Chapter 4 – Rae
Ayawn ripped from my soul. Every bone in my body was exhausted.
The shift from night owl to early bird was brutal.
Packed onto that was the fact that the days were long.
Unreasonably long. We began work at five in the morning, which meant rolling out of bed at four-thirty.
Because my hair was stretched back, waxed to make it stay in the awful bun, and face free of makeup, it took me ten minutes to get ready, dressed, and sprint to the big house.
But then the days didn’t end until seven at the earliest. There were three of us maids.
Maddie arrived at eight in the morning and stayed until eleven at night to clean the dining room after dinner.
But two nights this week, I had been instructed to help her so that I knew the ropes.
Which meant, if the math was calculated correctly, I got about four hours of sleep those nights.
My days off were supposed to be Mondays, but because I’d only worked Sunday this past week, I was required to work through Monday to learn. One wouldn’t think there was this much to learn about cleaning.
Boy, was that a false assumption.
The grand mansion had Victorian roots, but it had been expanded over the decades and was huge. Too big for three people to live in. They didn’t even use whole parts of the house!
But did that mean we didn’t clean those rooms? Hell no. They were scrubbed, dusted, polished….
Disgusting rich people.
Signor Grimaldi often had guests staying. This week alone, he’d had a half dozen friends crash at his place. They were all the same to me. Sly, cunning, and sharp. Business associates.
A laughable term. We, the staff, did not talk about it.
Grimaldi ran a powerful crime syndicate. The mob was far from dead. It adapted to meet the challenges of the modern era. And this one was one of the top tiers.
Uncle Theo sat me down the first night, after my bus trip to the city proper, when I was ready to sleep instead of chat. He laid the situation out in no uncertain terms. I was not to speak about the family business. If a shred of unloyalty was seen, he couldn’t protect me from the consequences.
I told him I knew they were mobsters, which seemed to both relieve him and make him uneasy.
There was one time, when I was twelve, that my mom brought me north for a visit.
Gangly and curious, I figured out pretty quickly that Francesco Grimaldi wasn’t a normal businessman.
It wasn’t until I pried the information out of his oldest grandson that I learned the proper term.
Over the years, I didn’t really care that my uncle worked for a crime lord.
It was kind of cool, actually. Plus, with the shit I dealt with on a daily basis back in Georgia, I didn’t have extra time to dwell on the ramifications.
Now that I was here, I kept my eyes and ears open.
It was astounding how much information I picked up on just by cleaning the toilets and doing the laundry for these rich assholes.
If I had any desire to go to the cops, it would be all too easy.
But the cops wouldn’t pay me, and my uncle’s unspoken warning was that snitches got stitches—or worse.
I frankly didn’t care. This was a temporary job. And if I could make a little cash on the side to set myself up by relieving the family of some of their unused trinkets or cash, then it didn’t matter to me how they earned a living in the first place.
“Rae! What are you doing down here?” Cathy, the other maid, looked up from the shirt she was ironing.
I blinked. “I finished polishing the silver. Theo approved it,” I added.
Cathy pointed to the wall where an honest-to-goodness bell system was modernized. “The signorina summoned you. Fifteen minutes ago!”
That was why my pager had buzzed when I’d been working a spot out of the oblong service tray, as Theo measured—yes, measured!—the distance between the forks around the dining table.
“Run!” Cathy said, voice hushed and laced with panic.
Maddie was tight-lipped and well on her way to being ancient before her time like Mrs. Sanderson.
But Cathy was nice enough. She didn’t gossip or chit-chat, which made working with her blissful.
She also didn’t tattle that I wore a discreet earbud to listen to podcasts or music while we toiled away.
Sucking down a deep breath, I changed trajectory and climbed the staircase that led from the servants’ workrooms. I rubbed my ear, missing the feel of metal.
If these holes closed, I was going to pitch a fit!
It was bad enough I had to wear the ugly ass clothes when I preferred black to hide grease stains and flannels because they were cozy.
But to cover the art that was my body? To hide my identity for the whims of the rich?
Fuck that. Emerging on the second floor, I took measured steps to the little princess’s room. I wasn’t running—that was unseemly.
But so was leaving a member of the house unattended.
The contradictions in this place were mind boggling.
I raised my fist and lightly rapped on the door.
“Come in,” a sweet voice called.
Plastering a smile that I didn’t feel on my face, I entered. “You needed something?”
Arabella’s youthful face lit up in greeting. “Hi, Rae, how are you this evening?”
Ready to be done with this farce. “Fine, thank you, Miss.”
“Oh, that’s good.” She clasped her hands in front of her body. Standing in front of the floor-length mirror, she looked exactly how a helpless kitten would. “I can’t reach the zipper all the way. Can you help me?”
“Of course, Miss.” I closed the door and crossed the room. Why the hell she wore things she couldn’t put on herself was beyond me.
I pulled the sides of the gown over Arabella’s soft bronze skin.
The zipper slid easily. There were half a dozen buttons that closed the sheer material over the back of her shoulders.
This gown, like her others, had a high neck and long sleeves, but created the illusion of showing the skin underneath.
Modest yet beautiful. I might hate fancy clothes on principle, but it stuck in my craw to look at her.
It would be easier to dislike Arabella if she was cruel and snotty. But her compliance and acceptance didn’t make sense. How could she just let these people boss her around? Mrs. Grimaldi detailed her every move! It didn’t make sense why she chose to live with such controlling godparents.
“Are you excited for tonight?” Arabella pushed her perfectly curled hair over her back.
To help my uncle serve you dinner? Who wouldn’t be! “It will be a nice evening, I’m sure.”
Arabella fidgeting with the diamond tennis bracelet. “I’m nervous, actually.”
Oh, good lord! She was trying to bond with me. Again.
“Nothing to be nervous ‘bout. It’s just supper.” I gave her a pat on the shoulder, trying to be supportive, because I just couldn’t help myself. She looked so sad!
Only, I used too much force and it was more like a thump. Arabella straightened, but instead of chiding me for the inappropriate contact, she gave me a wobbly smile.
“We haven’t seen Dominico in a long time. I don’t know what to expect,” she whispered. “When he left, Francesco was livid!”
I bit my tongue. I will not ask. I will not ask. I will not—
“Your godfather was mad?” I blurted out. “Why?”
Arabella’s head bobbed. “It was a small dinner party, just some friends of the family. Dominico got into an argument with one of them after I was sent to bed. But I…I heard the shouts. When I came downstairs, there was an ambulance hauling out one of the men and Dominico and Francesco were yelling at each other. Dominico’s been in Europe ever since. ”
I met several of the Grimaldi grandkids back during the visit when I was twelve. Dominico was the one who spent the most time with me. Something about us just…clicked. And of course, stupid girl that I was, I let him kiss me that last night.
It was innocent, a child’s fumbling. Over the years, I’d been through way more shit. There was no reason my first kiss should make my cheeks warm. It was such a silly thing to think about, but here I was, cheeks blazing.
It was just hot here in Arabella’s luxurious bedroom.
Clearing my throat, I asked, “How long ago was that?”
Her delicate features scrunched as she thought. “About three years—no, wait! Closer to four. I only just turned fourteen.”
My eyeballs felt like they were going to drop from my head. “You’re seventeen!”
Mercy! I knew she was young, but—
“I’ll be eighteen next month,” she added with a smile. “I’ll be engaged and married as soon as I turn nineteen.”
Common sense and emotion were slapped right out of me.
My brain was blank. Stunned speechless. What the hell kind of predestination shit was that?
Her existence summed up in the changing of the calendar!
I needed to get the hell out of this room before my big fat mouth opened and I said something I shouldn’t.
Like don’t go getting married just because you need something to do!
Clearing my throat, I managed a polite statement. “Well, that sounds nice, Miss. If there isn’t anything else you need, I’ve got to change.”
“Oh, yes, thank you, that was it.” Arabella graced me with a winning smile.
I returned a forced one and skedaddled out of there.
A violent shiver rattled me as I plucked my formal serving attire from my locker. “That girl gives me the willies,” I muttered.
“What girl?” Franky piped up from the back door, where he was coming back from a smoke break.
My hand slapped on my chest. “Jeezes, dude! Didn’t see you there.”
The cook chuckled. “I can see that.” He shut the door tight, shot a look around, then repeated his question. “Who you talking about?”
Biting the inside of my cheek, I debated lying. It didn’t matter, though. I’d just expressed an opinion about one of the members of the grand family.
“Miss Arabella is planning to get hitched in the next two years,” I said with a shrug. “Never understood girls who were crazy about marrying young.”