Kelly McClymer-Must Love Black (6 page)

All too soon Sarah had to hang up and join the family trek to do-gooderville. I stared at the phone in my hand, wondering how often we’d get to talk with me busy working here and Sarah busy working on a Habitat for Humanity site.

She had promised to try to beg a cell phone from someone to call me once in a while. I was sure it wouldn’t happen often, though.

I made my great four-poster all neat, just like I hadn’t slept in it. I never made my bed at home, but it just seemed right to do it here. I liked the way the room looked so perfect again, just like a dream room for a girl whose life was perfect. You know, the two-loving-parents, no-icky-stepmother kind of girl.

My bathroom had a shower with six jets. Six! After a few false starts where I sprayed cold water directly into my face, I figured it out and stayed in there for at least half an hour with no sign of the hot water running out. Sarah was going to be so jealous when I told her.

Part of me was enjoying the luxury; part of me felt like the cops were going to burst in and arrest me for so obviously
not belonging in this place. It didn’t seem right that the nanny had a room this amazing. I wondered what the twins’ room looked like.

There was a coffeepot in the bathroom. One of those fancy machines that makes one cup, fast. I made myself a cup of the Brazilian roast. New day, new life. The coffee was good, especially when I poked around under the smooth green granite countertop and found a minifridge with organic half-and-half and a few containers of yogurt and bottles of juice. There was a note, too, that said, “Miss, please enjoy these and order replacements from the kitchen when required—Havens.” How weird. He signed his name “Havens.” Did he have a first name? I bet it would be something like Sebastian or Charles or maybe Frederick like the butler in Mom’s book.

When I went out into the common room, fortifying mug of coffee in hand, Triste and Rienne were already there. Apparently, late-night meetings with the new nanny didn’t make them want to sleep late.

They were dressed, both mostly in black. I noticed that Triste had tried to do the layer thing like I had worn last night. I don’t think this was normal for her, though, because she’d done it all wrong, putting a bulky layer on the top and totally messing up the lighter layer underneath. Not that I had any intention of correcting her. Clearly, she was smart. She’d figure it out. In my experience, people who liked black didn’t like being told that they hadn’t quite gotten the hang of something yet. Better to figure it out on your own.

There was a big tray with bowls and a pitcher of milk and a
pot of something hot on the round table. The binder had been pushed aside to make room. I looked in the pot. Oatmeal. With a bowl of fresh blueberries next to it. There’s really nothing like fresh Maine blueberries, small, full of tart flavor, and not at all mealy. Oatmeal seemed a little retrocentury, but I was hungry. I put a little in a bowl and sat down.

“Why don’t you have breakfast downstairs with your dad?” It could be tricky asking them questions about the way the house was run. But I’d rather ask a pair of ten-year-olds than the butler—or even Geoff.

“He’s very busy,” Triste answered as she lined her blueberries on top of her oatmeal in a checkered pattern.

Rienne nodded. Her blueberries were in a swirl pattern, except where she’d dug in for her first bite of oatmeal. “He used to run the business with our mother, but now that she’s gone he has to do it alone.”

Triste added, “He just got a new partner, and she is very demanding of his time.”

“A new partner?” She? Maybe I was oversensitive, but it sounded like the twins were on the way to joining me in stepmotherland. “I guess running this place is a lot for one person.”

Rienne said, “Besides the yoga instructors and meditation counselors and masseuses for the guests, we have a staff of six: Ginger, the cook; Havens, the butler; Geoff, the gardener; Graciela, the housekeeper; Lionel, the chauffeur; and Laurie, the personal assistant.”

Triste shook her head. “Seven. Don’t forget Pippa. She’s staff too.”

Rienne argued, “But she doesn’t help keep this place running smoothly for the guests, now, does she?”

I didn’t quite like being low on the staff totem pole. “I get the most important job,” I told them.

“What’s that?” they both asked at the same time, staring at me with identical gazes.

I’d only meant it as a joke, but their grave eyes made my voice more serious. “Taking care of you, of course. I’m sure your dad thinks that’s more important than running a business, don’t you?” Okay, so I didn’t really think that, but I felt for the kids, especially if their dad’s new partner was going to end up being their new mother. Let them think they mattered to him. For a little while longer. From the smiles on their faces, it seemed my strategy worked.

I decided to change the subject. “So, you guys are into computers, are you?” This may have been a complete under-statement given the four huge monitors that dominated one side of the room. The twins had already turned them on, and the room had an electronic hum going on. It was interesting that a father who banned television and radio still indulged this obsession. Or maybe computers were an interest they’d shared with their mother.

“We do our research and studies on the Internet,” Rienne explained.

“I’m surprised your dad lets computers in the house, if he bans TV.” I said it casually, as if I didn’t mind the lack of a television. Fortunately, summer was rerun season, so I wasn’t missing too much.

“Computers are nothing like TV,” said Triste.

Rienne argued, “They can be, but we don’t use our computers for mindless entertainment. We use them for education.”

Education? Was I supposed to teach them during the day? I thought about what I could teach them, and came up with two things: how to make store-bought jeans look fashionable and how to write poetry. I’m a good poet, so my teachers say. But the thought of showing these two minipeople my poems was intimidating. They would argue about my word choice, my meter, my rhyme. Maybe not my subject matter—after all, they liked black as much as I did. Still, I’d rather not do a show-and-tell my first morning.

Which left me wondering what exactly I was supposed to do. It was probably written somewhere in the binder, along with the daily schedule, but it seemed weird to open that in front of them and consult it. I considered asking them directly, but it didn’t seem very nannylike. I’d gotten into big trouble that way once while babysitting—I’d asked a kid what snacks his mom let him have. He’d told me peanut butter crackers. It wasn’t until after he started swelling up that he admitted he had an allergy and showed me the EpiPen.

I tried a compromise question. “So, what are you working on right now?”

They took me over to the computer and started talking about something they called “Camp CSI.” Apparently, it was an online camp that gave children a chance to do their own CSI-type experiments. Even though the twins didn’t watch TV, they understood investigative procedures and were fascinated by the camp.

Rienne tapped a few keys and showed me their mission for today: take pictures of a butterfly and then figure out what kind of butterfly it is using the butterfly files in the “camp library.”

Triste frowned. “It’s not the most challenging mission for us because of the butterfly garden.” She didn’t seem to like taking the easy way.

Rienne shook her head. “The hard part isn’t taking a picture of the butterfly, Triste, it’s identifying it. That won’t be easy.”

Triste nodded thoughtfully. “I suppose you’re right. But let’s take a picture of a butterfly that’s really different from the rest, to make it a little bit harder.”

Rienne shrugged. “Okay. If you want.”

Watching them talk about their mission with such confidence, I let my attention wander to another computer and wondered if I could use it for e-mail. Sarah had said she’d check her e-mail. And so had Dad.

I had just sat down to check my e-mail when an old-fashioned bong sounded from somewhere in the ceiling. I looked up. The twins didn’t move, so neither did I.

When the bong sounded a second time, Triste sighed. “You’re being paged, Pippa.”

“By the ceiling?” I looked around.

“Here.” Rienne leaned over the computer terminal, clicked on a desktop icon, and suddenly, Havens’s face filled my monitor. A little scary, even though he’d seemed fairly harmless last night. “Good morning, Miss. Good morning, children. I trust you all slept well and enjoyed your breakfast.”

“Yes, we did.” Since I could see him, I assumed he could see me, so I sat a little straighter and tried to look like a responsible nanny who has everything under control.

“Mr. Pertweath would like to speak with you before you begin today, Miss.”

“No problem.” Maybe he’d clue me in on what I was supposed to do.

“He’s scheduled fifteen minutes for you—his day’s rather busy, you understand. If you could be downstairs in ten minutes, I’ll meet you at the elevator and show you to his office.”

“I’ll be there.”

“Excellent.”

Havens’s face disappeared from the monitor.

“He always calls the nannies ‘Miss.’ Isn’t that a funny thing?” Rienne said.

“Sounds nice to me.” I shrugged.

“It’s just because he can’t bother to remember your name,” Triste informed me.

I ignored this comment. “I should have asked if you were supposed to come with.” I looked at the monitor. It seemed likely that I could page Havens if he could page me, but I didn’t have a clue how, and I didn’t want to admit that to the twins.

Fortunately, Rienne piped up, “Oh, no. We’re going for our music lesson at eight thirty.”

Right. I remembered seeing that on the schedule.

“Am I supposed to take you?” Technically, I was able to drive. Not that I’d done much of it. It’s not that I didn’t enjoy
driving, it’s just that I didn’t trust the other drivers on the road not to make stupid mistakes that could get me into an accident. Hey, it happens.

Before the twins could answer, the elevator door slid open and a very pretty young woman emerged. I pinpointed her as Laurie, the personal assistant, since she looked too young to be Mr. Pertweath’s business partner, and her blazer, heels, and skirt seemed too formal for a cook. She wasn’t more than two or three years older than I was, at most.

“Who’s ready to go for music lessons?” She was a little on the peppy and pink side of life for me. Especially this early in the morning.

Apparently the twins agreed because they groaned and said in unison, “Laurie, you don’t have to pretend we’re not doing this under protest.”

“Hey, Lionel’s still off today, so you get to spend some quality time with Geoff. You can’t tell me you mind that.”

“He is cute,” Triste agreed. Rienne nodded. I tried to size up Laurie without being too obvious about it. Sounded like she thought Geoff was cute too. I wondered if she knew if he was taken.

“See? There’s always an upside.” Laurie was way too cheery. I wondered if she had a quirky side, like Sarah. I’m not much for instabonding with summer friends, but it could be cool to have a girl around my age to hang out with, and she might have the scoop on Geoff. But then she wagged her finger at the girls. “Just so long as you don’t get any ideas about my guy.”

CHAPTER FIVE

There was no sense longing for the man. He was as far out of my reach as the moon.

—Miss Adelaide Putnam,
Manor of Dark Dreams,
p. 25

Her guy? Geoff was taken? Bummer. Not that I’d planned to make a move on him, not without Sarah to egg me on, but Geoff, taciturn and hot, had presented a bit of a challenge. I like a challenge. Maybe I didn’t want to date him, but I had hoped to get him to say more than one sentence in a row. I looked at Laurie and realized that trying to do so would definitely be a waste. If Geoff liked this pink-and-pretty, bubble-gum couture-suit wearer, then he and I didn’t have enough in common for me to be interested in hearing more than one sentence from him.

We all took the elevator down to the main floor, where Havens met me. I had hoped to see Geoff there, too. Just to see if he was as into Laurie as she sounded like she was into him. After all, I believe in a fair trial with all facts and evidence
on the table before I condemn someone to loserdom. No go, though. Laurie and the twins peeled off toward what I assumed was the direction of the garage while I followed Havens through the smooth and shiny marble hallway where he’d welcomed me last night.

The house seemed to grow bigger and bigger—the meditation center, a yoga wing, a Pilates studio. We wended our way past two conference rooms and a bank of private elevators that each led to a different guest suite. Finally, Havens and I stepped into a sunlit lobby where patrons check in and out, and then into a hushed office with some woo-woo music playing very low and the faintest hint of incense in the air. I glanced with curiosity at the elegant and paper-laden desk Havens identified as Laurie’s. She wasn’t much older than I was and she was working as Mr. Pertweath’s personal assistant.

Havens touched a red button on Laurie’s phone and a voice came over the intercom, drowning out the music on the sound system: “Perfect timing, Havens. Send her in.”