Chapter 13
Thirteen
The kitchen was quiet that same evening, with only the tick of the clock and the low hum of the ceiling fan for company.
Fresh from the shower, Amara set the kettle to boil, reaching for the cocoa tucked on her shelf.
If life at boarding school and police barracks had taught her anything, it was how to make the perfect hot chocolate in less-than-ideal conditions.
No fancy milk frothers. No stovetop heating. Just boiled water from the kettle.
The secret was getting the cocoa powder to dissolve properly—to get no powdery clumps, or a half-mixed sludge at the bottom—by stirring the mixture with water for that right consistency, and the milk for that perfect drinking temperature.
The final touch, adding a square of real chocolate dropped in to melt slowly.
A trick she’d learned after one too many bland, powdered disappointments.
It wasn’t fancy. But it was her way.
As she stirred the hot chocolate, its warm, rich aroma curled up around her, and her thoughts drifted back to Tilly’s words—the weight of old stories, lost legacies, and that cold case file of the missing overseer.
Normally, she’d let thoughts like that settle, let them twist into neat case notes in her mind, having gone over that case file while Porter was out on a call.
But tonight, she didn’t want to be a cop.
She didn’t want to over-analyse every detail—not after Porter’s lecture about her needing to lighten up.
She snorted, taking a sip from her mug. Lighten up?
No way was she letting Porter have the satisfaction of being right, even if he was infuriatingly good at getting under her skin, making her question things she’d always taken seriously.
Because he wasn’t wrong. The prick.
She could be… rigid.
A rule follower to the core.
Because rules stopped the chaos, and they helped protect her from the hurt.
Rules had their place.
Putting the milk back into the fridge, she closed the door and stared at the blank space. It had almost been a week since she’d found her Not-to-Love List staring back at her—complete with Porter’s cheeky edits.
Maybe it was time she turned the tables…
She grabbed a notepad from the bench and clicked open her pen and started scribbling:
THE NEW HOUSE RULES:
Rule #1: No stealing coffee or cocoa rations. (Porter, this means you.)
Seriously, the man had three different coffee varieties taking up bench space, next to the kettle. One of them was decaf—which was a crime in itself. Alongside them sat a line-up of protein shake powders, like he was preparing for a triathlon, not a long shift at the station.
His food was just as methodically arranged, the fridge a system of precision, with neatly stacked jars of overnight oats speckled with chia seeds.
More jars with salads and sliced fruit, along with containers of pre-portioned meals—meat, rice, and vegetables—lined up like soldiers.
The freezer held foil-wrapped meals, all labelled and ready to go, as if he only cooked once a week, prepping every meal into a perfect grab-and-go routine.
It was ingenious, really. An efficient system that obviously worked for his varying shifts. And Porter had already warned her about messing with his meal system.
At first, she thought he was joking. Now, having inspected the results, she understood.
Not that she was judging.
No, because judging him would mean admitting that Porter—laid-back, messy-uniform-wearing Porter—was actually just as much of a control freak in his own way, and that he was right—she judged. A lot.
But she wasn’t ready to admit that.
However, she was ready to try teasing him…
Rule #2: No tracking dirt through the house. (Even if it’s just a little red dust.) You’re a simple guy and this is a simple rule—leave your boots at the door. And I’ll agree to set up my amazing automatic robot vacuum to do the floors while sleeping.
What else could she add?
She tapped her pen against her lips, her eyes roaming the room for inspiration, until they landed on the coffee mug drying by the sink. Chunky. Touristy. Made in China. One of at least a dozen others—all from Speedway events, dating back fifteen years. Maybe more.
She knew nothing about Speedway, except that it was a car-racing thing in the dirt. Right?
Which suddenly made perfect sense. Of course Porter would have a thing for fast cars. After all, he’d just renovated a shed for all his mechanical toys, like a proper rev-head who was just missing the mullet and a beer-stained blue singlet.
She smirked, adding to her list:
Rule #3: Do we really need 652,387 mismatched mugs in the kitchen? This is a house, not a pit lane canteen. I didn’t realise we were running a Speedway memorabilia museum. (Do they at least come with a sponsorship deal?)
Rule #4: Respect the hat collection. (Yes, my hats. No, you can’t wear them.)
Porter had already made a few remarks about her pink stockman’s hat, and she knew more were coming.
But she’d claimed her space.
The bright pink stockman’s hat now had a home—hanging proudly on the vacant hook along the bare wall that ran from the kitchen to the main living area, where it added a pop of colour to the room. Bright, bold, and impossible to ignore.
But for how long?
Rule #5: Hands off my chocolate stash. (This is not a drill. Theft will be severely punished to the full extent of the law.)
Porter already hogged all the prime fridge space for his ridiculously organised meal prep system—but her chocolate supply. Non-negotiable.
She had it safely tucked away on her designated shelf, where it would remain untouched.
Well, it’d better remain untouched.
And if Porter even so much as breathed near her emergency stash, he’d soon learn all about her police training, which included advanced interrogation techniques.
And she knew how to beat up men—a lesson learned from her days on the station, long before she put on the uniform.
A skill her father decided she needed to have before he lost the fight that mattered the most.
It was enough to sober her up, stepping back from the list.
Was she flirting? Or just teasing?
She couldn’t tell.
What she knew was she needed to keep this strictly platonic.
Even if Porter’s kiss had been better than it had any right to be—better than a slow sip of hot chocolate on a cold winter’s night.
Better than the thrill of a fast gallop over open country.
And yet, here she was, still thinking about it almost a week later.
She clicked the pen again and wrote out the next rule:
Rule #6: No flirting with housemates. Friends and work colleagues only. You have your job, I have mine, we can be professionals. (Because I am absolutely not falling for that, Porter.) No more kissing!!
She paused, tapping the pen against the page, then grinned, feeling the satisfaction of adding that extra exclamation mark, to show she wasn’t compromising on that one at all.
Sitting back, she let herself enjoy the moment—the quiet, the warmth of her hot chocolate, the silly satisfaction of writing rules that Porter would break the first chance he got.
See? She knew how to have fun.
Maybe this housemate situation wouldn’t be so bad.
Especially when she had a horse to ride in the morning, a comfy bed waiting, and a house that no longer smelled like a brewery or echoed with Cold Chisel and old country rock. Tonight, the silence was a comfort. And for once, she wasn’t overthinking the future.
After attaching the list to the fridge door, she switched off the kitchen light and padded down the hallway, pausing just long enough to murmur, ‘Night, Porter.’
He was out on patrol. But still—she smiled as she closed the door behind her.