The atmosphere was different that particular day, it was not so hard for Nathaniel to notice. He was the calm, calculating one after all. He did his things with precision and made sure his environment moved according to his pace to any extent possible.
So , yes. Something was different.
“Are we done here?” an impatient Amir asked, his hand running through his head which did not carry much but just a layer of hair that was glued to his skin in all its oiliness, without stress.
” Are we going to talk about the fact there is no house help in this house anymore?” Gabriel returned, his child-like face molded into a sneer at Amir.
“What happened to the one we have?”
“Well,” Gabriel sat back properly as he answered Nathaniel. “, why don't you ask Mr. Pervert here?”
On hearing the p-word, Nathaniel's interest was ultimately roused that he turned in his seat to fully face the culprit in question. "What did you do Amir?"
"I didn't do anything nasty, I promise." He swore, his hand grazing his lips after it had made contact with his chest. “I only fired her, that's all.”
“And you fired her, because..?”
“Uh…”
“I am listening.”
“See man, don 't be making me feel all pressured all of a sudden."
"Then just tell us why you fired the help! Dude, my library hasn't been dusted in the last three days and housekeeping doesn't come until next week." Amir eyed Gabriel with the side of his eyes, the latter throwing him another sneer.
“No one cares about your stupid library anyway. Nate, as I was trying to say before some dickhead interrupted, I fired her because I caught her doing something else when she was meant to be working.”
“Did he just…?”
Nathaniel waved Gabriel to shut up and he did, he was used to it anyway. No one ever listened to what he had to say. So he did what he did best, ran his hand through his hair to make sure it was set properly, sat back, and proceeded to zone out. “What was that something else?”
“Well, uh… I caught her pleasuring herself when she was supposed to be cleaning my room.”
His eyebrows couldn't help but cock, he just had to chuckle unbelievably. Nathaniel got off the stool he was sitting on. walked to the center of the room, his flops slapping the tiles furiously, and went to take a seat on one of the couches that adorned the almost empty room. “So, you found out that your room hadn't been cleaned. You then proceeded to look for the maid and when you found her, she was pleasuring herself.”
“Who said anything about finding her anywhere? I caught her on the security camera. Do I look like someone who would stress himself all because he wants his room cleaned?”
“Gabe, are you listening to this dude?”
“Dude, I stopped listening to him ever since he stole my prom date,” Gabriel replied with his eyes closed, even though a bit reluctant. He had dived into a world of imagination that was delighting him.
“You need to seriously get over that bro. Anyway,” Amir got up and faced his brothers. “, I wouldn't have fired her if she did not take so long just to pleasure herself.”
“You watched her while she did it?”
His hands recklessly in the air, a little shrug from his shoulders, “I was kind of hoping she would stop at some point.”
“You watched her pleasure herself,” Nathaniel repeated with disbelief.
“It's not as if it is something new.”
“Do you know how annoying you sound right now?"
“Wait, come, “ Amir gestured to the man that was staring at him like he was a stranger who had just walked up to him and said; Hey, let's fly to the moon right now.
“Why do you always act like you are never attracted to women?”
Even Gabriel had to frown at the bizarre digression. “How does that relate to what you guys have been talking about?”
“I did not talk to you Gabe, so just sit down and look pretty. Nate, ” Amir threw a forced grin at him, ignoring the finger Gabriel had thrown towards him. “, just answer the question. Tell me why.”
“I seriously don't understand your question.”
Shaking his head slightly, Amir resumed an akimbo position “Ever since I have known you, I have never seen you with a woman. Are you…”
“No, I am not.”
“I am just concerned for a brother, that's all. I mean, look at you, ladies swoon over you than they do at me and the fact that you don't even look their way offends me a lot.”
“We are not the same Amir. Just let me be with my weirdness.” Nathaniel punctuated his statement with his signature don't even push this any further look which doubled as his why on earth is my hair this rough? look.
“I thought we were trying to discuss getting a new help,” Gabriel had come back from his trip to the depths of his imagination.
“Yes, Amir, you should contact Rosco.”
“Oh, I already did. The new help should be coming in today or tomorrow. . .”
“Alright.” And for some minutes, silence stayed in the room, allowing each of them to clearly think.
As Nathaniel wondered if Amir would ever stop romancing numerous girls every blessed day, all that was on Amir's mind was the party that was going to hold in his secret room at one of their clubs. Gabriel on the other hand just wanted to sleep, but then, he couldn't help but hope that the new help would take care of his library.
"Whose idea was it to have a huge house again?"
"Yours!" Nathaniel and Gabriel screamed.
"Hey! Don't bite me . Why didn't you guys stop me from having such an idea? Look at us now, we have been living in this huge place with dust for the past few days.”
“Is this dude kidding me?” Gabriel asked Nathaniel who shrugged in response. Gabriel faced Amir. “Dude, you forced us to agree with you about which house to live in.”
"Well," it seemed like the cat had got Amir's tongue, he had immediately gone from wide-mouthed to timid. "We can always move to the smaller one."
"Now you are just being silly, you know this place serves us in a lot of ways. We can't leave here.” Amir, for the first time that day agreed with Gabriel.
“I guess we are stuck here for a while,” Nathaniel concluded and they all agreeably.
“Eh-hem, ” Chloe who had witnessed the whole agreement thing cleared her throat drawing the attention of the men toward her. She had taken the liberty of dressing in the worst way possible- she had on a t-shirt and sweatpants. She wanted to wear her favourite crocs, but she decided to look a bit presentable with her least favourite Converse. She was not even wearing make-up.
But the way their eyes lit up, you would think she had dressed elaborately like Cinderella going to the ball.
“Well, hello there.” Amir slowly danced towards her. “How may I help you?”
Chloe really wished the scowl pictured in her head was on her face at that moment. “Hello sir, my name is Chloe Ashley Steve. I have been sent here by Rosco as your new housemaid.” She also hoped her smile was top-notch.
“Well, you are at the right place. But before I continue, we have two rules for you." Chloe's brows quirked. "Oh yes. Number one, don't refer to us as sirs. We are not that old. Number two, you can never say no to…”
“To?”
“… to anything we ask you to do. We don't like it.” Amir stopped taking short walks around her and his eyes narrowed at her. “I don't like it."
“What if I can't do what is asked of me?”
“Hmm, I guess we will have to find another way then.”
Chloe took a few seconds to pretend like she was thinking. “Do I have this job then? "
A large, quite victorious smile got plastered on Amir's lips. "Yes, yes you do."
"Great. I guess I will resume tomorrow then." Chloe directed her statement to the other two who had just been sitting silently. They did not even move an inch of their body let alone say something in response.
“You can always resume next week.”
She flashed Amir another fake grin, “See you tomorrow sir.” And she walked out of the room, her hand making sure to have contact with the edge of the polished door.
“Guys,” Amir turned dramatically to face the two men. “, I am totally hitting that ass. Damn! That girl is fine! And she is going to be living with us again? Bro, I am hitting that ass.”
“ No, you are not,” came Nathaniel’s gruff reply that killed Amir’s excitement.
“Come on dude. You are still confused about your sexuality.”
Nathaniel readjusted in his seat. “If at all I was confused before, I certainly am not anymore .” Even Gabriel's face lit in surprise. As the image of the confident woman he had just seen in their conversation room flashed through his mind, he smirked and said, “I call dibs.”
Chloe had not exactly taken her time to study the huge house the previous day as she was more concerned with taping the rooms she could gain access to. The handle of her luggage held tightly in her hand, her eyes scanned across the hugeness of the building . Not sure whether to term it a mansion or not, she noticed how much the features of a regular duplex and a simple bungalow mixed to give the building a unique structure. Chloe certainly did not miss the huge see-through window to her extreme upper left which exposed what seemed to be a sitting room. If Chloe knew her Maths right, she had found two living rooms just on the ground floor the previous day. She just had to shake her head. 'Rich people and being ridiculous.' Taking a deep breath, she made for the entrance, recalling Agent Connor's advice. Be nice, he had said. He surely knew how disgusted she was to be living under the same roof with a rapist. But if he wanted her to be nice, she would be. Anything for the mission.
A week passed but Chloe was yet to make any discovery that could serve as a lead. Instead, the week was filled with chores and chores and a quiet house as the men were hardly around. But then, taking care of a huge house was more than she had anticipated. After her second day, Chloe just had to appreciate the fact that Lucille was employed as her partner. With tiredness coursing through her system as that particular day happened to be more tedious considering that she helped Madam Lugi, the head domestic help (she is mainly the cook) with the laundry. There were so many clothes enough for a community of fifty people to wear repeatedly for three years. Not bothering to take off her uniform, Chloe kicked off her shoe and jumped onto the amazing bed which she added to the list as one of the few things she liked about the house after she had experienced a wonderful night's sleep on it the first day. Gradually, sleep carried her, distant voices from outside her room entered her subco
"Boy do I hate working from home." Amir stretched as he decided to take a break from the system in front of him. His eyes darting to the busy duo in front of him who had decided to ignore his declaration, he decided it was time to get something else done. He could maybe have some fun. Leaning back in his chair, his nose picked up the vanilla-ish scent of the new help, Chloe, which signed how close she was to the room. Getting up, he decided she would be his fun for the day. Or perhaps for a long time. There was just something about her that interested him. He was right. Chloe was standing in front of the small living room, her eyes trained on something ahead, a broom staying still in her hand. Scoping her, Amir could not help but appreciate how amazing she looked in the uniform. Not being too loose nor too tight, the black and white material sculptured her in the right places. “Eh- hem. Chloe?” It was evident she had been deep in thought as she appeared a bit startled as she tur
"I don't think I can work under such conditions, sir. It is already quite strenuous on my mentality that I am living with a rapist. But him coming onto me, that's quite too much.""Pepper, I know how infuriating that can be, but you need to calm down and think with a cool head. You don't want to jeopardize what we have going here."Chloe shook her head unbelievably. He kept saying he understood, that he knew how infuriating it can be. But, he was not the one working his ass off because of some fucked up mission!“I don't even understand why I have to live with them. Whatever happened to sending a trained ninja-like agent to tape the house? It makes things easier that way. I wouldn't have to sit my ass here waiting for them to mention something related to rape or young girls."“Agent Pepper, you have to calm down. Yes, we could have taped the house but that would have done no good. That is why we need you to forge a relationship with them. A kind of relationship that would get you into
Chloe looked at the little group that hovered over their laptops and she wondered why they decided to do their boring finances in the library. It was even more annoying that they kept talking at intervals. And it annoyed her even more when they were not having a conversation that could give her a lead.Raising the book in her hand to make it seem like she was still interested in its content, Chloe wondered how on earth Nathaniel's words of them being a family was going to work out.There is Lucille who is always either doing something in her room or throwing dagger glares at her whenever Nathaniel happens to pass by. Amir on the other hand could be in a corner of the house making phone calls with his women if he is not busy with work.Gabriel as usual is his quiet self. He spends most of his time in the library while Nathaniel was always looking so serious and having one call after the other most certainly about business.Chloe did not see how them being like a family was going to help
Deep in thought, Chloe wondered when she was going to get that one lead she was looking for. Time was moving fast and having nothing to do but chores upon chores was starting to get on her nerves.True, it was part of her work so she had to be very patient and vigilant to get what she was there for. But, she didn't have all the time in the world to spend months in a huge house working her butts off. She had issues of her own to deal with.Her hand clenching the edge of the tiled surface, Chloe let out a swear word.Then, her train of thought drove in another direction.Recalling Gabriel's and most importantly Amir's words about Nathaniel liking her, she wondered if she wanted to use that channel to get what she wanted.Toying with real emotions was something that could become dangerous for her.She let out a huge sigh, nothing was clear to her anymore. Maybe that was because her reason for being there was not yielding results. Assuming she had gotten that one lead she was so desperate
“How do you manage to make any dress look good?” Gabriel complimented from the doorway.“Oh, Gabriel,” Chloe said shyly as she played with the end of her curled hair.“I think the dress just happens to fit me. But, isn't this a bit too much?"She looked into the huge mirror that came with the team that had come earlier to take care of her appearance. The dress which was long and black with a bit of silver sprinkled at its silted ends, really took Chloe aback who was just expecting a regular-looking gown.“I think you look amazing.” Gabriel moved closer and stood just behind her to continue admiring her look. “I love how daring your eyes look, it suits your personality even more.”“But what do you know about my personality?”“I know for sure that you have a crazy side that you are managing to keep in check because of your job.” His hand came up to help adjust the strand that was resting uneasily on her shoulder. After, he looked at her image with a small smile that brought out his cuten
Chloe hated the fact that she was finding it hard to get the feel of his lush lips against hers out of her mind. She hated, even more, the fact that it was the next day already.As she almost unconsciously recalled the night, Chloe turned on the tap of the wash hand basin and let the sound of rushing liquid ease her a bit.Nathaniel didn't come back after he left her standing in what one might as well call shock. Instead, after she had stood for almost an hour, he sent a driver to come get her and take her home.It was quite rude of him, but it was established that he did weird things sometimes.Sucking her lower lip in, Chloe got off the toilet seat and walked to the door handle where her smartwatch which kept vibrating was hanging.After she successfully connected her headset, she said, “Agent Pepper here.”“How did yesterday go?”“It was a short night. I noticed a few things though.”There was a brief silence before Agent Connor said, “Do tell .”“Well, Nathaniel Stone seemed to be