Be My Neat-Heart Read Free Page B

roll. “I show them how to purify, classify and stupefy….” I pulled myself together before I burst into “the knee bone is connected to the thigh bone….”
    â€œSorry, I get carried away putting like things together—even words.”
    Carver grinned, but a disparaging snort from somewhere over my right shoulder made me flinch. I spun around to see the handsome, bad-tempered man from the elevator leaning against a bookcase, a coffee mug in his hand and a withering expression on his features.
    He stared at me as if I were Kafka’s cockroach lounging on the miserably uncomfortable chair, a chair only my Aunt Gertie could love. I squirmed as any self-respecting bug might. “You!” I blurted before my brain was in gear. “From the elevator!”
    â€œYou two have met?” Carver seemed astonished by that.
    â€œWe rode up together in the elevator,” I stammered.
    â€œThe one that stopped at every floor?” Now Carver really looked amused. Then he seemed to remember there were amenities to perform.
    â€œMs. Smith, I’d like you to meet my friend, Jared Hamilton. Jared just stopped by to—” he paused to choose his words carefully “—to vent about something concerning his work. I invited him to stay and see what you had to say. Do you mind?”
    I minded a great deal, but I didn’t think it was prudent to say as much. “Anyone you choose to have here is welcome, Mr. Carver.” I turned to face the desk again but had the sense that Hamilton was hovering above me like a bad-tempered bat hanging from the rafters. Granted, a good-looking bat, with chiseled features and broad shoulders, but he alarmed me nonetheless. Too serious. Too cantankerous.
    Carver smiled encouragingly, as if to tell me to ignore the storm cloud lurking in the corner. “I don’t believe I’ve ever met anyone quite like you before, Ms. Smith,” Carver said.
    I didn’t dare consider what he might mean by that, so I decided to take it as an admiring comment. A girl can use all the compliments she can get.
    Unfortunately, I heard a muttered “No kidding?” from behind me.
    â€œPay no attention to him,” Carver said, giving Jared Hamilton a dirty look. “He’s had some bad financial news, and he’s being rather loutish at the moment.”
    â€œYes…well.” Excessively loutish, if you ask me.
    â€œNow that we’ve settled that, Mr. Carver, why am I here?” I forced bat-man out of my mind. “What can I do for you? This office doesn’t appear to need a professional organizer.”
    Silently he stood up and moved toward the bank of mahogany doors that lined the wall behind his desk. Without comment, he opened them.
    Why he wasn’t buried in an avalanche of paper as the doors silently slid away, I’ll never know. Shades of those sneaky Pharisees! With Ethan Carver, what you see is not exactly what you get. The cup—or in this case, the closet—had not been cleaned in a very long time.
    â€œThis will be our little secret, Ms. Smith. You do have a confidentiality clause in your contract, don’t you?”
    I made a little zippering motion across my lips. No one would believe it, anyway. The papers looked like they’d been sorted by a wind machine. If there was any sense whatsoever to the mess, I couldn’t fathom it.
    â€œI’m known in my business as a perfectionist. I have a photographic memory and can retain virtually all of the details of my business up here.” He pointed to his head. “Therefore, I seldom worry about the papers on which information iswritten and tend to simply toss them in here to be filed some day, but it has…gotten out of hand.
    â€œMy secretary does not deal with anything in my personal office. I prefer to do that myself.” He cleared his throat. “Now it’s to a point where I don’t feel comfortable asking