Looking to Score(20)

“Hi, Nick, it’s nice to meet you. I’m Amanda, and this is Oakley.” Brooke glared at me until I added brightly, “And this is Brooke, the blogger who will be writing up the piece on Oakley.” I really needed to get my head out of my ass and start being more professional. I didn’t need to build a reputation of being difficult to work with. I silently vowed that from here on out, I was going to be super nice to Brooke.

“Is everybody ready to head over to our first meeting?” I asked. I looked at Nick and asked him if he could have his camera ready to take a couple of candid shots of Oakley meeting Cassandra Kitchen. I checked the packet and found the room number. After looking at the map, I started to lead the others down a hallway to the right. Nick took his camera out and started fiddling with it as we walked. I guess he was checking the lighting or exposure or something. I didn’t really know anything about photography except that, to hide a double chin when taking a selfie, you were supposed to hold your phone up above your head. Nick would occasionally stop and look through the lens as we navigated the maze of hallways to get to Mrs. Kitchen’s room. When we got to the right door, Nick checked a couple more things and said he was ready.

I told Oakley and Nick to go ahead of me and Brooke so that Nick could get some quick shots. Oakley knocked on the door, slowly opened it and said, “Hi, Mrs. Kitchen. I’m Oakley.” He started to walk through the door, and I heard Nick’s shutter click before hearing both of them scream, “OH MY GOD!”

My heart pounded, and I was instantly on high alert. The door was open, and both Nick and Oakley stood dumbfounded in the threshold. In the two seconds it took me to reach the entry to her room, I had convinced myself that the guys had just walked in to find Cassandra unresponsive and I was going to have to do mouth-to-mouth. We were at a nursing home, after all. I braced my hand on Oakley’s back and shoved at him, trying to make my way through the door to assess the issues when moans filtered through to my ear.

What the fuck? Was she choking? Why was no one moving? Oakley’s feet were like deep roots in the ground. “Move!” I yelled.

My voice seemed to shock both Oakley and Nick, because they started scrambling to get out of the way. It was like roaches were climbing up their backs with the way they were cringing. Nick’s long, lanky limbs curled as he gagged and pushed Brooke to the side. Oakley started nervously laughing and shaking his head as he exited. A worn voice yelled, “Shut the door!”

I should have connected the dots. I should have known to run like hell. But I’m a stupid bitch.

I waltzed through the door like I was a fucking nursing major and not a publicist. And what I saw was the most intricate threesome I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Wrinkles on wrinkles on wrinkles. Cassandra wore leopard print lingerie and was currently being spit roasted by one man with hair growing out of his oversized ears and another man with dark skin and gray hair. Her mouth was full, so she couldn’t tell me to get out. But I saw the fire in her eyes.

The two men bludgeoning the flaps started shouting.

“Get outta here!” the man with large ears grumbled. He sounded seriously out of breath.

“I’m not wasting the Viagra, John. You know they ration this shit out,” the other said to his friend.

I threw my hands up to block the view. “I’m so sorry,” I shouted while walking backward.

“Finally!” the man with large ears shouted.

The back of my foot hit a dip in the carpet, and I started falling backward. Two strong hands wrapped around me, pulling me to a hard chest to break my fall. I opened my eyes and let out a breathless thank-you when I saw Oakley holding me up.

He smiled as Brooke slammed the door to Cassandra’s room shut. “Well, Solver,” he grumbled, hovering his lips over my ears to whisper, “I think our first community service is going well, hmm?”





10





I was stress cleaning. Tomorrow, the article about our time at the nursing home was scheduled to be published, and I couldn’t sleep; instead, I was scrubbing the bathtub at eleven o’clock at night. I couldn’t get the image of Cassandra in gland-to-gland combat with the cast of Grumpy Old Men out of my head. Just thinking about it made me both cringe with embarrassment and want to bleach my eyes.

I took it out on my bathtub instead. I’m pretty sure I scrubbed until the enamel was coming off. Brooke wouldn’t let me read what she was submitting, and not having control of the situation was driving me crazier than Britney Spears circa 2007. The “meeting” with Cassandra was definitely a shit show, but I think we managed to recover the rest of our time there.

Apparently, nobody told Cassandra we were coming, which explained why we walked in on her, well, cumming. She reached out that night to apologize and offered to reschedule, but I didn’t think that I could ever look her in the eye again. I politely told her I would check our schedules and get back to her.

I finally took pity on my poor bathtub, rinsed it out, and hung up my teal rubber gloves for the night. I crawled into bed and was able to settle down after reminding myself that Nick got some great pictures of Oakley eating dinner and laughing with a woman named Ruth who completely embodied the word grandma. And surprisingly, Oakley bounced back from the incident rather quickly. He really shined with all of the residents and looked like he was enjoying himself. Brooke, however, looked a little pale the rest of the afternoon. Even though she didn’t really care for me and I may have indirectly scarred her for life, I didn’t think she would write something about Oakley that might affect his willingness to sleep with her. So at least I had that going for me.