Interesting.
The car lurches up the drive in first gear, painfully restrained. The navigation system continues barking Italian questions shehas no hope of answering. She ignores them, focused entirely on maintaining exactly six miles per hour.
When she reaches the circular drive, the parking sensors erupt in a cacophony of warnings as the front bumper comes dangerously close to my imported Japanese maple.
Finally, she stops the car at an angle that would make a valet weep.
Then something unexpected happens.
She exits the vehicle and walks directly into the woods.
I frown, cycling through camera feeds. Nothing. I have no surveillance in that section of the property. Why would I? It’s just trees.
What the hell is she doing?
I rewind the footage, studying her face before she disappeared into the foliage. Determination. Urgency. Something else I can’t quite identify.
I make a mental note to install motion sensors along the perimeter. Maybe those trail cameras hunters use. This is a blind spot I hadn’t anticipated.
Three minutes later, she emerges from the trees, smoothing her skirt with one hand. She looks... relieved? I still have no idea what just happened.
I’m not used to not knowing. It’s unsettling.
She retrieves her bag and the red Louboutins from the car, approaching the house with visible trepidation. The music from inside is audible even through the security feed.
I switch to the interior cameras just as she pushes open the front door. The scene inside freezes—Dom and Ricky with their rented entertainment, all of them staring at my disheveled assistant like she’s an alien who just crash-landed.
“Who the fuck are you?” Dom’s voice booms through my phone speaker.
Her response is immediate, delivered with surprising composure:
“Delulu new girl. Not my shoes. Not my car. Definitely not my scene. Point me to the suits, please.”
Dom’s confused face fills the screen, his expression worth every dollar I spent on those security gates. I can’t help the smile that forms on my lips.
This is going to be fun.
Dom’s entertainment choices have descended to unprecedented depths of tastelessness. Three women, their bodies literally encrusted with glitter, are sprawled across my imported Italian leather sectional like abandoned party decorations. Each movement releases a fresh shower of sparkles that will remain stubbornly embedded in the grain for months, if not years.
Empty Veuve Clicquot bottles stand in formation like fallen soldiers after a particularly decadent battle. Cigar ash—not mine, never mine—dusts the pristine Carrara marble tabletop in gray drifts. The air is probably thick with a noxious blend of cheap perfume and expensive champagne—a scent that will linger in the fabrics and woodwork for weeks.
This precise scenario is why I relocated to the apartment above the restaurant.
Dom, dressed in nothing but a pair of boxer shorts that leave absolutely nothing to the imagination as far as his ten-inch dick is concerned, stares at Emmaleen as though she’s suddenly begun speaking fluent Mandarin. His confusion would be comical if it weren’t so utterly predictable. He reaches for his phone with the practiced motion of a man who knows exactly who to call when the unexpected appears on his doorstep.
My phone vibrates in my hand exactly on cue, as if choreographed.
“Let her in,” I say before he can even form words. “Point her in the wrong direction. I want to watch her face as she navigates the house.” A small test. A minor amusement. A way to observe Little Miss Take in an unfamiliar environment.
Dom doesn’t respond verbally. Just shakes his head and disconnects. He’s grown accustomed to my methods over the years. Doesn’t question them anymore. Doesn’t need to understand the why.
The security feed on my phone switches to the wide-angle camera in the foyer. Dom gestures vaguely down the first-floor hallway—deliberately away from the stairs, away from my bedroom suite.
Emmaleen hesitates, her expression clearly weighing his credibility against her instincts. Smart girl. But she proceeds anyway, apparently deciding that following directions, however suspicious, is safer than arguing with a half-naked man with a ten-inch hard on who reeks of whiskey and sex.
The limo slows as we approach the neighborhood, the driver navigating the winding private road with practiced precision. Two minutes out from arrival.
Emmaleen moves through the first floor with calculated caution, like someone navigating a minefield. She peers into the kitchen—professional Viking appliances that have never been used for anything more complex than coffee, marble countertops that have never been stained by actual cooking.