Chapter 15
SHE’S PLAYING WITH FIRE
Rhys
It’s a slow day at work. Yesterday was a heavy turnover day, and today’s almost as busy, but everyone’s behaving themselves.
I avoid Margot in the staff room by having an early lunch, even if I find excuses to spy on her from a close distance when I know she’s working the chalets since Mr. Robe-and-towels is here for one more night.
Mrs. Pinsley, the elderly woman working on her first novel, is checking out today, and I spot her hugging Margot as another of the security guys loads her luggage onto the retreat’s golf cart, which will transport her up to the main building and the shuttle to the airport.
“Now, no arguing. The tip I left is exactly what I meant to leave, and it’s for you, understand?” Mrs. Pinsley says.
“That’s not—” Margot starts, then catches herself, and smiles at the older woman. “Thank you, Mrs. Pinsley. Getting to know you has been reward enough in itself, but I appreciate your generosity.”
“Bah. It’s the least I can do.”
“Keep working on your novel. I’m going to check your website to make sure you did it.”
Mrs. Pinsley beams at her.
And even though I know I shouldn’t, after the old lady has been loaded up in the golf cart, and after Margot’s had enough time to switch out the bedding and towels and gather the trash and clean up the rest of the room, I circle back to the chalets.
She’s pushing her cart back toward the robe-and-towel dude’s room.
“How much did she leave you?” I ask as I fall into step with her.
“Two hundred dollars.”
“Holy shit.”
“It’s going in the communal tip jar.”
I grunt in acknowledgment.
Not surprised.
I’m starting to believe she really is nice.
Or at least has an unexpected level of self-awareness.
“You really gonna look up her website?”
“Already have it saved on my phone with a reminder in my calendar to peek at it every other month.”
I don’t want to believe her—it’s safer not to—but I do.
She locks the cart outside the chalet one door down from robe-and-towel guy, whom I spot peeking through his windows. “Gimme his towels,” I say on a sigh.
“Maybe I should just slip you the big tip instead,” she says with a cheeky grin.
My face gets hot as the phrase I’d like to slip you my big tip runs through my head. I’m able to control my dick today, but only barely.
“Not necessary,” I mutter.
“Many thanks.” She hands me a stack of towels.
I deliver them to the dude that I’m going to suggest management should blacklist, who stares at Margot when he’s not scowling at me.
She needs to quit this job.
It’s not necessary, and she’s interacting with too many people.
Too many people who might figure out who she is.
Too many people who see an attractive woman and start looking at her the way this guy’s looking at her.
The dude shuts his door in my face, and I head back to Margot’s cart.
She’s disappeared inside the empty chalet. “You need anything else?” I call to her in the doorway.
She peeks out of the bathroom door. “Nope. Got it. Thank you.”
I linger as long as I can without drawing attention, but then I get a call about a deer that’s looking at someone wrong, then about helping move some tables. I’m pausing in the staff room for a drink when the other two housekeepers on staff today come in.
“I’m just saying, if I were married to Jonas Rutherford, I’d be here every day, not just one Friday a month. You know the whole reason he had the spa installed was for Emma to be able to use it whenever she wants,” one’s saying.
I pretend I’m scrolling my phone and not listening as the other one opens the fridge. “It’s so sweet. And did you see the baby?”
“So. Cute.”
“Her smile!”
“And the little coos!”
“And the way he’s holding her and managing Bash too so Emma can just enjoy the day…”
They both sigh.
I glance up then, because my brain has fully caught up to the conversation they’re having, and this is going to be a problem for Margot. “Boss is here?”
Identical giggles answer me. “Hey, Rhys,” the younger one says. Zelda. Her name is Zelda.
“If you were married to Jonas Rutherford, would you be taking spa days every day instead of once a month?” the other—Louisa—asks.
I flip through my mental list of where the staff should all be right now based on the schedule I saw, and Margie—and yes, she has to be Margie right now—should be up at the spa helping with the laundry.
If Emma Rutherford’s headed that way—then Jonas might be too.
“Depends. We talking couples massages or getting facials and seaweed wraps with the girls?” I ask.
They both giggle again.
“Oh my god, he’s had spa treatments,” Zelda whispers to Louisa.
“They can’t do couples massages,” Louisa replies. “They didn’t bring the babysitter.”
“But they brought a driver so they can have a nice lunch with wine.”
“I’d be having wine lunches every day after spa time.”
“You don’t think that would get boring? I’d have to keep working. Not like, here, but like…something.”
I don’t have Margot’s number—that’s an oversight—so I text her security guy. Jonas Rutherford is headed Margie’s way.
No immediate answer.
Doesn’t surprise me.
Dude doesn’t owe me a response.
I grunt something to the two housekeepers and head out of the room.
Have to get to the gondola and get up to the top of the mountain and figure out how to get Margie off the top of the mountain without it looking suspicious, like she’s hiding from someone.
And that’s when inspiration strikes.
Laundry room is right down the hall.
I sneak in, grab the dish soap refill from the retreat center’s main supply closet down here, pour a shit-ton into one of the machines holding sheets ready to be moved into the dryer, and I restart the cycle.
And then I’m on the move.
I pass Jonas and Emma in the lobby, just as the housekeepers said.
Jonas is holding the baby and also the preschooler’s hand while Emma, his perpetually happy wife, squats to talk to the little boy.
I think I heard he’s about four, and he’s staring at the brightly colored origami swans hanging from the ceiling and demanding to know how to make them himself.
No one notices me as I head for the gondola to the top of the mountain, but I notice that Jonas and Emma are just a couple cars behind me on the lift.
Margot’s security guy still hasn’t texted me back.
I head immediately to the spa when the gondola car opens at the top of the lift.
Been about seven minutes. The washer should be about to overflow, shouldn’t it?
No one blinks at me walking into the staff entrance on the lower level behind the spa, where I know they have laundry facilities too.
I heard they almost put a kitchen in here, for spa lunches, but decided to keep the food at the winery tasting room on the other side of the lift at the top of the mountain here.
Storage rooms are empty. Just shelves of lotions and oils and rocks or stones or—actually, just all kinds of things I can’t identify despite knowing the words seaweed wrap and facials.
Laundry room’s empty too. Which leaves a small locker room—also empty—and a single stall bathroom with the light off and the door wide open.
I’m about to head to the main floor, knowing I’m at risk of running into Jonas and Emma again, when the door to the back stairway opens, and Margot steps through with her arms loaded down with towels and sheets.
“Hey,” I say.
She shrieks.
I hold up both hands. “Just me.”
“Oh my god, I thought you were the moose.”
I look down at my clothes.
Huh.
Moose-brown uniform shirt today. Didn’t do that on purpose.
I shake my head. “Jonas Rutherford is here. Here here. In the spa here. With his wife.”
“Oh, fuck. Seriously?”
I grab the laundry. “Don’t worry. Got you covered.”
“I have to wash those.”
Not grinning at that is impossible. She trails me into the laundry room, where I shove the towels and sheets into a single load. “You’re about to be banned from laundry duty.”
“Towels and sheets separate, Rhys,” she hisses, which is a question I wonder if she’s ever thought about before in her life.
“Oh, don’t worry, this isn’t the worst you’ll do to get banned from laundry duty.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I—”
My radio squawks to life. “Situation in the main laundry room,” Cynthia says. “Someone locate Margie Johnson. She needs to clean up her mess.”
Margot looks down at the radio clipped to my hip.
Then back up at me.
“What did you do?” She whispers the question with a cringe, but her voice holds an air of reverence.
I toss a normal amount of the right detergent into the washing machine and start the cycle for her. “You used dish soap instead of laundry detergent in the washing machines.”
Her blue eyes flare wide.
And my grin keeps growing as I lift the radio. “Just ran into her,” I report to our boss. “I’ll bring her down.”
“You’re evil,” she whispers.
“You’re fucking welcome.” I hustle her toward the back door at the exact instant the stairwell door slams shut again behind us. “Dada, we get mama a tweat?” a little voice says.
“We’re going on an adventure,” Jonas Rutherford replies.
Margot’s shoulders stiffen as I grab the door and open it for her. I glance back at Jonas, give him a brief nod, then follow Margot out.
“One minute, please,” Jonas calls to me.
Margie inhales sharply and keeps walking out the door.
“Yeah, boss?” I say.
“Are there…s-n-a-c-k-s down here?”
I shake my head. “Mostly s-o-a-p and l-o-t-i-o-n.”
“Ah. Then we’ve gone the wrong way. Thank you.”
I nod and head out the door.
Margot’s already halfway to the gondola. I catch up with her as she reaches the platform.
Once we’re inside a car, she takes a seat and sags, her head hanging over her knees.
And then she starts laughing.
Which is, unfortunately, fucking beautiful.