12 Days of Exomas - Day One! Male mummy x female reader (v. light nsfw) (Patreon)

Happy Christmas! Given that this is the first of 12 exclusive stories that will be going up on Patreon between now and 6th January 2020, this one is much much longer than normal - clocking in at a whopping 10,027 words! 

I really hope you enjoy it! I'll be writing a mix of readers and monsters on here, so hopefully there'll be something for everyone. It's my way of thanking you for your support, and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas! 

___

“My employer is very private,” his personal assistant stressed yet again - as if you hadn’t got that message the first few hundred times she’d said so on the phone. And by email. And now in person. “You are simply there to clean his apartment, make sure everything is arranged and tidied, and then you leave.”

“I understand,” you said evenly, mustering the last shreds of your patience. After barely scraping together the rent for your truly shitty apartment that month, you sorely needed this job, and it was almost a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for someone in your position. For what it was, it paid stupendously well, though you supposed he was paying for your silence and discretion, and for some reason your résumé had been the one to land the job. 

Erica nodded tartly and made a small noise in the back of her throat that said that she didn’t believe you for a second, but you had arrived at the penthouse level, and the elevator doors were opening. You made a small noise of your own when you saw the palatial setup beyond - all hardwood floors and white walls, with plush rugs here and there, and not an ounce of ‘soul’ about the place at all. It looked like a show home or a magazine spread.

She showed you around, and reiterated just how private he was. Grinding your teeth, you nodded and smiled. “I won’t do any more than is in my contract.”

“And you’ll use only the cleaning products left for you in that cupboard,” she added, pointing with perfectly manicured finger. “Nothing else. Mr. Kuraka is extremely sensitive to chemicals of all sorts, and that includes perfumes and body sprays. You will not wear them while you’re working here.”

“Fair enough.” Not that you did wear perfume on a daily basis, but this was starting to sound a bit more complicated than you’d first anticipated. ‘Think of the salary’ you chanted silently, hoping that there were no more casual ‘considerations’ for her to fling at you, last minute.

 There had been nothing in the contract, which you had meticulously dissected the night before, that was in any way more than you could deal with. The fact that you were to arrive at ten in the morning (and not a minute before) was a boon you’d never imagined for a job, and between that and leaving at no later than two in the afternoon, you had to dust, clean, and vacuum the entire penthouse except for one room which was to remain off-limits with the door locked at all times, pour the mineral water that was kept in the otherwise empty fridge into a lidded, hammer-beaten copper ewer to reach room temperature, and… that was it; six times a week, with Sunday off. Notice of any holidays or leave was to be given as soon as possible in advance to Erica, and payment would be sent directly to your bank account once a month at the end of the month. Who the hell cared if he was a neat-freak who wanted his apartment cleaning every day when he was paying you as much as a job that would require at least ten hours a day and a large portion of your soul to boot?

Erica showed you around the rest of the apartment, and you tried not to gawp as you trailed her like a disorientated lamb. Not only was the view from the window a panoramic cityscape worthy of Architectural Digest or something, but the entire living room wall was lined with bookshelves from floor to ceiling. Erica, obviously thinking you wouldn’t be interested in those, swept past on her way to the kitchen, but you slowed your footsteps and gazed at the titles. While their subjects covered everything from mathematics and statistics to the history, flora, and fauna of the Andes and Amazon, they were all academic in nature. There wasn’t a dime novel, bodice ripper, or ‘coffee table’ volume to be seen, and you smiled to yourself at the thought of finding one tucked illicitly between ‘Monte Carlo Statistical Methods’ and ‘The Universe in a Nutshell’. Your research on him before applying for the job had told you that Mr. Kuraka was a stupendously wealthy businessman; his company, called Quipu Accounting, was something to do with financial asset management and they supported a lot of worthy charities - a notable number of them in South America - but other than that, the man himself was basically a mystery, and he never ever made public appearances. 

She continued to show you around, and as your gaze took in the spartan decor, and the occasional priceless vase on a pedestal, you noticed something else. On display in a case that looked pretty much museum-grade, with its fancy lighting and the instruments tucked away at the side for humidity and temperature, was what looked to you like a cord necklace with a huge number of long strings or tassels, each one knotted and coloured faintly, as if the dyes had faded over time. 

As you paused again to take in the strange artifact, Erica glanced back at you and cleared her throat. “That, you will not touch,” she said. As if you needed telling, but you just nodded politely. 

Eventually, Erica deemed that she’d impressed upon you the importance of Mr. Kuraka’s desire for privacy enough times, and that you knew your way around his city penthouse sufficiently well that you wouldn’t completely fuck everything up on your first visit. She showed you back to the lift which would return the two of you to the foyer of the residential building. 

The doorman, an older man with a blithe expression in knowingly polite grey eyes, nodded and said, “Goodnight, Ms. Smith,” to her before adding his own well wishes for the evening to you. 

“Norman will give you access to the penthouse,” Erica explained as you exited onto the pavement outside, “But you will not have your own key.”

“As long as I can get out again,” you quipped, but Erica didn’t rise to it, stating simply that the key was not necessary to take the lift down, only up. You were sure there was a metaphor in there, but you didn’t voice it. She didn’t seem like the kind of person who would appreciate that kind of dark humour. All in all though, you signed the contracts, and started on Monday. 

Your first week passed uneventfully. You did exactly as instructed and dusted every single surface, whether or not there was a speck of dirt on it, vacuumed every square inch of hardwood floor, filled up the copper ewer with the mineral water provided, placed the matching copper beaker beside it, and used the environmentally friendly, pre-approved cleaning products on the sinks and in the bathroom - neither of which looked as though they’d ever seen a splash of water in them, let alone a grubby pair of hands, but you weren’t here to judge. You were here to clean. You were done in an hour and a half most days.

You never saw hide nor hair of the Mysterious and Extremely Private (did you get the memo) Mr. Kuraka, but that didn’t really bother you. It was as if no one lived here at all. And yet, each morning, that elegant, long-necked copper ewer was empty.

The silent stillness of the apartment got to you after that first week, so you brought some music along after that, and as you cleaned, you danced a little, the cable of your headphones swinging as you stretched to reach the higher shelves of the bookcase. If the odd, tuneless phrase escaped your lips too as you worked, there was no one there to hear you, after all. There were a small number of security cameras tucked away here and there at which you dutifully avoided staring. You were paid more than your average cleaner for your discretion, so you carried on and just dusted around them as if they were another object. 

It wasn’t until you decided to grab a luxury ‘Saturday afternoon coffee’ on your way home from the second week that you realised you’d left your mother’s silver ring behind. You’d taken it off to clean the sinks, and had left it on the kitchen worktop. A pang of sharp panic shot through you at the thought of being without it, and so, having asked for your coffee to go, you drank it down - scalding your tongue as you did - and scuttled back to the apartment building. 

Norman looked up as you pushed the doors open and trotted over to him. He took in your visibly flustered appearance and smiled slightly. “Can I help you?” he asked. 

“I left my ring behind,” you said, trying not to sound too pathetic. “I don’t suppose you could let me up could you? I know where it is. I’d be in and out in ten seconds…”

“I will have to clear it with Mr. Kuraka first,” he said. “I doubt he’ll let you in though. You will probably be best waiting until Monday, but I will notify him of the ring anyway.”

Your brows knotted. It’d only been half an hour since you’d left. “He’s home?” you asked, but Norman didn’t respond. He was too busy picking up the phone and waiting for someone to answer; presumably your employer. 

“Good afternoon, Mr. Kuraka,” he said in his benignly soft voice. He explained the situation and to your collective surprise, you were permitted to go up to the penthouse to retrieve it. 

With his eyebrows seeming to chase his receding hairline, Norman ushered you over to the lift and turned the key for you, allowing you to press the button for the penthouse. “You’re to go straight in. You’ll find it on the dining table,” he said. “Do not linger.”

“Gotcha,” you said, resisting the urge to finger-gun the man. This whole protocol was frankly ridiculous, but by sticking to it, you would have food in the fridge, and an apartment to come home to by the end of the month. In two weeks’ time, anyway, when you got your first pay cheque. 

As the doors peeled back with a soft chime from the elevator, you stepped out into the penthouse and hurried to the living room where the huge dining table sat in front of the panoramic view. To your surprise, you noticed that the ewer had been moved and the copper beaker was nowhere to be seen. He must be home then, you realised with a jolt. “Oh god,” you groaned, realising that you’d been practically doing the hairbrush-hits that morning as you pranced around with the feather duster. 

Grabbing your mother’s silver ring, you slid it on, thumbing the familiar curve of the band as it settled into the very slight groove on your finger. Taking a deep breath, you paused. Something else was different. Tilting your head slightly to the right, you realised that the door that was always, always shut and locked was now open ajar, a shaft of sunlight beaming through from beyond. A shadow moved across it and you bolted for the elevators, chirruping a hasty, “Thank you! Sorry to disturb you!” over your shoulder as you fled. 

On Monday you stepped into the apartment and immediately found your eyes drawn to that door. It was closed now, as always, but you wondered if he were there. The place was as silent and soulless as ever, and as you began working, every noise felt like an intrusion; too loud; impertinent. 

You did not play your music that day, and you did not dance. You cleaned, you poured the water, and you left.

Erica called you on Tuesday while you were there, checking that everything was satisfactory, and to report, to your surprise, that Mr. Kuraka was extremely impressed with you. 

“I just clean though?” you said, pausing by the window and staring out a the city beyond. You placed your fingertips against the glass before you’d thought about what you were doing, tracing the lines of the traffic, and when you drew them away you saw the greasy marks with horror. Cuffing them away only resulted in a hideous smear, but you maintained your calm as you spoke to Erica and mercifully she didn’t linger. 

After returning to the window to spritz it clean, you turned back and heard a soft clunk and a slightly louder thump from the other room. The ‘forbidden’ room. Frowning, you stepped closer to it, heart hammering. It hadn’t exactly sounded like a particularly innocuous sound either, like, for instance, a drawer closing, and rather it reminded you horribly of the time your friend had passed out in the bathroom and you’d not been able to get in for ages. 

Erica’s warnings about Mr. Kuraka’s privacy went right out of that freshly-cleaned window. You knocked on the door and called his name. “I’m sorry to intrude, but are you alight?”

Silence. 

“Mr. Kuraka?”

Nothing. 

“Shit.”

There was a phone on the wall, and you knew the number to speed-dial down to Norman. When he picked up with a polite query about Mr. Kuraka, you burst out with, “Hi Norman, it’s just me. Look, I’m a bit worried. I heard a noise from the room I’m not supposed to go in, and I think maybe Mr. Kuraka might be in trouble? He’s not answering when I knock on the door and I don’t want to just barge in, but…”

Norman interrupted you calmly and told you to stay where you were. “I will contact Erica. She will be there in five minutes.”

“But -”

“Do not enter that room,” he said with the sudden and unexpected sternness of a respected grandfather. 

“Right.”

You set the phone down and began to pace. Your eyes were drawn repeatedly back to the door, as if it would suddenly turn translucent and reveal what was really going on. Occasionally you paused, straining to hear any sounds of distress, but it was all silent. It suddenly occurred to you that perhaps you had done something wrong? Had you used too much of a chemical cleaner? No, they were all prescribed and safe to use around him; Erica had said so. Perhaps he was just old and had a heart condition or something? Perhaps it was nothing at all. 

When Erica marched in and told you to stay exactly where you were, you knew it wasn’t ‘nothing’. 

As the door swung open, in the second or so you had to peek into the room before Erica slammed the door shut, you saw a tanned, skeletally thin hand lying palm-up on the hardwood floor of the room beyond. Other than that horrifying, almost corpse-like fingers, the room itself had looked normal. Perhaps he really was incredibly ill. 

You caught the sounds of shuffling, shortly followed by murmured conversation between two distinct voices - that had to be a good sign, surely? You didn’t relax much, but paced over to the kitchen and took the liberty of pouring yourself a glass of the mineral water that was usually reserved for the copper ewer.

After another few minutes more, you heard a voice that was clearly not Erica’s saying, “Please reassure her. And thank her…” Although muffled by the closed door, his voice carried well enough for you to catch a very slight accent that warmed it somehow, adding a musicality to an otherwise bland accent. 

“I will,” came Erica’s curt reply. 

You’d barely had time to process the conversation when the door opened and Erica stepped out, her face set hard. When she saw the way you jumped up from where you’d been leaning against the kitchen counter at a polite distance from the door, her expression softened just a little. 

“Is he alright?” you asked in a small voice. 

She nodded. “Yes. Thank you for the way you acted. He… He asked me to thank you.”

“Does he need anything?” you asked. “I mean, if you need to be here with him, I could go and get something…?”

She shook her head, but this time she actually smiled a little. “No. Thank you. He has everything he needs here. You should go home now, I think.”

“Alright.” It was on the tip of your tongue to ask if you’d done something wrong, but you got the distinct impression that Erica would have said so by now if you had. “I’ll, uh… come back tomorrow then.”

Erica nodded once, and you took your leave. For the entire journey back to your tiny, shitty apartment block, you couldn’t shake the image of that hand. His skin had been pulled taut around the knuckles, though the colour had been a warm, cinnamon brown, and now that you dwelt on it more, you recalled the faint outline of tattoos on the first section of his fingers, but you couldn’t have said what they were. 

The main door to the apartment block was open when you got there, which was unfortunately not an uncommon occurrence. You didn’t have the luxury of a doorman and security in your building, unlike the Mysterious Mr. Kuraka, so it always made you jumpy. The smell of cabbage wafted out under one of the first floor doors as you made your way up the stairs - the elevators hadn’t worked for the past year - and the heady choke of weed billowed out under another, making your eyes sting. “God, I really need to find a new place,” you muttered disconsolately. Seeing how the other half lived during your working hours threw your own situation into sharp and painful contrast. 

Your phone rang just as you were about to sit down to some soup that you’d made weeks ago and frozen in batches, but since the only person who ever phoned you was your best friend, Ed, you picked up without really looking. “Yup?” 

The person who spoke your name with a softly questioning voice was not Ed. “Forgive the lateness of the call,” he said. “It’s Ninan Kuraka…”

“Mr. Kuraka!” you gasped, nearly dropping your spoon into your soup in surprise. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t look to see who it was. Are you feeling better?”

“Yes,” he said, his voice like dry autumn leaves rattling on concrete. If it hadn’t had that lovely, warm, almost spicy undertone, it might have been creepy. “I only wanted to call to thank you for earlier. You… You saved my life.”

This time your fingers did let go of the spoon, but it clattered onto the tabletop instead. “What?” you blurted and, to your surprise, he laughed. 

“I have a rare… condition, I suppose. I have worked myself to the bone, almost literally, lately, to the point that I neglected my health. That is something I cannot afford to do. Your swift thinking saved my life.”

“Really, I just… I mean… I… I only did what anyone would have…”

“No,” he said. “Many people would have ignored it, or would have ignored their contracts and called for an ambulance.”

It was only then that you recalled the clause in your contract that said you would contact Norman or Erica first in the event of an emergency, no matter waht. “Yeah,” you said, praying he wouldn’t notice the pause and hitch in your voice. “Well, I’m just glad you’re ok.”

“I won’t take up any more of your evening,” he said politely. “But I wanted to thank you personally.”

“You’re welcome. And while I’ve got you,” you said in a rush of stupidity or bravery, “I guess I’d like to thank you, you know, for giving me this job. I can’t tell you how much it means to me.” 

“I knew I’d made the right decision to hire you,” he said. “Goodnight.” And the line clicked as it went dead. 

Well, whatever else he was, he was a gentleman too. 

You’d nearly got through all the work the next day - without the headphones and music this time, just in case - when your phone rang, buzzing in a rude, obnoxious circle on the dining table where you’d abandoned it after a quick break between dusting and vacuuming. 

This time it really was Ed, and he was in a state. “Hey, so… uh… I just went to your apartment to drop off the hoodie you left at my place last week,” he said, “And, uh… there’s a notice on the main door…”

“What kind of notice?” you asked, heart beating suddenly cold. 

“Uh… they’re giving tenants, like, two days to move out.”

“What?”

“Yeah… I told you it was a shitty place to rent…”

“Fuck!” you cursed, breath coming short. “No no no no no,” you chanted. “This can’t be happening. I haven’t got my cheque yet from Mr. Kuraka. I can’t afford a deposit on a new place, and… shit, Ed, what am I gonna do!” 

“You could stay with me if you like,” he said, “But my place is too small for your stuff as well…”

Tears spilled down your cheeks and you sank to the floor just for a moment, trying to catch your breath. You’d been nearly broke when you’d moved to the city, and that had been the best place you could find, and it was the kind of place that came with free cockroaches and rising damp, but you’d still taken it. The landlords had you over a barrel, and they knew it. 

“We’ll figure it out,” Ed said softly. “When do you finish work?”

“I’ve still got maybe another half hour…?” you said pathetically, looking around at the apartment. 

“Ok. I’ll be here when you get home. We can fix it. Don’t worry.”

“Don’t worry? Ed, I’m going to be homeless in two days! And I can’t afford the rent anywhere in this god-damned expensive fucking city!” You didn’t normally let your mouth run away with you like that, but some times really did call for it. 

Once Ed had hung up a few minutes later, you stayed with your back pressed to the cold window, knees drawn up, arms around your legs, crying and trying not to panic. If you let out some of the fear now, you could face the problem with a little more clearheadedness in a moment. Maybe. 

To your horror, the door clicked open on the other side of the living room, but Mr. Kuraka didn’t emerge. His voice did call across the room to you though, his softly-articulated voice forming your name with a gentleness that you didn’t deserve for disturbing him. 

“I’m sorry,” you said, scrambling to your feet. “God, I’m so sorry. I… I was making so much noise.”

“There’s nothing in your contract to say you can’t make noise while you’re here.” 

Something about his quiet, deadpan delivery spoke volumes about his sense of humour, and it actually made you splutter out a laugh. 

“I assume there’s something wrong though?” he went on gently.

“Ugh,” you said, scrunching your fingers through your hair and turning back to face the incredible view behind you. As you stared out, you caught a glimmer of movement reflected in the glass, but resisted the urge to turn around. 

Good thing you did, because a second later, he said, “Stay where you are, please. Don’t turn around.”

“Sure.” God, he really was private. Though if his hands had been so withered, perhaps he was self-conscious. You could relate to that, in your own way. 

“What happened, if I might enquire?”

“I’m being kicked out of my apartment.”

“Why?”

You rolled your eyes. “Everyone is. They’re going to knock it down or something, but anyway, we’ve all got two days to clear out apparently.”

“That’s… That shouldn’t be legal…”

“I think it is,” you said. “I mean, I signed the contract. I was desperate when I moved here. Not much has changed since then, financially, I mean.”

You heard a slow, wheezing inhale from the other side of the room. “What will you do?”

You shrugged. “I’ll figure it out. My friend Ed says I can stay with him, and I don’t exactly have loads of stuff. Not sure where I’ll put it though… His place is about as small as your bathroom…”

“You could leave your things here.”

“What?” you blurted, and before you could think, you’d whipped round to face him. 

Standing in the doorway to what you had come to think of as his office, though really you had no clue what he used it for, the man jolted as if you’d hooked him up to a car battery. Impossibly thin, and, improbably for a businessman, he wore black tracksuit bottoms and socks, and a round necked, short-sleeved t-shirt, coloured a beautiful dark teal. His clothes, however, were not what held your attention. His hair was black and shiny, long, falling in a myriad of tiny, tight plaited braids over his shoulders and he had a fringe that fell to his thin eyebrows and framed a starkly emaciated face. His leathery-looking skin was stretched tightly over high, broad cheekbones and his dark, almond shaped eyes were wide with what could only be fear as you stared openly at him. 

“I…” you faltered. “I’m sorry,” but there was no point in turning away now. You’d seen him. 

His arms, barely more than withered muscle wrapped around the bones, with his tanned skin pulled tight around knobbly elbows, were covered in tattoos, though you couldn’t make the designs out from that distance. 

He took a deep, steadying breath. “It’s alright,” he said, and you suddenly forgot all about your own misery at the sound of his voice. The sadness in his tone made something crack in your chest as you heard it, and he had half turned away, one skeletal hand clutching the door frame in a death-grip. “I… I never should have come out. I meant it though, about… leaving your belongings here. So long as they’re… boxed up… contained… it won’t be a problem.”

“But… you… this is your home… you don’t want all my shit in here. It’s pristine, and the building I live in is probably full of germs.”

“So long as you don’t bring any cockroaches with you, I think I’ll survive…”

“But…”

“The choice is yours,” he said. “Please, forget you ever saw me. If you can manage that.”

And with that, he disappeared into his study, his long hair swaying as he walked awkwardly inside and closed the door behind him. 

“Mr. Kuraka, wait!” you practically yelped, darting across the room a few paces before you’d realised you weren’t sure what you were going to say. He’d looked so heartbroken. You couldn’t help but wonder what the hell was wrong with him to end up with him looking like an exhibit in the Ancient Egyptian gallery, but that didn’t mean he had to back off like he was contagious. Unless he was? Maybe that was why you had to clean the apartment every day? Maybe he wasn’t just a clean-freak with very particular habits. 

“Yes?”

His voice made you jump, realising you’d been staring at the floor. “I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable,” you blurted. 

One thin eyebrow sailed upwards in confused amusement at that. “If you made me uncomfortable?” he asked with a breathy chuckle. “Have you looked at me?”

“Uh… yes?”

“Which one of us is most uncomfortable right now?”

“Me?” you hazarded. “Because I did what you asked me not to… Oh shit,” you added as another thought dropped through your rapidly spiralling brain, “You’re not going to fire me are you?”

“On top of losing your home? How heartless do you think I am?” he asked, relaxing just a little. There was something oddly attractive about his features and the tattoos on his leathery skin, and in that moment you realised you weren’t afraid of him. 

You ran your fingers through your hair and his glittering eyes tracked the movement. “I… I don’t think you’re heartless at all,” you said. “I just… Your expression when I turned round… I thought… I’m sorry.”

He smiled. “You continue to surprise me, you know that?” he said with another slight laugh. 

“I’m just a cleaner,” you said. “I can’t be that surprising… Look, I’d better get on with things here… I’ve got to figure out how to get my stuff to Ed’s, and…”

“I meant it,” he insisted gently. “You really can leave your things here. The spare bedroom is never used, as you’ve probably noticed. You can leave your boxes in there.” 

“Mr. Kuraka, I -”

“Ninan, please,” he said. “Call me Ninan.”

“Ninan…” you repeated, trying out the unfamiliar name on your tongue. 

“It’s Inca,” he said softly. His voice was gentle, but his eyes were piercing, his gaze pinning you to the spot from the other side of the room. His bony fingers were still on the edge of the door, as if he couldn’t wait to slam it shut and retreat, but he lingered all the while you kept talking. 

“Inca,” you breathed. “Explains why I’ve never heard it before.” Your eyes darted to the strange object with the knotted strings in the display cabinet for a moment, wondering if that was an Inca artifact. “Is… Is that where your family is from?” 

He nodded slowly. His black hair was braided into tiny, tight plaits all around, and around one wrist, you noticed, he wore a single gold bracelet. His ears too were pierced, bearing little gold hoops. “It’s where that’s from too,” he said carefully, nodding at the object in the case. 

“What is it?” you asked, looking from it to him. 

“It’s called a quipu.” 

“Isn’t that the name of your company?”

He smiled a broad, white smile, and suddenly he looked much closer to your own age than you’d originally thought, despite his aged skin and emaciated figure. “Yes,” he said. “I named it after those,” he added, pointing a gnarled finger at the case and immediately dropping his hand when your eyes flickered to it. His fingers flexed slightly, as though anxious. “Khipu,” he said, altering the pronunciation a little, “Were used by the Inca to collect data. The information on khipus is numeric, decimal, and those numbers can then be read. Each cluster of knots is a digit, and there are three main types of knots…” he paused seeing that you were following, but a slight darkening of his cheeks indicated a rush of embarrassment on his part. 

You didn’t push. “It’s fascinating,” you breathed, emboldened by his generosity. He was clearly still nervous, caught like a horse on the point of bolting, but as you crossed the room to look at it, taking in the knots in various places up and down the length of each of the numerous hanging strands, he seemed to relax. He made no move to come any closer, but he released his death grip on the door. “It was used for collecting data?” you asked. 

“Among other things.”

“I can see why you named your firm after it then. Unique name, too.”

“Too unique,” he grumbled. “Most people spell it wrong or get the pronunciation wrong. I shouldn’t complain - after all, how many people besides those engaged in academic pursuits speak ancient Quechua these days…? There are modern speakers in South America, of course, but…”

“You say that like you speak pre-conquest Quechua…” you grinned, turning to look at him. Your journey towards the display case had taken you much closer to him, and you tried not to stare at his strange, thin, tattooed body, but it was hard to know where to look. 

When you eventually met his eyes, they were dark and stormy and impossible to read. His thin mouth hitched into a self-conscious little quirk. “Forgive me,” he said after a long moment of awkward silence. “I don’t deal with people face to face very often, as you can no doubt imagine. The only person I see with any kind of regularity is Erica.”

“Poor you,” you said sarcastically without thinking and clapped your hand across your mouth. “Oh god. I didn’t mean…” but he was laughing. It wasn’t a polite little chuckle either, but a deep, heartfelt belly-laugh. “Now you really are going to fire me, aren’t you?” you muttered. 

“No,” he said. “Especially not now.”

“Please don’t tell her I said that,” you said. “Look, I really should get going before I put my foot in my mouth any more.” You paused as you drew level with him and he shrank back from you into the doorway as if it were a shrine to protect him from you. “I’m… I’m glad I met you finally. And I’m really sorry if all my singing disturbed you. When I first started out here, I didn't know you were here.”

“I wanted it to stay that way,” he said. “And I don’t mind if you want to sing. It brings a bit of life into this place.”

“Duly noted. Tomorrow will be all the very best of hairbrush hits.” His eyebrows knotted in confusion and you snorted. “Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of singing into your hair bush like it’s a microphone… your hair’s long enough, though I don’t imagine you’ve brushed it with all those braids in…” 

Again, his sallow, gaunt cheeks coloured slightly and he looked away, staring at the floor. “You don’t have to work tomorrow,” he said without looking at you. “You’ve got more important things to deal with.” A thought occurred to him and he looked up at you. “I’ll transfer your salary for this month and next into your account in advance. That way you’ll have a cushion and a deposit for a new place if you find one…”

Your heart leapt. “You really don’t have to do that,” you said. 

He shook his head and gestured vaguely with his hand. “No. It’s the least I can do.”

You could have wept, or hugged him. Luckily your body decided on the former, and you grinned at him. “Thank you so much. You know, you’re not what I expected for the ruthless businessman with an entire empire under his control…”

“I’m hardly what anyone expects…” he said, turning his hand over and staring at it. All the shutters came down across his features then, and he turned hard, almost cold as he dismissed you. “Take the next few days to sort yourself out. And thank you again for your… discretion.”

It was a veiled request for your silence, and you took it at face value. You nodded, still trying to shake the whiplash as he went from awkward young man to hardened businessman in a heartbeat. “Sure,” you said. “And… Thank you.”

He twitched his head once in acknowledgement and then shut the door to his office behind him. 

Taking a deep, steadying breath, you turned away to begin thinking about how the fuck to tackle the gargantuan task ahead of you. 

Ed and a couple of his friends from work ended up helping you pack, for which you were eternally grateful. You had nowhere to put the third-hand Ikea sofa bed you’d bought, so you were forced to leave it behind, but everything else fitted neatly into bags and boxes, and one of Ed’s friends, a sporty looking girl called Hayley, drove it all to Ninan’s apartment block in her ancient Jeep. 

“Holy shit,” she whistled as you drew up outside. It was slightly back off the main road, like a hotel, and had room for two or three cars to park up and drop off. She killed the Jeep’s coughing engine and Norman appeared at the entrance with a smile on his face. 

“I was expecting you,” he said. “I shall ready the lift for you.”

“Thanks, Norman,” you grinned from behind a large cardboard box. “You’re a superstar.”

He simply tilted his head politely and stepped back as you and Hayley took the first two boxes into the lift and went back for the others. The weight limit in the elevators was sufficiently high that you’d get a decent chunk in there before it maxed out. 

After several trips, you had dumped it all in the spare bedroom and Hayley moved to have a look round, but you cleared your throat awkwardly and said, “He’s kind of private… I don’t think we should pry.” Hayley was Ed’s friend, not yours, and you felt weird about her poking around Ninan’s personal space like that. 

“Come on, just a quick peek - I’m not going to steal anything!” she laughed. 

“No, come on,” you said more firmly. “Let’s go.”

She huffed, but mercifully obliged, and you practically staggered back to the lift with relief. You'd glimpsed a shadow moving under Ninan’s office door at one point, so you knew he was here, not that he ever seemed to go out anyway. 

You gave Hayley some cash for petrol and for helping out, and she took it readily enough. As you miserably thought that that was the last of your supplies for the month, you suddenly remembered that Ninan had promised to transfer your wages in advance, and your heart leapt. 

“You want me to drop you off at Ed’s?” she asked, but you shook your head. 

“No,” you said. “I need to go to the bank anyway…” You didn’t, and in fact you planned on going back up to Ninan’s to make sure it was all stashed as neatly and as out of the way as possible. 

“Fair enough. See ya!” she grinned, waving as she pulled away in a cloud of billowing black smoke. 

You turned as she joined the stream of traffic, and asked Norman to let you up one more time. He did so without question. “Hey, Norman?” you asked as he turned the key and pushed the button for the penthouse. 

“Yes?”

“Did Mr. Kuraka say that I could come back up afterwards, or are you just assuming?”

“I never assume,” he said with a smile. 

“So he did?”

Norman nodded once. “He seems to have afforded you a greater level of trust than most of his employees… Apparently, you may come and go as you please.”

Something about that made warmth billow in your chest and you smiled goofily at him. As the doors closed with a soft chime, you realised how hot and gross you were after lugging all the dusty boxes around, and that going back up to that pristine apartment probably wasn’t wise, but you were halfway up now, so you might as well go up and grab a drink. It was unlikely that Ninan would begrudge you that much, or that he would even emerge after how weirdly you’d behaved the day before. 

He surprised you, however, by coming out of his office while you were grabbing a glass of tap water, and you nearly dropped the glass in the sink. “I’m sorry,” you said in a rush. “I didn’t mean to… uh… take advantage or push my luck… I just…”

“It’s fine,” he said, standing in the doorway to the office as if it were a portal to another world and he might just disappear back inside at a moment’s notice. “It’s just a drink. Please, make yourself at home.”

You smiled at him. He was wearing a pair of grey tracksuit pants that day and a white t-shirt that made his skin seem to gleam, the warm, dark, nutmeg brown looking rich and almost healthy in comparison to his extreme slenderness. ‘Slenderness’ - it wasn’t that. He was emaciated. Withered, shrunken, skeletal… 

Ninan cleared his throat and murmured, “Did you get everything sorted alright?”

You nodded. “Is it ok in the bedroom as it is? You really don’t need that space?”

He padded over in his socks - which seemed somehow adorably vulnerable - across to the spare bedroom and peeked in. He coughed slightly when he emerged but he nodded. “That’s fine.”

“Really? I don’t want to, uh…” what? Exacerbate any allergies he had? Kill him by bringing strange germs into his practically sterilised environment…?

“I wouldn’t have said so if it wasn’t fine,” he said. “Relax.”

“Thanks,” you mumbled. “Sorry.”

He could obviously see that you desperately wanted to know what was the deal with him, medically, and he sighed. It wasn’t as disheartened a sigh as you’d first thought, however, because he followed it with a chuckle and came over to the fridge and drew out a bottle of water. 

“Oh,” you said, twitching slightly as you realised you should have got it out of the cupboard where his usual copper beaker lived. “I’m sorry, I should have…”

“You’re not my servant,” he said with a slight snarl. “And I’m not that fragile. I can pour myself a glass of water. Thank you though,” he added as an afterthought when he realised how sharp he’d been. 

As he passed you to get to the cupboard where the copper ewer and beaker lived, you happened to inhale, and you caught the scent of his body. Sweet like incense, with a woody, almost earthy undertone, the smell of him caught you off guard and you almost let out a moan as it hit you. It was beautiful. Heat flushed under your skin and you barely managed to stifle a moan, which surprised you, to say the least. 

When he glanced over at you as he set the copper beaker down on the counter, he flashed you a slight frown as he caught you sinking your teeth into your lower lip. You smiled awkwardly and said, “I should… uh… probably leave… leave you in peace…”

“You don’t have to,” he all but whispered, and it sounded more like a plea than a statement. “Look, I know this is nine kinds of inappropriate, but if you need a place to stay, you can stay here. I’ll even charge you a nominal rent if you like, but it really won’t be much. You can come and go as you please, just… I don’t want you to be in… in trouble… if I can help…”

He seemed so unsure, so insecure, that you almost accepted then and there, but the shrill blare of a telephone in his office called him away with little more than a quick ‘excuse me’. You blasted a quick text to Ed to tell him about Ninan’s offer, and he immediately told you to take it if the guy didn’t give you the creeps. 

Ninan didn’t show any signs of emerging from his office, though the door remained open, so you headed over to the phone in the hall where you’d dialled down to Norman for help the other day, and tugged a square of note paper off the block by the phone. Predictably for this place, it looked like you were the first person to make use of it. 

Your note stressed that while you’d like to accept his generous offer, it was only a temporary thing and you wouldn’t impose on him longer than necessary. You also mentioned that you were heading out for a while and placed it on the otherwise empty dining room table, bolting for the door and taking yourself off to a nearby park to think. He was your employer, he clearly had some kind of serious medical issues, and it was, as he put it, ‘nine kinds of inappropriate’, but… you liked him. 

In fact, living with him turned out to be surprisingly easy. He almost never came out of his office, except to get some water, and you never saw him eat or use the other bedroom. One evening, however, about a week into your new arrangement, he emerged to find you cooking pasta on the hob. 

You jumped almost out of your skin when he just appeared behind you but you laughed it off and he mumbled an apology. “It’s fine,” you smiled. “I just didn’t expect to see you. You… uh… you’re pretty dedicated to your work…”

He huffed a laugh. “You could say that. I don’t sleep, so,” and then he fell silent. 

“You don’t sleep?” you quoted. “Like, you don’t sleep much, or you literally don’t sleep?”

“The latter,” he said. 

“At all?” you gawped. 

He shook his head. 

“Is it… uh… to do with -” you clamped your mouth shut so firmly that your teeth clicked. “I didn’t mean to pry,” you said. 

“It’s fine,” he sighed. “And yes. It is to do with my… condition.”

“Is it serious?” you asked hesitantly. “I mean, is there anything I should know, given that I’m living here for a little bit?”

He shook his head. “No,” he murmured, his eyes wandering to watch you as you stirred the steaming pasta. “There won’t be a repeat of the other day, I promise.”

“Right.” That didn’t exactly clear it up, but you left it there. “You want some pasta?” you asked automatically. 

“I would love some,” he said, “But no, thank you.”

“You already ate?”

“Something like that,” he said dejectedly and turned away. 

“Don’t tell me you’re going back to work?”

“I have clients all over the world,” he said. “I should…”

“Yeah, but… Sorry. Is it ok if I eat it on the couch? I was hoping to catch that new Netflix show…”

He paused as he crossed the room, wearing his usual black tracksuit pants that barely hid just how much his hip bones stuck out. He had a long-sleeved pullover on that day but his thick, black hair was loose as always, falling down his back in its usual myriad of tiny braids. 

“Come join me?” you said, hoping to draw him out of himself. 

“I have a call to make,” he said without turning around. 

“Sure.”

A little while later, you set your empty bowl down on the coffee table and leaned back into the sofa. It was comfy and cosy, the temperature of the apartment warm, and you felt your eyelids beginning to droop. Vowing not to fall asleep, you shuffled a bit, but soon you’d dozed off without realising it. You jerked awake as something soft brushed over your shoulders and thighs. Opening your eyes to find Ninan laying a blanket down across you, you smiled. “Thank you.”

“I’m sorry I woke you,” he said, drawing back. God, his cheeks were so gaunt it had to be painful. He also looked mortified at having disturbed you. 

You smiled softly and shuffled up the sofa again. “You can come and join me if you want. You don’t have to go…”

“I…” he said, but then appeared to rethink his refusal. “Alright,” he said. The way he sat on the sofa was stiff and awkward, with his hands on his impossibly thin thighs, his back straight even though he leaned into the cushions behind him for support, and his eyes locked on the screen. Well, it was a start, you supposed. 

He joined you almost every night after that, but he never ate, and whenever you went to bed, he retreated to his office. A work ethic like his couldn’t possibly be healthy, but who were you to bring that up when you didn’t even know why he looked like he belonged in a museum display case. 

Exactly ten days after you’d first moved in, you thought you’d found a place, but when you’d visited it, you’d seen mould on the walls in the entrance hall and decided you’d wait. 

Ninan clearly didn’t mind your presence that much. He’d even laughed at a joke you’d made the other day, and had shifted to sitting with his knees up on the sofa in a kind of seated foetal position. He seemed much more comfortable like that, but he always stayed at the furthest end of the sofa from you. You snuck glances at him when you could, admiring his bone structure and the warmth of his eyes, the way his thick, dark hair framed his face, his fringe almost dangling into his eyes. He seemed more like a college room mate than a multi-billionaire in charge of a worldwide finance empire.

“How did you get on with that place you went to?” he asked when he joined you in the kitchen as you made yourself some supper that night. 

“Want me gone already?” you grinned and he winced, physically flinching. 

“No,” he rasped. “That wasn’t why I asked.”

“I know,” you said. “Sorry. My knee-jerk humour isn’t to everyone’s taste. Well, it was basically a petri-dish in four dimensions, so I left before I even made it through the front door…”

Ninan grimaced. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I know you want to have your own place again.”

You shrugged and looked around. “You’re not exactly making it easy to want to leave,” you admitted, adding a little more stock to the risotto bubbling away on the hob. “How was work today?”

“I can’t keep doing this,” he said abruptly. 

“What? Working 24/7?”

“No. I can’t have you here, and…” Ninan faltered, stepping back. “I… I didn’t mean it like that, but…”

“O…kay?” you faltered, deflecting a little by turning away to stir the risotto. “What do you mean? You just said you didn’t necessarily want me gone, but… I’ve tried to be as out of the way as possible, and I’ve still cleaned the house every day, but if it’s to do with something else…”

“It’s not,” he said. “I… You trusted me. You risked staying with a stranger, and I’m hardly the most… normal person…”

You shot him a look. “You mean your ‘condition’?”

He nodded. “It’s not what you think.”

“I don’t know what I think,” you said honestly. “And it’s not really any of my business, unless you want to make it my business… You said I didn’t need to know anything more than I already do, so… I trust you…”

Ninon’s inhale was shaky and he rested his bony hand on the counter top nearby. “Turn that off,” he said, jutting his chin at the hob. 

“Why?”

“Because what I want to show you will take longer than that rice will take to cook. And if I don’t do it now, I never will.”

Confused, you obliged. The risotto would hardly ruin if you left it now. 

He looked honestly terrified, and when he brought both his hands up, palms facing the ceiling, his fingers trembled. “Do you believe in the supernatural?” he asked bluntly. 

“Not particularly,” you hedged. 

“If I tell you I’m just shy of six hundred years old, would you think I’m insane?”

You blinked. The first words out of your mouth were a joke because you couldn’t think of any serious response to that. “You don’t look a day over forty.”

“I’m serious,” he growled. 

“Ok, look, I know you’ve got some kind of physical condition, but you don’t have to try and string me along with some fantasy…”

“It’s not fantasy,” he said. “Look at me.” He stood up straight then, the bumps of the bones in his shoulders standing out though the fabric of his grey t-shirt. He then stitched to a language you’d never heard, said a few sentences, and then pointed over at the display case with the quipu in. “That belonged to me. I was a tax collector.”

Then, because you clearly didn’t believe him, he lowered his hands and surprised you yet again by taking his t-shirt off. He ditched his shirt on the floor and you gaped at what he’d revealed. His torso was bandaged tightly in places with strips of cloth, and around that you could see a colossal tattoo that went from the waistband of his tracksuit, up over his ribs, round his back, and up over his right pectoral. His skin was sallow, less smooth than the skin of his gaunt face, shrunken around his ribs, dessicated almost, and as you brought a trembling finger up to touch him, he held his breath. 

“Can I?” you asked and he nodded. 

You traced a line from his collarbones down the strangely hard, almost waxy skin of his chest, to the bandages. One end was tucked into the top and it unravelled beneath your tugging fingers. He held his arms up as you unwrapped him, revealing horrifying, gaping holes in his torso. You gasped when you saw the cavity behind that was stuffed with what looked like more of the bandages. You dropped the cloth in your hands, letting it fall loosely, leaving him half covered. 

“What…? What is…?” you began but didn't know how to voice the rest of your question. ‘What the fuck is that?’ didn’t seem to cover it quite. 

Ninan looked as mortified as you felt, but he inhaled wheezily. “I was mummified when I died. But my twin brother was a sorcerer. He refused to let me die. Because of the magic we shared - but to which only he had access - I lived on, even after he died. I kept living. I cannot eat or sleep, but drinking water keeps me hydrated. The tomb where I was first buried was a simple stone shrine. I cannot be far from it.” His dark eyes flickered across the room to his office.

“Is it… Is it in there?” you asked. You felt like you were waiting for him to say it was April Fool’s Day or something, or that he was just messing with you, but it was so painfully real. The chunks missing from his torso, the way the skin stretched taut over bone and shrunken muscle, the age-smudged tattoos on his arms and torso… It fitted. Everything fitted and made some kind of odd sense. 

Ninan nodded once and began to wrap himself up again. It felt oddly intrusive to see him then, as though you’d seen him completely naked. 

“Can I help?” you asked as he struggled to get a neat fit with the bandages. 

He gasped softly as you took the end of the wrap from his trembling fingers and leaned in close to continue it for him. His whole body shook softly and as you looked up at him you saw that his dark eyes were glassy, his lips parted slightly. Feeling strangely bold, you let your touches linger until a violent shudder ran down him and he had to grip the counter top to stay upright. When you straightened, his eyes were closed and he had tipped his head back slightly. 

“I take it no one has done that for you in a while?” you smiled, straightening. Somehow, knowing what he was had taken the worry out of it. When you thought he had some kind of terrible, terminal disease that was eating away at him, you had felt like you were constantly walking on glass, waiting for something to go wrong, but now… It was strange, and you weren’t sure that you hadn’t contracted something from that awful bio-hazard of an apartment, and that this wasn’t all some hallucination, but in a way it made more sense than anything. 

Ninan shook his head but couldn’t seem to formulate an answer. Instead, he took your hand gingerly in his and led you to his office. 

It was larger than you’d suspected. On the left hand wall was a bookcase, again, stuffed to the gunnels with books and artefacts. In the centre of the room, facing the window, was a large desk and a computer, but on the right hand side was something so incongruous that your feet stalled when you saw it. Monumental, ashlar masonry filled the right hand wall from floor to ceiling, with a shelf cut into it, large enough for a cadaver to rest.  

“This is… This was…?” ‘your tomb?’ You wanted to ask. 

He nodded. “Now that you know, I’ll understand if you don’t want to stay here any more. I just… It felt so wrong to be behaving so strangely around you.”

“Who else knows?”

“Erica,” he said. 

“And Norman?”

Ninan shrugged. “Not the particulars, but he’s aware that I am in a rather unique situation.” 

“Can I ask what happened that day when you passed out in here?”

To your surprise, he laughed, but it was a bitter, empty laugh. “I just overworked myself.”

“Really?”

“Yes. When I say I don’t sleep, that doesn’t mean I don’t rest. I hadn’t drunk much, and the magic that keeps me going ran too low. I should have lain down and recovered, but I pushed through.”

“Huh. Even undead mummies can overwork themselves. Puts a new meaning on the phrase ‘working yourself to the bone…’ Oh god,” you added. “I bet you’ve heard that so many times. Wait, you’ve even made the joke yourself to me, haven’t you?”

“I have,” he said, laughing. “And yes, it does put a new meaning to it. You know… I can’t believe how well you’ve taken this,” he said, leaning his weight against his desk, hands by his hips. 

You twitched a shoulder in a non-committal gesture. “It’s a better explanation than what I’ve come up with…”

His eyebrows pinched into a quizzical frown. 

“Oh, you know,” you said, waving a hand and turning back to look at his modest, almost humble, little shrine. “Terminal illnesses and the like. At least I know you know how to take care of yourself after, what was it, six hundred years?”

“Almost,” he said dryly. 

“I won’t tell anyone,” you murmured and then looked back at him. He’d crossed his arms across his chest and you brought your fingertips to the tattoos on his forearms. He inhaled sharply as you touched them but didn’t speak immediately. “Do they mean anything?”

He tilted his face down and you realised then just how long his lashes were. “They’re just symbols of power to my people,” he said eventually, his voice a little unsteady. 

“Does that hurt you?” you asked, suddenly thinking he might be incredibly fragile, given that he was actually a six hundred year old Inca mummy. 

He shook his head. “Quite the contrary.”

“Oh,” you smiled, and ran your hands up his arms again. 

Touch starved and clearly desperate, he let out a soft whine and tilted his head back. His braids brushed against some pens in a pot behind him and they rattled as he shook again. 

“You want me to stop?”

“No,” he whispered honestly. “But… you don’t have to… I mean… I can’t be very appealing… you know what - ah - what lies beneath this…” he said, touching the bandages again. 

You leaned in a little closer and brushed your lips against his neck, the sharp, jutting bone at the hinge of his jaw obvious as you nuzzled momentarily against him. He smelled sweet, warm, and suddenly his hands were on your hips. 

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispered. “I…” and then he laughed, embarrassed.

“What?” you asked as you drew back, letting him catch what breath he had. 

“You see that screen?” he said, nodding to what looked like a small, black picture frame on the shelf. You nodded. “It shows the security camera feeds in the apartment. I remember looking up one day and seeing you dancing around to your music, and I couldn’t stop watching you. I know it was wrong and creepy of me, but… you’ve brought such life into this place.”

“You mean your previous cleaners didn’t prance around here like idiots with no inhibitions?”

He shook his head. “You’re the first.”

“Huh.”

You turned back to him. “Can I kiss you?”

He nodded. “If you’re sure.”

“So long as you’re not going to unhinge your jaw like your Egyptian counterpart in that movie…”

He laughed. 

“Oh my god, you’ve actually seen that movie, haven’t you?”

“Yes,” he said. “It’s terribly inaccurate.”

“I thought you were Inca?” you asked. 

“I thought you were going to kiss me,” he grinned back. 

Laughing, you did, moaning into the gesture. 

___

Hope you enjoyed this one! Don't forget to check out the Patreon Masterlist, in case you missed anything from before. All the xmas/Exomas stories will be going up in a separate list on the masterlist, so you should be able to find them easily enough if you want to go back later. Merry Christmas! x