Marcia King-Gamble - All About Me

“Good workout,” Quen said as we cooled down. Of course he could say that he hadn’t been the one peddling or rowing. He hadn’t even broken a sweat. “Come with me to my office.”

I would go with him anywhere. I limped down a hallway to a glass-enclosed box that was as neat as he looked. A Formica desk held a tray with only a few pieces of paper stacked on top. A filing cabinet was angled in one corner. Framed photos of fitness gurus adorned the walls, and in another corner was one of those medical scales. Tell me he wasn’t planning to have me get on some scale. I liked the guy, okay, wanted him badly, but he didn’t need to see how much I weighed.

I took a whiff at my pits. Phew! My deodorant was a thing of the past.

Quen waved me into the chair across from his desk. He crossed over to the filing cabinet removed a card and handed it to me. His finger brushed mine.

Zap. Zap. Zap. His touch was electric and I was lit.

“What you got here?” I asked, turning the card over.

“A list of suggested foods to stay away from. I’m a nutritionist, remember? Normally I give these cards to my clients after weighing them in.”

We were back to weight again. I had no intention of putting one toe on that scale, not with him standing there. Besides, I’d only hired him to do the personal training bit. I didn’t need no menu.

“Thanks,” I said, the card still in my hand. I smiled at him. “You can hook me up with some menus soon as I can afford it. If my real estate career takes off then you and I are in business.”

Quen sat behind his desk, legs propped on the surface, ankles crossed. His brown eyes twinkled. He must find me amusing.

“Consider that a gift,” he said. “So when did you become a real estate agent? Last I knew you were working for the Chronicle.”

“I still am.”

“Hmm.”

I looked him square in the eye. God, just gazing at him made me want to eat him alive. “That job barely pays the bills so I had to do something. I got my first client yesterday.”

“Congratulations. Want another?”

I perked up immediately. Was he teasing me or what? “I’m open.”

“Available?”

I swear he was flirting and dang I wanted him to.

I needed another client. Heck I needed several more clients to make this work.

Quen took his legs off the desk and rolled his chair forward, looking at me intently. “I own three apartments in the Flamingo Place complex,” he confided. “I need two renters.”

“You don’t say?”

This was news to me. I knew Quen was smart I just didn’t know he had business sense. Boyfriend was a real entrepreneur.

“I bought them at the insiders’ price when the buildings were transitioning from rentals to condos.”

Forgetting about sweat and my fear of B.O., I leaned in closer.

“Betcha I could move those condos for you. Are you looking to sell or to rent?”

“Rent right now. I figured if I can hold on to them for a couple of years I could make a small fortune.”

“And they’re all waterfront?” My mind was calculating both possibilities and commissions.

“Yes. I’m keeping the corner unit for myself. It’s the biggest with the best view.”

Excitement surged through me. When I moved into Jen’s place we would be neighbors. And if I were his real estate agent we would be talking regularly. I won’t need an excuse to call him. I’d be more than the fat woman he was helping to lose weight.

Quen and I would be agent and client, and later boyfriend and girlfriend. Fantasy was already taking over.

I was going to be late for work. I stood.

“You’re my friend,” I said. “For friends I work miracles. You let me rent those apartments and I’ll cut my commission in half.”

“Three months,” Quen countered. “You’ve got three months to find me suitable tenants.” He named a figure he hoped to get for rent. I blinked. I needed to make it happen.

He was shrewd. I admired that in a man.

I pumped his hand when what I really wanted to do was the raise the roof dance. You know, palms in the air, booty swinging. I’d acquired my second client and in only two days.

Cha-Ching!

“Why should Flamingo Place Realty hire you?” Manny Varela asked me as if we were strangers.

He sat in this big swivel chair behind a huge glass desk, making notes on a pad with an expensive-looking pen.

I almost didn’t answer. I had nothing to prove to Manny. We’d been friends ever since nursery school. Manny and I had spent endless times playing “show and tell.” Truth is Manny has little to show, but he does like to tell. I know every inch of his olive body and he knows every layer of mine.

In the thirty-plus years we’d known each other, we’d done everything short of sleeping together. And believe me when I tell you his weenie is teenie. Sheena told me it still hasn’t grown up.

Okay, okay. I was supposed to take him seriously. This was an interview, if I got the job Manny would be my boss. He’d left Flamingo Beach after high school and gone away to college. He’d returned years later claiming to have experience in real estate and property management, and he’d worked his way up from agent to big shot.

“You know anyone who knows this town better than me?” I answered, batting my lashes at Manny.

His big white capped teeth flashed an acknowledgment. They were a new addition that must have cost him a fortune.

“Having you work for Flamingo Place Realty would certainly be a plus. You know everyone there is to know in town. And their business,” he added.

Smooth. Yeah Manny was as smooth as the slicked back black hair on his head. He tapped the black and gold pen he was holding against the desk’s glass surface.

“Aren’t you still working at the Chronicle?” he asked, stroking his chin. “How are you going to swing two jobs?”

I shot him my mean look, which meant narrowing my eyes and sticking out my bottom lip. “Didn’t you say this was part-time?”

“Yes, weekends and such. You did well on the real estate test, plus you’re a talker. That’s to be taken into consideration.”

Enough of this cat and mouse B.S. “Do I get the job or what?”

“I’m thinking.”

I’d brought Manny a copy of my notification that I’d passed the test, just in case he didn’t believe me. Either he wanted to hire me or he didn’t not. So what was there to think about?

“You still dating Lizzie Smith?” I asked, playing my ace card.

By the way he jumped out of that chair you would have thought a gnat had stung him.

“Off and on. Why?”

I pushed back a handful of store bought hair off my face, and did a chicken neck. “Ain’t you and Lizzie exclusive. So how come you doing Sheena?”

Manny needed to know I knew about Sheena. Let him read between the lines and not underestimate me. If he didn’t hire me I’d be chatting with Lizzie.

“I could give you a try…”

Manny wasn’t stupid.

I bounced up and down and began screaming. I threw my arms around his neck and pressed his muscular body against mine. “You the man, Manny. You won’t be disappointed.”

He gave me a little push away from him on account of the weenie becoming less teenie.

“There is a but.” He gulped.

“Yeah?” He was beginning to sweat. That white starched shirt had rings around the armpits.

“Uh…things are fairly casual here in Florida, but if you’re selling real estate you can’t look too wild. A personal shopper might help you get more pulled together.”

Suck it in, girl. You got the job. That’s what counts.

I loved my look. I might be out there sometimes but it was me. I liked being wild. And I didn’t need to lay out money for some 3X pants outfit or one of them stuffy suits. But if Manny wanted me to get a personal shopper then I’d consult Jen. She’d been threatening forever to give me a makeover. And it wouldn’t cost me a thing.