Crazy about the Cat Lady

by J. T. Marie

  Ms. Meredith is probably old enough to be my mother, Dayla tells herself as she fiddles with the clips. Head of her own business, that’s why she works such long hours, a real Devil Wears Prada kind of boss. Though, to be honest, Richmond isn’t exactly New York City. Maybe she travels, though. Dayla’s heard there are commuter flights to JFK during the week.

  She leans closer to the mirror to check her eyeliner and catches a glimpse of the living room clock in the reflection. Quarter to three, shit! She has to leave now if she wants to get to Windsor Farms on time. Ms. Meredith stressed the importance of being reliable when she called; the last thing Dayla needs is to be late.

  Fortunately there’s little in the way of traffic, and Dayla finds the address easily enough. She slows as she passes the house, awed by the sheer size of the place. It puts her tiny apartment to shame—it’s more of a sprawling mansion than somewhere anyone actually lives. Forty dollars a day to feed a pet cat might sound like a windfall to Dayla, but it’s obviously nothing to the woman who owns this place. She probably has a full housing staff, each with their own specific duties as well as a room in the servants’ quarters in the east wing.

  “Talk about the one percent,” Dayla murmurs. “Ms. Bitch is rich.”

  The homes around Ms. Meredith’s are all equally obscene. Dayla has never felt so inadequate in her life. So small, so embarrassed. Suddenly she wishes she had taken longer on her hair, and changed into something nicer, too. Her skinny jeans and off-the-shoulder, leopard-print peasant blouse makes her feel woefully underdressed.

  Then again, nothing in her closet would’ve been nice enough. If only all the clips in her hair matched. She even had some in the same dark auburn shade she dyed her hair that she could’ve used. In the car’s rear view mirror, the rainbow of clips look childish, almost clownish, stupid.

  God, don’t let her slam the door on me, Dayla prays as she pulls to a stop at the curb in front of the house. I’m out of my league here and I know it. There’s no need to rub it in, too.

  Gathering her courage and her purse, Dayla takes a deep breath before she gets out of the car. She can do this. Forty dollars a day, five days a week. An extra two hundred bucks—eight hundred a month—will help out a lot. It’s feeding a cat, she reminds herself. You like cats. You got this.

  The path between the street and the house stretches before her like Dorothy’s Yellow Brick Road winding its way to the Emerald City. The grass is so vividly green, lush and thick, that Dayla wonders what it might feel like beneath her bare feet. She resists the urge to slip off one of her sandals and find out, instead focusing on the house at the end of the path. Her destination.

  But halfway there, her cell phone pings with an incoming text. Without breaking her stride, Dayla reaches into her purse and pulls out the phone to check the message. It’s from a number she doesn’t recognize. Forgot to tell you, come around back, it reads.

  Her steps falter. Come around…is this from Ms. Meredith?

  She pulls up the list of calls and sees the number is the same one Ms. Meredith called her from earlier.

  An image rises unbidden to her mind—a rich woman lounging beside an Olympic-sized swimming pool, water twinkling opulently in the afternoon sun. Tanned skin slathered with heady coconut oil, muscles firm and belly taut, perky breasts augmented by implants that cost more than Dayla makes in a year.

  Don’t forget a fruity boat drink garnished with a jaunty umbrella, and maybe a hot pool boy for a little eye candy if there isn’t a Mr. Meredith in the picture. God, I left Richmond behind for Beverly Hills.

  The path branches off, one part leading straight up to an imposing front door and an offshoot heading around the side of the house. Dayla eyes the door as she skirts it, secretly glad she won’t have to try to figure out how to…what, knock? Ring the bell? Press the buzzer, wait for the maid, have the butler announce her presence?

  She probably wants me to come in through the servants’ entrance. I’ll be told to park around back at some point, too. Heaven forbid the neighbors see my eyesore of a car out in front.

  Dayla follows the path around the side of the house to a closed gate in a high wooden fence. She raises a hand to knock, but the gate swings back under her touch, so she eases it open and steps inside. “Hello?” she calls out.

  “Back here,” comes the reply.

  Dayla pushes the gate shut behind her but doesn’t latch it, leaving it ajar. Neatly trimmed hedges line the side of the house, interspersed here and there with rose bushes. A white trellis arches over the path before it opens out onto a concrete patio. There’s no swimming pool, but there’s obviously one coming soon—a section of the yard is gridded out with red flags and taut rope strung low on short pegs, calling out a large rectangular space just past where the patio ends. There’s a prefabricated shed off to one side, the doors open wide to display an interior filled with tools and wood and tiles, and a backhoe sits behind it, shovel high in the air in anticipation. Closer in is a sawhorse with blueprints spread out across the top. A woman leans over the prints, her strawberry blonde curls pinned down beneath a paisley do-rag.

  Cautiously, Dayla edges closer. “Hello?”

  When the woman looks up, Dayla sees her brow is furrowed with a deep line. A yellow pencil is clamped between her teeth. Then her gaze finds Dayla and she spits the pencil out onto the blueprints. “Hey there!” she calls out, gesturing Dayla to come closer. “You made it. I was hoping to catch you before you got to the door.”

  “I just pulled up.”

  Dayla gets a good look at the woman and her breath catches in her throat. She knows she’s staring, but she can’t help it. Despite the faded jeans and dirty T-shirt and do-rag, the woman before her is gorgeous. And probably doesn’t even know it, Dayla thinks. Anyone who knew she looked this good wouldn’t be chewing on a pencil or hiding those bouncy curls under a bandana.

  Damn.

  The woman has large, blue-green eyes rimmed by thick lashes. A pert nose splashed with freckles. Glossy bow-shaped lips, with small indentations in each corner from the pencil. Fair skin, which has pinked a little on the tip of her nose and across her neckline from where she’s taken in too much sun. She’s shorter than Dayla, willowy and lithe, but those eyes have a commandeering presence that makes her seem larger than life.

  Is this Ms. Meredith?

  Before Dayla can ask, the woman skirts the sawhorse, hand extended in welcome. “Hi, I’m Keri. You’re Dayla, right?”

  “Yeah.” The word comes out in a sigh as Ms. Meredith—no, Keri—takes Dayla’s hand in hers and gives it a firm shake. Her skin is warm and smooth where it presses into Dayla’s palm, and for a moment, Dayla doesn’t want to let go.

  Then she remembers the mismatched clips in her hair and flinches in embarrassment. God. She pulls her hand away from Keri and runs it over her hair instead, hoping maybe the other woman hasn’t yet noticed the hot mess on top of her head.

  But Keri’s gaze follows Dayla’s hand. Feeling the need to explain herself, Dayla starts, “I don’t normally look this bad…”

  “What? You look fine.” Keri brushes away Dayla’s protest. “You just got off from work, I understand. Look at me. I’m a mess!”

  I wouldn’t say that. But since she’s been given permission, Dayla lets her gaze linger on Keri. This close, Dayla stands a head taller than the other woman, but that only increases the gawkiness she feels. “You look fine,” she murmurs.

  “Just wait until the real work starts,” Keri says, hands on her hips as she looks around the spacious backyard.

  Dayla looks, as well, but steals glances at Keri from the corner of her eye. Does she even know how good she looks? Probably not. In Dayla’s experience, the prettiest women never think they’re all that, and she suspects that might be part of their charm.

  Trying to think of something to say that isn’t I love you, Dayla asks, “So what, you’re putting in a pool, I guess?”

  “Pool and hot tub,” Keri says with a nod. “It’
s going to be L-shaped, but I only got the shallow end here mapped out. It’ll turn around behind the cabana over there…”

  She points to a building easily the size of Dayla’s apartment building. “The water will get deeper at the bend there, down to about seven feet or so, and we’ll put up a diving board on one side, the hot tub in the corner, and there’ll be another shallow end on that side. We’ll have some bistro-style tables and stools over there, a little wet bar, maybe a fire pit.”

  Dayla stares out at the backyard, trying to picture the pool, but all she sees is Keri’s trim body in a painted-on swimsuit that hugs every curve, creating ripples as she effortlessly glides through the water. Those strawberry curls tightened and damp, spray beading across her sun-kissed cheeks…

  Before Dayla can lose herself in the fantasy, Keri turns to her, full lips spread into a lovely, giddy grin Dayla feels in the pit of her stomach. “But you aren’t here to listen to me ramble on about that. You’re here about the cats.”

  Cats, plural. Had she said that before? Dayla doesn’t remember. “Yes, the cats. How many are we talking?”

  With a shrug, Keri says, “I only have two. Well, my two, and then there’s the fosters.”

  She says the word fosters nonchalantly, as if Dayla should know what she means. Because she doesn’t want to lose face in front of the woman, Dayla nods as if she does know. “Fosters, right.”

  Is that a particular breed? Or the cats’ names? Or maybe her neighbors’ cats that she watches sometimes? But when, if she works so much she has to pay someone to come in?

  And doesn’t she have enough staff to take care of the cats anyway? Dayla muses. Maybe cleaning the litter box is beneath the maid’s pay grade.

  Folding her arms in front of her, Keri says, “Basically I need someone to come by and feed them, change the litter, maybe play with them a bit. This job has me busy like you wouldn’t believe, and it gets so hot during the day that I try to get the bulk of work done really early in the morning or after the sun sets.”

  “Do you own your own business?” Dayla asks.

  Keri nods. “It’s just me and whoever I bring on. I have a couple of guys scheduled to come in next week and help out, and I want to get the cats squared away before then so I can focus on what needs to be done.”

  “Sounds like a plan.” But Dayla’s just saying that to be agreeable. She isn’t quite sure what Keri’s talking about. What kind of work does the woman actually do? She should’ve asked when it first came up, but now it’ll just sound awkward. Like asking what she means by fosters. Dayla knows she looks stupid with these damn multicolored clips in her hair; no need to ask dumb questions, too.

  I’ll find out eventually, she thinks. Until then, she’ll pretend she knows what Keri’s talking about, no big deal. I got this.

  “I need to finish up here,” Keri says, with a nod at the blueprints on the sawhorse. “I thought I’d be done by now but something’s off somewhere and I want to nail it down and get it fixed before I call it a day. Are you busy tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow?” Dayla shrugs. “I work in the evening, five to eight. Do you need me to start checking on the cats tomorrow? You said sometime this week.”

  Keri shakes her head, curls bouncing above her shoulders. “No, I just thought maybe you could come by my place and meet the cats, let me show you the routine, stuff like that.”

  With a nod at the large house behind them, Dayla asks, “Can’t we go in and meet the cats now?”

  Keri frowns at her, confused. Then, before Dayla can explain, she laughs. “Wait—no. This isn’t my house. Do you think I live here?”

  I did. Now it’s Dayla’s turn to be confused. “You mean you don’t?”

  “God, no. Honey!” Keri chuckles; the sound trickles pleasurably down Dayla’s spine. She called me honey. “If I lived here, I wouldn’t need to hire someone to look after my cats. Hell, they’d have their own staff!”

  “Then who…” Dayla glances around, trying to put together a likely story with the clues around her. “Don’t tell me you’re the one who’s putting in the pool.”

  With a nod, Keri says, “I already told you, remember? It’s going to be L-shaped, with a hot tub, a wet bar…we stood here and discussed it at some length, did we not?”

  “But I thought…” Dayla replays the conversation they had and realizes Keri never said she’d hired someone else to put in the pool. She’d talked as if she was putting it in herself, but Dayla thought she’d used the royal we, meaning someone she paid to do the work. Not meaning she was going to do it all herself.

  Yet Keri was the one leaning over the blueprints when Dayla arrived. I thought she was just looking them over, checking behind the workers, making sure the all I’s were dotted and T’s were crossed.

  When she said, “I only got the shallow end mapped out,” I didn’t think she really meant she did it herself!

  “So you’re the contractor,” Dayla says. Now how stupid does she look? But how was I supposed to know this wasn’t her house?

  “I’m installing the pool,” Keri corrects.

  Still slow on the uptake, Dayla says, “You said you have your own business.”

  “Meredith Aquatics.” Frowning at her, Keri asks, “You didn’t see the van out front?”

  “I didn’t know to look. Wow.” Dayla rocks back on one heel, impressed. “I would’ve never thought…I mean, I honestly believed—let’s just say I thought you lived here and leave it at that. I didn’t know when you said you were putting in the pool that you were actually the one putting in the pool.”

  Keri grins. “Don’t get me wrong, it pays well. But not that well. My home sweet home is a far cry from this.” Her laugh flashes like sunlight off glass, and when she touches Dayla’s arm, the skin beneath her fingers threatens to burst into flame. “You thought I lived here. Me! I love it.”

  I love you, Dayla thinks again. Out loud, she asks, “Where do you live?” She hopes it isn’t somewhere too far to drive to from her apartment, though the ad had said mileage might be paid. Still, Dayla needs to be able to get to the salon on time. Though I’d drive fifty miles one way if it meant I’d get to see this woman again.

  “In the west end,” Keri tells her. “I’ll warn you now, though. It’s a far cry from this, so don’t be disappointed when you see it.”

  Dayla laughs. “Are you kidding? My entire apartment could probably fit inside the outline of this pool you’re putting in.”

  Keri’s smile lights up her face. “Yeah, it’s probably going to have more cubic meters than my house, too, once it’s done.”

  Which makes Dayla feel better all over. It sounds like they have more in common than she initially thought. Careful, chickie, she warns herself. You’re going to be picking out drapes next if you don’t watch it. This is a cat sitting job, remember, not an escort gig.

  That doesn’t keep her cheeks from burning or her heart from skipping every time Keri looks her way. Whatever Dayla feels for her is quickly on the way to becoming a full-blown crush.

  “So will sometime tomorrow morning work for you?” Dayla asks.

  Keri nods. “How about ten? Can you come that early?”

  Girl, I’ll come whenever you want me to. But all she says out loud is, “Ten works for me.”

  Chapter 4

  The next morning, Dayla readies herself as if she’s going to work before she leaves for Keri’s place, even though she has hours before she has to be at the salon. But Keri already saw her at her worst; Dayla wants to show how nicely she cleans up, too.

  Besides, who knows where this may lead? she thinks as she pulls her dark hair into an elegant up-do. Her makeup is flawless, her outfit on point, her hair to die for. With a long last look at her reflection in the mirror, she has to admit she likes what she sees.

  She hopes Keri does, too.

  You’re just going to meet her cats, damn. Calm down, bitch.

  But her nerves trill with anxious energy. Dayla keeps remembering the way Keri’s
hair, damp with sweat, curled against the nape of her neck under the do-rag. And her large eyes ringed with thick lashes. And her pouty lips, her freckled skin.

  Wonder if she’s freckled all over.

  The thought runs through Dayla’s mind before she can stop it. This is a job, she reminds herself. Keri’s my boss, sort of. I can’t be thinking of her like that.

  But once the pool’s put in and Dayla no longer needs to check on the cats, who’s to say what will happen? Things might heat up between them before then.

  Dayla makes a funny face at herself in the mirror. “Like I’m going to wait that long.”

  In a pair of tight denim shorts and a flowing, sleeveless top, Dayla looks like the epitome of summer. The shorts show off her legs nicely while the top bares her arms, and there’s even a little bit of side-boob action happening when she leans forward. She’ll have to keep that in mind…

  Are you trying to seduce this woman? a voice inside her whispers.

  Running a hand over her styled hair, Dayla laughs out loud. Who’s she kidding? There’s no trying about it.

  When she plugs Keri’s address into her GPS, it turns out to be not too far, only a short, five-minute drive from Dayla’s apartment. She pulls up in front of a cozy, two-story country cottage with pale Wedgewood blue siding and maroon shingles on the trussed roof. There’s a small porch with a swing on it, and to the right of that, a large bay window overlooks a proliferation of azalea bushes. This late in the season, the leaves are still full but there are no flowers left.

  The first word that pops into Dayla’s mind is cute. It’s much smaller than the mansion in Windsor Farms, just like Keri said. Cozier, too. Dayla had wondered if the cubic meters comment was only said to make her feel better, but the woman who lives here is someone Dayla can relate to. While her apartment might easily fit into Keri’s first floor, Keri’s whole house is definitely smaller than the pool she’s putting in.

  A narrow path winds through lush grass to deposit Dayla at Keri’s front door. She takes a moment to smooth down her shirt, stand up straight, and suck in her stomach, then she takes a deep breath and knocks.