by Melody Mayer
“I have to go meet your parents,” she told him as she took a seat. “Diane called.”
“Ah yes, the royal summons,” he mocked, then brushed a lock of hair from her cheek. “And she's not my parent.”
Esme checked her Timex. She had ten minutes. “Well, whatever she is, she hired me and I'd prefer not to be late when she fires me.”
“I've got some information that I think you'll appreciate,” he reported.
“I'll take anything.” She rubbed her burning eyes, musing on the night before. First, Diane had caught her and Jonathan in her guesthouse. Esme had been sure that she'd be fired on the spot. But Jonathan had stuck up for her and Diane had retreated, warning that she would consult with Steven and discuss the entire matter with Esme the next day.
Then Esme had gotten a call from her friend Lydia Chandler—another nanny whom she'd met at the Brentwood Hills Country Club—with the news about Kiley and Platinum. The two of them had rushed to help Kiley; Esme had had the sudden brainstorm to enlist her good friend Jorge in the effort to keep Kiley from going straight back to Wisconsin. That effort had been successful, and Jorge had immediately invited Kiley to sleep in his brother's empty bedroom at his family's Echo Park bungalow. Esme hadn't gotten back to the guesthouse until five and hadn't gotten to sleep until six. That sleep had been fitful. Though Diane hadn't fired her the night before, there was a good chance that the guillotine would drop that morning.
God, what would her parents say if that happened? Even worse, would spiteful Diane fire them, too, for what their daughter had done?
“Your job is safe. I talked to my dad at breakfast.”
Esme grabbed his hand. “Really?”
He nodded. “Before Diane came down.”
Esme felt her body sag with relief. “I was so worried. …”
“I know.” He put a comforting arm around her. “I should warn you, though. You're about to get clocked with some pretty strict rules.”
“Such as?”
He moved his arm and ran his hand impatiently through his hair. “Like middle school shit. Here on the sacred family grounds, you and I are strictly friends. No public displays of affection. Definitely no visits to your guesthouse.”
Esme swept her damp hair off her face. It wasn't as if this was a shock. After all, those were a stricter variation on the rules she'd shattered in the first place.
“To quote my father,” Jonathan continued, “‘What you do in the outside world is your own business, Jonathan. But I'd feel more comfortable if the two of you weren't alone on the property. And I know you want to make me comfortable.’”
“Right,” Esme agreed. What else could she do? A ruby-throated hummingbird flitted down from the tulip tree behind them and hovered motionless in the air not five feet from them, outlined perfectly against the crystalline blue sky. Esme realized how quiet it was—so quiet that she could hear the flitting of the bird's wings.
“It's never this quiet in the Echo,” she said softly, once the bird had flown off in search of more nectar. Esme had read about hummingbirds. They had to eat and eat and eat, because of how much energy they consumed in flight. Sometimes she felt as if she had to run and run, just to stay ahead of her past, maybe even ahead of her destiny.
It was so easy for someone like Jonathan. It would never, ever be easy for her.
“So, what do you think?” he pressed. “Can you live with that?”
“Sure,” she replied, forcing a coolness that she didn't feel.
Evidently he could live with it, or he wouldn't be presenting it to her now. So what if there was this electricity between them? If he could keep his hands off her, she could damn well keep her hands off him. He was just a guy.
I am such a fraud, she thought. Even at that very moment, it was everything she could do to keep her hands off him, her lips away from his. Could she trust herself to live by her boss's rules, or would it just be too much torture? What about Junior? Where did he fit into the scheme of things?
“Sure?” Jonathan echoed, sounding hurt. “I don't understand you, Esme Castaneda. Last night, you told me you didn't want to skulk around in secret. I got right in my stepmother's face about you. I'm ready to go public, I told you that. We don't have to hide in the guesthouse. Wherever you want to go— Viper Room, Geisha House, the Derby, goddamn Spago, even though no one in there is under fifty—if that's what you want, just tell me. Just say where.”
God, she was so confused. What if she said: “Let's hop in a Chaparral and go to House of Blues.” How would it work? During the day she'd be the hired help, and at night she'd be his girlfriend? She rubbed the tight spot between her eyes. She had no time to figure this out; she had to go meet Diane.
Why can't I be like Lydia? Lydia would say go for it, sleep with Jonathan and sleep with Junior, and keep your mouth shut about both of them. But I'm not like Lydia, and I never will be.
She checked her watch again: 10:43. If she was going to make it to the big house on time, she'd have to hurry.
She rose. “Right now, I've got to go talk to your dad and Diane.”
He got up too. “Yeah, whatever.”
Jonathan was obviously bummed, but he had to give her time. She wanted to do the right thing. But for the life of her, Esme couldn't figure out what that right thing was.
For all the time that Esme had been working for the Gold-hagens, she'd never once set foot in Steven's home office. To get to it, she had to enter the main house through the rear entrance; go through the ultramodern kitchen sporting a new five-hundred-dollar Gaggia Classic espresso machine; cross a game room with original arcade versions of Pac-Man and Donkey Kong, several Xbox 360s, and a professional British snooker table; and then continue through the meeting room, which featured a long teak table with a dozen high-backed black leather chairs, four white boards along the far wall for note-taking, six Sony VAIO Notebooks, a video-conferencing PC, DVD players, and a huge Sony plasma monitor that hung on the north wall. Evidently, Steven didn't have to leave his estate in order to conduct his business, though Esme knew he had a suite of offices that triangulated perfectly between the Endeavor, William Morris, and CAA talent agency headquarters.
When she reached Steven's office, she knocked on the black glass double doors. An efficient beep was her signal to push the doors open; Steven and Diane were at the far end, huddled behind Steven's desk, eyes on a flat-screen computer monitor. Steven waved Esme to one of the black barstools that were set not far from his gunmetal desk.
With nothing else to do, Esme peered around the room. Everything—the triple-coated, hand-painted walls, the ostrich-skin sofa, the in-wall speakers, the ubermodern lighting fixtures— was a variation on a theme in black and white. The only things that weren't black and white were posters of Steven's various television shows over the years (all of them were in black onyx frames, though) and a black trophy case containing three shelves of gilded Golden Globe and Emmy awards.
The whole effect was intimidating, and Esme couldn't get comfortable on the barstool. She thought maybe that was the whole point—that if Steven's visitor was uncomfortable, it would give Steven the power position on anything that was being discussed.
Finally Steven looked up. “Thanks for coming, Esme.”
“Sure,” Esme ventured. He was her boss—it wasn't as if she had a choice.
“Diane and I wanted to thank you for all your work with the children during FAB,” he went on, putting his hands on his desk and leaning toward her. Diane mirrored the gesture with her French-manicured hands, which gave Esme the distinctly uncomfortable sensation of being the subject of an interrogation.
“It was fun.”
“We've been talking this morning, and we've—I've—talked with Jonathan as well. Has he spoken with you?”
Esme decided this was no time for fibs. “Yes. Just a little while ago. He came down to the guesthouse.”
“For the last time,” Diane stated flatly. “Did he make that clear?”
“Yes, he d
id.”
Steven looked at her closely. “You need to give this some thought, Esme. We're very happy with your work. But I won't have your relationship with my son interfering with your duties to Easton and Weston.”
Esme's chin jutted upward slightly. “I would not let that happen, sir.”
“So we're all in agreement here?” Steven asked, folding his arms. He turned to his wife. “Diane?”
Diane nodded. “Just please understand that we are one hundred percent serious, Esme. If you break the rules again, we will have to let you go.”
Esme felt like smacking the smug look off Diane's face. But she forced herself to keep her voice even, and pleasant. “I understand.”
“Excellent.” Diane smiled. “The girls love you, and we would hate to lose you. And now …” Diane tented her fingers, eyes shining. “We have a surprise for you.”
Surprise? What surprise? Esme had had enough surprises in recent days to fill anyone's quota.
Diane came around the table, a sheaf of papers in her hand. She pushed them at Esme, who saw from the corny airplane-festooned logo that they were from some travel Web site. “We've decided that we're worn out by FAB,” Diane reported. “We could use a vacation. We're going to take the kids to Jamaica.”
“That's great!” Esme blurted. A few days of freedom from her job were exactly what she needed. “I'm sure you'll have a great time. I hear it's beautiful.”
Steven smiled. “It is. And you're going to get to see for yourself. Our flight leaves at eight tomorrow morning. Make sure the girls are packed, okay?”
Lydia was met with a huge surprise when she let herself in the back door of the moms' house: her aunt Kat—who was supposed to be on the East Coast, prepping for her latest ESPN tennis reporting assignment—was sitting at the kitchen table with Anya.
Neither of them looked at all happy.
Not good. Anya had probably filled Kat in on the “borrowing” issue, as well as the “she sucks as a nanny” issue. Still, Lydia pasted a welcoming smile on her face—she'd learned from the Amas how to maneuver a power play: never let 'em see you sweat—and stepped into the state-of-the-art kitchen with its flowery, southwestern-style mosaic floor and stainless steel everything else.
Alfre, the moms' nutritionist, a radiantly healthy ex-hippie chick in suede Birkenstocks, was hard at work chopping raw scallions and red bell peppers on the counter. Lydia reasoned that this was a positive sign. If Alfre was on site for a talking-to, then the talking-to couldn't turn out to be too severe.
“Hey, Alfre,” Lydia offered. “Whatever you're slicing sure smells delish.”
“Raw veggies,” Anya snapped with her thick Russian accent. “You have not eaten single raw veggie since you arrive from Amazon.”
Well, okay, that was true, Lydia allowed mentally. But there was no need to make her into a criminal because she turned down the odd crudité.
Lydia suddenly flashed to a time in the rain forest when she'd been fishing alone. She'd been just about to climb back up the riverbank when she'd seen an angry tapir—a sort of anteater mutant—confronting her. This had been no joke, since the tapir had weighed about four hundred pounds. In that situation, the best defense can be a good offense. Lydia had flung her cane fishing pole at the beast, then had screamed and charged like a wild woman, figuring that if she stayed where she was on the log, she was a goner. The tapir had frozen in its spot for a split second, then turned its snouty face and bolted back into the jungle.
Two angry tapirs, minus the snouts, Lydia told herself as she took in the moms' scowls.
The best defense can be a good offense.
“Aunt Kat!” Lydia cried, as if just now noticing her in the room. She was also careful to emphasis the “aunt” part, as if unexpectedly seeing her aunt was perhaps the single most exciting thing that could happen to a girl. After all, blood was thicker than whatever it was Anya and Kat did under the sheets. At least, Lydia hoped it was.
“Alfre, would you excuse us?” Kat asked pointedly, without even so much as a look at Lydia.
Uh-oh. More not good. Alfre dismissed. Really, really not good.
“It's no problem, I've got to go to Whole Foods anyway,” Alfre responded cheerfully. “We're out of organic sprouts.”
Suck-up, Lydia thought. Alfre worked for these people. What was she going to say? No?
Lydia pulled down her cutoff Houston Oilers football jersey so that it covered every inch of midriff, and hitched up her cutoff shorts with the same goal in mind. These were the clothes in which she'd arrived, and she'd put them on just to be on the safe side. Never underestimate the power of nostalgia. “So, Aunt Kat. We didn't expect you home for a few days!”
Anya literally grabbed her partner's arm. “You see?” she cried. “She has responsibility of hamster! She acts like all is normal. All is not normal!”
Jeez, Lydia thought. She probably has “Drama Queen” tattooed on both cheeks of her butt.
Kat motioned for Lydia to take a seat at the far end of the table. Lydia did, noticing how tired her aunt looked; the disheveled expensive white silk Armani suit, the noticeable bags under her blue eyes. Since she'd gotten her new job as ESPN's chief women's tennis commentator, she'd been working very hard.
“Anya filled me in on the goings-on around here, Lydia.”
Lydia played dumb. “Really?”
Her aunt's partner leaped to her feet and pointed a finger at Lydia. “You know, you know. You take daughter Martina for dessert. You make children eat bugs. Martina go belly dancing, I see her practice in room. You take clothes from Kat and my closet with no asking.” She grabbed Kat's forearm again, this time in a death grip. “She give children milk!”
“Only to prove that they're not allergic,” Lydia defended herself. “I mean, they might have been, but they're not anymore.” She looked over at Kat. “Isn't it great that I found that out?”
No agreement was forthcoming. Instead, Lydia got an upbraiding from her aunt that went on for five minutes and covered everything from how Kat and Anya had done a favor for Lydia by bringing her out of the rain forest, to how Lydia was interfering with Kat and Anya's parental authority, to how Lydia was besmirching the Chandler family name with her unprofessional and downright dangerous behavior.
Lydia shook her choppy blond hair off her face and waited for the tirade to end. As she did, she made some quick calculations. Obviously, she was not going to be fired, probably because Kat still took pity on her for all those years in the rain forest with only air-dropped copies of Cosmo for company. She would have to bide her time on the reformation project for Martina, wherein she planned to help the plump, self-conscious, generally miserable ten-year-old to actually get a life. She'd have to figure out a way to get some decent clothes of her own instead of raiding the moms' closet. What about those upscale used clothing places she'd heard about? Maybe she could troll there and—
“… nanny cam,” Kat concluded.
Oops. Lydia had missed most of that, but anything that ended in “nanny cam” could not possibly be a positive development.
“Sorry?” Lydia asked, as pleasantly as possible.
“You heard,” Anya accused. “You just don't like what you hear. Nanny cams. We need eyes in the back of head for you!”
Nanny cams. That had to be those closed-circuit television systems by which parents could keep an eye on their nannies' doings. Some parents hid the minuscule cameras in their children's Steiff animals. Her own aunt would do that to her?
“Gee, Aunt Kat, that's a little drastic,” Lydia began.
“Not drastic enough!” Anya insisted, eyes blazing. “There must be confidences for what Lydia has done,” she declared, after some further assassination of Lydia's character.
“Consequences, you mean,” Kat corrected.
“Yes, yes,” Anya agreed. “Consequences. In old Soviet Union when I was girl, we would go before committee.”
“There are no committees here, but I can think of one thing in addition
to the nanny cams that will show you how serious we are, Lydia,” Kat mused. “It should also help you focus on your responsibilities.” Kat rested her head on her hands and looked at Lydia. “How often does X drive you around?”
X was the moms' driver. A gay guy in his early twenties with exquisite taste in both clothes and friends (in fact, Lydia was in a hot relationship with his very hetero best friend, Billy Martin), he had gotten to be great buds with Lydia. She had taken advantage of his services not just to bring the children to various activities, but also as a way to get from point A to point B herself. It wasn't as if a girl could ride a bus to Los Feliz, nor could she have taken driver's ed in the Amazon.
“Some,” Lydia ventured.
“Ha!” Anya barked. “I check mileage on BMW!”
Anya was keeping track of the mileage on the BMW to see when Lydia was taking unauthorized trips? Jeez, Joseph Stalin had nothing on her.
Kat stood up. “Until the end of the summer, no unauthorized trips with our driver. If you're in the car with X, it's because we said you should be there.”
Okay, this was definitely going to cramp her style. Without X, she was pretty much in a very well-heeled jail.
Anya took a list out of the pocket of her green velour pants dotted in artistically placed anchor appliqués. They were the sort of pants Lydia would have liberated from the moms' closet until recently. “Right now, you and children have appointment with local public library. I will drive you myself there to be sure children do not select comic books. Go get ready. Be at BMW in four minutes.”
Kat nodded and Lydia realized that was that. Class dismissed.
Well, at least she still had her job.
Kiley shoved her hands into the pockets of her jeans and forced herself to tell Esme and Lydia the horrible words she'd been thinking ever since she'd arrived at the Brentwood Hills Country Club: “This is probably the last time we'll be together.”