The Best Next Thing ((Un)Professionally Yours 1)

“Let’s go for a walk, girl. See if we can find your mum.”

It was the best thing to do. He wasn’t a huge reader and had pretty much blasted through his audiobooks already. Television was out of the question as Mrs. Cole had allocated precisely three hours for television watching in a bid to conserve electricity. He was saving those hours for later. When he had asked her how many hours she had, she had told him that she rarely watched TV. Which he found hard to believe. What the hell else was there to do out here?

Stormy was a sharp little girl, and they’d been on enough limited outings in the short time that he’d had her for her to recognize the word “walk”. He took her out every four hours for toilet breaks, relishing the opportunity to stretch his legs. It was cold and rained intermittently, and it probably wasn’t good for either of them, but both he and the pup enjoyed their forays out into the vast garden.

Today, wasn’t as blustery as the last few days had been, and Miles wanted to walk along the lakeshore and take the opportunity to search for Stormy’s mother.

&nbsp

; The house had a private beach about a mile long. During summer, his siblings and their friends made good use of both the beach as well as Miles’s forty-five-foot sloop that remained moored year-round at their private jetty. He figured he could easily walk up and down the flat, sandy stretch of beach without getting too winded.

“Mrs. Cole?” he called, before entering the kitchen. She didn’t like being startled— he had picked up on that pretty quickly. As a result, he had taken to announcing his presence before intruding upon any areas he deemed her domain. And the kitchen was very much Mrs. Cole’s territory.

She looked flushed and flustered when he walked into the room a moment later, and his eyes narrowed. She was standing by the sink, patting her pristine hair, a dull red flush darkening her cheeks, and she couldn’t quite meet his eyes.

Something was up with her.

Miles assessed her appearance, wondering what could have caused such an uncharacteristic reaction in his usually unruffled housekeeper. A quick scan around the spacious, bright room solved the mystery almost immediately.

A pot of tea, next to a half full cup, sat on the round table at the cozy banquette in the corner of the kitchen. She must be on a break. A gossip magazine, the likes of which he would never have imagined Mrs. Cole reading, lay open beside the dainty porcelain cup.

The bright red headline screeched:

“Mermaid Pregnant with Chris Hemsworth’s Love Child.”

He fought back a grin but was immediately distracted when his gaze dropped and he caught sight of her ugly, unwieldy shoes. They were tucked beneath the table, with her thick, white socks stuffed into them. His eyes tracked back to Mrs. Cole and trailed down her slim body, lingering over those beautifully shaped calves again, before finding themselves helplessly drawn to her small, delicate feet.

Ten perfect toes, topped with frosted blue tips. The shade was a surprisingly whimsical choice for the monochromatic, buttoned-down, stern woman standing in front of him.

Miles swallowed in a bid to moisten his abruptly dry throat. He had never found feet particularly erotic before…but right now, these elegantly arched soft looking beauties were seriously revving his engine.

He was staring, he knew he was staring…he should stop fucking staring before his dick went from half-mast to a full, proud salute.

He cleared his throat and jerked his gaze back to her deer-trapped-in-the-headlights stare and said the first nonsensical thing that popped into his head, “How does one copulate with a mermaid, do you suppose?”

Her jaw dropped and he felt his own face heat at the inanity of that question. But before he knew it, even more stupid words spilled from his lips, “I mean, which parts go where? It’s not like there are corresponding bits. No inserting Tab A into Slot B as it were.”

He sounded like a bloody fool.

“Well, you’re overlooking the most common mermaid trope,” she said, after a long, measured pause. “They can take on human form for limited amounts of time. I would assume that’s when the…uh…copulation takes place.”

The word “copulation” wasn’t sexy, but hearing it spill from her lush lips was like a spark to tinder. He was embarrassingly erect in seconds.

Fortunately, he was wearing a baggy sweatpants, and his errant hard-on wasn’t noticeable. Still, it was damned awkward standing in front of his stalwart housekeeper sporting wood with her name on it.

So inappropriate.

“I uh…we…” He dropped his gaze to Stormy who was curled up in the crook of his elbow. “We’re going for a walk. On the beach. I was looking for something to fashion into a lead and collar for Stormy. Any suggestions?”

A small frown settled on that smooth brow.

“I don’t think you should do that. It’s slippery and perilous out there. You could fall.”

Did he look so fucking frail to her?

“I assure you, I’ll be fine, Mrs. Cole.”

“It’s also freezing and raining. I don’t think you or the dog…”