Chapter 6 Gregory
Gregory
The generator shed offers minimal protection from the blizzard. I yank the door open against the wind and snow swirls inside with me. The metal walls provide shelter from the worst of it, but it’s still cold enough that my breath mists.
The generator sits silent. Still shut down from when I came in here last night. I want to double check the fuel reading.
That’s what I tell myself, anyway.
If I’m being completely honest, I just wanted to get out of the house.
Get away from her.
Because her words... let’s just say, she’s not wrong about me.
Shaking off the thought, I move to the control panel and brush snow off the display. The fuel gauge reads one percent.
One fucking percent.
I stare at the digital display like it might change if I glare hard enough. It doesn’t. The numbers just sit there, mocking me with their brutal honesty.
If only the delivery on the twenty-first had come on time...
Since then, with the way the power has been cutting out lately, I’ve been burning through diesel fuel like it’s infinite.
Well, at least before I came to my senses yesterday.
.. I was running the heat at full blast. Powering every light in the house.
Using the espresso machine multiple times a day.
Acting like a spoiled asshole who’s never had to worry about resources running out.
Christ.
I stare at the silent machine. Before I shut it down, it was making this grinding noise.
Getting worse each time it cycled on. Definitely something internal is wearing down.
Maybe a bearing. Maybe the alternator. I don’t know enough about generators to diagnose it properly and Thomas isn’t here to fix it.
I could test it.
Run it for thirty seconds just to confirm it still works.
That the grinding hasn’t progressed to full mechanical failure.
My hand hovers over the manual start button...
Thirty seconds of runtime burns fuel I can’t replace.
And what if it doesn’t start? What if that grinding noise was the sound of something dying and I just don’t know it yet?
Better that I don’t know.
At least this way, we still have hope.
I pull my hand back.
One percent.
Maybe enough for a few hours when the storm finally clears. We might need that power to charge our phones, or the laptop, or the Starlink battery pack. Or we might need it for emergency heat.
Then again, maybe one percent won’t be enough for anything at all.
I have to laugh at that last thought.
Here I am, standing in a freezing shed next to a machine that might be dead, and my eight billion dollars might as well be Monopoly money.
The silence in the shed is absolute. Just the wind howling outside. The creak of metal walls. The sound of snow piling against the door.
Just cold.
And uncertainty.
I step back outside into the full force of the blizzard and shut the door behind me.
By the time I get back to the house, my face is numb and my hands are shaking.
I find her in the kitchen. Sorrel is standing at the gas range with a large pot full of snow, watching it melt with the kind of focused attention I usually reserve for quarterly earnings reports.
She doesn’t look up when I enter. Her back is rigid with the kind of anger that makes the air feel charged, but I notice other things too.
The way my Columbia hoodie hangs off one shoulder, exposing the curve of her neck.
How the sweatpants sit low on her hips because she had to roll the waistband multiple times.
The shape of her ass underneath all that fabric, curves that even oversized clothes can’t hide.
Fuck.
I shouldn’t be noticing. Not after the fight we just had. Not when she has every reason to hate me.
But my cock doesn’t care about should.
“What are you doing?” My voice comes out rougher than intended.
“Melting snow.” She still doesn’t turn around. “No power means no well pump. Which means no running water. We’ll need several gallons daily for drinking, cooking, washing. This is how you do it safely. You heat it to kill any contaminants, let it cool, store it in clean containers.”
She rattles off the process like she’s teaching a field course to rude undergraduates. Every word a small reminder that she knows things I don’t.
That she’s useful in ways my billions aren’t.
I watch her work. The efficient movements.
Her practical field training showing through despite the hostility radiating off her like heat.
The way she reaches for another pot and the hoodie rides up, exposing a strip of skin at her lower back.
The flex of her calves when she shifts her weight.
Her hair falling forward as she leans over the stove.
.. I remember washing that hair last night. How it felt between my fingers. How...
Stop.
“I double-checked the generator,” I tell her bluntly. “Fuel’s definitely almost gone. We can’t turn it on again. We’ll have to conserve what’s left and use it only in emergencies.”
Now she turns. Those brown eyes meet mine with accusation and understanding mixed together, and the full impact of her face hits me again.
The gold flecks in those eyes catching the light.
Her lips slightly parted. The way her chest rises and falls with each breath underneath the hoodie (my hoodie!), and I can see the outline of her breasts, no bra because hers is probably still damp.
The memory of her frantically covering those breasts of hers yesterday flashes through my mind unbidden.
Christ, I’m an asshole.
She’s recovering from a fever and hates my guts and I’m standing here cataloging her body like some kind of predator.
“If we do turn it on, how long will the generator last?” she asks.
“A few hours. Maybe less.” If it turns on at all.
I lean against the doorframe because standing feels like too much effort right now.
And because I need the support.
Because looking at her is doing things to me that are completely inappropriate given the circumstances.
“The great room is the only space with heat,” I add.
“So we’re stuck in one room together.” Her tone suggests this is somewhere between a nightmare and a cosmic joke.
“Yeah.” I don’t apologize. What’s the point? “You can freeze upstairs out of principle or you can be practical. Your choice.”
Her jaw tightens. I watch the pulse point in her throat. The way her hands grip the counter. The slight flush climbing up her neck that has nothing to do with the stove’s heat. She’s angry and beautiful and completely off limits.
Tell that to my cock.
I watch the war play across her face. Pride versus survival. Ideology versus reality.
She turns back to her snow pot without answering.
I sigh, then leave her to it and retreat to my office. One last check before the cold makes that room unusable too.
My laptop sits on the custom desk. Forty thousand dollars of furniture supporting a machine that’s currently worthless. I open it anyway. Battery at fifteen percent. The warning icon blinks in the corner like a countdown to irrelevance.
I quickly close it.
I think about Derek. My former protégé. The one who leaked those documents to the press. Not for principles. Oh no. He sold me out to a competitor for cash. Five years of mentorship, and he threw it away for whoever paid the highest price.
I still don’t know which rival bought him. Could be any of them. They all want to see me fall. Want my market share. My contracts. My mines.
Has it really all been for nothing?
I’ve spent thirty years building an empire. Surrounding myself with people paid to care about me. Paid to solve my problems. Paid to make me feel powerful.
And now in an actual crisis, when it actually matters...
I’m completely, utterly, alone.
Well.
Except for a broke graduate student in my kitchen.
Who has every reason to hate me.
The office is already getting colder. I can see my breath starting to mist.
Time to face reality.
I return to find her in the great room. She’s dragged her sleeping bag from upstairs and claimed a section of the sectional near the fire.
Not close to the fireplace itself. That would be too accommodating.
But close enough to benefit from the heat.
Meanwhile the water containers have been pushed up against the wall next to the fireplace.
Her field gear is spread out nearby. Drying finally in the warmth. She’s reading the romance novel with its shirtless cover model. A small act of defiance on her part, I suppose.
When she doesn’t look up, I use the opportunity to study her.
She has her legs tucked under her on the sectional. The firelight plays across her skin, turning it golden. My hoodie has slipped off both shoulders now, and the neckline gapes enough for me to see her collarbones. I can still see the curve of her breasts where the fabric drapes...
Heat floods through me that has nothing to do with the fireplace.
“Everything okay?” My voice comes out lower than intended.
“Yep.” Her voice is flat.
I sigh, then claim the opposite side of the sectional. As far from her as physically possible while still being in the same room.
The fire crackles between us, the orange light dancing across the leather and wood and all the other expensive shit that won’t protect us from cold.
Or from the awareness that’s crackling between us. The knowledge that we’re alone in this house. That we’ll be sharing this space. That she’s right there, close enough to touch if I wanted to cross the distance.
Which I don’t.
Shouldn’t.
Won’t.
The silence stretches uncomfortably.
I again think about how I was just washing her hair only yesterday...
Fuck!
I should say something. Apologize maybe. Explain that Brazil wasn’t as simple as leaked documents make it look. That every extraction operation exists in shades of gray. That rare earth minerals are necessary for the green technology she probably worships.
But the words stick in my throat.
Because she’s right.
We did poison that water supply. We did know about it. And I did sign off on continuing operations because stopping would have cost millions and pissed off the board and made me look weak.
Forty two people got sick.
Her grandmother’s village.
Her parents’ homeland.
But how was I supposed to know that?
And if I had known, would it have stopped me?
I... don’t actually know.
The house creaks around us as the temperature beyond the great room continues to drop. Walls that used to protect now feeling like a trap.
I study her again. The light plays across her face. Shadows in the hollows of her cheeks. Her lips slightly parted. The elegant line of her throat as she tilts her head back against the sectional.
I want to taste that throat. Want to feel her pulse against my tongue. Want to hear what sounds she’d make if I put my mouth there.
Jesus Christ, what’s wrong with me?
She looks tired. Still recovering from the fever.
And yet... still absolutely gorgeous.
“Everything okay?” she asks suddenly. She looks up from her book.
The question catches me off guard.
I look at her. This woman who couldn’t care less what I’m worth. Who judges me on actions not assets.
For the first time in decades I feel like I’m being evaluated on who I am instead of what I have.
And it’s strangely... refreshing.
Even if so far I’m failing spectacularly.
“Yeah.” The word comes out quieter than intended. “I think it actually might be.”
She studies me for a long moment. Those brown eyes seeing more than I want them to. Seeing through me in a way no one has in years.
And then she shrugs and goes back to her book without comment.
The fire pops.
Sparks drift up the chimney.
Outside the storm continues its relentless assault against the windows.
I settle back into the sectional and close my eyes.
But I can still see her behind my eyelids.
Can still smell coconut shampoo and woodsmoke.
Can still feel the phantom weight of her in my arms from last night.
Tomorrow the storm might break.
Tomorrow we might get communications back.
Tomorrow we might go our separate ways.
But today we’re just two people sharing warmth by a fire.
Two people fighting the cold.
And I’m... I’m fighting something else, too.
This pull toward her that makes no fucking sense.
Christ, listen to me. Acting like there’s something mutual here.
She hates my fucking guts.
Made that crystal clear this morning when she found out who I am.
What I’ve done.
I poisoned her grandmother’s village and now I’m sitting here cataloging the curve of her neck like some kind of obsessed asshole.
This attraction of mine... it’s just one problem among a series of problems.
A problem I need to bury deep until this disaster ends and she can get the hell away from me.
Which is exactly what she’ll do.
And then I can go back to being alone.
Where I belong.