Curtis raised a brow. “With the house?”
“No.” She couldn’t keep her smile back. She glanced down at Noel’s tangled dark hair to hide it. “I’m surprised you eat carbs.” Not to mention that you have a box of fifty cent macaroni lying around. Maybe his sister dropped it off with the kids. Lexi had never met her, but she was pretty sure most of the other James’ were normal. It was only Curtis’ gene pool that seemed to have gone faulty.
Curtis snorted. “Yeah. Well. I guess we all have our failings.”
“Do you also happen to have a diaper and some clothes for these guys? I’ll get them dressed while their dinner is cooling off.”
“Yeah. Upstairs. First room on the left.”
Lexi rolled her eyes. She shifted Austin in her arms. He was tugging at her hair with his fists, probably about to ask her to giddy up like a pony. Noel looked sleepy after the bath. Her hair was a snarled mess of knots and she shivered in the towel. Thanks for the help, Trust Fund Asshole.
“Come on, guys. Let’s go on a treasure hunt to find your stuff, seeing as your uncle is super-duper helpful.”
The kids didn’t understand her sarcasm. Austin let out a screech and Noel took off, her oversized fluffy white towel coming loose and trailing behind her like a massive cape. It was a miracle she didn’t trip and fall. Curtis muttered something behind her but didn’t offer to help. He probably hadn’t scrubbed the wall clean either. He seriously had another thing coming if he thought she was going to do it.
After chasing Noel up the stairs and letting Austin steer her around by her hair, she was able to locate the room the kid’s stuff was in. The entire house was crazy sized. Even the guest room was probably five hundred square feet. The king-sized bed in there and the heavy dark furniture didn’t even begin to take up much space. The rest of the place was very masculine. All white walls, but dark floors. It was very clinical, expensive and just sparsely enough furnished to be tasteful in that detached, bachelor, too much room to actually live in sort of way.
She’d had enough phone calls with the interior designer and decorator, conveying what Curtis James apparently wanted with his house, seeing as he was too high and mighty to talk to actual real people who had actual real jobs, that she wasn’t at all surprised to see modern art and blocky hard looking furniture all over the place. It was exactly as he’d described. The interior designer and decorator, a guy named Paulo who was a superhuman, only took work for high end asshole clients, so he pretty much knew what to expect. He was super nice, a real rock star in her books, and Lexi took the pleasure of using James’ company credit card to order a very nice edible arrangement for Paulo after the job was complete.
After she dressed the kids, Lexi steered them back to the kitchen. It appeared that they were already running out of steam. They were young and probably went down for the night pretty early. She’d hoped that they would be hopped up on sugar from their clueless uncle who bribed them with ice cream and candy in an effort to win over their affection, but alas, no such luck. They weren’t bouncing off the walls, which meant she was going to get stuck with the TFB for the rest of the night.
She should have known though. Curtis might eat carbs, but ice cream and candy were out of the question. Lexi knew for a fact that the guy worked out four to five times a week. She freaking renewed his gym membership for him because he didn’t even have enough basic skills to do even that.
“Macaroni!” Noel exclaimed. “You’re the best, Uncle!”
Curtis James, being the true asshole that he was, just pushed the bowl towards the edge of the counter with a disgusted look on his face, like he didn’t want Noel to come too close to him. Lexi rolled her eyes and grabbed the bowls.
“Do you have spoons, or do you think they’re Neanderthals for real?” she quipped as she settled the kids at the massive kitchen table that stood off to the side of the kitchen cabinets. It had eight chairs around it and was solid wood and probably cost a fortune. It also looked like it had never been sat at before.
A drawer slammed behind her and she was presented with two massive, adult-sized spoons. She didn’t complain. Good. Let the kids make a massive mess everywhere. She’d take them off to bed after and leave James with it. He probably had no idea how to even operate a napkin let alone a dishcloth.