by Alyse Zaftig
After growing up around shifters on Fate Mountain all her life, she’d never met her fated mate. She really didn’t think she had one. Besides that, the absolute last thing she needed was to get into another romantic relationship right now. She had to focus on saving money for college and getting on with her life.
Matilda had a lot of respect for Lily. She’d known her for a long time through her mom, back before Matilda had left town. Her happy relationship with Shane was legendary. But Matilda knew that not everyone got that lucky.
She sighed and looked back down at her newspaper, hoping there would be more jobs the second time she looked. But just like before, there was nothing she was even remotely qualified for.
She chugged down her coffee and finished up the last bites of her apple pie before throwing some cash on the table and booking it out the front door of the cafe. Her crappy old Honda sat in the parking lot like a dirty white eyesore.
Matilda slid behind the wheel of her car and turned the engine on. Gripping the steering wheel, she gritted her teeth, realizing that she really did have no other options besides going back to work for her mom.
She drove across town and parked in front of her mom’s mid-century modern house. Her mom’s cleaning van was parked in the front driveway so Matilda parked on the street. She slid out of the car and trudged up the front walk to her mom’s house. Just as she was about to grip the doorknob, her mom flung open the door.
“Where were you?” her mom asked.
“I was getting a bite to eat and looking for a job in the paper.”
“Matilda. Why are you wasting your time looking in the paper? I can give you shifts right now. You’d be paid by the end of the week.”
“I know, mom. You’ve told me that like a thousand times.”
“Well, I’m reminding you for the thousand and first time. Are you ready to stop being stubborn and get to work?”
Her mom stood in the doorway, tall and curvy with long black hair that only had a tiny dusting of white around her temples. Matilda’s mom had once been considered a great beauty on Fate Mountain.
Most people didn’t understand why such a beautiful woman had settled for a life as a cleaner. But after Matilda’s father left, her mom had been determined to live life on her own terms. That meant running her own business and staying single.
Matilda respected her mom more than anyone, and that was why it was so hard for her to admit her mistakes and accept her mom’s help.
“Okay, okay. You win. I’ll take a job as a cleaning lady. When can I start?”
Chapter 2
James Hill poked the burning coals in his grand stone fireplace with an iron rod and frowned. This fireplace needed to be cleaned out. So did the stack of dishes piling up in the sink. Not to mention the floors, the carpets, his bedsheets, and the toilets.
Since his cleaning lady had quit last week, he hadn’t had anyone to tidy up his estate. He sure as hell wasn’t going to do it himself. He paid other people to do that sort of thing. Besides, he was far too busy. He had a full schedule of brooding, grumping, and trying to stay relatively sane.
The sanity part was something he rarely admitted to even himself. But ever since selling his tech company and moving to Fate Mountain, his grip on reality had been slipping further and further away.
That was another reason he needed a cleaning lady. With at least one other person around the estate every day, he felt a little less on edge, even though he assumed he would prefer to be alone. He’d realized almost as soon as he’d moved into his mansion that he couldn’t be there by himself all the time.
Since the Great War, he’d been having problems. A male shifter of a certain age, who had been drafted into the war ten years ago. James had served his time in the military. After the shifters had helped bring the war to an end, he’d been allowed to go home. But the memories wouldn’t rest while he slept at night.
The kinds of things he’d seen, he still couldn’t fully process. His inner bear certainly couldn’t. The poor beast had been broken beyond repair.
After the war, James had had to sell the multi-billion-dollar company he’d built. Even during his years of service, he hadn’t sold it. It was only when he had come back and tried to run it again that he finally realized he had to let it go.
Sitting in meetings or strategizing with coders drove him to the brink. He couldn’t deal with people being so close to him all the time, asking things, expecting things, looking at him.
Now, he was alone in this mansion and the sickness that had plagued him since the war was only getting worse. Sometimes he honestly believed the mansion was alive.
There had been stories about the mansion being haunted before he’d bought it. As a logical man, he hadn’t believed them. But every day his madness was growing.
At least having the cleaning lady around every day had helped him from spiraling into total insanity. With another person in the house, he could compartmentalize the things he was seeing as delusions. It helped keep him from being taken over by them. Without a cleaning lady around, the delusions were getting worse all the time.
It had been his fault she’d quit. He had to admit that to himself. He wasn’t exactly the easiest person to work for. James wasn’t sorry for his behavior, though. She never should have entered his private rooms without permission. Especially with him in there. He hated his private space to be violated. He’d yelled at her. But he still believed she deserved it.
Nevertheless, he was left with no one to clean up after him, and no one to add normalcy to his life. He wasn’t sure which he needed more.
He knew one thing for sure, he needed a new cleaning lady. He’d asked the cleaning company for a new girl, but they hadn’t been able to find anyone yet. All the other cleaning women refused to work for him. If there were another private cleaning company on Fate Mountain, he would have gone to them, but Fate Mountain Cleaning was the only game in town.
He knew he could always put an ad in the paper and hire someone directly, which he didn’t want to do. Hiring a person himself sounded like a nightmare he would really rather avoid.
James threw another log in the fire and flames popped and burst. He grimaced and then let out a long sigh, turning away from the fireplace. He walked through his large master bedroom, the dark oak bedposts spiraling up toward the thirteen-foot ceiling.
His brown leather couch was covered in throw blankets from where he had slept the night before. It had been a fitful night, and the mess on the sofa just reminded him how much he needed someone to come and take care of his mansion.
He scratched his ass under his gray flannel long underwear and trudged across the room in his fur-lined leather slippers.
He had taken off his shirt the night before, when he’d been drinking bourbon straight out of the bottle. This always happened to him this time of year. Spending another New Year’s alone always got to him.
The loneliness riled up his demons in the darkest recesses of his imagination. When he had passed out onto the cold stone fireplace he had actually imagined he’d seen the clock on the mantle look down at him through eyes in the nine and the three on the face of the clock. He’d had that particular delusion many times before.
But he didn’t want to think about that now. He was starving. His stomach grumbled and he patted it, contemplating what he might have for breakfast. While James didn’t enjoy going into town for groceries, he always had a fully stocked pantry and refrigerator. Even the baddest billionaire bear on the mountain had to keep his stomach full.
If there was one thing that a grumpy bear liked, it was food. He marched out of his bedroom, down the grand staircase, and into the well-appointed chef’s dream kitchen where his coffee was already brewed. Putting his coffee pot on a timer was one of the few things he managed to do for himself on a daily basis. That was aside from making sandwiches, and stews and chili in his crockpot.
James poured himself a cup of coffee and opened the refrigerator to look inside. As he was sipping th
e bright medium brew from the misty hills of Ecuador, he tried to decide if he would rather have French brie or German Gouda in his morning omelet.
Finally, James decided on the brie. He grabbed a dozen farm fresh eggs from a local chicken farm, rich cream, and the brie he’d had imported from France. He set it all on his black and gold-speckled granite countertop and grabbed a copper egg pan from the hanging pan rack above his six-burner gas stove.
James might be a grumpy bear, and as a retired billionaire there weren’t many things that he would get himself out of bed to do—but cooking was one of them, as long as he was able to still push away the dirty dishes and pots and pans to another part of the counter. He frowned at the mess. There wasn’t much counter space left.
James dropped a dab of butter into the pan and melted it before pouring in the eggs and adding the brie cheese. He went back to the fridge for some spinach and grabbed a package of English muffins, fresh from the bakery in town, and threw them in his toaster.
He tossed a handful of spinach into his omelet and flipped it. When the omelet was ready to slide on the plate, the toaster dinged and he pulled out the English muffins. He sat down at the table in his breakfast nook and slathered his muffins with butter and fresh jelly.
Looking out the window, he gazed onto the manicured grounds of his estate. Everything was covered in snow this time of year but soon the flowers would bloom and the grass would grow green in the meadows again.
It was loneliest up there on the mountain in winter, when even the forest creatures hid from view. Without the cleaning lady to come every day with her chatter and gossip, he had only his weekly deliveries to count on for company. Sometimes he contemplated going back to the city, but he knew he could never go back to where he’d come from. The time for that had passed.
James took a big bite of English muffin and followed it with a bite of his omelet. His stomach grumbled and his inner bear growled.
If James’s human was grumpy, his inner bear was even grumpier. The bear loved the forest and all the pleasures that went with allowing his primal urges to emerge in its natural habitat. But his inner grizzly also longed for the desires of the flesh, and James hadn’t seen an attractive female since he had left his company several years ago.
The cleaning lady had often chattered about joining the dating website created by another fate mountain billionaire.
Mate.com catered to male shifters and curvy human females. Since there were so many more male shifters than female shifters, male shifters often had to find their fated mates among the humans.
But James couldn’t have a mate. His old maid could never understand that. And he didn’t want her to either. He didn’t want anyone to know about his curse. He didn’t want anyone to know that he was slowly losing his mind.
The only thing that made it any better was letting his bear loose in the forest to do whatever carnal thing a beast would do in the dark forest at night. Often James would come back and find himself naked, covered in blood, and lying on his back porch. So early the dew still clung to the grass and cold hung in the air. He knew it was animal blood, but he could rarely remember what had transpired the night before.
He tried to shove the thoughts from his mind as he ate his breakfast and gazed out on the snowy expanse of his estate. The frost on the statues had melted, exposing the cold gray faces of the stone figures. The chiseled man and shapely women gazed with vacant eyes over the snowy land. A chill went up his spine when he imagined he saw one of their faces tilt toward him and blink its eyes. James closed his eyes hard and when he opened them he took a long sip of hot coffee to warm himself.
If only he had someone in his life to reassure him that these things were not real. As much as he knew he could never invite anyone into his insanity, he longed for the human contact that would keep it at bay.
James grabbed his smartphone from the breakfast table and navigated toward that Mate.com website his cleaning lady had kept pestering him about. After answering a ridiculous questionnaire, he was invited to upload a photograph, but he chose not to. He didn’t even use his real name.
When his profile was filled out the algorithm began to load his matches. A hundred percent match was supposed to be a shifter’s fated mate. He waited for the screen to load. When it did, he scrolled through it. There were pictures of many beautiful women, all between eighty-five and ninety-seven percent matches. But there was no hundred percent match. His fated mate had not been found.
James frowned. And threw his cell phone across the surface of the richly polished walnut table. He knew it was a stupid idea to sign up for a dating site. Even if his fated mate had been there, he didn’t want one anyway.
How could he possibly allow someone into his life? Even if he wasn’t slowly going insane, he didn’t like people around him, touching his things, asking questions, and expecting him to pay attention to them in the first place. James Hill would forever and always want to be left alone.
Chapter 3
Matilda stood in the driveway of her mother’s house with a mop in one hand and a bucket in the other. Under her fluffy winter coat, she was wearing the ridiculous cleaning lady uniform that her mother had insisted on. Matilda was sure that if the uniform were any shorter, it would look like a French maid costume. At least her mom had allowed her to wear leggings underneath, and she had on sneakers instead of heels. But Matilda still felt ridiculous.
At her last job, she’d worn a jumpsuit, goggles, and earplugs. Working in her ex-boyfriend’s family’s meatpacking plant hadn’t been that great of an experience. But at least she didn’t have to go to strangers’ houses in a little dress.
“Do I have to wear this? I look like a call girl.”
“Stop being ridiculous, Matilda. That is a standard maid uniform. Even the sixty-year-old maids wear it. Besides, you don’t even look sexy, so don’t worry about it.”
“Well, thanks a lot.”
“I’m just trying to help, honey. You have all of your cleaning supplies, correct?”
“Yes, everything. Window cleaner, squeegees, toilet bowl brush, bleach to drink.”
“This is what I mean, Matilda. You need to learn to be grateful for the opportunities presented to you.”
“Yeah I know mom. I am grateful. I really am. For everything. It’s great of you to let me crash here and to help me get back on my feet.”
“I always knew that boy was trouble.”
“I know. I know. You told me.”
“I’m not going to lecture you here in the driveway. You need to be at your client’s house in an hour and fifteen minutes. If you want to stop to get something to eat on the way, you should probably go now. It’s a little bit of a drive up to his estate.”
“I’ve heard some really weird things about this guy. Not to mention the fact that he lives in the haunted mansion. You do realize that, right mom?”
“That mansion is not haunted.”
“Every kid I knew growing up on Fate Mountain knew that place was haunted. It was vacant for years and now this weird billionaire lives there. I think it’s too much of a coincidence if you ask me.”
“Matilda, you need to be at your appointment in an hour and ten minutes. We don’t have time for this. I know you’re going to get hungry as soon as you start working so please go to the diner and get yourself some lunch.”
“Fine. You’re no fun.”
“Good luck, honey. I know Mr. Hill is a little eccentric, but it’s going to be fine.”
“What happened with the last cleaning lady?”
“He yelled at her and scared her to death. Now no one will clean for him. That good news is that now there’s an opening for you.”
“That isn’t exactly reassuring.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers,” her mom said, before turning up the walkway.
Matilda shivered in the driveway and hugged herself around the waist over her fluffy winter coat. Her mother hurried back to the front door of the house and went inside. Matilda got in the
car, backed out of the driveway, and turned out onto the street headed into town.
She was grateful to her mother for everything she had done, but if Matilda had had any other options, literally any other options, at all, she would have taken them. But she didn’t. So here she was, going out to work for a notorious weirdo in his notoriously weird house.
At least her mom had given her a few bucks for lunch. Matilda pulled up in front of the diner and parked the car. When she was slipping into the booth next to the window, she noticed Lily walking down the aisle with a coffee pot in hand.
“How goes the job search?” Lily asked.
Matilda opened her jacket and showed Lily her maid uniform with her nose wrinkled in a look not unlike a snarl.
“It’s not so bad. I wear a uniform to work. And I’ve been told it’s rather sexy,” she said, glancing back toward the kitchen where her husband Shane Keenan was plating up an order of a Fate Mountain burger and fries. Matilda could see the long sleeve of his tattooed arm through the window between the kitchen and the dining room.
“I’ll take your word for it,” Matilda said.
“I’m glad you found something at least, hun,” Lily said, pouring Matilda a cup of coffee. “What will you have?”
“I’ll have the Fate Mountain burger and fries and a huckleberry milkshake.”
“Coming up,” Lily said, scribbling the order onto her order pad.
Matilda clicked on her phone and scrolled through the screen she had been looking at the last time her phone was on. She was on the website for the university she wanted to go to. She knew that someday she would have enough money to go to school.
She often looked at the university website to keep herself motivated. She’d knew she would need a lot of motivation today. She was going to work for an eccentric billionaire in his haunted mansion. Things couldn’t be any worse.