“Good job, honey. Obviously, I’ve taught you well.”
“Are you really kicking me out?”
“I don’t have any other choice. I told you when you first moved in here that I was going to start using that room for storage this month. I’m expanding the business and hiring several more employees. I can’t afford an extra storage space right now for all the new equipment. So unless you want to sleep on the couch, I would suggest you ask Mr. Hill if you can be his live-in help.”
“This is not going to end well,” Matilda said, shaking her head.
“If worse comes to worst, Matilda, you’ll end up sleeping on your mom’s couch.”
“Right…” Matilda said in a low voice.
“You better get going, your appointment is in fifteen minutes. I’ve heard Mr. Hill does not like tardiness.”
“Okay, okay, I’m leaving.”
Matilda left the house with her bucket and mop and threw it all in the back of her car. On the way up the mountain, all she could think about was what would happen when she asked James if she could be his live-in cleaning lady.
She really didn’t want to sleep on her mother’s couch. It hadn’t been replaced since 1998. Matilda’s mom was a cheapskate. She expected her daughter to do it on her own just like she had. According to Matilda’s mother, it built character, or something stupid like that.
Matilda knew one thing for sure: being forced to ask a weirdo like James Hill if she could live in his weird house was definitely going to build her character. No more character development would be needed after this. She didn’t think she would survive it.
She pulled up in front of his house. He swung open the front door, glaring at her as she walked up the walkway. Was he really that pissed that she was a little late?
“You’re two minutes late,” he barked.
“It’s nice to see you too,” she said, following him over the snow-covered ground. “Oh, did you notice that it snowed three inches last night?”
“That’s no excuse. From now on, I expect punctuality. I will accept no less.”
“I’m sure I can get here on time every single day if we had some kind of arrangement,” she said, trying to get up the nerve to ask him if she could be his live-in help.
He turned and glared at her, obviously confused by the statement. He closed the door behind her, and they stood staring at each other in the front hall.
He was wearing black loungewear that looked like it had come out of a designer men’s catalog, but he still hadn’t shaved, and his hair was as wild
and shaggy as it had been before. The smell of his cologne filled her nose and the heat of his body burning in the space between them made warmth rise from the base of her spine.
It filled her with a tingling ache that she couldn’t ignore no matter how much she wanted to. Dammit. Why was she so attracted to this weirdo? It just did not make any sense. And now she had to ask him if she could live in his house.
“What exactly are you talking about?”
There wasn’t any point in dancing around the subject. Better to get it out there in the open.
“Well, you know my mother is the owner of Fate Mountain Cleaning, right?”
“I was not aware of that.”
“Anyway. My mom needs the room where I sleep for storage, so now I’m basically homeless. That presents you with a great opportunity to have a live-in cleaning lady at your disposal twenty-four-seven. I’d be on time every single day.”
“I told you yesterday, I can’t have you around here.”
“Me… or anyone?”
“You or anyone else. But especially you.”
“Do you have some kind of problem with me that I don’t know about?”
He looked at her and growled, his lip curling back over his teeth. She saw the sharp curve of his canines, and the bright yellow glow in his eyes. She was slapped in the face with the realization that James Hill, the eccentric billionaire, was a shifter.