A Winter’s Secret

Chapter 1

Ben

There was one thing I hated more than people.

Christmas.

The sight of Christmas trees springing up around town was enough to bring my skin out in hideous hives, and every time Christmas songs played from a car or a shop, they grated on me like nails down a chalkboard.

Fortunately, I could ignore the damned day that fell every December 25th, but I couldn’t ignore people. I needed them to keep my business going and make me money. And I needed those people more than ever.

Since my business partner, Jake Morley, died a few months ago, the business was struggling badly. I knew why too. Jake was the face of Morley and McScroodge Properties, the one who schmoozed potential tenants into signing contracts to rent one of our many properties across the town of Henderson.

I preferred my role. The only time I had to talk to people was when tenants fell behind in their payments, and I had the job of evicting them. It had been that way since we started the company fourteen years ago, when we were fresh out of college and determined to make a better life for ourselves.

I’d be lying if I said I didn’t thoroughly enjoy my role; people’s sob stories about why they couldn’t pay their rent for the month never worked on me. The way I saw it, if people couldn’t pay their rent, why should they be allowed to freeload off me?

After Jake died from lung cancer—I’d warned the idiot time and time again that smoking would kill him, but he never stopped chain-smoking—I was left to deal with both sides of the business, but I quickly learned that schmoozing was not my forte.

Jake had a way of getting people to eat out of the palm of his hand within seconds.

Tenants often overlooked the finer details of the contract, thanks to Jake’s charm offensive, and missed the crucial section in the contract that said there were no warnings if they failed to pay rent.

One missed payment, and they had twenty-four hours to get the money together or get their shit out of the apartment.

A rule we never deviated from.

I, on the other hand, couldn’t remove the permanent scowl on my face, warning people to keep their distance. It was a habit I couldn’t, nor wanted to change. I didn’t like being around people; it was as simple as that.

But in doing so, I’d lost a bunch of potential tenants, and for the first time since starting the business, I had a record number of vacant properties across the town that I just couldn’t rent out.

Something my account’s manager, Rob Crutchens, often reminded me of during our monthly financial meetings.

Rob joined the company about a year after the business started, when it grew too big for just Jake and me to manage. Despite Rob being employed by us for the last thirteen years, I knew little about him, other than that he was married and had a son and twin daughters.

I planned to keep it that way too. Rob was nothing but an employee, and as long as he did his job, I didn’t give a fuck about his personal life.

The same with my personal assistant, Alice.

She’d worked with us for a couple of years, but most days, I barely remembered that the timid woman was employed by me.

Still, she got her job done, and on time, too.

My morning started the same way most Sundays did. It was the one day of the week when the office was closed, but I didn’t take the day off to relax like most did. Once I’d made myself a coffee, I settled into my home office and loaded up my computer.

Flicking the radio on, the channel set to the classical music station that I listened to whenever I needed to concentrate, soft piano music flowed from the speakers, and my shoulders relaxed at the calming tones.

Until the music stopped, and the presenter harped on about how November was at an end, meaning Christmas was a day closer.

I clenched my teeth and switched the volume right down, cutting his words off. I didn’t need to hear him drone on about how exciting it was that Christmas was only a few weeks away, nor did I want to hear him wish his listeners a Merry Christmas.

Merry fucking Christmas. What a joke. It was as if people thought all their problems would disappear because of the festive cheer and good wishes.

In my humble opinion, Christmas was nothing but bullshit, and if I could have found a way to sedate myself from Thanksgiving to New Year’s Day, then I would have done it, just for the peace and fucking quiet.

After a few minutes passed, I turned the volume back up on the radio, relieved to hear a string quartet playing a gentle melody.

Letting the peace the music brought wash through my body, I clicked open my emails to see if there had been any enquiries for rental properties overnight, sighing when I discovered the mailbox was empty.

This time of year was always hard on business.

People preferred spending money on buying shit for Christmas that would inevitably end up in the trash months later.

In recent years, the cost of moving had soared, too, so whenever this time of year rolled around, people stayed put in their homes instead of forking out the expense of moving.

I’d never had to worry in the past; we always had money in reserve for the Christmas period, but this year, that reserve was getting smaller and smaller, and I was having to use my personal funds to keep the business afloat.

That was fine for now. Unlike Jake, I invested a lot of my money and was sitting on a pretty fortune. But if I kept pumping it into a failing business, it wouldn’t last long.

Clicking out of the emails, I opened up the company accounts. I usually went through them with Rob, but given today was the one day of the week he had off, I figured I’d get a head start on them. It wasn’t like I had anything else to do.

Although that was a blatant lie. I’d lived in the house for over a year now and hadn’t bothered to do anything to tidy it up, except for the room that housed my home gym.

Throughout most of the property, paint was falling from the walls, the carpets needed replacing, and the kitchen had seen better days.

There was plenty to do, and I could have made an effort to do some of the work myself, but that involved going to the DIY stores and having to deal with salespeople trying to sell me shit I wasn’t interested in.

I’d considered hiring a company to get the work done, but after getting quotes from local companies, I’d decided that I would rather leave the house as it was than spend the money the greedy fuckers wanted for sprucing the place up.

It wasn’t as if anyone else lived here, nor did I have any visitors, so who gave a fuck if the place was a little… run down?

I would get round to it one day, but until then, it could wait, especially when I had better things to do, like making money.

Casting my gaze down the screen, I read through the names of the tenants currently renting one of my properties, ensuring they’d all paid their rent for the month of November. My eyes snagged on a familiar name, finding the word ‘OVERDUE’ in bold, red font.

I clicked into the account of Bella Matthews, the face of the girl fluttering to my mind. I didn’t often remember the faces of tenants, but Bella’s stuck in my head.

I’d been wary of her the first time we met. Jake brought her back to the office to go through the contract after showing her around a studio apartment. From one look at her raggedy clothes and greasy hair, something in my gut told me she would be trouble, but Jake didn’t agree.

He eventually convinced me to give her a chance, and even though I knew it was because he wanted to fuck her, I relented and offered her the contract. She’d been a tenant for the last six months, and she hadn’t come to my attention.

Until now.

I scanned over the list of her payments to the company.

Like every other tenant, her rent was due on the first day of each month.

Anger bubbled under my skin at discovering that for the last four months, she’d been late paying her rent.

It hadn’t been by a couple of days either; she’d paid it right at the end of the month, a few days before the next payment was due.

My anger turned to boiling rage when my gaze landed on October’s payment. Not only had she been late, but she’d underpaid by $200; something Rob should have brought to my attention.

Not giving a shit that it was his day off, I grabbed my phone from where it sat on the desk next to me and dialed Rob’s number. He answered it after a few rings. “Mr. McScroodge…is, uh…is everything okay?”

His apprehensive voice shook down the line, making my jaw clench in irritation. Rob wasn’t a big man, neither in personality nor in stature. Often, his voice was barely over a whisper, and he always looked like he was going to shit his pants whenever Jake or I went over his figures.

“No, everything is not okay,” I hissed, staring at Bella’s accounts.

“I want to know why it wasn’t brought to my attention that Bella Matthews underpaid me by $200 last month?

” There was a short pause, and I was certain I heard him gulp nervously.

Before he could reply, I continued. “I also want to know why you haven’t informed me that she has been late making her rental payment for the last four months? ”

“I…I think there must be a mistake. Why don’t we look at the accounts tomorrow?” he stuttered, the obvious lie in his voice adding to my growing fury.

“In all the time you’ve worked for me, Rob, you’ve never made a mistake.

Nor have you lied to me. So I suggest that if you want to keep your job, then you tell me the truth.

Why haven’t you brought Bella Matthews’ account to my attention before?

” I snarled, standing from my chair and pacing my office.

A heavy sigh of resignation echoed down the line. “She’s a friend of my son. She…she comes from a difficult background-”