CHAPTER THREE

If Vivian Chase was nothing like what I expected, the Kensingtons are even stranger. Julian Kensington wears a veneer of politeness that carefully hides an even more carefully constructed persona of superiority. He greets me with a friendly smile, but his eyes are cold and hard as diamonds.

"It's good to see you, Nate. I'll have Clara show you to the pool."

And that is the extent of our conversation.

Clara Kensington is beautiful but in a more stereotypical California bleach blonde way. Her plastic surgery isn't terrible, but she hasn't worn it well. Her face and body carry the telltale signs of someone who got hooked on drugs and alcohol too early and could never quite unhook herself. I'm all too familiar with those signs.

"Good afternoon, darling!" she says in the exquisitely manicured voice of a socialite. "It's wonderful to see you!"

She offers me her hand, palm down, wrist limp, as though she expects me to kiss it. Instead, I shake it professionally, then release it. Her eyes widen and her lips tense slightly. Why she would care enough to be offended is beyond me, but I really don't care.

"Okay," I say. "If you take me to your pool, I can get started. It's still early, so barring something unforeseen, I should have things wrapped up before dark."

"Oh, I do hope so," Clara says. "We're expecting company tonight, and I'd love for them to be able to use the pool. It's going to be a lovely evening."

"Well, we do recommend that you wait twenty-four hours for the treatment to cycle," I tell her.

She blinks, utterly stunned that I would ever suggest that she can't have whatever she desires. "Oh. Well, that's truly unfortunate. I was expecting the pool would be available for use once you were finished."

"Jesus, Clara, you can wait one fucking day."

Julian's sudden vehemence shocks me. He looks at his wife with naked disdain. I can't say I got a good first impression of the woman myself, but for God's sake, that's his wife!

Then again, I'm not a person. I'm just the pool cleaner. It doesn't matter if he insults her in front of me.

She looks at him with a mixture of contempt, self-loathing, hate and despair that I've seen on the faces of every single wife here. In fact, the only happy woman I've met so far is Vivian, and she's stopped being a wife.

Well, God, if this is how their husbands talk to them.

"Well, I suppose it's all right. There will be other warm nights." Clara laughs after that, an uncomfortable, harsh sound, like glass shattering on an aluminum countertop. "Come with me," she says. "I'll take you to the pool."

She steps outside and leads me around the side of the house. The thought of allowing me into their home never even occurs to them.

I'm actually kind of grateful for that. I felt utterly out of place in Vivian's home. Not to mention the fact that she was clearly flirting with me and I was a half-step away from giving into that temptation.

I can't imagine a world where Clara Kensington could do anything to get me to give into temptation, but it's nice to be back into a familiar lane. I don't belong here. I'm here to do a distasteful job, then disappear as quickly as possible. That's how they like it, and it's how I like it.

"You're going to replace the pool filter, right?"

"Yes, ma'am. The service includes a thorough cleaning, filter replacement and water treatment."

"Oh, good. It makes this horrid rattling noise, and I just can"t wait for it to stop."

I open my mouth to tell her that if there's a mechanical problem with the filter pump, I'm not going to be able to fix it, but I don't really want to have that conversation right now. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

So, I just smile and walk into the backyard. The pool is in worse shape than Vivian's, but it's not an unmitigated disaster. It'll take me about twice as long to clean this one, but it'll get done before the sun sets.

"It doesn't look too bad," I say. "I should have this all set by…"

My voice trails off when I look up and see I'm alone in the backyard.

"Yep," I finish.

I head back to the van and get my equipment. I'll need the vacuum for this one, not just the net.

I figure out the rattling noise in the pool filter pretty quickly. There's a pearl necklace tangled around the motor's chain. By some miracle, it's managed to avoid tangling itself in the actual chain and is just wrapped around the cylinder head with a few pearls laying against the chain.

I take it off and set it to the side. I'll take it in to Clara when I leave.

I take a moment to look at the necklace before replacing the filter. I don't even want to know how expensive that necklace was when it was new. Hell, even now, it's probably worth as much as the van I drive.

A thought crosses my mind. Clara will almost certainly just throw this necklace away and buy another one. This necklace, which is worth tens of thousands of dollars to anyone willing to take twenty minutes to clean it, will spend the rest of its existence in a landfill.

This could solve all of my problems.

I reach for the necklace, but I close my fist before my fingers wrap around it.

This won't solve all of my problems. It'll bring all of them back. I learned that lesson the hard way. I don't want to learn it again.

I replace the filter and get to work on the pool. I'll have to put the treatment in after I clean it. I'll just end up vacuuming all of the chemical out if I put it in now.

The sun is blistering hot, and I'm grateful for the lemonade Vivian gave me. God, I can't understand how people work landscaping in this heat. At least I'm working around water. It's not like I can just take a dip, but enough water splashes on me to cool me down a little bit. What if I had to be mowing grass and picking weeds like this?

I get most of the debris with the vacuum then take a break before I use the net. Best Pool allows me to take a single fifteen-minute break during the job, but they ask that I save my meals for in between houses. That's reasonable enough. It's not like I want to spend any more time here than I have to. I just need to take a load off for a second.

I catch sight of movement out of the corner of my eye. I make the mistake of following that movement to an open second-floor window.

My breath catches in my throat for the second time today.

The girl in the window is around my age. She is absolutely stunning.

It's a different kind of beauty than Vivian's. Vivian is all of the best stereotypes of an attractive, healthy older woman and none of the worst.

This girl is more like a specter. She's slender with skin so pale it's almost translucent. She has enough curves to look attractive, but her… um… assets aren't as well-developed as Vivian. They're proportionate to her delicate frame, though, and since she only wears a bra and panties at the moment, I see all but the most sensitive parts of that frame. Her hair is long and straight, a dark brown color that matches Julian's. Probably his and Clara's daughter. I don't get a good look at her face, but the side profile I see tells me that her features are as delicate as the rest of her.

Vivian Chase looks like the kind of woman you dream of having tell you what to do. This girl looks like the kind of person you want to protect and care for, the kind you want to hold in your arms and ensure nothing ever happens to her.

I look at her, and I feel a longing that I've never experienced before.

Christ, what is my problem today? I"m here to work, damn it, not fantasize about girls who are beyond off-limits to me. It would just be my luck if I do something stupid and lose everything I"ve worked for before I even have a chance at a future.

I pour my energy into my work and finish the pool fifteen minutes early. I'm about to pack up and return the necklace to Clara when I turn and see the girl from earlier staring at me.

She"s dressed now in sweatpants and a t-shirt that fits her well without being tight enough to be immodest. I get a good look at her face this time too. She"s pissed.

"Why the hell are you spying on me?"

Oh, God damn it. "I wasn't spying on you."

"Yes, you were. I saw you staring at me through my window."

Oh shit. "I… I wasn't. I swear."

"Did you like my underwear?" she says cattily, "Was it slinky enough for you?"

This is it. This is the end of my job. This is the loss of everything I worked hard for. All because I can't stop thinking like a damned high school boy. I'm seriously going to lose my job because I was gawking at a client's daughter.

"I… I'm sorry," I stammer. "I didn't mean to…"

My voice trails off when she throws her head back and laughs. I stare at her uncertainly, and when she points at me and says, "Your face! Oh God, your face!" I am less than pleased.

Anger replaces my fear, and it's all I can do not to curse her out. Instead, I smile and chuckle slightly, hoping that's what she wants me to do. God, I can't wait to get out of here.

"It's okay," she says. "I know you're not a creep. It's my fault for leaving the window open when I was in my underwear, anyway." She looks at me and says, "Seriously, don't worry. I'm not going to tell my parents or anything."

"Oh," is all I manage to say.

"What's your name?"

"Nathan Harlow."

She sticks her hand out. "Lila."

I can't help but notice how thin her arm is. When I see her at first, she looks slender. Seeing her up close, I wonder if there's more to it than just slimness.

Not that I'm going to come anywhere close to acknowledging that.

"It's nice to meet you, Miss Kensington."

She smiles drily at me. "You've seen just about all of me now. You might as well call me Lila."

"Oh. Um. Sure. Nice to meet you, Lila."

She laughs and says, "I can see that I've completely terrified you. I'll let you go without teasing you anymore. I have to go change for dance class, anyway. Seriously, don't worry about catching me half-naked. Everyone spies on everyone here."

She says that like it's the most normal thing in the world. A part of me wants to ask why that is.

Most of me is grateful to get the hell out of here. I stammer a goodbye, then refuse to look at her as I hurriedly pack and leave, even though I know she's still staring at me.

I forget all about the necklace. It's just as well. Let that be someone else's problem. It's not until I return the van that I left the pool vacuum there too.

Wonderful. I'll have to go back tomorrow and get it. God, what a shitty day.

As the fear subsides, though, I begin to regret running away so fast. Lila was pretty. She's not a supermodel type like Vivian, but in a way that makes her even more attractive. She has that cute girl next door look. And she has an incredible smile.

I should have asked for her number. Maybe tomorrow when I get the vacuum…

I laugh and shake my head. She might look like a girl next door, but she's not the girl next door to someone like me.

Still, you never know. Stranger things have happened. Maybe today isn't so shitty after all.