Chapter 1 - Pounding The Pavement

Background color
Font
Font size
Line height


With a perfectly manicured finger, Xiomara rang the doorbell belonging to the villa perched high on a slope overlooking the beach. There was nothing shaky or nervous about the structure. It glared down at her with a haughty air, giant bay windows casting sunlight into her eyes.

Filthy rich bastards. Even the glass stating the number of the house looked expensive, but she could care less. She wasn't here to appraise the damn place.

Feeling rather itchy, she lifted her finger once more just as the heavy wooden side door was pulled open with a grunt, forcing her to take a step back onto the sidewalk. However, when dark brown eyes narrowed at her, she took yet another step back, this time onto the street itself.

Holy shit. The guy was huge. He towered over her like a mountain. A rather angry mountain with short cropped hair and a well-kept beard. A suit like the ones James Bond wore covered his massive frame, the expensive fabric straining around his bulky arms.

"Hello," she said.

"Do you have an appointment?" The voice was cultured with a deep timbre that sent vibrations rolling throughout her body. It was a weird, yet sexy sensation accompanied by a chill down her spine – one she had yet to feel.

"Uh, not exactly. I'm looking for a job."

His eyes darkened with disapproval. "What kind of job?"

"Anything. I will do anything," she muttered. The words spilled out of her mouth before he could have a chance to slam the door shut in her face. Honestly, he looked like the type who would do just that.

A slight shiver went creeping down her back when those brown eyes narrowed even more before traveling over her body in a fast sweep.

She fidgeted under the modest dress she'd chosen to wear and lifted a hand to wipe the sweat from off her brows. The cheap booties on her feet were also drenched in sweat, the bottom of the shoes becoming gooey insoles. It felt as if she had walked straight into the lagoon with all its slime and gummy seaweed.

This was not her. A facade really. She was a sexy beast – Jennifer Lopez level kind of sexy beast – but circumstances had forced her to put on a potato sack in thirty-five degrees heat to please the likes of him.

She could tell by the smug look on his face that he was not impressed by her. He looked rather bored, his eyes grim, his full lips curved in a taut line.

"We're not hiring," he said.

How in the world had she known that he was going to say just that? She had apparently failed his appearance test, and now the verdict was in. Not hiring.

The mountain went to shut the heavy wooden door, but she quickly blocked the doorway with her boot. "I can cook. I can clean. Iron, wash your clothes. Whatever."

At this point, she had managed to squeeze her tiny body wholly into the doorway. She gave him the best puppy look she could muster and he sighed. Actually sighed.

"Do you have credentials?"

"What?"

Annoyance flickered across his handsome features. "Did you go to maid school or something?"

She shook her head and glanced away. Did people go to school for this shit? Unbelievable. It wasn't that hard to make a bed or wash the dishes. She'd been doing it since she was five years old.

"But I have experience, sir. Lots of it. My mother can vouch for me. She works as a maid at a hotel right down the road," she said desperately.

She needed this job and she would do anything to get it. Desperation didn't discriminate. Nobody cared about how smart or how pretty she was. Those things didn't matter once you'd fallen into the greedy claws of desperation. Desperate smart girls were used to count drug money and desperate pretty girls became whores. She hadn't sunk that low yet, but it was probably just a matter of time.

"What else can you do?"

Again that voice had her full attention. Not because of what he was saying, but because of her body's reaction to it. His voice was unnaturally deep, the notes vibrating every cell in her body, turning her insides to jelly. He carried command in his tone and when he spoke he expected an answer.

"I ... uh." She swallowed. "I can type? Run errands. I also have experience as a waitress."

Brilliant, she was fumbling to find her words, but all that mattered was that the Mountain hadn't kicked her out on her butt yet. And if she kept this up, it wouldn't be long before he did. She had to come better than this because her sister's wellbeing depended on her getting a job. Preferably today.

Again with the bored look, but this time she caught a glance of something more. Something hot. A second later it disappeared and his face went back to stone.

"Alright," he said, "come on in. Let me see what I can do for you."

Holy shit!

This was the furthest she'd gotten all day on her unconventional job hunt.

She couldn't wipe the grin off her face despite her brain telling her that she didn't have a job yet.

When she'd started her hunt earlier this morning she'd been dressed differently. She had chosen a sexy halter top with a decent amount of cleavage display, paired with blue jean shorts.

After knocking on the door of a luxury apartment, an old white lady with beady eyes had taken one look at her and called her a whore. The urge to scratch out the old lady's ancient eyes still lingered, but the first house she'd approached after changing her clothes had let her in. Hallelujah.

"Where did you say your mother worked again?" The Mountain shut the door behind her, his long legs leading her up a stony path along a driveway bordered by trees to the villa.

The cream and brown structure looked a lot friendlier from this angle. In another life, this would have been her dream house. Hell yeah.

Fantasies aside, she concentrated on the path ahead of her, her tiny feet walking twice as fast to keep up. The sun blasted down from above and a trickle of sweat ran down between her breasts. "The Alcove Hotel," she answered, still distracted by the landscape.

"Ah. It's part of the De Vries Enterprises. Ever heard of it?" His tone was much more pleasant now, but she wasn't fooled. Not at all.

"Nope. Should I have?" She used to work at that hotel with her mother, but had gotten fired, and he probably owned the hotel. Oh great.

The mountain shrugged and spun around to look down at her, making direct eye contact. "What's your name?"

"Xiomara Castillo."

He didn't acknowledge her name in any way. She wasn't a Peterson or a Van den Hoogen. So she was a nobody. Those names commanded respect and belonged to politicians and other influential families on the island. Castillo was an immigrant. Castillo had to beg and plead to get a job, while a Peterson or a Heiliger only needed their last names.

"I need to frisk you before I let you inside the house," he said.

"Why?" Apparently, he thought her a criminal too. A nobody and a criminal.

"Security reasons. If you don't agree you can leave." His voice was indifferent as he looked down at her and still that sexy tingle shooting down past her navel persisted. What was wrong with her? This was so not like her.

Xiomara bit her lip. The reason she was reacting this way to a total stranger was that where she came from she was not used to seeing well groomed men wearing suits. It was a delightful change for sore eyes. The way the mountain carried himself with so much confidence was sexy as hell.

"Okay, do your thing," she whispered.

He towered over her, his shadow engulfing her. Xiomara took an unconscious step back but came up short against the glass door.

"Put your hands above your head and spread your legs," he commanded.

Holy cannoli. That voice. That tone. So manly. So bossy.

Doing as he asked, she proceeded to lift her arms above her head and widen her stance as her toes squished around in her sweaty socks. At the touch of his hand plowing through her wavy hair, she trembled, although it was Sahara Desert hot outside. He patted her potato sack, being careful not to touch her intimately. Her shoulders, her back, her torso, and lastly her thighs.

Standing up straight, he moved past her and slid the glass door to the villa open. She stepped into a foyer that belonged somewhere on the pages of Home Magazine. Tall ceilings. Airy. Modern looking furniture – that probably cost more than her mother's yearly income, time five.

The air inside the villa caressed and chilled her heated skin, almost like she'd walked into a fridge. The Mountain led her further into a large living area with comfy looking couches and an antique, but still very chic looking coffee table.

"Have a seat. Don't move. Don't touch anything." Those brown eyes squinted at her. "Understood?"

Jeez. He needed to take a chill pill. ASAP.

"Understood," she croaked and sat down on what felt like sitting on cotton candy. So soft. She let her fingers run over the velvety material in a gentle caress. It was hard to tell what was caressing what because the couch caressed her right back.

So this is what it felt like to sit on money. There were no words, just feelings.

The Mountain strode away from her, his broad shoulders rolling. She couldn't help but stare. He was tall and built like a pillar from the Roman ages. He was gorgeous.

And so not her type. She was more into guys like Jesse Williams from Grey's Anatomy, not The Rock. Muscles weren't her thing. Imagine getting into an argument with all that testosterone. He would snap her neck like a chicken being slaughtered for McDonalds McChicken. And then he would dispose of her quietly. And she would end on Discovery's Unsolved files.

It wasn't long before the Mountain stepped back into the sitting area and told her to come, jarring her out of her foolish daydream. In her haste to get to him, she nearly knocked over a vase of fresh flowers. Thank the heavens for her killer instincts, she caught the vase mid-fall, water splashing over the rim to soak her manicured fingers.

"Got it!" She grinned at the Mountain, but all she got from him was a nasty glare.

Alright, somebody wasn't happy. She carefully returned the vase to its original position on the stand-alone table. Running her clammy hands along her dress, she took a deep breath to recollect herself before following him down a dark hallway.

The Mountain ushered her into a library of a room where another man was seated behind a desk fit for the President of the United States. Light grey eyes locked in on her face and smiled, dimples showing.

Holy rabbits.

He too was gorgeous with curly hair and dressed in a similar looking James Bond suit. Where the mountain was mostly all muscle, this guy was lean and fit based on the imprint of his body beneath the suit.

Today was bound to be a good day after all. Two good looking men, a potential job, what could go wrong?

But really, she needed this job, like it was the air she breathed. The last five months of unemployment had not only taken a toll on the family's finances, but it had also crippled them, her mother's maid salary struggling to keep them afloat.

It was so bad, that they now eat just one meal a day, consisting mostly of oatmeal, rice, or cornmeal, and if the regular emergency trips to the hospital permitted, they would sometimes have chicken. Her youngest sister, Esmeralda, was always sick, and boy did her medical fees come with a hefty price tag.

The sooner she got this job, the better off they would be. The only thing left to budget on were the utility bills and she was not ready to go weeks without a shower or brushing her teeth. No way in hell. They couldn't sell the two bedroom apartment, because it wasn't theirs, to begin with. The place was a shack anyway, she doubted anybody would want it.

Hell, she didn't want it, but it was all they had for now. At three hundred and fifty bucks a month, it was a bargain. A decent two bedroom on the island was about eight fifty to nine hundred dollars a month. Which was about the same amount as her mother's salary. Imagine stretching a thousand dollars across seven mouths, medical bills, medicines, rent and utility bills, food, school fees, and unforeseen bills ... it was almost impossible. They had their backs to the wall with a snowball's chance in hell of not ending up on the streets next.

This job wasn't just about digging them out of the hole they were in, she wanted to show her mother that she was an adult and could contribute to the household. That she wasn't a total failure, despite never going to college. That she cared about her family just as much as she did.

No matter how much she sometimes resented her mom, she could never allow her siblings to suffer because of her mother's bad decisions. So if it meant that she had to sacrifice her soul to get this job ... she would do just that.

*****


A/N
Comment and vote if you'd like and I truly hope you stick around for more ☺️.

You are reading the story above: TeenFic.Net