The Wild Heir and His Icy Bride novel · Chapter 2 of 3
Chapter 2: House Rules
Griffin moves into Imogen's spotless house, and every stunt meets a rule; his cousin Tobias arrives with bagels and a helpful idea.
The first thing Griffin saw in his wife's house was a boot tray with his name on it.
It was a clear plastic tray beside the front door. A strip of label tape ran along the edge: GRIFFIN.
"I printed it Thursday," Imogen said, from behind him. "Shoes go in the tray. Your socks go in the basket by the stairs."
"I don't wear socks."
"Then you'll find the floors are heated."
The house stood on a bluff above the Sound, white inside and out, with white floors and a white stair rail.
She led him upstairs to a guest room with a double bed, a window, and a heavy brass lock.
A laminated sheet hung on the door at his eye level.
THE HOUSE RULES, it said, in bold black capitals.
Shoes off. Sixty days. Separate rooms. No touching unless there is a reason. Knock.
"What counts as a reason?" Griffin asked.
"A fire. A fall. A photographer." She handed him a key. "Dinner is at seven. I get up at 5:40. Good night, Mr. Oakes."
She went to her own room at the end of the hall and shut the door.
He heard her lock turn.
Day one, he thought. Easy.
He slept on the floor, because he could.
Day two began with mud.
At dawn he walked out to the garden in his boots, rolled in the flowerbed on purpose, and came back through the kitchen door.
Imogen was already at the counter in a gray robe, reading something on a tablet.
She did not look up.
"Shoe tray," she said.
"It's raining out."
"I know. That's why there's a second tray at the kitchen door and a towel on the hook."
There was.
The towel was folded in thirds, and the hook had a label that said TOWEL, GRIFFIN.
He stood there dripping on a mat that had apparently been waiting for him.
She took the notebook from her robe pocket and wrote.
"Four," she said. "You did it correctly. It was just the wrong house."
That night, at four in the morning, he put on the loudest metal album he had and turned it up on the guest-room speaker.
The walls shook. A picture frame in the hall tipped sideways.
He grinned at the ceiling.
At 4:07 someone knocked on his door, three taps, evenly spaced.
He opened it.
Imogen stood in the hall in a gray robe, with her hair already pinned and a cup of tea in her hand.
"Quiet hours end at six," she said. "You are two hours early. I assumed you wanted company, so here is a tea."
"That's not what I want."
"It never is. Take it anyway."
It was a plain white cup.
He took it, because his hands wanted something to hold.
Behind her shoulder, the hall light caught the cabinet in the kitchen alcove. One door was open.
On the shelf sat twelve white mugs, and between them one blue enamel mug with a chip in the rim.
He had not seen anything chipped in the whole house.
"What's that one?" he asked.
"That one is not for use," Imogen said, and shut the cabinet.
She wrote in the notebook. "Five. Next time bring a drum kit. I'd like to see it."
On day three he escalated.
He dumped his entire duffel in the upstairs hall: six weeks of laundry, mostly socks he had said he didn't wear.
The cleaner arrived at nine and found the pile.
Griffin watched from the landing, arms folded, waiting for the shriek.
The cleaner looked at the pile, then at the notebook Imogen was holding, then at Griffin.
"Do I wash this or frame it?" the cleaner asked.
"Wash it. Fold it. Return it to him by seven with the invoice."
"Which invoice?"
"His."
By seven o'clock his laundry sat in a neat stack on his bed, folded by size, with a card on top: SIX AND A HALF. Please hang up the cap.
The bill was forty-two dollars. It was taped to his mug.
He sat on the edge of the bed with the red mug in both hands and no idea what he'd won.
It was quiet in the house.
He heard her footsteps stop outside his door.
"I'm not staying," he said through the wood.
"I know," Imogen said. "I'm only asking you to sleep."
Then the footsteps went on down the hall.
In the morning, the doorbell rang at 6:02.
Griffin came down in his socks, the first ones he'd worn all week.
His cousin Tobias stood on the step with a paper bag and a wide, friendly grin.
"Everything bagel, no questions," Tobias said, holding it out. "Cuz. You look like a man who needs a plan."
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