Maid for Each Other

In this sparkling rom-com, Painter (Happily Never After) pairs a maid and a millionaire. Abi Mariano needs a place to sleep while her apartment is being fumigated. Declan Powell, the wealthy owner of one of the apartments she cleans, is out of town for a week, so she thinks she can crash at his place without anyone ever knowing. Then his parents show up at his penthouse, see Abi walking out of the bedroom, and assume she’s Declan’s girlfriend, Abby, whom they’ve never met—for good reason: Declan made her up to get them to stop bugging him about his love life. Abi plays along before making a quick exit, but when Declan realizes what happened, he tracks her down and offers her $40,000 to continue the ruse during a weekend of work events. Faking romance (and staging some swoony PDA) leads to real feelings, but Declan and Abi both fear revealing that their emotions have deepened. With falsehoods, miscommunications, and socioeconomic disparity complicating their way forward, the path to happily ever after is rocky. Painter injects a familiar trope with both levity and genuine emotion. Readers will especially be drawn to Abi, whose smarts and sass make her the perfect match for the more staid but driven Declan. This is a treat. (July)