When I got to the gate, I began to wonder who the hell these people were. When the guard asked for my driver’s license and then took a moment to consult his list before making a phone call, I was really starting to worry who they might be. Who needed this kind of protection from unwanted guests? Sure this was Los Angeles County, but there were celebrities everywhere here. Whoever it was had to be someone ridiculously famous, important, or dangerous to need this kind of protection from the outside world.
After a few minutes, the burly looking guard waved me through. I followed the directions he gave me all the way to the end of the beach. When I pulled into the driveway right beside of some sports car that I knew cost more than I could ever make in ten lifetimes, I nearly passed out. I was home in bed, still dreaming… Right?
Behind the sports car was a little coupe that was a few years older. I figured it belonged to one of the other housekeepers interviewing. My stomach filled with butterflies and anxiety. This was too good to be true. It had to be. Whoever lived here wasn’t going to hire me. They would want someone older, with more experience, someone respectable.
I was only twenty five and had only been working as a temporary housekeeper for Perfectly Clean for less than two years. I wasn’t respectable. I tended to run my mouth, and I had more tattoos and piercings than was conventional. Most of the people I temped for made me wear long sleeves and wanted my hair kept down to cover up my tattoos. The woman who had called Stan wasn’t going to want me…
Even as I thought those words a middle aged woman with her graying hair in a sever bun came storming out of the house. She was muttering to herself and shaking her head in agitation. She got into the coupe, put it in reverse, and practically burned rubber pulling out of the driveway. I watched in horror as she nearly hit the moving van that was pulling up at the curb. The driver blew his horn at the woman, but she didn’t even stop as she shifted into drive and sped off down the road.
I blinked a few times, my heart racing at the near miss that I had just witnessed. What had made her so upset?
Finally collecting myself, I stepped out of my beat-up old Corolla and started up the driveway to the front door. Behind me the driver and his crew were getting out of the van. They were laughing and cursing. I shot them a frown as I reached the door and pushed the doorbell. Moments later it opened to a woman with a full blown temper flashing in her eyes.
“What?” she snapped.
I took in the fire in her green eyes, the flare of her nostrils making the stud in her nose rise up and down with each breath she sucked in. Her auburn hair was pulled back in a ponytail and the Demon’s Wings shirt she had on stretched over a noticeable baby bump. I knew who she was, of course I did. You didn’t listen to the music I did and not know who Ember Jameson was. And even if you didn’t listen to rock, you would know who she was if you had picked up a tabloid anytime in the last three months. The fact that she was pregnant with Nik Armstrong’s baby had been big news.
This blew my mind.
“I’m Layla Daniels,” I told her. “I work for Perfectly Clean and was scheduled for an interview.”
She raked her gaze over me from head to toe. My long dress pants hid the tattoo on my right leg, but my shirt didn’t cover the Celtic knots at my wrists, and I was sure that my shirt and bra didn’t disguise the fact that both my nipples were pierced. Ember took her time on the return trip up to my face, and her head cocked to the side as if she was seeing something that was particularly curious to her.
“Layla?” she questioned. “Your mother must like Eric Clapton?” I shrugged and a hint of a grin teased her lips. “Well then, let’s make the best of the situation.”
I snorted at the line from the song and nodded. “Yeah, I never heard that one before… What did you do to that woman, by the way? She nearly took out the movers.”
Ember stepped back to let me in. “Judgmental bitch! I told her that if she was hired she would have to be opened minded. I live with four rockers, for the love of Gods. One of them wakes up in a pool of his own vomit more often than not. She said that it was despicable… Oh, and was I sure of which one was my ‘baby daddy’?”
I bit my lip when she actually made quotation marks when she said ‘baby daddy’. I could see myself in this woman and after only just meeting her I felt like I had known her for years. “Wow. I would have slapped the bitch.”
“Right?” She full on grinned now. “I showed real restraint.” She stood holding the door open. When she heard the movers out in the driveway, she sighed. “Excuse me a minute. There was supposed to be four able bodied men assisting me today, but hey...” she shook her head, muttering about ‘fucking Nik’ as she walked down the few steps. “Who’s in charge?” She called to the movers.