Page 4 of A Hidden Past

I don’t count on meeting anyone as beautiful as Vivian.

She looks to be about twenty years older than me, give or take. That puts her near the age range I expect.

Everything else is different. The slight wrinkles on her face and the fact that her lips are the size of a human’s and not massively stretched and plumped out of proportion tells me that she’s not had any plastic surgery. Her skin is lightly tanned, but it’s the healthy tan of someone who spends time in the sun, not the tan that costs five hundred dollars at Beach Dolls ‘R Us.

When she smiles, it’s plenty seductive, but I don’t think a woman who looks like her could smile any other way. She’s about five foot seven, which makes her six inches shorter than me. She has long hair that is blonde, but a natural darker blonde and not the frosted straw-color dyed look. The hair frames her face and draws my eyes down to another part of her body that I can tell is just as natural as the rest of her.

No surprises there. With natural assets that look like the ones she has, there’s no need for implants.

My eyes fall to her hips, which curve gently over long, toned legs. When I catch myself looking up and down her body, I snap my eyes back up to her face.

That doesn’t help. Remember those perfectly sized lips I talk about earlier? Well, they’re soft and sweet and just slightly parted at the moment, and they rest under gray eyes that look like the sky the morning after a winter storm.

She’s beautiful.

“You must be Nate,” she says, and damned if her voice isn’t as perfect as the rest of her.

Today might be a good day after all.

“Yes,” I say. “That’s me. Nathan Harlow, Best Pool Cleaners.”

She smiles slightly and extends a hand. “Vivian Chase, divorcee.”

And she’s single. Part of me wishes she wasn’t. It’s going to be hard enough to keep the fantasies at bay without knowing that there’s a chance I could fulfill them.

Get a grip, Nate. This is real life, not Real Housewives.

I take her hand and shake it professionally, then release it. “Nice to meet you. Is now a good time?”

“Now’s a great time. Do you want to come inside?”

She tilts her head a little when she says that, and it takes more effort than I care to admit to keep my eyes focused on hers. “I would love to come inside.”

She laughs, and waves her fingers, indicating for me to follow her. As she walks, I notice that there’s another part of her body that’s all natural and perfectly shaped.

“The pool’s out back,” she says. “Surprising, I know. It’s in fairly good shape. I had it cleaned a month ago, but since the weather’s warm now, I figured I should get it cleaned one more time before I spend all day lounging in front of it in a two-piece.”

Thank you for that image.

“I’m happy to help.”

She looks over her shoulder, and I feel a flush as her eyes move up and down over me. “I’ll bet you are.”

We walk into her backyard, and it’s then I realize that I have no idea what the inside of her house looks like. I usually at least take a peek at the lifestyles of the rich and famous people of Autumn Downs. I might despise them, but that doesn’t mean there’s no part of me that wishes I could live like them.

But I’m too focused on Vivian to give much of a crap about the size of her tv or whether she has marble or granite floors.

“Here we are.”

She gestures at the pool, and I see—with some relief—that it really isn’t all that bad. There are some leaves, and a thin transparent film of gunk across the top, but it’s not a swamp like the other houses I went to yesterday.

The pool itself is maybe four hundred square feet. That’s fairly large, but as far as houses here go, it’s on the low end of average. I should have this done in a couple of hours.

“Yeah, this shouldn’t take too long. I’ll go ahead and pour in the treatment now and let it sit while I replace your pool filter and clean out the leaves. That should take me an hour or two. Then I’ll run the filter. You’re going to want to give it twenty-four hours before you use it, but it’ll be good as new by then. Who cleaned it last time?”

“A delightfully pleasant older woman named Maria. She was my cleaner for many years, but she has recently retired. That’s why you’re here.”

“Well, I’m happy to be your new pool woman.”

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