Taming the Beast

The guy with the messiest house in the history of messy houses was seriously going to fire her after she had spent two hours working on his disgusting, dirty kitchen. She couldn’t believe the injustice. Her mom had better pay her time and a half for this, that was for sure.

As James stared at her from the doorway, Matilda thought over her life choices. She contemplated leaving Fate Mountain and moving to Portland with the seventy-five dollars she currently had in the bank.

“There isn’t anyone else,” Matilda continued. “You scared off every other cleaning lady on Fate Mountain.”

He growled and turned away, waving his hand into the air. She could see the curve of his neck under his shaggy hair line. It looked like he didn’t get to the barber as often as a billionaire should, but something about his unkempt look was even more attractive than it had any right to be. Matilda had to smash down her arousal along with her irritation at this annoying man.

“I need a cleaning lady,” he said with his back to her.

“Well,” she said flatly, “I’m it.”

“Fine,” he growled. “Come back tomorrow and finish the job.”

“Look,” she said. “I don’t know what your deal is, but I really need this job. I’m going to do my best. You can be sure about that.”

He turned back to her with that supernatural light in his eyes, glowing so brightly it made her gasp. The look on his face was dangerous and violent and she could see the simmering rage he held in his body as he stood in the kitchen doorway staring at her. It made her take a step back at the sight of it.

“I already said to come back tomorrow to finish the job,” he growled.

“Great,” she said hesitantly, inching toward her jacket over the back of the chair. “I’ll just be going.”

She grabbed her parka and slid it on. She grabbed her mop, bucket and cleaning supplies and hurried toward the front foyer. She couldn’t get out of there fast enough, but James followed her all the way to the front door. His presence was like a dark shadow that emanated heat and desire like a radiator.

She was so flustered by the time she grabbed the doorknob, she didn’t realize that the door was locked. She rattled the knob for several seconds before he stepped beside her with a grunt and flipped open the deadbolt.

His body beside her sent a surge of electric fire into her core. She glanced up into his face as he opened the door for her. His eyes were bright and his expression was unreadable, but there was something in his look that told her he was having the same feelings she was. It was all so absurd and impossible. Why was she attracted to this eccentric, insane, bad billionaire?

It didn’t make any sense why every nerve in her body was at war with itself. On one hand, she was filled with fear. On the other hand, arousal crept up from deep within and twined around the base of her spine, calling her to examine its many secrets. The scent of James’s expensive cologne made her want to stroke the ache she felt in his presence, but the dark look in his eyes made her want to run away as fast as possible.

He blocked her with his arm at first, but finally pulled it away. She hurried out the door, her feet crunching over the icy snowpack on the walkway. She made it to her car and opened the back door, throwing all her supplies inside.

She glanced back at the mansion. James still stood in the doorway, staring at her as she climbed behind the wheel of her car.

Whatever was up with James Hill, she wanted to get to the bottom of it almost as much as she wanted to never see him again.

Chapter 6

James watched Matilda drive away in her crappy little white Honda. Of all the bad luck possible for a bear without luck, he had just experienced the worst luck of his life. Only two minutes after finding that his fated mate existed, and that he could never have her, she had showed up right at his door. The entire time she had been cleaning, he had hidden himself away in his rooms, pacing back and forth across the floor.

The cuckoo clock had stared at him with those inanimate eyes that seemed to follow him and judge his every movement. The madness was too deep; he could never bring another person into his mess, let alone someone as young, innocent, and beautiful as Matilda.

The college-age girl was not quite as sweet as he had expected her to be, but she had done an excellent job cleaning his kitchen.

He had almost forgotten what the counters looked like all cleared off since he had started stacking up dirty dishes a week ago. It amazed him how quickly these things could pile up. He’d almost expected her to refuse to clean it. But she had handled it like a real champ.

Unfortunately, his growing respect for her only made the fact that he could never have her even more excruciating. He had tried to fire her when she left, but she hadn’t let him. Now he had agreed to allow her to come back tomorrow.

It would be another day of hiding out in his room, trying to resist the alluring scent of her body as it permeated his entire mansion.

His grizzly growled and roared inside his mind, more crazed and wild than ever. He didn’t know if he could survive another moment of her in his house, let alone having her come back day after day. It would never work. But none of the other cleaning ladies at Fate Mountain Cleaning would work with him anymore. Matilda was the only one who was willing to put up with his moods or his ways. And if he scared her off, he wouldn’t have anyone else to clean for him. And then where would he be? He’d have to start washing his own dishes.

The prospect of washing up after himself was almost as terrifying as the prospect of having his fated mate so close without being able to touch her. He slid into a red leather upholstered chair by the window in his bedroom and stared outside at the snow-covered grounds.

The winter was still thick and frozen across Fate Mountain. In the snowy dead of winter, his mind played tricks on him. There hadn’t been a day since the snow started in November that he did not feel his grip on reality slipping further and further away.

The objects in his house seemed to move on their own. They whispered behind him as he walked down the halls. The candlesticks rearranged themselves from one moment to the next. When he looked away, the paintings on the walls changed. The decorative artifacts that had been left by the previous owners seemed to have a mind of their own.

Now that Matilda had arrived and disrupted his life in more ways than one, James contemplated the possibility of leaving and going back to San Francisco to open another tech company. He still had plenty of billions left from his previous company. He knew that he still had it in him to compete with the other tech giants in his field.