Live For Me (Blurred Lines #2)(2)
Author: Erin McCarthy

Yet for the first time in my life I was going to be alone. Completely and utterly alone, in the best way possible.

Based on a recommendation from my high school teacher, I had landed a job as the caretaker for some rich dude who was never there.

Best. Job. Ever.

Once I got used to the silence, I figured it would be like chocolate meets a hot shower meets winning the lottery, with the check handed to you by a super-hot guy.

I was anticipating peace, with no foster siblings messing with me and trying to brush up against me or offer me help getting dressed.

No yelling. No backhanded cracks to my face. No Gram demanding care all day long, some necessary tasks, some simply spiteful.

If this room and this carefully manicured private terrace were any indication, it was going to be paradise. Like a vacation from being me.

“It’s beautiful,” I murmured, as we stepped out onto the terrace, and I breathed in the salty, briny air of the ocean. “Are you sure you want to quit this job?”

She laughed again, and it amazed me how easily she laughed, how often she smiled. “Yes. Absolutely. I want to go spend time with my grandkids. Besides, I couldn’t stand the quiet being in this big house by myself. I swear, I about jawed the landscapers to death every week all summer.” She gave me a look of concern. “Are you sure you want to do this? It’s a lonely existence. Mr. Gold is only here once or twice a year, at most.”

Perfect. The less he was there the better, in my opinion. Being naturally curious, I had done quick online research on him, and discovered he had paid over two million dollars cash for this property, and that he was a music producer in New York City. The record label had nicknamed him Gold Daddy, because of the volume of hits he had produced. I was picturing an overly tanned guy in his sixties who wore sunglasses inside, even at night. Not who I wanted to hang out with.

Lonely would be a welcome change from continual harassment. “That’s fine with me. But why does he have a house he never uses?” I asked, because it seemed crazy to me. As Hattie had led me through the house, the formal living and dining room furniture had been covered with sheets to keep the dust off and the whole house felt very still, empty. Well cared for, but not well loved.

“He doesn’t like to come here anymore. Not since…” She shook her head. “Well, never mind that. He’s just busy in New York.”

So she didn’t want to share the boss’s secrets. I could understand that, but since she was no longer working for him, I was surprised. It meant Hattie really was as good a person as she seemed. But it did increase my curiosity about Mr. Gold.

“And you’re sure you can handle keeping the house clean? It’s really just dusting and sweeping and then dealing with the kitchen and your bathroom.”

I touched the bush in the pot next to the door, to see if it was real. It was so perfect it looked fake. But it was real.

Like this house. Like this job.

The place was huge, the biggest house I’d ever been in, but I didn’t think that it was anything I couldn’t handle considering no one was living in it and most of the rooms were shut up. I’d cleaned at Gram’s, plus cooked for her and fetched and carried. I’d walked to the grocery store, paid the bills. Taking care of an empty house with zero clutter would be easy, as would the solitude. It was more that I was worried about damaging something. As we had walked through the mansion I had been overwhelmed by its grandeur, and when I bumped an end table in the foyer, I almost had a heart attack. I had eyed the electronics in the grand family room with excitement and horror. I wanted to explore everything, but was afraid to touch.

At least in front of Hattie. Once she was gone, I planned to poke into every dark corner in an effort to feel less intimidated by the quiet, the hulky furniture, the blinking lights on the technology present at every turn.

This terrace, despite its elegant green potted bushes, felt cozy and contained, the view totally amazing. I could see sitting there and feeling comfortable. Not like I belonged to the house, but like I could visit in peace.

“I just can’t get over how young you look,” Hattie said. “I’m going to fret about you being here by yourself. Thank God for security systems.”

It was hard not to be sensitive when people mentioned my looks. I was vertically challenged, to say the least, and I had big brown eyes that were too large for my face. In my opinion, anyway. By sixteen I’d given up thinking that I was going to have some sort of late bloomer growth spurt. I did look young, and I hated it. “I’m eighteen,” I said, hearing the defensiveness in my voice.

“To me, eighteen is infancy,” she said with a chuckle. “Honey, I have bras that are older than you.”

That was a visual I didn’t need, giving Hattie’s billowy chest. But she was being really kind to me and I felt guilty for sounding a little snotty. She hadn’t meant it as an insult. So I gave her a smile. “I’m probably smaller than your bras, too. I kept waiting to shoot up, but it never happened. I’m pocket-sized.”

“You have an advantage, you know. Everyone must want to hug you and take care of you.”

That almost made me laugh, but she was so sincere I resisted the urge. No one had ever taken care of me, and yet here I was. I had survived, intact. Mostly normal. Suddenly panic was replaced by excitement. I was on my own. I had a future. A real one. With no rent and no interference, I could save my paychecks to go to community college and get a nursing degree like I wanted. The life I had thought was going to drone on endlessly, the same, day after day caring for Gram, was now suddenly all changed, and it sent a wary anticipation through me.

When Hattie reached out and hugged me, I was startled, but I didn’t resist. In fact, I sank into the embrace, taking in her floral scent. Despite it being so chilly outside, her touch was warm and comforting.

“If you need anything, you have my cell phone. Plus I’m just down the road for three more weeks before I go to Florida.”

“Thank you,” I said, closing my eyes briefly, wondering how it was that some people were lucky enough to be born to women like Hattie, and others were not.

Like me.

Somewhere I had a father who might or might not know I even existed, and a mother who had died without seeing me for three years. And Hattie was moving several thousand miles to be near her family.

There was a whole flurry of last minute directions, suggestions, and concerns, and then Hattie left.

I was alone.

In a house the size of my high school.