Circles Collide

Chapter 25: The Naughty Nanny

Santa Clarita, California

May 23, 1998

It was the Friday that kicked off the start of the Memorial Day weekend. Celia and her band had worked an eight-hour day in their new tour rehearsal warehouse, as they had done every day since the facility was handed over to them for their use the previous Monday. Under the terms of the tour agreement they had finally signed with National Records two weeks before, KVA was paying for the lease on the facility, the catering, and the salaries of all the musicians, but National was footing the bill for renting or buying all the tour equipment and for training up the roadies and techies who would be running the shows. National would also pay for the venue rentals when the tour actually started, and half of the transportation and personnel costs involved in moving the tour from city to city. In return, National would collect half of all ticket revenue and the other half would go to KVA. It was not the deal that KVA or National had hoped for, but it was what they finally agreed upon over six long days of negotiations.

The contract for Matt’s tour was a little bit different because National had an ace to play for that one. Since they owned the rights to Matt’s previous solo material and had the ability to forbid him to perform it if they wished, they demanded a few more concessions. The biggest was the division of the revenue. They would get sixty percent of ticket sales instead of fifty. And KVA would pay for one hundred percent of Matt and his band’s travel and entertainment expenses out of their own pocket. National would still pay for half of the road crew personnel and transport costs and one hundred percent of the venue costs, but KVA had to pay for feeding and entertaining the entire crew. KVA, in turn, had voted to give Matt sixty percent of their forty percent of the revenue so he could enjoy a healthy profit for his efforts (Matt would pay his band members and his paramedic out of that money). This did cut down on KVA’s tour profit considerably, but KVA had a lot more faith in their upcoming CDs than National did. They planned to clean up on those CD sales.

Jake, as had been his habit since the beginning of the experiment, had spent the workweek alternating between the two warehouses so he could supervise and shape the way both tours were being put together. The Nerdlys did the same, though they worked opposite of Jake, meaning that whichever band Jake was with on a particular day, the Nerdlys were with the other, working on their sound and engineering.

On this day, Jake had been with Celia and her band. They were a bit behind Matt in progression and were still working on the basic layout of how the show would go. There were only a few sound guys working with them currently. They had a basic stage set up and a basic sound system. As of yet, there was no concert lighting, no backstage area, no choreography being planned. They had not even found a saxophone player yet, so Laura was filling in for that part, but she had made herself very clear when she proclaimed that she would not be going out on the road.

The band finished their third rendition of Playing Those Games—which was loosely planned to be the closing number for the show—just after four o’clock. Though they usually worked until 5:00 PM, Celia decided to call an early end to the day in honor of the three-day break that everyone would be taking for the holiday weekend. The band, all of them tired and grumpy and a little burned out from this first week of grinding work, were grateful. Charlie, Eric, Liz, and Little Stevie all cut out immediately. Coop elected to hang out with Jake, Laura, and Celia for the traditional Friday post-rehearsal beer.

“Anyone wanna burn?” asked Coop, pulling out a joint and a lighter.

“I can’t,” Jake said with a little regret. “I’m flying in a little bit.”

“You’ll be flying a lot sooner if you hit some of this shit,” Coop told him. “It’s genuine Humboldt skunk bud.”

“Tempting,” Jake said with a sigh, “but I’ll have to pass all the same.”

“I’ll take a couple hits,” Laura said. “Fire that thing up.”

“Really?” asked Coop. “I thought you weren’t supposed to do that.”

“I’m not breastfeeding anymore,” she said. “Caydee got her first tooth two weeks ago. That brought an end to my nipples in her mouth.”

“So ... you’re just like feeding her regular milk now?” Coop asked.

“I still have a pretty good supply of pumped milk in the freezer,” Laura said. “We’ve been giving her that and some formula.”

“She’s also starting to eat baby food now,” Jake added. “Elsa makes it for her.”

“Oh ... I see,” Coop said, nodding wisely. Though he was a father, and was paying five digits a month in child support, he had never actually been around the child. “Let’s burn then.”

Coop fired up. He and Laura passed the joint back and forth until they were both feeling good. Celia and Jake watched them, Celia sipping out of a bottle of beer, Jake with a bottle of iced tea that was completely unsatisfying.

“Good shit, Coop,” Laura said, her eyes now half-lidded.

“For sixty bucks an eighth, it better be,” he replied.

Coop left a few minutes later. Nobody bothered to tell him to be careful driving while he was stoned. He was Coop, after all, and he probably drove more miles per week stoned than he did straight.

Ordinarily on Friday evenings Jake and Laura would go back to Celia’s house with her and the three of them would get naked together and do the sorts of things that three naked, horny people liked to do. Jake and Laura would then shower and drive back to the airport and fly home so that Meghan could start her weekend off after earning a little time and half bonus for the extra Friday night work. But that was not going to happen on this day. Instead, the three of them would be staying the night at Tom and Mary’s house outside Cypress. Caydee was going to visit Grandma and Grandpa with Jake for the weekend. The ladies had their own plans. They were going to drive to Sacramento tomorrow morning to attend the Dixieland Jazz Festival that was held every Memorial Day weekend in Old Sacramento. They had hopes of finding a sax player there was the excuse they used. Jake suspected they just wanted to drink and have fun, but he kept his suspicion to himself.

Jake used his cell phone to call Pauline and let her know they had knocked off early and were heading out of town soon. She was at the KVA studio working on some paperwork related to the upcoming tour. She had been invited to come with them but had passed. She and Obie and Tabby were going to spend the holiday weekend at an all-inclusive resort in Mazatlán. They would be flying out on a chartered business jet at 9:00 AM the next morning ... He then called the house phone in Oceano. Elsa picked up and he asked to speak with Meghan.

“Hey, Jake,” Meghan greeted a few moments later. “What’s up?”

“We knocked off a little early today,” he said. “We’ll be touching down at around...” He looked at his watch and did a few calculations in his head. “ ... oh, say five-thirty-five or so.”

“I’ll be there,” she promised.

“You’re the best,” he told her.

“Uh ... thanks,” she said shyly.

“You’re supposed to answer: ‘that’s what they say,’” Jake informed her. “Work on your witty retorts a little, will you?”

She giggled a little and then promised she would work on that.

“All right,” Jake said, stuffing the phone in his pocket. “Let’s blow this scene.”

They blew the scene, grabbing their luggage from over by the door and then tossing it into the trunk of Celia’s Mercedes. They let the security guard on duty know that they would be leaving Jake’s truck in the parking lot for the weekend. His name was Frank and he was a young kid in his early twenties who was quite awed to be regularly scheduled for this particular assignment. He promised that he and his colleagues would keep an eye on the truck as well as the warehouse and all of the expensive musical gear inside of it.

Celia drove them to Whiteman Airport with Laura in the front passenger seat and Jake in the back seat (“where you belong,” his wife told him with a giggle). Celia parked her car in the hangar where Jake’s truck was normally kept. They then boarded the Avanti, Celia in the copilot’s seat, Laura sitting just behind Jake. In the seat next to her was one of the four car seats they owned. This one was permanently kept in the aircraft. Another was kept in Jake’s BMW, another was kept in Laura’s cursed minivan, and the fourth was usually kept in Meghan’s new car (she had used her new earnings to buy herself a brand-new Honda Accord). Jake fueled up the tanks to about three-quarters full since jet fuel was cheaper at Whiteman than it was in San Luis Obispo or Heritage. Jill would have been proud of him. They took off a little past 5:00 PM and touched down at SLO Regional at 5:33. Jake taxied over to the general aviation terminal, where Meghan’s new Honda was sitting in the parking lot. He shut down the engines and the three of them stepped out of the plane.

“Where’s my little Caydee?” Laura asked in her high-pitched voice as Meghan walked toward them, Caydee in arms. “Where’s my little girl?”

Caydee, seeing her mommy and daddy and the cool lady who hung out with them a lot, broke into a huge smile. Laura took her out of Meghan’s arms, gave her a big hug, and then covered her face with kisses. Caydee giggled and cooed and kissed her mommy back with her wet, sloppy lips.

“I swear to God,” said Celia, smiling at the display, “she’s grown another inch or two since I saw her last week.”

“She definitely outgrows her clothes long before she wears them out,” Jake said. “Come here, Caydee. Come see Daddy.”

She held out her arms to him and Jake plucked her out of Laura’s grasp. He gave her a few kisses of his own and then hurled her up into the air, catching her neatly as she came down. She laughed in delight at this game, which was one of her favorites.

“I really wish you wouldn’t do that,” Laura said, chewing her lip nervously as Jake did it again, making Caydee laugh even louder.

Meanwhile, Meghan was staring at Celia with an expression of awe that bordered on religious worship. The two of them had not met yet but she was on record as being a huge Celia Valdez fan.

“Apparently they forgot their manners,” Celia said to Meghan with a smile. “I’m Celia.”

“Yes,” Meghan said. “Yes, you are.”

“And ... uh ... you’re Meghan right?” Celia asked, though it was not really a question. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

“You have?” she asked. “What did you hear?”

“Uh ... just that you’re Jake and Laura’s nanny,” she said reassuringly. “And that you take very good care of little Caydee while they’re working.”

“Oh ... yeah ... yeah, I do do that,” she stammered.

“I met your sister,” Celia told her.

“You did?” Meghan asked. “When?”

“Uh ... when she was helping Laura deliver Caydee,” Celia said carefully. “I was there when she was born. That’s how Jake and Laura met you, right?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Meghan said. “Danielle told me that Laura was her patient and she helped deliver Caydee. She didn’t tell me that you were there though.”

“Interesting,” Celia said, impressed. Danielle had kept private information private, even from her own sister. Hopefully that discretion was a family trait. After all, she knew that young Meghan here had been made aware of what was going on between the Kingsleys and herself. “Well, it’s nice to meet you, Meghan.”

“It is awesome to meet you,” Meghan said.

Celia then turned to Jake. “Hand over that chiquita,” she demanded. “I’ll hold her while you load the plane.”

Jake handed her over and Celia cuddled her against her body, calling her Chiquita, and exclaiming about how big she was getting. Caydee laughed and giggled and cooed and tried to grab Celia’s nose.

Jake and Laura and Meghan pulled all of Caydee’s baggage out of the Honda. She had more than her parents combined. She had a large diaper bag, the car seat, a suitcase full of clothes and toys, and another suitcase stuffed with extra diapers, extra wipes, bottles of frozen breast milk, jars of homemade baby food, cans of powdered formula, empty bottles, and a kit full of emergency supplies like Tylenol, teething gel, and diaper rash cream (Caydee was very fair skinned, like her mother, and prone to diaper rash). Jake loaded the suitcases into the cargo compartment in the nose. The car seat and the diaper bag were loaded into the main seating area and secured.

“All right,” Jake said once everything was loaded. “Looks like we’re ready to fly. Thanks for meeting us, Meghan.”

“No problem,” she said. “Glad to help, especially if I get to meet Celia Valdez.”

“Enjoy your weekend off,” Laura told her. “We’ll be back on Monday night.”

“I’ll see you then,” she said.

“Goodbye, Meghan,” Celia told her. “It was nice to meet you.”

“Thanks,” Meghan said shyly. “I just want you to know that I really enjoy your music.”

“Thank you,” Celia said. “Maybe when we get our act together a little more you can come out and watch one of the rehearsals and tell us what you think.”

“Really?” Meghan asked, her eyes wide.

“Really,” Celia said. “I’d love to hear a fan’s opinion of how we’re doing.”

“Anytime!” Meghan said enthusiastically.

“We’ll let you know when we’re ready for public consumption,” Celia promised. “You can bring your sister too if she’s not working.”

“That would be so cool!” she exclaimed.

Meghan said one more round of goodbyes and then climbed in her Honda and fired it up. She pulled out of the parking lot with a big smile on her face.

“She seems like a nice kid,” Celia said as she and Laura boarded the plane and Jake went into the office to file his flight plan.

“She’s a sweetheart,” Laura said, taking Caydee from Celia’s arms so she could strap her into the car seat. “A little young and naïve, maybe, but then so was I at that age.”

“Weren’t we all?” Celia said with a laugh. “Hopefully her lips are nice and tight.”

“Excuse me?” Laura said.

Celia looked at her and then laughed. “Not those lips,” she said. “Although they probably are. I was talking about the lips on her face, the ones she could spout unflattering information with.”

“Oh ... of course,” Laura said with a giggle. “So far, so good.”

“Your mind certainly went to the naughty place rather quickly,” Celia said slyly. “You got the hots for little Miss Meghan, Teach?”

“I do not have the hots for her,” Laura said firmly.

“Not even a little?” Celia chided.

“Well ... maybe a little,” Laura admitted. “She is really cute when she walks around in her long t-shirt with no bra on.”

“She does this a lot?” Celia asked, raising her eyebrows.

“No, not a lot. Just if she has to come out in the middle of the night for water or a snack or something. She doesn’t do it to be provocative. That’s what makes it cute.”

“Interesting,” Celia said. “She has nice legs?”

“Yeah,” Laura said dreamily. “She really does.”

“Hmmph,” Celia said. “Do I have myself a little competition to contend with here?”

“Not at all,” Laura said. “I would never do anything with Meghan even if she wanted to. She’s too young for my tastes and she is an employee. And she’s not into girls anyway. She’s just nice to look at when she’s walking around with her legs bare and her boobs bouncing around. That’s all.”

“Does Jake think so too?” Celia asked.

“He makes an effort not to look at her in that way when I’m in the room,” she said. “But he’s a guy. I’m sure he appreciates the occasional glimpse he catches.”

“What about Meghan’s thoughts about Jake?” she asked. “Anything there?”

“I don’t really know,” Laura said with a shrug. “Jake is a good-looking guy, and he’s famous and all that. But if she is attracted to him, she doesn’t let it show, doesn’t give off any vibes about it. And I trust Jake. He would never do anything with her even if she wanted to.”

Celia nodded. She strongly suspected that Laura was right about this. She knew Jake as well as she knew anyone on Earth. He might enjoy looking at the young nanny—especially when she made an appearance in a long t-shirt and no bra—but he would never actually fuck her. Not while he had two other lovers that he needed to keep satisfied. And speaking of that...

“We’re not going to be able to get together for some fun this weekend, are we?” she asked.

Laura shook her head sadly. “The only night we could do it is tonight,” she said. “But we’ll be staying with Tom and Mary tonight. They presumably do not know about the three of us. Jake and I would like to keep it that way.”

“No sneaking into your room then?” Celia said with a pout.

“No sneaking into our room,” she confirmed.

“Well ... that’s a rip,” she said, using a Jake-ism.

Meghan Zachary arrived back at the Kingsley’s house just after six o’clock. She used the remote control she had been given to open the gate to the property and drove through. As she had been instructed, she stopped immediately once she reached the other side and was clear of the gate’s swing. She watched in her rearview mirror until it was firmly shut again. Nobody tried to dash through or enter the property behind her—no one ever had—but she did not let herself be complacent. The incident with the hippies had convinced her that the Kingsleys really did have crazy people who would try to get to them.

She pulled up to the garage and pushed another button on the remote which opened the automatic garage door. She parked next to Laura’s minivan and then got out, grabbing her purse and the now-warm bottle of diet Pepsi she had been drinking out of. She carried these things to the door that led into the house, pushing the garage door button on the wall and watching as the door slid down. Only then did she use her key to open the solid door and enter the house. The alarm was not set, which meant the Elsa was still here. She would have set it if she had gone back to her quarters for the night.

Sure enough, the Nigerian housekeeper was in the kitchen when Meghan entered it. She was just putting some finishing touches on her cleaning before calling it a workweek.

“Hey, Elsa,” Meghan greeted politely. She liked Elsa a lot but was also more than a little intimidated by her. There was no mistaking who was actually the boss of the household, and it was not Jake or Laura. Though Meghan and Elsa were technically equals under their employment agreements, Meghan knew that Elsa was really her direct supervisor and had the power to have her dismissed if she felt like exercising it. So far, she had not.

“Meghan,” Elsa said with a nod. “Did you get Miss Cadence off safely on her journey?”

“I did,” she confirmed. “And I got to meet Celia Valdez! How cool is that?”

“Very cool indeed,” Elsa said. “I am very fond of Ms. Valdez myself. She always makes a point to make her bed when she stays over. Of course, I remake it because she does a terrible job of it, but I do appreciate the effort.”

Meghan blushed a little at these words. She always made her bed as well and Elsa always came behind her at some point during the day and re-made it (as well as stripping it down and washing her bedding every Monday and Friday). And she had organized Meghan’s dresser space and closet with military precision, with the socks and underwear she laundered for her neatly folded and arranged according to color, and her shirts, blouses, pants, and dresses always neatly ironed and hung in a similar arrangement. “That’s good to know,” she said.

“I am about done here for the night,” Elsa said. “I will be making the trip to Orange County early tomorrow morning so you will have the place to yourself. I trust you will abide by the visitor policy that you agreed to in your employment contract?”

“Yes, of course,” Meghan told her. The visitor policy was that she could not have anyone but her sister or her parents over to the house. No boyfriends, girlfriends, priests, rabbis, or even the Pope Himself was authorized to be present on the Kingsley property without explicit permission from Jake or Laura.

“Excellent,” Elsa said. “I prepared a few meals for you and put them in the refrigerator.”

“Really?” Meghan said. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know I was not required to do this,” Elsa said simply. “I did it anyway. I rather like you, truth be told, but that is not the primary reason. I did not want you cluttering up my kitchen trying to concoct something yourself.”

“Oh ... I see,” she said.

“There is a plate of my chicken parmesan in there,” Elsa told her. “There is a plate with meatloaf and my homemade macaroni and cheese. There is another plate with marinated tri-tip that I deliberately undercooked so that when you heat it up it will be medium as you prefer it. There is a baked potato that goes with the tri-tip. In addition, I have made three breakfast burritos with sausage, egg, potatoes, and cheese and one plate with a chorizo and egg scramble in it. All of these meals have written instructions on how to heat them up. Please adhere to the directions so you may enjoy the meals properly.”

“Uh ... wow,” Meghan said. “I will, Elsa. Thank you!”

“You are welcome,” she said. “And do not forget to clean up after yourself as you go through the weekend. If I come back on Tuesday morning and find your laundry scattered about, or dirty dishes in the sink, or your soda bottles laying around, or any other form of mess in the house, you and I will have words.”

“I’ll keep things clean, Elsa,” Meghan told her. “I promise.”

“Very well,” Elsa said with a nod. “On that note, I will make my leave. Enjoy your weekend.”

“You too, Elsa,” Meghan said.

“And do not forget to latch all the windows and lock all the doors,” Elsa told her. “Set the house alarm and activate the motion sensors when you go to bed. If the motion alarm goes off, immediately lock your bedroom window and go to the office to evaluate the situation. Do not hesitate to call the sheriff’s department if you even suspect an intruder.”

“I won’t,” she promised.

“Very good,” Elsa said. “You’re a bright girl. You have a good head on your shoulders. Just use your common sense and all will be well.”

“Common sense,” Meghan said. “Right. I have that.”

Elsa showed her a rare smile. “Yes, you do,” she agreed.

And with that, she made her way out of the house, leaving Meghan alone. This was the first time she had been all alone in the house since she had started working for the Kingsleys. It felt a little strange. She had no Caydee to take care of. She had no Jake or Laura or Elsa to talk to. She decided that the first thing she would do was eat. She opened the refrigerator and pulled out the chicken parm plate. There was a neatly written set of heating instructions taped to the top of it. She read them and then took the plate over to the microwave and put it inside. She removed the plastic wrap and replaced it with a paper towel. She then set the timer for four minutes and thirty seconds and pushed the start button.

While her meal was heating, she walked into the entertainment room and went to the bar. Jake had told her that any food or drink in the house was hers to consume, including the alcohol (except for certain racks of the wine collection), as long as she was off duty when she consumed it. He had even instructed Elsa to stock certain things that she liked, such as diet Pepsi, Yoplait yogurt, Ritz crackers and chunky peanut butter, and Bartels and Jaymes wine coolers. She reached in and pulled out one of the B&Js—it was the tropical mango variety—and popped the cap. She took a nice long swig of the sweet beverage and then headed back to the kitchen to wait for her chicken parm to be done.

She ate in the kitchen nook and then rinsed her plate and silverware and put them in the dishwasher. She then went back to the entertainment room and found something to watch on the large screen television. She drank two more tropical mangos as she watched a few mindless sitcoms. By this time, the sun was low in the late spring sky and she was starting to feel a pretty good alcohol buzz. She looked out the window at the coming sunset and her eyes happened on the hot tub that sat out on a deck at the edge of the cliff.

Jake and Laura liked to go out there and watch the sunset from the hot tub. And when they did it, they went out there with their robes on and nothing on underneath. She had seen them on several occasions shucking their robes and climbing in (not that she had been trying to see them, of course but—oh, who was she kidding? She had been). She had been treated to a brief view of Jake’s bare butt on those occasions, but had never seen his cock. She had also seen Laura’s bare butt and the side swell of her naked breasts, and, while those sights did not particularly interest her, the idea that the two of them were naked together certainly did. And on one occasion she had seen, in the dim light of post-sunset twilight, Laura climb atop Jake’s lap and start bouncing up and down atop him while they kissed each other passionately.

I watched them fuck, she thought, feeling herself get a little wet at the memory. True, she had only seen dim silhouettes, but it had been quite obvious what they were doing. And then there had been the time when she had gotten up to get a glass of water one night near midnight and heard the distinct moans and cries of Laura in the throes of an orgasm come drifting out from behind their bedroom door. She had sounded very turned on, turned on to a level that Meghan herself had never experienced before.

Meghan had had sex with seven boys or men in her lifetime, only three of them more than once. She had never had an orgasm with any of them. One of them, that asshole in Mexico on spring break, had actually semi-raped her while she was drunk and had gotten her pregnant and given her gonorrhea and she had received no pleasure whatsoever out of the deal.

Jake is good in bed, she thought now, her hand idly playing with her right breast through her shirt. Her nipples hardened up as she touched herself and she began to feel tingly all over. She knew she would never do it, but she began to fantasize about how it would feel if Jake were naked with her, was touching her, was making her feel the way he made Laura feel.

Or the way he makes Celia feel, she thought with a delicious shudder. The three of them do it together! They might be doing it right now! And, again, though she had no real attraction to the female form, the thought of Laura and Celia and Jake all naked together and getting it on was blackly exciting.

She realized that she wanted to get naked and play with herself. She stood up, looking down the hallway in the direction of her room, but then she looked out at the hot tub again. There was nobody home except for Elsa over in her quarters. And Elsa did not, as far as she could tell, ever use the hot tub. And that hot tub could not be seen from outside the property at any time, and could not be seen from the house once the sun went down and the twilight faded away.

Should I? she thought, a naughty smile on her face. Why not? Who would know? Who would even care if they did know?

She made the trip to her bedroom. It was not the primary guest room, but it was still one of the larger secondary rooms. She had a queen-sized bed, her own bathroom with a separate shower and tub in it, a walk-in closet, a large dresser with a mirror, and a window with a view of the ocean. The bed was neatly made by Elsa’s hands. Her burgundy robe was hanging on a hook just inside the closet.

She closed the door and then quickly stripped naked. Her young, firm breasts felt congested and tingly. Her nipples were standing up proudly. Her neatly trimmed vagina was wet, the lips swollen a little. She could smell the odor of her own arousal. She touched herself between those wet lips for a moment and then put her fingers in her mouth, sucking the taste of her juices off of them.

Mmmm, I’m going to enjoy this, she thought. She was quite the accomplished masturbater. After all, she was the only she could rely on to pull an orgasm out of her. And it had been well over a week since she had last diddled herself. She was ripe and ready. And she had never done it in a hot tub before.

She threw the robe on and tied it around her waist. She opened the door and walked back to the entertainment room, where she went to the bar and pulled another bottle of B&J tropical mango out of the fridge. She opened the beverage and threw the bottle cap away in the garbage. She then went to the sliding glass door that led out onto the deck and opened it.

The sun was now only a few degrees above the horizon and the light was fading. The temperature was pleasant, maybe seventy degrees or so, and there was only a slight breeze blowing off of the ocean. She closed the door behind her and then made the walk across the deck, down the small set of stairs, and then along the concrete path to the second deck where the hot tub stood. She climbed those steps and opened the cover to the tub, letting out a blast of steam that was scented with chlorine. She pushed the cover all the way over the side, where it latched into the open position. A little digital display on the controls told her that the water was 101 degrees. She touched it with her hand. Yes, it was hot. The temperature of a hot bath. It would sting a little when she first got in, but then it would be heaven once she got used to it.

She reached for the tie on her robe and then hesitated. She looked out over the ocean for a moment. There were no boats nearby, just the faint lights of what was probably a container ship far out near the horizon. She then looked back at Elsa’s quarters. The lights were on there. If Elsa was looking out the window, she would see her. Was she?

Had she not had three B&J tropical mangos in her belly, she might very well have chickened out. She was, at heart, a modest and shy girl. But the alcohol’s effects on her judgment center told her to go right ahead and drop the robe and get in. What of it if Elsa was watching? She wasn’t breaking any rule. Jake and Laura had given her specific permission to use the hot tub whenever she wanted to. Laura had even suggested that using it in the nude was the way to go. Your suit won’t fill with air and there would be no laundry soap residue to get into the water.

“I’m doing this,” she said with mischievous determination. And she did it. She shrugged off the robe, climbed up the small set of steps, and got into the tub. She did submerge herself quickly, feeling the heat blasting her unprepared body, but she did it.

Once she was used to the temperature, she examined the controls on the panel and figured out how to turn on the jets. They fired up, spraying powerful blasts of water and air out, making the surface roil and bubble. One of jets was just to her right and was hitting her outer thigh. She moved her body around so it was hitting her in the small of her back. The sensation was quite nice, like getting a massage.

She sipped her tropical mango and watched the sun sink into the sea. She felt the jet against her back and the fingers of her left hand slowly crept between her legs and started idly playing, sliding between the lips, sending little tingles out, making her flush.

Once the sun disappeared below the horizon and her drink had disappeared into her belly, she began to work a little harder. She spread her legs wider, began to play a little rougher with her fingers as she ran thoughts of Jake’s naked butt, of Jake and Laura and Celia getting it on through her head. It wasn’t long before she was well into the fantasy and feeling quite fine indeed. It really was enjoyable to do this out here in the hot tub. It was so naughty. So deliciously naughty and decadent.

And then a particularly mischievous thought occurred to her. The jet that was shooting into her back. What would it feel like if it was shooting ... well ... on her special spot? Would that feel good? Or would it be painful?

She decided that she wanted to give it a try. She looked over her shoulder for a moment, towards Elsa’s quarters. The lights were still on in there, but the landscape was now quite dark. She did not have the lights for the tub on. None of the security cameras were pointed at the tub. There would be no way that Elsa could see what she was doing out here at this point.

She smiled and turned her body around. She adjusted herself in front of the jet, feeling it shooting her upper thigh, and then her pubis. She moved a little bit more and then suddenly it was hitting her right on her clitoris.

“Oooh,” she squealed. “Oh God!”

The sensation was quite exquisite, much more pleasurable than she had even imagined. The pleasure began to build within her. She did not even need to touch herself. This was freaking incredible! She moved herself a little closer and the pleasure increased. She let it take her away. She closed her eyes and let her mind return to the images of naked Jake and naked Celia and naked Laura and the things they might be doing together right at this very moment.

The orgasm was one of the most powerful she had ever had. It had its way with her for the better part of two minutes, sending ripples of pleasure through her entire body. When it finally faded away she shifted her body away from the jet and then turned around to face the ocean once again. She looked at the stars, which were now starting to shine, as her breathing slowly returned to normal.

“That was badass,” she whispered, using a phrase she picked up from Jake. She was definitely going to have to employ that technique again.

She sat out there for another five minutes or so, letting her body relax, feeling the pleasant afterglow of orgasm, and then she started to feel a little overheated. She turned off the jets and pulled herself out of the water, shivering a bit as the rapidly cooling air hit her wet, naked skin. It was then that she realized she had neglected to bring a towel out with her. Damn. Her options were to stand here shivering until she air dried or to put the robe on while she was wet and get it all wet. She elected to go with the latter idea.

She donned the robe and then closed up the tub. She then walked quickly back to the house, leaving wet footprints on the concrete as she went. She opened the sliding door and stepped back inside. She locked the door and secured the security latch and then quickly made her way back to her bedroom. Once inside, she went to the bathroom and shucked off the now soaked robe. She dropped it in the laundry hamper and then pulled a towel from the rack and dried herself off. She dropped the towel in the hamper and then walked back into the bedroom, where she pulled on a pair of lacy blue panties and then grabbed one of her long t-shirts she preferred to use for nightwear. This one was blue, tattered from years of use, and had a picture of Snoopy on it. She pulled it over her head and let it settle into place.

She felt a little sleepy after the wine coolers and the orgasm, but it was too early to go to bed just yet. If she went to sleep now she would wake up at three in the morning. She decided to go back to the entertainment room and watch some more TV. Maybe she would put on a DVD from Jake and Laura’s extensive collection.

She walked back out and saw her purse sitting on one of the chairs. She walked over to it and picked it up. Elsa would give her hell if she did not put it where it belonged. As she hefted it, she saw a red light blinking from within. That, she knew, would be her cell phone. She picked it up and flipped it open, looking at the little screen. There were three missed calls there, all of them placed over the past thirty minutes, all of them from her mother.

“What the hell is going on now?” she asked the air. The air did not answer.

She dialed her voicemail number to see if Mom had left a message. She had, but it was not very helpful. It just said to call her as soon as she could and that it was very important. That Mom’s voice sounded a little bit frantic was her only clue.

She sighed and walked back over to the couch, leaving her purse where it had been and making a mental note to move it later. She looked at the phone in her hand, not really wanting to make the call. Her mother most definitely did not approve of her new job or her new employers, particularly not after finding out how much the Kingsleys were paying her (“there is no way in Heaven they are paying you that much just to be a nanny!” her mom had cried). Both of her parents had always been a little overprotective of her, but her mother was, by far, the worst offender. She had hovered around her her whole life, second-guessing every decision she had ever made, giving her unwanted advice on every aspect of living. The overprotectiveness had become even worse after she had dropped out of college before her junior year. And then, when she had told her that she was going to be working for the Kingsleys and moving into their house with them, she had become even whackier. She loved her mom, but sometimes she was just a little hard to take.

“Might as well get this over with,” she said with a sigh. She pushed the callback button on the phone. A moment later, it began to ring. She sighed again and put it to her ear.

Loraine Zachary, her forty-eight-year-old mother, answered the phone on only the second ring. “Meggie!” she barked. “Is that you?”

“Yes, it’s me, Mom,” Meghan said. “I’m returning your call.”

“Where in the world are you?” Loraine demanded. “Why didn’t you answer your phone?”

“I’m at home,” she told her. “I was out in the hot tub watching the sunset.”

“That place is not your home, Meggie,” her mother said sternly. “And who were you out in that hot tub with? Was that Satanic singer and his wife out there with you?”

“I was out there by myself, Mom,” she said patiently. “Jake and Laura and Caydee are out of town for the weekend. It’s just me and Elsa, the maid here. And Elsa has her own quarters. Oh, and Jake is not a Satanist. I thought we had gone over that.”

“Then why do all the papers and new reports say that he’s a Satanist?” she asked. “And why does he write songs about Satan if he’s not a Satanist?”

Meghan sighed. “I’m not going to argue about this with you,” she said. “Is there some reason you called me three times?”

“Yes, there’s a reason, young lady!” she barked. “Earlier tonight, I got a call from one of those reporters!”

“A reporter called you?” she asked. “About what?”

“He’s from that horrible American Watcher rag,” Loraine said. “He said they’re planning to run a story about you in next week’s edition!”

“A story about me?” she asked, confused. “What the hell?”

“He says it has to do with your relationship with those horrible people,” she said. “He says they have information that you and they are ... well ... that you are more than just their nanny.”

“That is complete bullshit, Mom,” she told her.

“Don’t you swear at me!” she said sternly. “You didn’t use to use such language with me before you moved in there!”

She sighed. “Sorry, Mom,” she said. “I’ll watch the potty mouth. But what they’re saying is not true. I am Jake and Laura’s nanny. Nothing more. I don’t know what information they think they have, but it is not true.”

“You need to tell them that then,” he mother said. “He gave me his phone number and wants you to call him so he can get a statement from you for the story.”

“I’m not going to call the reporter,” she said. “But I will take his name and number.”

“If you don’t call him he’s just going to print what he has and say that you refused to dispute the account,” she said. “He told me that!”

“Jake warned me that something like this might happen,” she said. “He told me that if it did, to call him or to call his sister, Pauline and they will handle it.”

“They have no right to forbid you from telling your side of the story,” she said. “Even if it’s true, you have to deny it completely.”

“It isn’t true, Mom,” she said firmly. “I really get angry when you do not believe me when I tell you that.”

“It’s not that I don’t believe you, honey,” she said soothingly, “it’s just that that man is so notorious, so sleazy, so violent!”

“He is actually none of those things,” Meghan told her. “He and Laura are both very nice people who love their daughter a whole lot. And Caydee is the cutest little thing in the world. I love taking care of her.”

“You need to get out of there right away,” Loraine said. “Right now. Tonight! I want you to come home and get back in your bedroom where you belong. Just leave all of your things there.”

“I’m not going to do that, Mom,” she said patiently. “Now, please give me that reporter’s name and number.”

“Meghan, you don’t know what you’re doing!” she said. “Your name is going to be smeared all over that sleazy rag! Your picture is going to be on newsstands all over the country.”

“Yeah, I’m not really happy about that, Mom,” she said, “but I’ve been instructed on what to do if this happens and I’m going to do it. Now, please give me the name and number.”

Reluctantly, she gave the name and number. Jack Fenton was the reporter’s name. His number had a Los Angeles city area code. She jotted it down. “Okay,” she said. “I’ve gotta make a phone call now. I’ll talk to you later, Mom and let you know what’s going to happen.”

“My daughter is going to considered the slut of the century is what is going to happen,” Loraine predicted. “He told us that there are even reports that you might be being held there against your will!”

“I’m not being held here against my will,” she said.

“Are you sure?”

“I am pretty sure,” Meghan told her. “I think I would notice if I was being held against my will. Tell Dad I love him. And don’t worry too much. Jake and Laura deal with this stuff all the time.”

“I have no doubt about that,” Loraine said huffily.

“Goodbye, Mom,” Meghan said. “I love you.”

“I love you too, Meggie. Please come home.”

“I am home,” Meghan told her with a sigh. She then hung up on her.

Jake, Laura, and Celia were doing nothing even remotely like what Meghan had been fantasizing about. Instead, they were gathered in the grandparental Kingsleys’ living room with the Nerdly grandparental units, all of them drinking beer except Caydee. She was being held by her grandma and was drinking a bottle of breast milk spiked with rice cereal. On the television screen, the Giants were playing the Dodgers and getting their asses handed to them. The volume on the television was turned very low and no one was paying particular attention to it. Jake was sitting on the couch, Laura sitting next to him on one side, Celia on the other, and he was strumming his guitar and singing the lyrics he had finally come up with for the melody that Caydee had enjoyed so much starting inside Laura’s uterus.

The song was now called Winter Frost. The analogy was related to Caydee herself, who had been born in December—not technically in the winter, but close enough. Winter frost was something that occurred when the conditions were right for it. It was something that happened inevitably, whether you were ready for it or not if you had placed yourself in a place where it could happen. It was something you had to embrace, something that you learned to love and even look forward to. That was the basis of the chorus of the piece and the theme. The verses had to do with the profound sense of love that Jake felt for his daughter upon seeing her for the first time and upon watching her grow into the tiny human being she now was. He waxed particularly poetic on the look in her eyes she had when she gazed up at him when he was holding her—the look of contentment, the look of love, the look of trust and safety she felt in his arms.

It was the most emotional and heartfelt piece he had ever composed. The Kingsley and the Nerdly parents, upon hearing it for the first time, were overcome with emotion. All four of them were seen actually wiping tears from their eyes as they heard and processed the tune.

“That was just ... just beautiful, Jake,” Mary said, a tear running down her cheek once he finished it up.

“I agree,” said Tom, wiping his eye and pretending it was just an allergy thing. “That is probably the best tune you have ever written.”

“It’s Caydee’s tune,” he told him. “The one she would keep cadence with when she was in Laura’s womb. And she still always loves to hear it. Did you see how she just laid there and smiled while I was playing it?”

“Yes,” Mary said. “As soon as you started, she stopped drinking her bottle and looked over at you.”

“That’s amazing,” Tom said.

“Isn’t it?” Jake asked. “You want to see some more amazing Caydee stuff?”

“Of course,” Tom said.

“Watch this,” Jake said. He began to strum out the melody for Nights in White Satin, another one of Caydee’s favorites (and one that the grandparental Kingsleys had listened to while stoned many a time). She heard the melody and clearly became excited by it. Her eyes lit up and her smile got bigger. And then Jake began to sing the lyrics. When he got to the chorus and the repetitive, drawn out, I love you’s, Caydee began to coo along with him. She could not form the actual words as the intricacies of actual speech were still months in her future, but she was imitating the length and breaks between syllables almost perfectly.

The grandparents looked at this in awe. Tom, Mary, and Cindy all realized the musical ramifications of what they were seeing. “She’s cooing that in key!” Mary exclaimed. “Well ... almost in key anyway. You’re singing in E-minor, Jake and she’s damn near following along.”

“And she’s definitely keeping in time,” added Tom.

“Well, it helps that I’m singing with her,” Jake said, pausing the tune so he could take part in the discussion. Caydee immediately began to fuss and squirm when the music stopped. She began to coo out the syllables again, this time with an insistent, demanding tone. Her communication was quite clear. Play the fuckin’ song some more, Dad!

Jake began to play and sing again and she settled down immediately. She cooed out the chorus syllables right on time and mostly in key. When he finished up, she started to fuss again, but he had learned he could keep her calm by simply continuing to strum the guitar. It did not matter what he strummed—it could be anything from Old Macdonald Had a Farm to War Pigs—as long as he was playing some kind of organized melody, she would remain copacetic.

“Does she do that with any other song?” asked Mary.

“Not to that extent,” Jake said, continuing to absently strum while he talked. He was currently playing out the melody to Highway Star by Deep Purple, the acoustic version that was considerably slower in tempo than the radio version. “She does it a little bit on a few other pieces like Stairway to Heaven, Behind Blue Eyes, and Going to California, but it’s hit or miss and not with the same enthusiasm.”

“She likes to hear the ‘I love you’s’,” Laura said with a smile.

“You know, you used to do the same thing, Jake,” Tom said.

“Really?” he asked.

“It’s true,” Mary said. “When we would play music for you when you were a baby, you would always try to sing along, even before you could talk. That’s when we started to realize that you were going to be a singer.”

“That’s why we had you doing voice lessons while you were still in grammar school,” Tom added. “I think maybe little Caydee here is going to have herself a pretty good voice.”

“She already does,” said Celia, who was looking warmly at the little center of attention in her grandmother’s arms.

Jake was about to say something else, but the phone started to ring. Tom and Mary looked at each other expectantly, their non-verbal communication quite clear. Both were asking “are you going to get that?”.

Tom lost the battle. With a sigh, he stood up and walked across the room to the cordless handset sitting in its charging base. He picked it up. “Hello?” He listened for a moment. “Hey, Paulie, how are you doing?” Another pause. “Yes, he’s right here. He was just showing us how Caydee likes to sing along with him to Nights in White Satin.” A chuckle. “Yes, it is pretty amazing. Anyway, I’ll get him for you.” He turned to his son. “It’s for you, Jake. It’s Pauline.”

Jake wondered what was going on now. Pauline was not in the habit of calling him just to shoot the shit, particularly when he was out of town on a holiday weekend. He stood up. Caydee immediately began to fuss again. He handed the guitar to Celia. “Here,” he said. “Play something for her.”

“Right,” she said, taking the instrument from him. She immediately began to strum out the melody for Dreams, by the Cranberries. Caydee quieted back down in an instant.

Jake took the phone from his father and then stepped out of the room and into the kitchen before putting it to his ear. “Hey, Paulie,” he said. “What’s up?”

“Hey, bro,” she said. “Sorry to interrupt family time, but I just got a call from Meghan.”

“Meghan?” he asked. “About what?”

“She tried to call you but all she has is your cell phone number and it just went to voicemail.”

“I turned it off and put it on the charger when I got here,” Jake said.

“I figured,” Pauline said. “In the future, I’d suggest that you give Meghan a list of numbers where you can be reached when you’re out of town.”

“Point taken,” Jake said. “What’s going on?”

“Apparently Jack Fenton—he’s one of the sleazeball celebrity reporters at the Watcher—got in touch with Meghan’s mother today. I’m reciting this all thirdhand at this point, so take it with a grain of salt, but he told her mom that he has information that Meghan and you and Teach are more than just employers and employee, that he has even heard suggestions that Meghan is not entirely free to leave the situation if she wants to, and that he wanted to interview Meghan to get her side of the story before the Watcher publishes it in next week’s issue.”

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Jake said, shaking his head. “Where do they come up with this shit?”

“I’m going to guess that they’ve been talking to the locals again and getting their speculations,” Pauline said. “I know there is no basis in fact for this tale, so maybe we have something going for us here.”

“What do you mean?” Jake asked. “We’ve been down this road many times. They can print whatever they want. As long as we cannot prove it is not true there is nothing we can do about it.”

“That’s always been the case before,” she said, “but the times are changing a little bit. The standards for defamation lawsuits are starting to slide a little more in favor of the defamed.”

“What do you mean?” he asked.

“Ever since Carol Burnette successfully sued the National Enquirer there have been a handful of other cases that have come up. Most of the time, the tabloid wins, but in a few, they have lost and been hit with pretty significant punitive damages.”

“You’re saying that we sue them if they print this?” Jake asked. “How does that help anything? Meghan’s name still gets dragged through the dirt and it would be years before we would even get to tell our side.”

“True,” she said, “but that’s not where I was going with this.”

“Where are you going with it?” he asked.

“Maybe nowhere,” she said. “I would still brace Meghan for the worst if I were you. But I’m going to make a few phone calls and try to get something other than second and thirdhand information. I’m not going to issue any statement to the reporter just yet. Maybe I can do something with what I gather.”

“That doesn’t sound all that hopeful,” Jake said.

“It’s not,” she said. “But it’s what I can do. Why don’t you call Meghan and talk to her—she’s kind of upset—and while you’re at it, get me her parents’ phone number. I think I need to talk to her mom as well.”

“She’s not going to want to talk to you,” Jake warned.

“I’m sure she won’t,” she said, “but that’s okay, because I don’t really want to talk to her either. But it has to be done.”

Pauline was sitting at her desk in her home office. She was wearing a pair of sweatpants and an old t-shirt. Her hair was a mess. Obie was in the living room, watching something on the TV. Tabby was in bed. They were supposed to head out for the airport in less than twelve hours. She sighed as she picked up the phone to dial the Zachary’s home number. It was now just past nine o’clock at night on the eve of a holiday weekend. Well past the reasonable hour and day for discussing business such as this, but she wanted to get it done. She had instructed Meghan to call her mother and prepare her for this phone call. At least there was that.

She took a little sip of the white wine she had sitting next to her open legal pads. It was only her second glass of the night and she was reasonably sober for this. She dialed the San Luis Obispo number and listened to the phone ring on the other end. On the third ring, it was picked up and a female voice said, “hello?”

“Mrs. Zachary?” Pauline asked.

“Speaking,” the voice said coldly.

“I’m Pauline Kingsley,” she said. “I understand your daughter told you to expect a call from me?”

“She did,” the voice said, still cold as ice. “Though I’m not sure we have anything to talk about.”

“We have quite a bit to talk about, Mrs. Zachary,” she said. “My interest is the same as yours in this matter. I wish to keep these vicious and unfounded rumors about your daughter out of print in that sleazy rag. I don’t know if I will be successful at this. The First Amendment gives these tabloid journalists an awful lot of wiggle room when it comes to printing speculation and innuendo. But if I am to be successful in this venture, I need information.”

“What kind of information?” she asked.

“Tell me exactly what that reporter said to you on the phone,” Pauline said. “Word for word if you can remember it.”

“How does that help anything?” she asked. “And how do I know you’re really looking out for Meghan? Your Jake Kingsley’s sister, aren’t you?”

“I am,” she confirmed. “I am also a part owner of KVA Records, which is co-owned by Jake, Celia Valdez, and Bill and Sharon Archer. I am also Laura Kingsley’s manager. And I am also a practicing attorney at law and member in good standing of the California Bar. I graduated from Stanford School of Law and have been knee deep in the music industry for the past thirteen years now. My interests are to protect and defend the interests of KVA Records and everyone associated with those who operate under that label. Your daughter is an employee of my brother and his wife, who are also my business partners. Therefore, it is in my interest to protect her from defamation because that defamation also extends to Jake and Laura. Does that make sense?”

“Uhh ... I’m not sure,” she said, a little doubt creeping into her voice now. “How do I know you’re not just trying to keep Meghan from telling her side of the story.”

“What is her side of the story?” Pauline asked.

“Well ... she says that what the reporter is saying is not true,” she said.

“That’s because it is not true,” Pauline said. “Your daughter is not lying to you.”

“How do I know that though?”

“I don’t know how to answer that for you, Mrs. Zachary,” Pauline told her. “Do you trust your daughter?”

“Of course I trust her!” she said. “Meghan has always been a good kid. She maybe lost her way a little over the last few years, but she’s never been in any kind of real trouble and always does the right thing.”

“I have met her,” Pauline said, “and she is a very nice girl. Jake and Laura both enjoy having her work for them and Caydee absolutely loves her. Now, my question is, if you trust your daughter in all of these other things, why don’t you trust her when she says that nothing is going on?”

“I ... I want to trust her,” Mrs. Zachary said, “but your brother has such a horrible reputation! He’s been accused of being a Satanist, of beating his wife and girlfriends, and of having sex with anything and anyone. Would you want your daughter living with him?”

“Yes, I would,” she said. “He is, in fact, listed in my will as the person who will assume custody of my daughter in the event of me and her father’s premature death. But I know my brother. You do not. You are basing your opinion of him on the very sort of tabloid journalism that is now threatening to defame your daughter.”

“I don’t know what to do here,” she said, sounding miserable now.

“Look, Mrs. Zachary,” Pauline said. “I’m not here to try to convince you that Jake is a saint. He really is not. He has his human flaws like everyone else. But don’t you think that if he was a violent, sadistic Satanist who wanted to have sex with your daughter, she would have picked up on that by now? That she would have left his employ in disgust and got as far away from him as she could? That she would want to talk to this reporter about how horrid it is working for Jake Kingsley?”

“Uh ... well ... I suppose,” she said softly.

“Again, this comes back to whether or not you trust your daughter. When you talked to her, did she sound like someone in an abusive situation? Did she give you the impression she is not free to leave if she wants to?”

“He’s paying her a lot of money,” she said. “More than a standard nanny should be making. Maybe she feels she needs to stay to keep earning that money.”

“He’s not paying her that much more,” Pauline said, “but you are correct. He is paying her well for the position. That is how Jake operates. He pays his employees very well and treats them very well because that instills loyalty and promotes longevity. There is nothing more to it than that.”

She sighed. “This is all just so distressing,” she said. “I wish Danielle would never have given your brother Meggie’s number.”

“What’s done is done,” Pauline said simply. “Now we must address the situation at hand. Will you please tell me exactly what that reporter said to you?”

She hesitated a few more moments and then sighed again. “All right,” she said. “It’s not like there is much to lose anyway. He told me he was working on a story about an alleged sexual relationship between Meghan, Jake, and Jake’s wife. He said the allegations are that she was hired specifically because she was an attractive young girl who needed money and would be willing to have sex with the two of them in addition to undertaking the duties of nanny. He said that some of Meghan’s friends had even expressed concern that she was not staying in the position voluntarily, that once she became aware of what the Kingsleys were really like, that she wanted to leave but they are keeping her prisoner up in the house.”

“I see,” Pauline said. “And, knowing your daughter as you do ... you believed that?”

“Well ... it is not like Meghan at all, of course, but with Jake’s reputation ... and ... well, I’m her mother! When someone tells you something like that you have to at least consider it might be true!”

“A fair point, I suppose,” Pauline said. “Did he name any names?”

“What do you mean?”

“Did he tell you the names of any of the people who are alleging these things?” she asked.

“No, he just said they were sources he had contacted in town and some of Meghan’s friends.”

“But he did not tell you which friends?”

“No,” she said, “and, truth be told, Meggie doesn’t really have all that many friends. Not close ones anyway. She’s never had anything like a best friend. She’s always been a little bit of a homebody.”

“That’s kind of what I figured,” Pauline said.

“Are you saying that he’s making all this up?” she asked.

“Not in the strict sense of the word,” Pauline said. “What he undoubtedly did is to go trolling around the town and probably at the Cal Poly campus, trying to find anyone who even remotely knew who Meghan was. It’s not that hard to do now that the town knows she is working for Jake. And then he simply askes those people—who likely do not even really know your daughter on a personal level at all—what they think is going on. These people spew out gossip that they have heard or perhaps made up themselves, and the reporter writes it down and considers it a source. And that is how he will cite those sources in his story: ‘Someone who knows Meghan,’ ‘A close friend of Meghan,’ ‘A friend of the Zachary family.’ That is pretty much how tabloid journalism works.”

“That is terrible!” Mrs. Zachary cried.

“Yes, it is,” Pauline said. “And that is why a good portion of the world believes that my brother is a Satanist, that he is a wife-beater, that he threw a girl off a boat once, that he snorts cocaine from butt cracks, that his child might have been conceived at an orgy and that he is not actually the father, and, if I cannot put a stop to it, that your daughter is his sex slave.”

“How can you stop it?” she asked.

“I’m not sure I can,” Pauline said, “but I’m going to give it a shot. Did you give any information to the reporter? Anything at all about Meghan, her life with Jake, anything else? Think carefully here, because if you did, he will cite you as one of his sources.”

“I just told him that Meghan was working for Jake,” she said. “I did say I did not approve of her doing that because I worried about her.”

“Okay,” Pauline said slowly. That would be one for the reporter. “Anything else?”

She thought for a moment. “Uh ... well, I did say that his information on how Meghan got hired was incorrect.”

“Really?” Pauline said. “How did he say she got hired?”

“His information, from his source, was that Jake recruited her using the internet. He put out an ad asking for applicants for the position of nanny, and asked that they attach a picture. He chose who to interview based on the pictures. And then, in the interview, the applicants were specifically told that having sex with Jake and his wife was part of the deal.”

“He told you this?” Pauline asked.

“Yes,” she said. “That was why I corrected him.”

She closed her eyes for a moment. Why the fuck didn’t you tell me this a few minutes ago when I asked you to tell me word for freaking word what the man said?? she did not yell into the phone. Instead, she took this information as the helpful tidbit it actually was. “Okay,” she did say. “This is helpful. What did you tell him to correct him?”

“The truth,” she said. “I told him that my oldest daughter was a labor and delivery nurse who helped Mrs. Kingsley deliver her baby. It was Danielle who told them about Meghan and they thought she might make a good nanny. Danielle put them in touch with her and they met her and hired her.”

“Did he ask to talk to Danielle?” she asked.

“No,” she said. “Not at all. In fact, he changed the subject to something else once I told him this. It was like he didn’t want to hear it.”

Pauline smiled. “He didn’t want to hear it,” she said. “It contradicts a rather juicy part of his story. This is very useful information, Mrs. Zachary.”

“In what way?”

“It suggests that the reporter has information that discredits his narrative. Journalistic ethics—which is what he would be judged under in any legal proceedings—demand that he follow up on this information and at least present it in the story. His lack of further questioning of you on this issue suggests he has no intention of doing that.”

“And that’s useful?”

“Potentially,” she said. “Tell me something. If this reporter prints this story as he presented it to you, with that bullshit about Jake finding her on the internet and telling her she needs to have sex with him intact, would you be willing to go on record with the true story of how Meghan came to meet Jake and Laura, and that you informed this reporter of this story prior to his publication?”

“Go on record?” she asked.

“That means tell your story to another journalist,” she said. “Make the public aware that this happened.”

“Uh ... well ... yes, of course,” she said. “If they print lies about Meggie I will absolutely dispute that on the record.”

“Excellent. Hopefully it won’t come down to that. One more question: Will your older daughter—Danielle is her name? Correct?”

“Correct,” she said.

“Will she be willing to go on record with the actual story of how Meghan came to be in the employ of Jake and Laura?”

“I’d have to ask her, but I would think she would,” she said.

“Very good,” Pauline said. “Please call her at some point before Tuesday morning and confirm that she is willing to do this. I’ll give you my office number and you can leave the answer on my machine.”

“What are you going to do?” she asked.

“I’m going to try to kill this story before it sees the light of day,” she said. “I think you have given me just enough ammunition that my scheme might work.”

Pauline called Meghan back after hanging up with her mother. The young nanny was still awake and sounded a little on the tipsy side. Pauline reassured her that she was doing everything she could to help rectify the situation. She then interviewed Meghan for more than forty minutes, asking her a series of personal questions related to the people she hung out with, the boys she had dated, the jobs she had had, and everything else she could think of. They did not go so deep as to start talking about Meghan’s abortion or her shoplifting arrest, but they scratched the surface.

“Okay, hon, I think I have enough now,” Pauline told her. “I’m gonna try to nip this thing in the bud.”

“Do you really think you can do that?” Meghan asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “But I’m going to give it a shot. And if it doesn’t work and they print that story anyway, I’m going to the fuckin’ wall for you. I promise you that.”

“Okay,” she said. “Thanks, Pauline.”

Pauline hung up the phone and stared thoughtfully at her notes for a little bit. She would take them with her on vacation and spend a lot of what should be leisure time compressing them and expanding upon them and organizing them into a coherent form. This just might work. And if it didn’t, the fucking American Watcher was going to incur the wrath of the Kingsleys.

Pauline, Obie, and Tabby landed back in Los Angeles just after ten o’clock on Tuesday morning. The holiday weekend was over. By now, Jake, Celia, Matt, and everyone else would be back in their studios and warehouses, working on their tours. Meghan would be back on the job, watching Caydee while Jake and Laura were in Los Angeles for the day. And those fucks over at the Watcher would be hard at work on their smear story, getting it ready for publication on Friday morning.

Upon arriving home, Pauline went immediately to the answering machine in her office. There were, like usual, multiple messages waiting for her. She listened to them. Most were nothing that required her immediate attention. One was kind of interesting in that bunch, however. Celia left a brief word that she and Laura had possibly found a new saxophone player during their trip to the jazz festival in Sacramento. She wanted to meet as soon as possible to discuss it.

Pauline made a note to call Celia back about this and then moved onto the next message. This one was the one that she was truly interested in. It was from Mrs. Zachary. Her daughter Danielle was quite willing to go on record regarding the story of how Meghan had come to be employed by the Kingsleys. She smiled as she heard this.

She listened to the rest of the messages and then cleared the machine. She then went to her bedroom and quickly unpacked her suitcase and then took a shower. She changed into her sweats and t-shirt again, no bra, no socks. She had decided that this would be her battle uniform from now on.

She walked into the living room where Obie was sipping a bourbon on the rocks despite the early hour and Tabby was watching Blue’s Clues from one of the DVDs of the series she owned. She was answering back in all the appropriate places.

“You got Tabs for a while?” she asked Obie. “It’s time for me to go tweak some balls.”

Obie grinned. They had talked extensively about what she planned to do. “I got her,” he said. “Go tweak away, darlin’.”

She closed herself in her office and then fired up her computer. Once it was ready for action, she opened up her contacts list and paged through until she found the office number for the American Watcher’s editor-in-chief’s office. It was not a number that the general public had access to, but she had dealt with this office, and with this particular sleazeball several times in the past. His name was Stanley Veneer. He was the kind of person that even lawyers and record company suits considered to be too slimy to want to touch. She put her phone on speaker so she could refer to her notes easily and then dialed the number.

“Editor-in-chief’s office,” said a bubbly female voice after four rings. “Can I ask who is calling, please?”

This was the gatekeeper. Pauline would need to get past her. “This is Pauline Kingsley,” she said. “Manager for Jake Kingsley and Laura Kingsley. I need to talk to Stan right away, please.”

“Uh ... Pauline Kingsley?” she asked, perhaps a bit taken aback. “Really?”

“Really,” Pauline said.

“Well ... Mr. Veneer is not available right now. I can take a message.”

“Make him available,” she said simply. “This is regarding the story your paper is planning to run in Friday’s edition. He needs to hear what I have to say and he needs to hear it now.”

“Uh ... well ... hang on a second,” she said. “I’m going to put you on hold and see if I can track him down.”

“You do that,” Pauline said.

She listened to the on-hold music for perhaps two minutes, long enough for the Muzak version of If You Leave Me Now to give way to the Muzak version of Sweet Caroline. She sighed, wishing that the Watcher would subscribe to the on-hold music company that Teach used to work for. Finally, there was a click and the music disappeared.

“Pauline?” a male voice enquired; a glad-handed tone clearly audible. “Is that really you?”

“It’s really me, Veneer,” she said. “We need to talk.”

“Well, it’s always a pleasure to talk to you,” he said. “What shall we talk about?”

“Cut the bullshit,” she said, deciding that an aggressive approach was the proper way of playing this out. “Your secretary already told you why I called. It’s about the smear story you’re planning to publish about Jake and Laura and Meghan Zachary, their nanny.”

“Uh ... yes,” he said, “she did mention that. I am aware that Jack Fenton is working on something along those lines, but I haven’t seen the final copy yet.”

“Bullshit,” she said. “You know every detail of the story. You’re probably helping to write it.”

“I’m sorry you feel that way, Pauline, but that’s simply not true. In any case, if you have some content you would like to discuss about the story, you need to contact Jack. It is my understanding that he is still waiting on any official statement from the parties involved.”

“He’s not going to get a statement,” she told him. “Your story is nothing but a smear job meant to sell your sleazy rag to morons in the supermarket checkout stand. Let me take a wild guess here ... you have the words ‘Naughty Nanny’ somewhere in the headline, don’t you?”

“We have not come up with the headline yet,” he told her. “But again, while we welcome any statements from the principals involved in the story, they really must go through Jack, as he is the primary reporter.”

“And you are the editor-in-chief, the one who decides whether the story actually runs or not,” she said. “This story had better not run.”

“Oh?” he asked, amusement in his tone this time. “And why would I decide not to run a compelling piece of journalism such as this?”

“Because you have no actual facts to back up your allegations,” she said. “You have nothing but baseless speculation from sources who do not even know Jake, Laura, or Meghan. You have no names to name, no pictures to show, nothing whatsoever to prove that what you are alleging is even remotely true.”

“I do not need to prove what the story is saying is true,” Veneer said simply. “In order for a charge of libel to stand, you would have to prove the allegations are not true. And, as you are no doubt aware, it is very difficult to prove that something is not true.”

“You’re going too far this time, Veneer,” Pauline said. “You’re crossing a line here. This is not the same as suggesting that Bigg G is actually the father of Jake’s unborn daughter. This is not the same as suggesting that there is a sexual relationship between Laura Kingsley and Celia Valdez, or between Celia Valdez and some lesbian pilot. They are all celebrities or people in close relationships with celebrities and fair game for you and your jackals. Meghan Zachary is a completely different ballgame here. You are preparing to defame the reputation and character of an innocent twenty-one-year-old girl whose family are pillars of the San Luis Obispo community, a girl who has done nothing to deserve this, and if you print these baseless allegations, we will go after you for defamation of Meghan Zachary’s character, and we will go to the fucking wall.”

“A nice job of sounding tough, Pauline,” Veneer said, unimpressed, “but we’ll take our chances.”

“I wouldn’t advise that,” Pauline warned. “I have some rather compelling information that you should be made aware of.”

“Such as?”

“Such as, your reporter is planning to report that Jake went on the internet and that is where he found Meghan. He is planning to report that Meghan was given an interview based on her looks and that she was told that sexual favors were part of the deal.”

“That is the information his source revealed to him,” Veneer said. “We are not required to verify it.”

“But you are required to follow up on valid information that disputes this account,” she said. “Meghan’s mother told Fenton the real story of how Meghan was hired. Her sister is a labor and delivery nurse who assisted in the birth of Cadence Kingsley. While taking care of Laura Kingsley, she told Jake and Laura about her sister Meghan, who worked in a day care center. It was Danielle the nurse who introduced Meghan to Jake and Laura. They did not know what she looked like before they met her. Meghan’s mother is willing to go on record as having provided this information to Fenton. Danielle is willing to go on record as to how the hiring of Meghan came about. How about we start there? You reporter was given this information and provably disregarded it. That would go a long way toward establishing that your publication is purposely attempting to defame Meghan Zachary, wouldn’t it?”

It took a moment for Veneer to answer. Finally, he coughed a little. “If that is true,” he said, “and I have no reason to believe that at the moment, then we will just cut that part of the story out. The rest will stand.”

“That would be the allegations that Meghan’s ‘friends’ advanced that she is required to provide sexual services as a condition of her employment?”

“Exactly,” he said. “How she came by the job is really not the issue here. It’s what happened after she started work.”

“What happened after she started work is that she takes care of their daughter while they are working on music every day in Los Angeles. She lives in a guest bedroom in their home and that is the extent of the relationship.”

“That is your side of the story,” Veneer said, “and if you tell that to Jack, he will include it in the article, as required by journalistic ethics and standards.”

Pauline laughed. “Listening to you spout about journalistic ethics and standards is like listening to fuckin’ Saddam Hussein spout about human rights and justice.”

“That is uncalled for,” Veneer said huffily.

“I don’t really think so,” Pauline countered. “In any case, what if I were to tell you that Meghan Zachary does not really have any friends?”

“That’s absurd,” he said. “Of course she has friends. Jack talked to many of them. That is his primary source for the article.”

“He talked to townspeople and probably some college students at Cal Poly,” Pauline said. “People who do not even know Meghan personally, but have just heard of her because she now works for Jake Kingsley. If you publish this story, we will file a defamation suit against you. And we will demand in court that you name the sources of your information.”

“We cannot be compelled to name sources,” Veneer said. “You know that.”

“Yes, I do,” she said. “But there are two courts we’ll be dealing with here, Veneer. One is the court of law. You don’t have to name your sources for them. The other court is the court of public opinion. That’s the one that really counts in our society. When I told you that we would go to the wall with this thing, I was not fucking around with you. We will pull out all the stops. We will get statements from people who actually know Meghan and who will go on record as saying that the Meghan you are portraying is not even remotely like how she is. We will have her mother, her sister, her father, her kindergarten friends, her professors at Cal Poly, her coworkers at the KinderCare, anyone who can give a true picture of her go on record about her character. And we will continuously demand that you name a single source—fucking anyone—who can validate your accusations. And when you consistently refuse to name even one source—because you know you don’t have any—how is that going to look in the public opinion court? How do you think the jury that is finally seated for the trial after four or five years of this shit is going to view your rag? How is the judge who oversees the trial going to feel? And, in the meantime, how are your readers going to feel? The people who buy your rag in the checkout lines? Are they still going to have faith in your bullshit when they see that you cannot come up with a single source to support your allegations against this cute, innocent girl?”

There was silence on Veneer’s end of the line. A long silence. Finally: “I think you’re bluffing about this.”

“I’m not bluffing, Veneer,” she told him. “I am dead fucking serious about this. You print that story and KVA will spare no expense to go after you. We will drag your asses through the fucking mud for however long it takes for this thing to go to trial. And you may ultimately prevail in the end. The judge and jury might just follow the letter of the law and come to the conclusion that we could not prove that what you suggest was not the truth, but that’s a pretty big chance to take, isn’t it? Because we will not accept a settlement. We will go all the way with this thing. And, win or lose, we will make sure that the court of public opinion is on Meghan’s side and not on yours. We will do everything within our power and financial means to make sure of that.”

Another long silence. At last: “Well, this has been an interesting discussion, Pauline.”

“Not the word I would use for it,” she said.

“I will take your words under consideration,” he said. “I will talk to Jack about the story and see what he thinks.”

“You do whatever your need to do, Veneer,” she said, “but just remember that if you print this story, it means war. Total, complete, unrestricted warfare. If you want to print articles about Jake, about Laura, about Celia, hell, even about me and Obie, you go right ahead and sling your mud. But we are not going to let you get away with smearing this young girl who has done nothing but accept a job to take care of a child.”

“As I said,” Veneer told her. “I’ll take your words under consideration.”

The phone call ended. Pauline sat and looked at her notes for a moment, feeling the buzz of battle adrenaline flowing through her body. Finally, she stood and left the office. Obie was still sitting on the couch, sipping a drink. Tabby was still watching Blue’s Clues.

“How’d it go?” Obie asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I gave it my best though.”

Obie smiled. “Then I’m guessing that story ain’t gonna run come Friday.”

“Time will tell,” she said.

His smile got a little wider. “You know, you look really hot when you’re in battle mode.”

“Do I?” she asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “You figure we could slip away for a bit while Blue is entertaining Tabs here?”

“I think maybe we could,” she said.

The week went on. Pauline concentrated her energies on looking into the references and background of one Miles O’Leary, a forty-two-year-old who was a crop duster pilot for a small outfit that operated out of Colusa, California by profession and the saxophone player for the semi-professional jazz band the Dixie Doodles, who had performed at the Dixieland Jazz Jubilee. Meghan continued to take care of Caydee each day while her stomach flirted with the beginnings of a peptic ulcer caused by stress.

Friday morning came. The new edition of the American Watcher hit the newsstands. The lead story on the front page was concerned with the Monica Lewinsky and Slick Willie scandal. There was no new information in this story, just a rehash of already printed allegations. It had all the looks of a stock story that had been composed weeks earlier and held in reserve for when it was needed.

There was not a single word written about Meghan Zachary.