Taming the Beast

She had had no idea until that moment. Now she was even more scared than she had been before. Her heart slammed in her chest and she wanted more than anything to leave. She had nowhere to go. If she went back home now, her mother would be pissed. She might even lose the invitation to sleep on the couch if she screwed up this job.

“Are you a shifter?” she asked, taking a step back.

“Yes. My inner bear is particularly grumpy. Especially around chatty cleaning ladies who lack punctuality.”

“Chatty? No one’s ever called me chatty before.”

“One word is too many. Now let me show you to your job for today.”

Matilda tried desperately to hold back her irritation as James led her through the house. Who did this guy think he was? Even if he did want to accept her offer of being a live-in cleaning lady, she doubted that she could handle living with such an irritating person anyway.

No matter how great his ass looked in the lounge pants he was wearing. She couldn’t help but stare at it as she followed him through the mansion. Her mind started playing dirty tricks on her, forcing her to imagine what it would feel like in both of her hands.

When they made it to the master bathroom, she had to squeeze her eyes closed for a moment to force the image from her mind. When she opened them again, she found herself standing in a huge marble tiled room with a massive walk-in shower and a deep jetted bathtub. All that beauty was covered in laundry, trash, and who knows what, from James’s personal hygiene routines. There were wet towels covering the floor, and she didn’t even want to know what she would find in the toilet.

“I don’t usually let people into my private space, but my master bathroom is in desperate need of cleaning. This is your assignment for the day.”

Matilda glanced up at James like he was crazy. As much as she wanted to make a good impression and be a good worker, she could not help being stunned by him. It was only slightly less shocking than the level of slovenliness he was clearly comfortable living with.

“Can I ask you a personal question, James?” she asked, unable to stop herself.

“No.”

“Why don’t you just clean up after yourself?”

“I’m a billionaire. Why should I do that?”

“Um… So you don’t have to live like a slob?”

“And that, my dear, is the one and only reason I invite you into my space. I have other things to do. Could you please do your job?”

“Not a problem, sir,” she said, trying to hold back the sarcasm.

“If you do a good job at this, we can talk about you maybe living here. Until I can find someone else that is.”

“Really?” she said, her tone lightening.

“I’m not making any promises, and it’s only until I can find someone else.”

“Okay then. I’ll get to work.”

Matilda set down her mop and bucket, unable to believe that this was her life now. She had sunk to begging a weirdo to be his live-in cleaning lady. James Hill may be a billionaire, but he was the slovenliest person Matilda had ever encountered in her life. And she was the daughter of a cleaning lady; she thought she had seen it all.

The things she had to clean up in James’s bathroom would have made the guys in the kill room at the meatpacking plant hesitate. But Matilda was a professional. She did what she needed to do to get the job done.

Several hours later, the bathroom was just as clean as the kitchen had been the day before when she’d left. She hadn’t seen it yet today, but she doubted it was still in the same condition.

As she scrubbed the last corner of the bathroom floor on her hands and knees, she felt the distinct feeling that she was being stared at. She turned just in time to see James standing in the doorway, staring at her as she knelt on the floor. His eyes were clearly burning a hole in her ass. Her own eyes grew round with shock and she gasped.

“Can I help you?” she asked.

Her heart was thumping a million miles a minute and she couldn’t calm down. She should hate the feeling of his eyes on her, but instead, it made her blood boil and her juices run hot. She bit her lip and stood, brushing off her maid uniform.

“The room looks great. I can take a decent shower again.”

“It looks like my two hours are up. I should get going, unless you’re ready to talk about me living here.”

“I should not agree to this. However, I do need a cleaning lady. I’m going to let you stay here, but only until your mother finds me someone else.”