Kelly McClymer-Must Love Black by Kelly McClymer Read Free Book Online Page B

around.
    “Here.” Rienne leaned over the computer terminal, clicked on a desktop icon, and suddenly, Havens’s face filled my monitor. A little scary, even though he’d seemed fairly harmless last night. “Good morning, Miss. Good morning, children. I trust you all slept well and enjoyed your breakfast.”
    “Yes, we did.” Since I could see him, I assumed he could see me, so I sat a little straighter and tried to look like a responsible nanny who has everything under control.
    “Mr. Pertweath would like to speak with you before you begin today, Miss.”
    “No problem.” Maybe he’d clue me in on what I was supposed to do.
    “He’s scheduled fifteen minutes for you—his day’s rather busy, you understand. If you could be downstairs in ten minutes, I’ll meet you at the elevator and show you to his office.”
    “I’ll be there.”
    “Excellent.”
    Havens’s face disappeared from the monitor.
    “He always calls the nannies ‘Miss.’ Isn’t that a funny thing?” Rienne said.
    “Sounds nice to me.” I shrugged.
    “It’s just because he can’t bother to remember your name,” Triste informed me.
    I ignored this comment. “I should have asked if you were supposed to come with.” I looked at the monitor. It seemed likely that I could page Havens if he could page me, but I didn’t have a clue how, and I didn’t want to admit that to the twins.
    Fortunately, Rienne piped up, “Oh, no. We’re going for our music lesson at eight thirty.”
    Right. I remembered seeing that on the schedule.
    “Am I supposed to take you?” Technically, I was able to drive. Not that I’d done much of it. It’s not that I didn’t enjoydriving, it’s just that I didn’t trust the other drivers on the road not to make stupid mistakes that could get me into an accident. Hey, it happens.
    Before the twins could answer, the elevator door slid open and a very pretty young woman emerged. I pinpointed her as Laurie, the personal assistant, since she looked too young to be Mr. Pertweath’s business partner, and her blazer, heels, and skirt seemed too formal for a cook. She wasn’t more than two or three years older than I was, at most.
    “Who’s ready to go for music lessons?” She was a little on the peppy and pink side of life for me. Especially this early in the morning.
    Apparently the twins agreed because they groaned and said in unison, “Laurie, you don’t have to pretend we’re not doing this under protest.”
    “Hey, Lionel’s still off today, so you get to spend some quality time with Geoff. You can’t tell me you mind that.”
    “He is cute,” Triste agreed. Rienne nodded. I tried to size up Laurie without being too obvious about it. Sounded like she thought Geoff was cute too. I wondered if she knew if he was taken.
    “See? There’s always an upside.” Laurie was way too cheery. I wondered if she had a quirky side, like Sarah. I’m not much for instabonding with summer friends, but it could be cool to have a girl around my age to hang out with, and she might have the scoop on Geoff. But then she wagged her finger at the girls. “Just so long as you don’t get any ideas about my guy.”

CHAPTER FIVE
    There was no sense longing for the man. He was as far out of my reach as the moon.
    —Miss Adelaide Putnam,
Manor of Dark Dreams,
p. 25
    Her guy? Geoff was taken? Bummer. Not that I’d planned to make a move on him, not without Sarah to egg me on, but Geoff, taciturn and hot, had presented a bit of a challenge. I like a challenge. Maybe I didn’t want to date him, but I had hoped to get him to say more than one sentence in a row. I looked at Laurie and realized that trying to do so would definitely be a waste. If Geoff liked this pink-and-pretty, bubble-gum couture-suit wearer, then he and I didn’t have enough in common for me to be interested in hearing more than one sentence from him.
    We all took the elevator down to the main floor, where Havens met me. I had hoped to see Geoff there, too.