“I get that a lot. Most people expect cleaners to be older.” I set the duster down on the shelf. “If you'd prefer someone else, I can arrange for a different technician?—”
“No.” He stepped further into the room and closed the door behind him. “You're here. Might as well finish what you started.”
The way he said it sent heat crawling up the back of my neck — not nervousness, but the recognition of an opportunity presenting itself in a way I hadn't planned but could definitely use.
“I appreciate that, sir.” I picked up the duster again and moved toward a bookshelf that didn't need any attention. “I'll be as quick as possible. I won't disturb you.”
“Take your time.” He loosened his tie without removing it and moved to stand by the window. “I'm in no rush.”
I worked methodically, wiping down surfaces, straightening books that were already straight, hyperaware of his presence behind me. I could feel his eyes tracking every movement — the way I had to reach for the higher shelves, stretching the fabric tight across my back and shoulders, and the way I bent to clean the lower ones, the angle deliberate enough to be noticed without being obvious about it.
“What's your name?” he asked after two minutes of silence.
“Ken, sir.”
“How long have you worked for Elite Home Services, Ken?”
“Six months.” The lie came easily. “It's a good company. Flexible hours.”
“And do all their employees wear uniforms quite that... fitted?”
I glanced back at him and found him watching me with undisguised interest. “Company policy, sir. Professional appearance.”
“An interesting definition of professional.” His mouth curved slightly. “Though I'm not complaining about the view.”
I turned back to my work and allowed myself a small smile he couldn't see. “I aim to please, sir.”
Moving to the dresser, I started organising items that didn't need organising, and that was when I saw it — a photograph in an expensive frame, partially hidden behind a lamp. A woman in her mid-thirties, dark hair pulled back, a genuine smile that reached her eyes. She was holding a boy of about seven or eight who was laughing at something off-camera. Both of them caught in a moment that felt entirely unguarded.
I picked it up without thinking, drawn to the warmth radiating from the image. It felt utterly at odds with everything else in this carefully curated space.
“Don't touch that.”
Harrow's voice cut clean through the room. I turned and found him closer than he'd been a moment ago, as if the distance had personally offended him. As I started to set the frame down, careful and slow, I caught what I'd missed at Eden — or rather, what I'd seen only in passing when the lights had stuttered across him and he'd looked briefly, inexplicably human.
A slim white band circled his left wrist. Hospital paper, half-hidden by the cuff of his shirt. Too ordinary an object for a man like Harrow, and too deliberate in the way it sat to have been forgotten.
His gaze was fixed on the photograph. “Do you always handle clients' personal items?”
“No, sir. I apologise.” I kept my tone neutral and professional, though my attention had caught on his wrist again — the band showed more clearly whenever his sleeve shifted. “It's just...” I glanced down at the woman in the frame. Her smile was soft, unguarded, kind in a way that felt almost anachronistic against everything this house represented. “She looks kind. Your wife?”
“My mother.” His jaw tightened around the word. “And me. A long time ago.”
I looked again at the boy beside her and found it disorienting, trying to map that child onto the man standing in front of me. “She has a lovely smile.”
“She did.”
He took the frame from my hands, his fingers brushing mine in the exchange. As he lifted it, the cuff of his shirt rode up and the bracelet showed fully for a single second — his thumb pressing into it immediately, as if to anchor himself, as if it were the only thing in the room that could hold him in place.
I didn't mean to look. I did anyway.
His eyes moved to mine, and he saw the exact moment I clocked it. Harrow's fingers tightened on the frame while his other hand came up with a motion so smooth it felt long-practiced, pulling his cuff down and swallowing the bracelet in expensive cloth.
“You're observant,” he said quietly.
“Occupational hazard,” I replied, keeping my tone polite and safe, as though my pulse hadn't just kicked hard against my ribs.
He stood there for a long beat, holding that photograph with more care than he'd touched anything else in the house. His thumb rose again and pressed beneath the cuff where the bracelet was hidden — a private gesture, unconscious and protective.
