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her room and called for Tia to discuss the newest development in her life. Tia joined her with some lunch and the two women sat down on Lena’s bed to eat and talk.
                  “I can’t believe Zeus is doing this to me,” she said.
                  Tia was not convinced.
                  “I can’t believe your bodyguard is such a hunk . I wish I had a man like that following me around.”
                  “Gross,” Lena said, giving Tia a look that told her that the younger woman was not interested in discussing that subject with the woman who she considered in many ways to be her mother.
                  “What bothers you so much anyway?
                  Lena released an exasperated sigh.
                  “He’s always right behind me. He’s like a little lost puppy, with big lost puppy eyes. And he’s such a wimp. Always ‘yes sir, no sir, yes ma’am no ma’am’, it’s pathetic.”
                  “You know, in my day we called that manners,” Tia said. “And it’s his job to follow you around. The rest of us around here don’t have any choices about doing our jobs, you know?”
                  “I know,” Lena sighed. “But I don’t need him. I don’t even want him. You and Michaela are family, he’s like a creepy uncle,”
                  “What does that make your creepy uncle then?” Tia whispered conspiratorially.
                  Both women laughed and for a moment forgot about men and the trouble that they had brought them.
                  “What do you want to do when you get out of here?” Tia asked.
                  “Ugh, I don’t know.”
                  “Come on, there must be something. A girl as smart as you can do whatever she wants in the world.”
                  Lena blushed. Tia held the girl in high regards, and she sometimes worried that she’d never live up to the image that her surrogate parent had for her.
                  “I just don’t know. I don’t want to stay here, but I don’t know where else to go or what I’d do.”
                  “What about college?”
                  Lena had been so frustrated by her time at the boarding school that she’d honestly never given university a thought.
                  “Maybe I could go to get my MRS,” she said.
                  “Masters of…”
                  Lena laughed.
                  “My missus degree, auntie. I could go to meet a nice boy.”
                  Tia smiled, but did not share Lena’s sentiments.
                  “You want to meet a nice boy? Why not start with the new man in the house?”
                  “Oh Tia no ! He’s awful!”
                  “I don’t think so,” Tia said. “I don’t think you think so either.”
                  Lena did think that Ramon was awful, but that didn’t mean that she wasn’t interested either. He was different from the goons that her father normally hired, and although she was not interested in his quiet subservience or his impossible distance, she did want to know what made Ramon tick.
                  “I don’t want him anywhere near me.”
                  That much was true, but only in a very narrow sense.
                 

Ramon
    Ramon was going to need some more clothes and a few comforts of life. Zeus had given him his first paycheck up front so that he could get settled into the house. Zeus knew that nobody would run off with his money without first doing the job that they were paid for.
    He picked up his cell phone and called Gabe.
    “Ramon, how’s it going man?”
    “Not too bad,” Ramon said. “You didn’t tell me this guy was for real though.”
    “You’re a