The Roommate Rules (Steele Brothers of Starlight Cove #4)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER ONE

DECLAN

I never woke up planning to piss off the hot librarian. But I’d be lying if I said being on the receiving end of Penelope Shea’s wrath didn’t improve my day.

Since she’d moved to Starlight Cove a year ago, I’d become well-versed in exactly how to rile her up. And I wasn’t opposed to using that knowledge for a little fun anytime the opportunity presented itself.

Main Street was already crawling with too fucking many people, all of them taking every available parking space in our minuscule downtown. But I needed to be at Steele Ink in ten minutes, so that meant I had to improvise.

It was just a bonus that my improvisation would get under Penelope’s skin.

The sidewalk in front of the library was brick-paved and wide, tucked between a bench and a stacked stone embankment lined with overgrown shrubs. It might as well have had a parking sign with my name on it for how well my motorcycle fit. Tucked out of the way, as if it belonged right there.

I kicked the stand, killed the engine, and stepped off the bike. I’d barely adjusted the collar of my jacket before the library door slammed open. Right on time.

“Seriously?” a voice called. An extremely outraged and affronted voice—clipped, furious, and just this side of scandalized.

I glanced toward the building, squinting in the late September sun.

Like clockwork, Penelope came marching down the steps, her eyes narrowed on me from behind her black-framed glasses.

With every step she took, her copper ponytail swung, her prim little cardigan doing absolutely nothing to conceal the bounce of her generous tits.

Her pissed-off gaze was focused on me—that ire was always focused on me. She didn’t even glance at the library patrons watching her as if they couldn’t believe the fury pouring out of their normally friendly, normally warm, normally sweet librarian.

I didn’t share their disbelief.

She might’ve been the epitome of sunshine with every other soul on the planet, but I seemed to be the one and only person who could stoke her irritation like no other.

Once at the bottom of the concrete steps, she stopped in front of me, her mouth pinched in a thin line. She glared at my bike before lifting her gaze—sharp and furious—to me.

I didn’t move. Just stood there with my arms crossed and glanced down at all five feet nothing of her while she glared up at me like she was seconds from strangling me to death.

Which, honestly, was a hell of a sight.

Especially coming from someone with an I voice woodland creatures during story time and I like it vibe, freckled skin like porcelain dotted with fire, and a wardrobe that looked like it came straight out of a porno called Dewey My Decimal.

“This isn’t a parking spot.” Penelope forced out the words through a tight mouth and pointed toward the sidewalk.

I raised a brow at her. Looked down at my motorcycle. Looked back up and met her gaze. “Sure it is. My bike’s parked right here.”

She took a slow, deep breath like she was choosing between screaming or setting something on fire. Probably me. “Sidewalks are for pedestrians, Mr. Steele.”

I leaned toward her until our faces were inches apart and lowered my voice. “Mr. Steele, huh? Might as well just call me sir.”

The flare of her nostrils nearly had my lips curving, but I didn’t change my expression. Couldn’t. If I did, she’d walk away, and I was enjoying our daily spar far too much for that.

Rather than go off on me like I’d been betting on, she reached into that enormous librarian bag of hers and yanked out a pen and spiral-bound planner. She flipped to a tabbed page and peeled off a sticky note before aggressively scribbling something on it.

Once she was done, she stuck the note to my mirror with all the subtlety of a throat punch.

“There.” She shoved her things back into her bag before adjusting her little fantasy-inducing librarian glasses and glaring at me once more. “Not that it’ll matter since you have a selective relationship with rules.”

Done with her rant, she spun on her heel, her short dress flaring around those thick thighs and hips, and I swallowed back a groan.

Focusing my attention elsewhere, I reached for the note, peeled it off, and read it aloud before she could get too far. “‘This is a library, not your personal garage. Grow up.’”

With a smirk, I folded the note and slid it into my back pocket. “You always this warm in the mornings, or is this fire all for me, rebel?”

She froze for a second before glancing back. And even though she was almost a foot and a half shorter than me, she somehow managed to look down her nose at me. “Don’t flatter yourself. This is enforcement, not attention.”

Her expression was pure steel, which was quite the juxtaposition when every other inch of her screamed softness—from the freckles scattered across her cheeks, to the full curve of her tits, to her generous ass that begged to be spanked.

Without a second glance, she turned and walked to the café across the street, her hips swaying like she had no idea just how fucking tempting she was. I watched until she disappeared inside, and only then did I allow a smirk to break free.

While we’d been doing this dance for a while, I’d never seen her that pissed off before. And I couldn’t say I hated it.

I also couldn’t say I wasn’t itching to see it all over again tomorrow.

The bell above the door jingled as I stepped into Steele Ink. Low music spilled from the speakers, some kind of indie folk bullshit Rowan liked. And something I’d be forced to listen to all fucking day. That was the rule—whoever was in first picked the tunes.

Didn’t matter if I owned the damn place.

Since we weren’t open yet, the space was empty except for the two of us.

Against the back wall, Rowan stood on a step stool, stretching onto her tiptoes as she shelved fresh ink bottles.

Because of course she was. Even though Cam and I could reach the top shelf without straining, Rowan didn’t have it in her to wait for anyone else to do shit for her.

She might’ve been a tiny thing, but her size only lulled her victims into a false sense of security. She could gut a man with her sarcasm and then pop over to parent-teacher conferences with homemade muffins and a smile.

“You’re late,” she called without glancing back.

“Good thing I’m the boss, then.”

“Being the boss can’t save you from the Indigo Girls.”

I strode through the space toward her and the back room. “I hate you for that.”

“Lies.”

“And I had a run-in on the way here, Mom.”

As she strained to reach the top shelf, a bottle wobbled and fell. I caught it midair before it could hit the floor and placed it where it belonged—no stool needed.

“Show off,” she muttered. “Pretty sure your reflexes are better than your decision-making.”

“You’re welcome.”

She climbed down from the stool and gave me a look. “You rile up the hot librarian again?”

My brain unhelpfully supplied a replay of Penelope whipping around, skirt flaring, hips and ass swaying like she either didn’t have a clue or didn’t care that she was driving me half insane.

“Depends on what you consider ‘rile.’”

“You’re gonna push that girl to murder you if you’re not careful.”

I shrugged out of my jacket and hung it on the hook in my station. “Who says I want to be careful?”

“I’m telling you, she’s gonna snap one day.”

“Worth it.”

Rowan leaned her hip against the tool chest in her workstation, arms crossed. “Not if she stabs you with a pencil engraved with World’s Best Librarian and you bleed out on the sidewalk you were bound and determined to park on.”

“Then I’ll die the way I lived.”

“By being insufferable?”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“I say that like I’ll have to mop up your blood when she finally loses it.”

I dropped into my chair and spun one of my pens between my fingers. “Relax. I’ll make sure Cam is on cleanup duty that day.”

Rowan snorted and rolled her eyes. “Please. That man cleans up as well as my children. Which is to say, not at all until I give them the look that says to try me and see what happens.”

“I don’t understand how men twice your size are scared of you.”

She slid her gaze to me, giving me the aforementioned look—the one I’d seen her give her teen sons a hundred times—and I almost shuddered in my chair.

“Point taken.”

She hummed, her mouth tilting with quiet satisfaction, then reached for the tablet we used to manage appointments. “Cam’s going to be late. He’s taking his dog to the vet.”

“What’s wrong with Ruby now?”

“She ate a sock.”

I blinked. “Again?”

“Second one this month.” Rowan shook her head. “And he just ignores me when I tell him she needs to be crate-trained so this doesn’t keep happening every time he leaves.”

“Apparently he hasn’t gotten the memo that you’re always right.”

“Apparently not.” She swiped her finger across the tablet screen. “He rescheduled his early appointment for later this week, so it’s gonna be light in here till later. I’ve got a piercing at noon and then the third session on that back piece at two.”

I nodded, then leaned back and opened my sketchbook, my pencil moving before I’d made a conscious decision to draw. A few idle strokes—nothing specific. Just the arc of a ponytail caught mid-swing. The soft angle of a jawline set in irritation.

“I’ve got Levi coming in at noon to start on the new design we’ve been working on, a couple touch-ups later today. And I squeezed in a consult for a memorial piece tonight.”

“You mean after we close and you’re not supposed to be working anymore?” she said, exasperation heavy in her tone. “You keep taking all this extra work, and you’re gonna burn out.”

“I’m fine.”

Staying busy meant I didn’t have time to think about the shit I didn’t allow myself to want.

Rowan rolled her eyes. “Uh-huh. That’s what people say right before they’re absolutely not fine.”

I ignored that.

“Her brother passed a few months ago,” I said instead. “Was I supposed to tell her to get fucked?”

“Oh, I remember her. She was in last week, right?”

I dipped my chin in acknowledgment. “Yeah, I think so. Cam said she came in asking for me.”

Rowan raised a brow. “They always do.”

I glanced up. “Your point?”

“You don’t have to say yes to every single person who walks through that door looking for you.”

I clicked my pen once. Twice. “It’s my shop.”

“It’s your life too,” she shot back.

Jaw ticking, I held her gaze. “Exactly. My life.”

She blew out a deep sigh before throwing her hands up in surrender and muttering something under her breath. But she knew me well enough to know when it was time to drop shit.

“She’s gonna be nervous.” Rowan typed something into the tablet. “So try not to be a dick.”

“I’m never a dick to clients.”

“Right. You save that for hot librarians, your coworkers, and your brothers.”

“My brothers can take it. I can’t be nice to everyone—I need some balance.”

“Balance, huh? Is that what you call parking your motorcycle on the sidewalk to get the hot librarian’s attention?”

“I can’t help it if she sits behind the circulation desk, just waiting to enforce the rules.”

“She doesn’t have to wait long since your dumb ass is hell-bent on breaking them.” Rowan grabbed her coffee cup and shot me a look. “Speaking of, while you and the hot librarian were having your daily verbal foreplay, Mabel stopped in.”

Without bothering to respond to the foreplay comment, I glanced out the window toward Mabel’s shop, Wicked Little Things. Starlight Cove’s horniest senior citizen stood in front of the storefront, waving around a glitter-laden walkie-talkie that sparkled in the sun.

“She staging another fake disturbance?” I asked.

“She upgraded. Now, she’s practicing emergency response drills for when Sheriff McKenzie finally deputizes her.”

“And what’s the emergency this time?”

“Told me she was gonna call in a suspicious vehicle parked illegally outside the library. Wonder who that could be,” Rowan said dryly.

“Tell her I said thanks for the dedication to public safety.”

“Oh, I did. She asked if she could practice cuffing you next.” Rowan smirked. “I told her you’d probably be into that.”

With Mabel? I’d rather be tased.

But with a sharp-tongued redhead who was all prim indignation, color-coded rules, and barely leashed fury for me and me alone?

Yeah, I’d risk the cuffs and let Penelope put me on my knees.