Page 40 of Fragile Kiss (Fragile 2)
The rest of the windows in the guest room—the third guest room in her house, that is—ran from floor to ceiling. When Lillian first saw the awkward window that was half the size of the others, she grimaced. Who approved this design? she wondered, quickly wiping the ugly expression off her face. Turning to Katharina, she smiled and assured her that they would be able to make this room look perfectly fine, and that the black sheep window would be no problem at all.
Really, she was wracking her brain to figure out how to keep it from being an eyesore. That was when her eyes settled on the sleek copper bookshelves Katharina had imported from somewhere in Europe.
“Give me a minute to look around at what we’ve got left,” she said to Katharina. “We may need to do a little reorganizing to give this room a good theme, and make sure it doesn’t look like all the rest of the moving stuff was thrown in here.”
Katharina shrugged, and got a lighter from her back pocket. “I’ll let you work your magic, Lily of the Valley.”
Please don’t call me that, Lillian thought.
As it did every couple of minutes, Katharina’s phone made a dainty dinging noise and she lifted it to look at the screen in an instant. Mouthing whatever the message said, her brows pulled together and she made a “humph” sound. Tapping twice, she raised the phone to her ear and began jabbering in a language Lillian couldn’t have figured out if she tried.
“I need to make noise while I move stuff,” she said quietly, beckoning to the furniture left in the room. Katharina nodded and pulled a long, thin cigarette from a little gold case in her pocket. Still conversing in a tone that was less than happy, she held her phone between her shoulder and jaw while she lit the cigarette and walked outside to her porch.
Lillian turned back to the room and let out a big sigh. She looked at the watch on her wrist. “Not even noon,” she groaned, “and I’m already exhausted.”
Katharina was definitely not the easiest person to work with. She was constantly going from ultra-pleasant and happy to finding a problem with something and making a hundred phone calls to all her contacts to ensure that the problem was fixed immediately. Despite all this, Lillian couldn’t help but admire her. Katharina had the most drive and ambition of anyone she had ever met, and she absolutely got any job done as best as it could possibly be done.
I hope I’m like that one day, she thought, and turned her focus back to the room. As Katharina chatted away out on the porch, Lillian walked through the house to see how many items would fit into her potential theme for the third guest room.
When Katharina finally ended the conversation she came back in, gushing.
“This is only half of your bookshelf,” Lillian explained, walking over to the copper bookcase under the awkward window. “I took it apart and put the other two shelves on top of the desk.”
Katharina’s jaw dropped as she pranced over to the desk and ran her hand along the top of the shelves. “How did you take it apart?”
“It was actually two pieces, just fastened together in the middle.” Lillian picked up a handheld drill.
“Where was that?”
“Inside one of these drawers.” Lillian nodded towards the wall unit. “So that takes care of the window. I’m thinking this room would be good to have a rustic sort of feel to it. Wood and metal. It’s a great combination, don’t you think?”
Elated, Katharina clapped her hands, and her mouth spread into a wide smile, revealing her perfect teeth. “Wonderful. I don’t know how you do it.”
“Just part of the job,” Lillian smiled.
“Listen, I’ve got a meeting just after lunch that will likely take up most of the afternoon. Since tomorrow is our last day, do you think we’ll be able to do the rest of the house by the time you fly back?”
Lillian stepped out into the hallway and peeked around the corner into the other guest bedroom. All the furniture was there, and except for it being scattered all over the room it already had a cohesive aesthetic. “Yeah, we’ll be able to get it done. It’s just this last guest room and the bathroom, and maybe a few tweaks.”
“We aren’t rushed, then?”
“Nah, we’re okay. We make a great team.”
Katharina looked a bit frazzled after her heated conversation during her smoke break, and Lillian wanted to make sure she provided some positive vibes. This woman had spent a lot of money to bring her here—well, it seemed like a lot of money to Lillian, even though she knew it was merely a drop in the bucket for Katharina—and she wanted to make sure she did a good job.
“Take a break,” came the oft-spoken command. Lillian set down the drill and followed Katharina into the kitchen.
“Is white okay?”
“White?” asked Lillian.
Katharina reached into the fridge and pulled out a bottle of wine with the most beautiful label in the world. It looked like it was decorated with gold leaf.
Wine? Before lunch? Her first thought was last night’s episode. She felt fine, and the emergency pill seemed to take care of whatever issue was going on inside her, but she wanted to take it easy. She reached into her purse sitting on the counter and pulled out a muffin left over from the hotel’s gourmet breakfast. “Don’t mind if I do,” she said as she nodded and smiled. It’ll be okay, as long as I have some food in my stomach to help soak it up.
“Let me warm this up for you.” Katharina snatched the muffin away, put it on one of her dainty china plates, and stuck it in her microwave. The pleasant noise of the wine pouring into the glasses almost made her smile.
Today’s not too bad of a day, she thought, remembering her good dream and even better sex. She was angry at the fact that a small part of her felt guilty for being so intimate with Cayden when they were still broken up, and she didn’t even know the relationship between him and Katharina—or any other woman, for that matter. Not wanting to ruin the moment, she shoved the feelings away and toasted with Katharina, extra careful not to tap the glass too hard.
