Penthouse Suite Read Online Free

the slim, dark-skinnedman waiting by the door said in approval. “Normally Mrs. Jarrett has a companion with her, but Lucy left several days ago and isn’t back yet. Mrs. Jarrett asked for you.”
    Kate yawned and followed Ricardo to the elevator. Mrs. Jarrett again. “What’s wrong?”
    “I don’t know, but it sounded urgent. If you don’t already know it, Mrs. Jarrett is one of our most important resident guests. She keeps things lively.”
    “I figured that out yesterday when she browbeat your day manager into giving me this job. Why is she in a wheelchair?” Kate asked, as much to let him know that she wasn’t sleepwalking as for information.
    “Arthritis, I think. She can walk with difficulty, but she uses her wheelchair most of the time. Don’t let her helpless appearance fool you. She’s about as innocent as a killer bee. I just hope that the problem is something we can solve.”
    “If it’s maintenance work, I think I can handle the job,” Kate replied. “I’ve had training in mechanics, carpentry, and plumbing. Anything else I can probably fake.”
    “Not necessary. We always keep three maintenance men on duty in the daytime. Anything you can’t do, somebody else can. Mr. Sorrenson insists that everybody work together around here. We have a good team.”
    “I met Mr. Sorrenson last night. He’s quite young to be so successful, isn’t he? What kind of man is he?” Besides being strong, silent, sensual, and knee-knocking sexy? she added silently.
    “He’s pretty much a recluse. Doesn’t mix much with outsiders. Just lives up there and plays with his computers, his fishing boats, and his realestate. I think he’d rather deal with spread sheets than people. He’s a fair man, but he doesn’t get involved. He expects us to do our jobs, and we do.”
    “Really?” That didn’t sound much like the man she’d talked with at his kitchen table.
    They reached the ninth floor, room 904. Ricardo knocked and directed his voice into a speaker panel beside the door. “It’s Ricardo, ma’am,
and
Kate.”
    “Let Kate in. You go away.”
    “Yes, ma’am.” Ricardo unlocked the door and gave Kate a shrug of his shoulders. It was clear that he was glad to be dismissed. “If you need help, I’ll be at the desk.”
    Every light in the suite was burning when Kate entered. She blinked her eyes in protest and closed the door behind her. There was no sign of Dorothea.
    “Mrs. Jarrett? Where are you?”
    “Are you alone?”
    “Yes, ma’am.”
    “Well, come in here. I’m in the bathroom, and I can’t get this bony old body out of this damn slippery lily pond they call a hot tub.”
    Kate followed the voice into a bedroom-sized bath that must have been designed for some movie star out of the nineteen-forties.
    Black marble tiles covered the floor and ran over the side of a lotus-shaped pool, which was filled with rose-perfumed bubbles. In the midst of the bubbles was the pink-faced cherubic woman with her arms crossed in regal disdain.
    “What seems to be the problem?”
    “The problem? Criminey, woman, use what sense the Lord gave you. Whoever created this swimming pool failed to take into consideration thatthere are those of us who need sides, normal sides. I told them I didn’t want a hot tub in here anyway. Well? Don’t just stand there, come and get me out.”
    “Come into the tub?”
    “Unless you have the power to levitate.”
    Kate tried to keep a straight face as she considered Day Two of her grand adventure in the hotel of the rich and famous. Only a few hours earlier she’d practically drowned herself in the penthouse. Now she was about to be knee-deep in bubble bath. This was some party she’d been invited to.
    Kate slipped out of her shoes, got a firm grip on her sense of humor, and stepped into the tub. She reached down to lift the slender frame of a very nude and very slippery Mrs. Dorothea Jarrett. Between the bubble bath and the downward slant of the hot tub, the chore was