by J. L. Beck
There’s a moment of silence, which I cling to, a brief respite from the inevitable rejection that will kick me swiftly out the door with little chance to get back the family heirloom that should be rightfully mine, but now resides in his possession.
“I can’t believe I’m going to say this.” He shakes his head to himself and lets out a private little laugh. “But I’m going to give you the job.”
I have to fight to keep my jaw from falling to the floor.
His blue eyes meet mine. “I came from nothing too. So I get it.”
I blink in surprise. “You—you did?” All the articles just detailed his current state: single, wealthy, and hot as fuck.
“Three years ago, I was evicted from my apartment because I couldn’t pay my bills. I worked hard to get where I am and I think everyone deserves a chance to better themselves.”
Under the table, I pinch my forearm to be one hundred percent sure this isn’t a dream and I didn’t pass out in his kitchen moments ago. It wouldn’t be the first time I stalled a con job gone wrong that way.
“You’ll cook three meals a day for me Monday through Friday using recipes I’ll select for you.”
I flinch at his words. Three meals a day for him… “So you work from home?”
He laughs. “I’m an app developer. My dev team is in India, my quality assurance team is in Romania, and my new marketing team is in New York. This is my office.” He outstretches his hand at the expanse of the house.
“How often do you go visit those places?”
“Just got back from New York last week and I have no plans to go to India or Romania any time soon.”
I stiffen. If he’s here all the time, that will certainly make finding the brooch nearly impossible. But still. It’s a chance.
A chance to rob him blind.
I hold out my hand to shake on it.
3
When I show up for my first day of work, the housekeeper arrives only moments before me. She gives me a harrumph instead of a hello and lumbers toward the back door without a word. Dark bags hang under her eyes, encased in severe wrinkles. Wisps of gray hairs stick out from her bun. I bite my lip, glancing toward the front door where I was planning to go. With a sigh, I amp my pace and fly across the lawn, blades of damp grass tickling my ankles. I catch up to her just as she drags herself up the stone back door steps. A keypad awaits and her arm stretches toward it lazily, propelled by muscle memory.
I hold my breath, tuning my ears toward the sound of the numbers and not even daring to blink.
But before she presses a single number of the entry code, she glances back at me with eyes narrowed. Then, she cups her hand over the keypad, shielding all view of the numbers, and sings loudly to herself in Spanish to conceal with the digital tone of the numbers. My hands curl into fists at my sides, but I keep a polite smile etched on my face.
She swings the door open and lets it slam shut in my face before I can even take a step toward it. When I twist the knob, it’s already locked. I let out a frustrated scream and then haul ass back to the front door. I ring the doorbell, and the same housekeeper pulls it open for me. There’s a slight glint in her eye that hints at triumph.
I brush past her and ignore the thump in my gut at losing to her power play.
A full array of cookbooks rests on a brand new short stack bookshelf stationed next to the kitchen entryway. A twinge flutters in my chest as I imagine Colby dragging himself out to Barnes and Noble after work last night and buying out the entire cookbook aisle, then straddling on the floor to nail together a bookshelf plucked from the first furniture store to have one in stock. My interview was only yesterday.
On the granite counter, there are three books propped open, each to a specific recipe. Attached to a recipe for simple poached eggs, a post-it note reads: I thought we could start off easy today. Just bring them in when they’re ready. Galina can lead you or you can follow the sound of me cursing out people in the IST time zone.
His note puts a chuckle on my face. Seeing as he’s holed up in a room somewhere, I slide out of the killer stilettos I brought to keep his mind focused on anything besides my snooping. Flats feel like heaven on my feet and—bonus!—they’re silent when I pad from the kitchen through the hallway. Colby’s waiting for his breakfast but an extra few minutes won’t kill him. Those stolen seconds might be all I need.
I press my ear against the first closed door, holding my breath to listen for a voice or typing or anything. When only silence greets me, I twist the handle and swing it open to reveal a cozy man cave complete with a pool table in the center, pinball machines lining the walls, and every video game console that ever existed in a row attached to separate flat screens. My gaze sweeps over the closet doors, and then lingers on a locked cabinet in the corner. My heart thumps. A locked cabinet could mean jackpot.
I place one foot on the chevron rug, but a scraping sound from just behind me makes me flinch. I spin around, goose bumps popping on my skin, only to come face to face with Galina. She purses her lips, crinkling her peach lipstick that cracks at the creases, and shakes her head at me.
“I was just—“ I start to say. My rapid pulse beats in my neck. “Looking for torch?” It comes out more of a question than a statement. “I thought I’d make crème brûlée later.”
Galina keeps staring at me with the kind of gaze a witch might use to put a hex on someone.
Blood rushes to my face. “Clearly it’s not in here.”
She makes no effort to move, squarely blocking the doorframe. I tilt my body to the side and scoot past her, making a grand show of pressing a finger to my lips to appear confused…and not appear as if I’d just gotten caught.
I grip the countertop with white knuckles and focus on keeping my exhales even before I shift gears to Colby’s breakfast, reading the recipe three times before it makes sense. I follow the steps exactly by boiling water, adding vinegar as specified and cracking the eggs into a whirlpool. The white part runs in streaks before curling up around the yolk. I set the kitchen timer and let out a breath. With a recipe, I can break each step into a rhythm. It’s exactly like making a cocktail, only with the heat coming from the stove and not the alcohol content.
I grind and scoop coffee beans into a pour over coffee carafe. A nutty aroma fills the kitchen. As I’m setting everything onto a tray, Galina grabs her purse and stands in front of me, glaring. In Spanish, she tells me she’s heading to the store for more cleaning products. Then she taps the side of her eye and points at me with a menacing look on her face, the universal sign for: I’m still watching you. A shudder runs through me.
With shaky fingers, I carry the tray toward the sound of Colby’s voice coming from a room at the very end of the downstairs hallway. He cups his hand over his headset and mouths a quick thank you before gesturing me to set the tray down beside his computer. Three giant monitors line the edge of his desk, each displaying a different spreadsheet. One contains Brady Bunch-like squares of talking heads, including Colby’s. From the waist up, he looks prim and proper with a button down shirt and neatly combed hair, but below the waist he’s wearing pajama pants and cozy brown slippers. When he catches me looking, his cheeks turn red and he winks, placing a finger against his smirking lips.
I shut the door and lean against it, grinning to myself.
After a moment, I straighten. Colby’s occupied on a call. Galina left me high and dry. Her threat hangs over me, making my spine shudder. My eyes scan the wall for the security cameras that are surely lurking, watching my every move. But this is my one chance. I discard the heels and creep upstairs because the man cave is too close to him right now, cringing at the creak of the hardwood floor on the second stair. I keep my breath shallow, my steps light, and my pace slow and steady.
My heart begins to beat louder as I take in the closed doors ringing the long hallway and the secrets they might conceal inside. My best chance is Colby’s bedroom, and I take an educated guess as to which door it is. A long breath slip
s from my lips when I swing open the correct door.
Several elegant dark wood dressers surround a manly king sized bed made with a crisp white comforter. Only a neat stack of hard drives lines the tops of his bureaus. The tick of a clock on his wall marks my beating heart. A lemony fresh Lysol scent lingers in the air and sunlight streams in through the open curtains. There are hardly any signs of life in the room. Galina already cleaned and destroyed them all. But I have to start somewhere.
If I bought a multi-million dollar diamond brooch, where would I keep it?
I heave his mattress up, my elbows locking under the hefty weight, and peer beneath at the prized hiding spot for most sixteen-year-old girls trying to keep their stash of condoms away from the prying eyes of their parents. But the only thing beneath the mattress is a sturdy box spring.
I pull open the bottom drawer of his long dresser, marveling at the neatly folded Polo shirts with perfect creases as if a Gap retail worker set up the display just for him. I run my fingers over the scratchy fabric, slipping my hand between each in case he decided to be sneaky and hide the brooch between two shirts.
With a sigh, I move onto the next one. Just as my fingers close around the cold metal handle, the faint vibration of footsteps ricochets through the floor. I scramble away from the drawer, my stomach winding up like a fist. My breath comes in ragged gasps as I fly to his bathroom and conceal myself behind the door. I lean against it, squeezing my eyes shut as the bedroom door flies open.
Colby’s footsteps grow closer, the hardwood floor squeaking beneath his feet. “Liliana?”
A flush of the toilet and twist of the water faucet buys me enough time to find my composure. I wipe sweat from my brow before I open the bathroom and greet him with a smile. “Hey. What’s up?” I tilt my head at him as if I’m the one confused by his presence in the bedroom.
He squints at me, a muscle in his jaw feathering. “What are you doing up here?”
I force a little indent to furrow in my brow to really sell this. And then I let out a laugh as if I just got the joke. “You were on a call and I had to pee.” I shrug. “I went up here to avoid disrupting you.”
Colby’s scowl deepens. “The upstairs is off limits. You got that?”
His harsh tone startles us both. I stumble backward a step, nodding. So not the locked cabinet then. His prized possessions are up here.
He watches me intently, expectantly. I duck my head to prevent him from seeing the redness creeping across my cheeks.
“You know, you look really familiar?” His voice goes lighter but there’s something rigid about it, as though he’s speaking through clenched teeth. “Have we met before?”
A cold crackling sensation races down my spine. Shit. “Yes.” I lift my chin, meeting his eyes head on. It’s the oldest trick in the book: when you lie to someone, lie like you mean it. “Yesterday.” My lips crack a smile, coaxing him to laugh as well and join in on this joke even though the joke’s on him.
He massages his jaw. “No, I don’t think that was it.”
I shrug in the most nonchalant way I can muster. “I mean, we live in the same town,” I say even though until yesterday, I lived three hours away. “Maybe you’ve seen me around.”
He purses his lips. “Maybe.”
“Well, I should get back to it. How were the eggs by the way?” When lying doesn’t work, distraction is the next best substitute.
This time he cracks a genuine smile. “Better than yesterday’s.”
I leave him in his bedroom, mumbling a silent prayer to the universe that he believes me. That the first time we met was yesterday…and not three weeks ago, back when the only person who screwed me over was my own flesh and blood and not a stranger.
If my paternal grandmother hadn’t passed away a month and a half ago, I wouldn’t be here right now. When she died, the heirloom diamond and ruby brooch that dates back to Charlotte, Queen Consort of the United Kingdom back in the seventeen hundreds, should have been passed down to me. King George III gave the collection of royal jewels to Charlotte upon their marriage and her Will left the precious items to successors of the House of Hanover. Nearly all the jewels became part of the crown jewels, except one: a diamond and ruby brooch she bequeathed to a friend she worked with at Kew Gardens, where she volunteered as an amateur botanist. That friend took a cue from Charlotte herself and willed the brooch down the family line, woman to woman, with each one vowing to keep it safe and never sell it. Since my grandmother only had sons, the brooch should have gone directly to me, and my grandmother had all but given it to me already.
“It’ll be yours, my sweet child. It’s always been yours.” She used to whisper those words deep in my ear, lulling me to sleep with her promise.
But my parents were married at the ripe age of twenty-one after a quickie one night stand that resulted in a bun in the oven. They were young and stupid and didn’t bother to get a Pre-nup. Years later, their fighting about my mom’s drug use led to her throwing my dad out of the house with the intent to divorce his ass. Beside himself, he consoled his woes in a bottle of gin before she could even gather the paperwork. He drove straight into a telephone pole that night. “He was killed instantly,” the officer at the scene told me. “No pain.”
I’d lost him and my mother was too far-gone to be mine anymore, but I clung to my grandmother growing up. And when she passed away, the only thing that got me through the grieving process was knowing the brooch would be safe in my hands, exactly as she wanted. But due to a legal technicality thanks to her not bothering to update her Will since before I was born, her possessions were still bequeathed to my father. And his Will transferred all possessions to his wife. My mother.
As soon as my mother got her hands on the brooch, she put it up for auction.
Thanks to its royal status and mint condition, it was estimated to be worth 3.5 million dollars. I nearly choked when I heard that price. That kind of cash could pay off all my debts. But it could also supply my mother in years’ worth of cocaine. Lawyers turned me away when I tried to hire someone to fight for the brooch because the legal technicality was binding and my lack of funds for a retainer fee proved even more binding.
So I scraped together every last cent I had, pawned off all my possessions, and borrowed whatever I could from friends. Thirty seven thousand dollars later, I headed to the auction house with only a prayer and a back up plan: if all else fails, steal it.
I slipped into a seat in the back row, trying not to fall apart as the auctioneer held up every item that came before the brooch. Paddles seemed to go even higher in the air after each million dollars the prices ticked past. My leg rattled on the floor and the corners of my mouth trembled. My only hope came from a necklace estimated to be worth 1.2 million but only sold for twenty thousand.
“Next we have a brooch dating back to Charlotte Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Queen Consort of the United Kingdom. Three hundred diamonds surround a two teardrop rare rubies encased in gold.”
I bolted upright in my chair, fanning myself in my face with my paddle. My gaze roamed around at all the chairs, each one a potential enemy. My heart pounded so hard and fast, it felt like the room was spinning.
“We’ll start the bidding at ten thousand dollars.”
My paddle shot high in the hair, and I gripped my elbow to prevent it from wavering.
“Ten thousand.” The auctioneer nodded at me.
I held my breath, squeezing tight on the wooden handle of my paddle as I brought it down to my lap. All auctions started at ten thousand but quickly escalated. I mouthed a silent prayer to whoever might be listening above to let this one go to me, fair and square. No lying, cheating, and stealing involved. Not when this should have been mine to begin with.
“Do I hear twenty thousand?” The auctioneer scanned the crowd.
My shoulders tensed.
“Going once…”
I scooted to the edge of my chair, clenching down on my teeth.
“Going twice…”
The auctioneer lifted up his gavel to declare me the winner, but before he could say the official words, a guy rushed in from the main hallway, panting for breath. He thrust his paddle high in the air, waving it frantically. The auctioneer nodded and my breath came in shallow spurts as I tried to tamp down the panic.
“Do I hear thirty?”
The guy’s eyes widened, clearly in shock that the bidding only reached a measly thirty. A smile crested on his face as he sauntered toward an empty seat. The confidence on his face made me nearly crack into pieces right there.
I lifted my paddle in the air, but the guy raised his right after me.
We were at forty, I was out of borrowed cash, but he clearly had more money to play with by the way he relaxed in his seat and gave me a tiny shake of his head complete with a smirk.
I raised my paddle again and again, driving the price up up up until he stood up. “Three point six million,” he said. “I believe that’s one hundred thousand more than the brooch is actually worth.” He turned to me, delivering a triumphant smile that clearly indicated checkmate.
But he was wrong. The brooch was worth way more than any dollar amount to me.
I set my paddle in my lap and let him claim his prize. But I didn’t leave empty handed. I walked out of there with a vow to find out who he is, where he lives, and steal back should have been mine in the first place.
4
Ten minutes after catching me upstairs in his bedroom, Colby carries out all his equipment one by one and sets it all up on the dining room table where he can watch me without dragging his eyes from his three monitors. Whenever he slips into his office for a confidential phone call, Galina appears in his vacancy to scrub the countertops with renewed vigor.
I’m playing a role here, and so I decide to play it in order to earn Colby’s trust and get his suspicious eye off me. Galina’s too. So I hum to myself while reading the cookbooks. I work extra hard to prepare his meals, following each recipe exactly and adding extras meant to impress him. Garnish here. A complicated dessert there. I even scrawl out menus onto fancy paper with intricate font work gleaned from Bullet Journal YouTube videos. Anything to make it seem like I care more about giving him a good meal than lulling him into complacency.
