The Help (Kings of Linwood Academy 1)

I catch up to her and Samuel as he ushers us into a back foyer that leads to a large terrace and a sprawling backyard. From there, he circles around to show us the great room, the conservatory, the ballroom, the library, and the den. I don’t even know what the fuck a “great room” is, but it’s huge and has couches, chairs, and end tables artfully arrayed around the space.

The other wing of the first floor holds the kitchen and several guest rooms, with a humongous motor court and two garages at the far end. There’s a basement with a steam room and sauna, several rec rooms, a small basketball court, a wine cellar, and an actual mini-movie theatre.

At some point during the tour, my eyes stop bugging out of my head. I’ve seen too much to be surprised anymore—the level of wealth and luxury in this place is staggering.

As we’re heading up a different set of stairs to the second floor, a willowy woman starts down the steps toward us. She’s wearing a loose, expensive-looking top and flowing pants. Her chestnut hair is streaked with subtle highlights, and her berry-red nails are long. She looks younger than Mom, and for a second, I totally understand the struggle people go through when they meet me and my mom together—that moment of confusion about whether we’re mother/daughter or siblings.

Is this woman Samuel’s wife or his daughter?

She stops a few feet away from us, her eyebrows lifting with mild, bored interest. “Oh. Who are you?”

“Darling, they’re the new housekeeping staff. I told you they’d be arriving today, remember?”

Samuel wraps an arm around her waist, tugging her toward him and kissing her lightly.

Well, guess that answers that.

The woman shrugs out of his grasp, her gaze bouncing between me and Mom. She doesn’t seem openly hostile like her son did, so that’s good, I guess. But she doesn’t seem… all there either. Her eyes have a slightly glassy quality, and there’s a slowness to her movements, as if there’s a half-second delay between her brain and her body.

She smiles, her lips slowly stretching as she blinks at us. “Oh, yes. Of course. Welcome to our home. I’m Audrey.”

My mom makes our introductions as I step up beside her. Shaking Mrs. Black’s hand is like holding a piece of cardboard. It’s cool and dry and slightly stiff.

“I’m sure my husband will take excellent care of you.” Her lips float up in another smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Darling, I’ll be in the pool house if you need me.”

She brushes past us to continue down the stairs, and as Samuel starts leading us up again, my mom shoots me a look. Okay, even she picked up on that weirdness.

I shrug to let her know I don’t understand it any better than she does.

Rich people be crazy, am I right?

The Black family mansion is so huge and ostentatious that it actually has “service quarters”. After giving us a brief tour of the second floor, Mr. Black leads us to a self-contained one-bedroom apartment on the west side of the house, above the garage.

“And this is where you’ll be staying,” he says, smiling at my mom. He’s the only person in this house who seems to do that and mean it. Then he turns toward me. “It only has one bedroom, unfortunately. And it seems silly to ask the two of you to share when we have plenty of perfectly good guest rooms that aren’t being used. So you’ll be staying just around the corner, if it’s all right with you, in a spare bedroom near the laundry room.”

I shrug. “Sure. Works for me.”

He beams again, and I wonder if it’s always like this. If he’s trying to compensate for having a son who’s an asshole and wife who’s barely there.

“Wonderful! Then I’ll leave you two to get settled in. Penelope, tomorrow evening we can go over your expected duties and some household logistics. We’ve had live-in help before, so it’ll just be a matter of getting you up to speed on the systems your predecessor created.”

“That sounds great.” My mom nods enthusiastically. She shakes his hand again. “Thank you for having us. This is a wonderful opportunity. We can’t wait to get started.”

He does the double handshake thing again, clasping hers between both of his. “Of course. Celeste spoke very highly of you.”

Before he leaves, he shows me around the corner to my room. The service entrance door is nestled into the corner where two hallways meet, and my room is several yards past that. The room is huge—obviously it wasn’t intended for servants to sleep in—and as Mr. Black noted, the laundry room is right next to it. There’s even a door that leads from the bedroom to the laundry room, although I’m not quite sure why. All I know is, he just gave my mom the perfect excuse to assign me laundry duty.

I chuckle under my breath, rolling my eyes. Thanks a lot, dude.

A second later, Mom raps gently on the half-closed bedroom door and pokes her head inside. “Hey, kiddo. Want to help me unload the truck?”

Heaving a breath, I stand from where I was testing out the bed. The mattress is soft and bouncy, just how I like, and what I really want to do is put on my pajamas and curl up under the covers. But we only have a few hours of daylight left, and until we unpack our shit, I don’t even have any pajamas to change into.

“Yeah. Let’s do it. Home, sweet home.”

There’s no sign of either Lincoln or his mom in the house as we unload our boxes and bags from the moving truck. It doesn’t take long—we sold or donated all our furniture, and neither of us own a whole lot. It’s mostly clothes, books, and other day-to-day necessities.

That night, I sleep like a damn baby swaddled in the softest sheets known to mankind. Usually I have a hard time sleeping in new places, and I would’ve thought that would be especially true in this massive, overwhelming house. But tucked away in the northwest corner, around the corner from my mom’s little makeshift apartment, I feel safe and cozy. I can almost imagine the rest of the house doesn’t exist.