tone. “I would like anything you would like. Find me something beautiful for a bed cover, and I will be happy. I’m sure I can move the paintings in the house around to fit whatever I end up with.”
“Right. I’ll furnish your bedroom to my taste. So, that’s the dining room done except for chairs, and the bedroom done except for accessories. Let me finish off those two rooms before I start on the sitting room. I think your guest bedrooms and bathrooms are lovely already. And I didn’t see your bathroom.”
“I’ll want you in the bedroom by Tuesday night—to see how everything looks.” He glanced away as he said the last part.
“Do you expect me to have found your bed coverings by then? I can’t. I’ll be at work. Unless you think I can spend my lunchtime on your extracurricular activities.”
“Now, there’s a leading statement. I can let you have a long lunch break, and I’ll drive you wherever you want to go in the interests of my bedroom.”
Her face began to warm, and she turned away. Although he’d strictly stuck to talking about decorating, her susceptible mind heard that he wanted her in his bedroom by Tuesday night, and she couldn’t focus on anything else. The thought of being in his bedroom for purposes other than decorating gave her a full body throb.
While he drove, she stared out the side window of the car, not concentrating on anything but her hopeless yen for Hagen. She had moved out of the one-night-stand category, which was a step up. Last night’s audition had earned her the highly desirable job of being his bed partner for the time being. By her reckoning, she would last with him at least until she had finished helping with his house, not that she thought he was fickle, but he clearly wanted to change his bedroom from being Mercia’s into his. This hinted at a man with plans to fill the bed with another, or at least rebrand himself for a new relationship.
Marigold wanted to dawdle with the job, but he had hurried her along too well for her liking.
“My bed will be gone tomorrow.” He sounded satisfied. “I’m going to need a place to sleep for a while.”
“Says the man with three spare bedrooms.”
“Let’s not ruin a perfectly good weekend by sending me off home on Sunday night.”
“Well, let’s not pretend you’re homeless. Let’s pretend you want to be with me.”
He pulled the car up outside her house. “Bad move, huh? I wasn’t quite sure you wanted to be with me, so I thought the pity card might work.”
“If you think I sleep with men because I feel sorry for them, you need to think again. I need to be very attracted to someone before I sleep with him.”
“Can I attract you two nights in a row?”
“We’ll see.”
He drew an extended breath and opened his door. Within moments he had rounded the car and opened her door, taking her hand to help her out. “What do you want to do about dinner? A quick meal at the local?”
* * * *
“Do you see anything you want on the menu board?” Hagen asked as he escorted Marigold to the empty table by the window. He had made a reservation at an Italian restaurant that he had always liked, while she’d changed out of the black pants and top she had been wearing all day, to a black skirt and top. Outside, the daylight had begun to fade.
“I’m going to get fat if we keep eating out. I’ll have the marinara.”
He paid for two. He had never much cared what he ate, but apparently she did, which worked in his favor since he wanted her to move in with him. If she did, she could get Imelda to prepare anything she wanted. That was the way meals had been organized when Mercia was alive. She had done very little cooking herself, despite her extensive shopping.
Marigold didn’t want wine with her meal, and that suited him, too, although he usually had a drink when he ate out, if not
half a bottle. As he toyed with his water, he said, “I’ve heard that if you do the same thing for four days in a row, you’re on the way to forming a habit.”
“In relation to what?”
“Specifically, in relation to having a drink with a meal, but also for exercise, like taking a walk after dinner. Apparently you can make that into a habit.”
“I think I’ve made reading into a habit.” She twirled her spaghetti around her fork. “I always read a few chapters before I go to sleep.”
He grinned. She hadn’t read a word last night. “Unless you are otherwise occupied.”
“Let’s rephrase that to say unless I’m distracted.” Her lips pressed together as if she was deliberately trying not to smile, but her eyes crinkled slightly. “If you stay with me tonight, what are you going to do in the morning?”
Tricky. “How about what we did this morning?” He tried not to look too keen.
Her cheeks turned pink. “I meant about dressing and going to work.”
He considered. “I’ll go home and shower and dress and drive off to work as usual.”
“We wouldn’t want Sandra knowing where you spent the night.”
“She thinks I’m celibate.”
“And were you?”
He kept his gaze steady. “For some time.”
“Everyone has to break out eventually.”
“What about you?”
“I’m breaking out with you.” She looked away.
Once, he had thought he would never get that chance. Years ago, she had told him in no uncertain terms that his future success was assured because of his parents’ hard work and ambition, and not because he was any sort of genius. The harsh assessment had decided him to ask her to waltz with him at the school formal. Her date had left her with egg on her face. Even if she had seen Hagen as nothing but a rich boy, at least he had cared.
In those days, if she had refused to dance with him, he would have had enough front to imply he’d been joking, but back then he had the bolstering of his peers. Now, he was on his own, wanting a woman who had pricked his ego long ago, by being patently uninterested in him. These days, she seemed more likely to accept a relationship.
Golden Opportunity Page 15
