“I need your help,” Helen explodes into my ear, as soon as I answer my phone.

Oh, Jesus. It’s another one of her emergencies. They come like clockwork. At least twice a week somebody calls out for the day and she flies into a panic and calls me. If I survive the stress of night school and working for her agency, I’ll be thankful for every last damn hair on my head. I stayed up all last night studying because I thought I had today off and could sleep in. Of course, I should know better by now.

“What time is it?” I groan.

It must be really early, because she doesn’t answer my question. “Lisa fell and sprained her ankle last night,” she frets instead.

“You don’t say!” I mutter, turning from my side to my back, and knocking over the pile of books I’d left lying beside me in bed. Of course, Lisa and her accidents! This time, it’s an ankle sprain. A couple of weeks ago, it was a sprained wrist. Before that, a bruised tailbone. A pinched nerve. Always things no one can follow up on since she can’t be expected to prove that any of it is true. The bruised tailbone is my favorite, supposedly the result of slipping down the stairs onto her ass. God, I really hope that one, at least, was true.

“You don’t need to sound so sarcastic.” Helen tuts. “Some people can’t help it. They’re just accident prone.”

I wish I could say, stop with the bullshit, but I know what she’s doing. She’s making excuses because she doesn’t want to lose Lisa, since Lisa handles some of her best clients. I squint at my alarm clock. “I’m sorry, Helen, I really am, but don’t you think this is getting a little ridiculous? This was supposed to be my first day off in two weeks, and I’m seriously behind in my Psych homework. I was up studying until four this morning. And according to my clock, it’s only freaking six-thirty now.”

Helen chuckles, apparently unconcerned by the extent of my sleep deprivation. “If it were anybody else handing me that line, I’d say they were lying.”

“But you believe Lisa’s lying ass every time,” I mutter.

“You, on the other hand,” she continues, like she didn’t just hear my quip. “Are the one person I can believe is pushing herself that hard. I don’t know how you do it.”

“Yeah, well, a lot of coffee.” I sit up. I need a brain reboot, which always involves a pot of coffee.

“Just for this, and because you’re such a terrific sport and somebody I can always count on, I’m giving you Lisa’s most prized account. I mean, you’re gonna love this. It pays a fortune.”

My ears perk up. Well, that’s different! “Just how much is a fortune?”

“A thousand dollars,” she announces smugly.

My eyes nearly pop out of my head. Whoa? That kind of money for one day of work? “Do I have to give someone a blowjob after I finish cleaning?”

“I know you’re joking, so I’ll let that go.” Her voice is dry. “It’s a 4,600 square-foot penthouse. Belongs to some crusty old billionaire, but I’ll doubt you’ll even see him. Lisa never has.”

“You want me to clean a 4600 square foot penthouse in a day?”

“It’s in tip-top condition. Hardly any scrubbing. Lisa normally finishes it all in a day. I think he just likes having someone come out to give it the royal treatment before he gets back from his business trips. His secretary said that he won’t be back for another two days, but Lisa is booked solid for the rest of the week, so I had to schedule his place today.” She pauses while her words sink in. “Any of the other girls would have bitten my hand off for this job, but it’s yours, if you want it.”

“Yes, I’ll take it,” I snap, launching myself out of bed, and switching on the coffee maker. The royal treatment simply means a deep clean. I can do a tip-top apartment that size in seven maybe eight hours. A thousand smackers for nine hours work tops. Holy crap. Where do I sign?

“That’s wonderful news,” she gushes, like she didn’t know I would accept even if it had only paid the usual rates. I’m such a sucker, and she knows it. “Now, there are specifics we’ll have to go through first.”

I pause in the middle of pouring my coffee into my mug. I knew it was too good to be true. “Specifics?”

“Specifics. He’s a very specific type of person. Dani, he’s paying a thousand bucks. I think we can give in to a few demands.”

I breathe in the fragrant aroma coming from my coffee mug. “Demands. First it was specifics, now it’s demands. Should I start getting nervous?”

“If you don’t think you can handle them…”

Sometimes I hate Helen. She’s more manipulative than a doe-eyed two-year old. I look down at the chipped Formica counter, heavy with unpaid bills. “No, I can handle them,” I say, before pouring a half-mug of coffee down my throat. Something tells me I’m going to need it today.

“Great,” she coos happily.

“Where is it, by the way?”

“Central Park West.”

“Naturally.” If he could afford to pay that much for a cleaning service…

“Do you have a pen handy?”

Jeez. How long is this list of specifics and demands? I scramble back to bed and grab my pen. I open my notebook. “Right. Shoot.”

“First, you have to wear shoe covers the moment you walk inside. He doesn’t like the carpets getting dirty.”

“I thought that was why people took their shoes off before entering a home.”

“He doesn’t want that. No socks or tights, nothing like that on his floors.”

“Wow! He sounds like a party animal.” I write it down. “Where would I even get them?”

“I don’t know. Walmart, probably. If Lisa can find them…”

“Right, right. Next?”

“A hair net, too.”

“Am I cleaning his bathroom, or cooking his food?”

She snorts. “We’ll get to the bathrooms in a minute.”

I exhale. Suck it up, Dani. It’s not every day you get to make a thousand for a day’s work.

“You can’t use bleach. Fresh lemon or orange juice, white vinegar and baking soda only.”

I scribble it down. “Hmm…that’s interesting. Do you know why?”

“He hates the smell and it’s unhealthy,” she explained.

“Is he a germaphobe?”

“No. Just very particular, and very health-conscious.”

“Okay. That, I can get behind.” Even if my treadmill makes a better clothes hanger than it does a means of exercise.

By the time we finish, I’ve filled out two pages. Both sides. “This is a lot, Helen. And Lisa does this on her own?”

“She does, though she’ll sometimes split the job between two days when there’s a decent amount of time before the client gets back to town. Though, we don’t have two days. You’re booked tomorrow at Mrs. Sheldon’s.”

“True.” And I’m not about to split the work with anybody else and let them cut in on my payday. “It’s okay. I can handle it. It’ll just take a good part of the day.”

“Let me know if you run into any problems.” Now that she knows I’ll take care of the job, she’s all light and breezy.

“You mean, if I open the wrong closet door and find dead bodies hanging from hooks?”

“Lisa told me she cleaned those up last time, and he has promised he’d never leave them out again.”

I gulp the rest of my coffee. It’s already cold. “Famous last words.”