So Far Into You (7 page)

Sometimes a sneaky voice in her head would say: why not take on a few more regular clients, Remy? Think of the extra money.

Always she gave that little voice a mental whack with a bloody big hammer. If she took on more clients it would blur the line. She'd feel like a phone sex worker who had a second job in viticulture, rather than a viticulture worker making some extra cash to pay her father's debts. Plus it would get much harder to keep her little sideline from her mother.

Remy threw her work bag into the passenger seat and gave up trying to smooth her hair. She wiped her palms on her khaki work pants, breathed deep twice, and headed for the cellar door.

Come see me when you finish work.
Seth had texted.
I'll be in the office.

She'd never been in Seth's office. She'd only been in the administrative centre once, when Greg Trimble had interviewed her for the job.

She pushed into ‘Old Joe's tasting room, with its lingering scent of polished jarrah, wine, and visitors perfume. The dishwasher hummed beneath the sink, washing lipstick from a load of glassware that would be pristine when cellar door opened for business next morning. She was completely alone, with no idea why she felt so jumpy.

She shivered. Since the Saturday at Vintage Festival, her life had been one big shiver. Now her uniform felt at once both too tight and too hot, and her skin felt hot all over.

The pale green corridor—some quarter-shade of the Lasrey corporate colour—seemed to shrink in and she had to stop herself checking over her shoulder to make sure her boots weren't tracking mud on the carpet.

She passed the boardroom on her left. Seth's door was further up on the right. It was open and she could hear him speaking.

About then she realised she couldn't understand a word Seth said, except that his conversation sounded French and important. Then she was at the threshold, shuffling her feet like a schoolgirl. He wasn't facing her, and it gave her the chance to study him in those seconds before he knew she was there.

His hand was on his hip. The flash of the watch on his wrist caught her eye. His other hand pressed the phone to his ear. He wore a white shirt, arms rolled to the elbow, waist tucked into his trousers with a black belt. The desk obstructed her view of his legs. He could have been barefoot for all she knew, like those newsreaders who wore posh jackets for the camera while their desk hid tracksuit pants.

Only she'd bet Seth wasn't barefoot. She'd bet his shoes were designer like his jacket, like his car.
Like him.
She hid another shiver and dragged her gaze away.

Built-in shelves lined the left-hand wall, most filled with textbooks or files. One held a copy of the globe, another, a series of framed certificates. Business degrees, Remy thought.

A huge triptych canvas covered most of the right-hand wall in thick textured blocks of colour. It looked like something a five-year-old might smush together, which probably meant it cost the GDP of a third world country.

The wall behind Seth was floor-to-ceiling glass. It overlooked the workings of the winery where stainless steel tanks and catwalks gleamed. The winery was well lit, daylight poured through high windows. In contrast, Seth's office was dark. None of the overhead halogens shone. Only a desk lamp added to the blue glow of a laptop screen.

The jacket that matched his trousers was slung over the arm of a black leather couch in the corner. On the cushions of that couch, papers spilled from an open briefcase.

No sound drifted from the winery. Not the beep of a forklift in reverse, nor the hum of a pump.

Remy stared at the damp patch on her knee where she'd knelt to repair a dripper tube earlier in the day, and at her dirt-capped Blundstone boots. This felt so far out of her league.

He
felt so far out of her league.

Seth turned, locking his eyes with hers. There was a moment where that gaze was white-hot. Then it cooled.

‘Excuse-moi, Helene.'
Seth covered the receiver with his hand. ‘Shut the door please, Remy. Sit there.' He indicated the couch. Then he turned his back without waiting for a
yes
or a nod or anything and resumed his conversation, staring at something she couldn't see beyond the glass.

Remy stood rigid, halfway between his desk and the door, staring at the back of his head. If he'd been talking to the dirt crusting her boots he might have shown more warmth, and she didn't know what had suddenly changed. He'd been so open at Ellen Brook. He'd given her the best day of her life. The best weekend.

Hell and Tommy.
She'd come here thinking bushwalks and kisses and dolmades, and Seth was all business.

She sat on the couch, then bounced up again, scattering some of his papers. Crossing to the door, she shut it behind her with a determined click. She didn't sit.

She remembered enough high school French to know an
adieu
when she heard one, and knew the conversation was coming to a close.

Finishing the call, he walked around his desk toward her, glancing at the papers scattered on the floor. He flicked two fingers toward the couch and settled with the back of his thighs against his desk. ‘I'd appreciate if you could pick those up. I fly out tonight and I'll need them.'

Remy had forgotten all about the papers. Washing wineglasses for a week would be preferable right now to picking them up, but Seth was the boss. She needed this job.

Remy stepped to the couch. Kneeling felt more dignified than stooping. She scraped the pages together, tapped them against the briefcase to get a neat edge and left the stack on the leather seat.

‘Okay then,' she patted the trousers of her Lasrey uniform, glanced at the door. ‘What was it you wanted to see me about?'

Seth crossed his legs at the ankle. His eyes never left hers. Very, very softly he said: ‘I want to see you stand against the wall, Remy.'

She forgot to breathe. When she remembered, the air leaked from her lungs. ‘Pardon?'

‘Stand against the wall. Face it.'

Remy took a shaky step backwards. Her insides were trying to hammer an escape through her skin. ‘I don't think that's appropriate.'

‘I didn't think it was particularly appropriate either when I heard you say it to your girlfriend yesterday. Don't let that stop you now.'

In the window behind him she could see their reflections: the back of Seth's head, shoulders broad and thick in a white shirt about nine hours shy of crisp; and her face, a blush running through it, lips popped open, eyes wide and wild.

‘I don't know what you're talking about.'

Seth pushed off from the desk. His face was hard as the winery's concrete floor, his voice harder. The authority in it made her flinch. ‘I heard you on the phone yesterday, Remy. Cut the act.'

‘You heard me? That's—'
sick, crazy. I don't even think it's legal. Oh God. What did he hear? How much?
Her head spun. She wished her feet would spin, move,
anything,
but they were like lead. Lead buried in concrete.

‘I couldn't last twenty-four hours without laying eyes on you, apparently. So I drove to your place to pay you a visit. I even bought you a coffee.' He laughed in a way that said he didn't give a shit about coffee. ‘Maybe next time you play X-rated phone games with your girlfriend, you should shut the window.'

‘You keep going on about a girlfriend … I'm not,' she stumbled, ‘not that there's anything wrong with it and each to their own and everything, but, I'm not gay.'

If it was possible for Seth's face to go even more rigid, it did. ‘Then who were you talking to?'

Remy groaned inside. What was worse? For Seth to think she was a lesbian? Or for Seth to know she had a handful of female clients who paid her an exorbitant by-the-minute rate to make them come. Did she want Seth to know her family owed Doug Mulvraney so much money, that's what she had to do to pay it back?

Not in a million years.
‘I was on my own time, in my own house. You were the one doing the eavesdropping. It's none of your business.'

‘You lied to me.'

‘I didn't lie. I don't have a girlfriend.'

‘Then tell me who was on the other end of the phone?'

She opened her mouth, but no sound came out. Her throat felt like sandpaper and that wasn't because of the fledgling cold. ‘No.'

He contemplated her for a beat longer.

‘How did that game go again?' He was close enough now to reach for her hand and she was so stunned by the last three minutes, she didn't snatch hers away. ‘I want to play. Stand against the wall, Remy.'

She couldn't move. She stood with her tummy fluttering like warm silk ribbons in a breeze.

‘I'll make it easy for you. Come on. Here.' He turned her like they were partners in an old-style dance. Next second, the tip of her work boots nudged the skirting board and her nostrils filled with the faint scent of years-old paint.

***

Christ on a stick.
What was he
thinking?
He'd never meant to go so far, but she'd been so damn
composed.
He'd just wanted to … what exactly? Scare her? Punish her?

He'd wanted to make a fool of her, like she'd fooled him.

Only right now, Remy wasn't acting like any lesbian gold-digger he knew. Her scent was sunshine and cinnamon, she was warm and young and vibrant, and the longer he stood here—with her smell a sweet smoke in his head—the more he wanted to play this goddamn game for real. Play it with her.
Here.
Damn the consequences.

Seth liked women. He'd never needed props when he made love, never needed games, but if he touched Remy now, like he ached to, a line would be crossed. A huge great bloody black line and there'd be no going back. She was his employee. She was a goddamn lawsuit waiting to paper-plane through the door and land writ-side up on his desk. He was so close to being past the point where he could laugh the whole thing off as a joke.

Seth flexed his arm to take her weight, swing her back from the wall, but the apology he was preparing died in his throat because he heard,
thought he heard
, some indescribable sound.

He thought he heard Remy moan.

Her eyes were closed. She'd turned her head and her cheek rubbed gently against the paint. A small silver hoop he hadn't noticed before pierced her ear and Seth had time to admire the simple grace of silver curled against the smooth column of her neck. He wondered if he'd ever see anything so perfect again.

He wanted to take the elastic band out of her hair, tumble that blonde mane around her shoulders, and if one of his desk drawers had held a hairbrush he might have offered to spend an hour brushing out the day's knots. Then he'd like to tug it a little, see if he could get her to make that sound again.

There was a soft pop as her lips opened … the rush of a shallow breath. Then she whispered, ‘Don't stop now, Stud. It's just getting interesting.'

It shocked him so much he laughed, once he got over the minor earthquake her words caused at the base of his balls.

In answer, he picked up her right hand and moved it to her shoulder height, spreading her fingers and pinning them under his far larger hand. He was on the verge of leaning into her—wanted to put some pressure on her to let her know who was boss—when sanity clouted him across the head.

You
are
the boss, goddammit. Let her go.

‘You're not very good at this are you?' She trembled, like her knees couldn't quite hold her up and the hand beneath his clenched, turning her fingernails dusky pink. ‘Did you forget what comes next?'

‘Of course I didn't forget what comes next. How the hell could I?'

‘Well, go on then.' Her ridiculously long eyelashes fluttered open and Seth could have sworn he saw a smile curve her lips. ‘Tell me to spread my legs.'

Either she was the best actress he'd ever seen, or his Snow White gold-digger in khaki was stark raving certifiable. Maybe both. Whatever was going on, she was too good at this game for him. Seth stepped back.

She clicked her tongue and sighed in what sounded like genuine disappointment and he almost felt sad for her until she added, ‘Your problem is you're not nasty enough.'

‘The hell I'm not.'
Certifiable.
She had to be.

‘You're not,' she said, emphatically, turning slowly to face him. ‘You ruined it when you said you'd brought coffee to my house. A nasty guy wouldn't bring coffee.'

He gripped her arm, gave it a shake. ‘I am
not
nice. And you don't make a bluff like that based on whether or not I bought you
coffee
. What if I was some psycho?'

‘I didn't say you were
nice.
I said you weren't nasty enough. Not nasty enough to do … this.' She waggled her finger between their bodies, like a pheromone metronome. ‘Not properly.'

‘Go sit there, crazy girl. Let me think.' He pushed her gently toward the couch and watched her walk away, remembering how beautiful she was when she moved, forgetting whatever it was he needed to think about.

Lucky for him, Remy sat with her knees pressed together and her palms on her knees. The clutch and release of her fingers in the fabric of her trousers was the only sign that gave her tension away.

Where to start? He had so many questions. ‘You're not gay?'

‘I'm not.'

‘You weren't spinning that story for a bloke, surely.'

‘No. Not a bloke.'

This was like pulling teeth with a pair of tweezers. ‘Then why do you do it?'

‘Do what?'

‘Make phone calls like that. What's that all about?'

She lifted her chin. ‘I do it for the money, Seth. So I can pay the bills.'

‘And you didn't want to tell me your mum stacked shelves.' He shook his head. Give him another few minutes and he might find this whole thing funny. Not quite yet. ‘There's nothing wrong with working at a supermarket, Remy. Compared to—'