Chapter 12 Gabriel
The pizza arrives and our group migrates to the living room, which Cain has already set up for games, a stack of boxes on the coffee table with the architectural ambition of someone who intends to get through all of them.
He does this every time. I’m not sure when he’ll learn that his wife’s games are never board games.
Piper has been put to bed with impressive efficiency by both her parents working in total wordless sync, and it makes me smile seeing the way Rhiannon and Cain have become such amazing parents.
Now it's just the seven of us with two pizzas, a pitcher of margaritas, and apparently an extremely competitive game of Twister that’s about to kick-off.
My sister claps her hands together, her grin devilish. “The first game tonight is Twister, but it’s not your normal game of Twister because it has a twist.”
Of course it does.
I glance around her cozy, eclectic living room, noting the familiar faces gathered for one of her infamous game nights.
Her husband Cain lounges on the couch, looking like he’s found nirvana after putting their daughter Piper to bed.
My youngest sister Eden is nestled next to her boyfriend, a guy who I don’t dislike, but still don’t see them being end-game, and my cousin Natasha lounges with a drink in hand.
And then there’s Alessia—adorable as ever in tight black jeans and a purple long-sleeved tee, her dark brown hair falling in loose waves around her shoulders.
She looks relaxed for the first time since that night she mistook me for Roman and kissed me like she was looking for her last breath inside my mouth, but there’s still a flicker of guardedness in her eyes.
That same defense she seems to always have up around strangers.
“Okay, so the twist is… well, I’m not playing.
” Rhiannon gestures to her pronounced baby bump with mock exasperation.
“But I’ll spin the board and ask trivia questions.
If you get the question right, you stay put.
If you get it wrong, you move to the color the pointer landed on with the body part. It’s simple.”
I chuckle darkly. Alessia has no idea what she’s signed up for because Rhiannon’s idea of trivia is never rated PG.
Actually, all the games that she comes up with for our game nights aren’t.
There’s always a twist. Usually, it ties into her career as a sex therapist since these are games she suggests for ‘bonding’ with her couples.
“First up is Gabriel and Aly!” Rhiannon announces with theatrical flair.
I hide my smile.
I push to my feet and take my place at one end of the mat.
Alessia stands at the opposite side, determination etched on her face like she’s prepping for battle.
She’s doing everything possible not to look at me now, but I saw her checking me out earlier, the quick glances she thought went unnoticed.
I already know she wants me. That much was clear when she was running her little “operation” on me instead of my cousin. Her eyes are sharp and focused, but they keep drifting back to me anytime she thinks I’m not looking.
The attraction isn’t subtle. It’s thick. Heavy. It sits between us like a live wire, buzzing every time she steps too close, or her voice drops half an octave.
This could go one of two ways tonight.
One, she lets that guard of hers slip just a little.
Just enough for me to slide in. We flirt.
I say something soft in her ear that makes her swallow a little harder.
My hand finds her waist. Maybe we end up back at my place, the tension that’s between us finally breaking, her nails digging into my shoulders like she’s been waiting for someone to do this with.
There’s no future talk. Just heat and skin and one reckless night of release that we both desperately need.
God, I want that. But here’s the problem.
Alessia doesn’t just have walls built around her heart and mind.
She has fortifications. Hurt wrapped tight around her like barbed wire.
And I can see it. I can feel it every time she stiffens after laughing, like she caught herself enjoying me too much.
Every time her eyes linger a little too long. And I get it.
The other option is she keeps all of that locked down. Keeps me at arm’s length. Builds her new life here in Brookhaven with my cousin and sisters and never lets me get close enough to for us to break.
And I let her. Because as much as I want her, I’m not sure I want to sign up to be the guy who has to pry those walls apart brick by brick.
I want her wild and breathless in my bed for one night.
I just don’t know if I want to bleed trying to get her there.
I’ve bled before for a woman, and it didn’t end well for me.
Rhiannon spins the wheel. “Okay, right hand, red. And the trivia question is: Is shoe size really related to dick size?”
Alessia’s lips part in surprise. Her gaze darts to my feet before she can catch herself. I grin when her eyes snap back to mine, her cheeks flushing a soft pink. I’m in nothing but my socks now, perfect for her to assess my foot size. I’m tempted to ask if she’d like a measuring tape.
“What kind of question is that?” she mutters.
Rhiannon winks. “Welcome to adult Twister. These aren’t your usual trivia questions.”
Alessia laughs and it’s that unguarded one where I can see the cracks through her armor. “Okay, I’m going to guess that yes, shoe size is related to… dick size.”
Rhiannon looks to me for my answer.
“Yes,” I say before adding to get a reaction out of her, “I’m a size 11. For research purposes.”
Her eyes narrow like she’s fighting the urge to roll them, and Cain snickers from the couch.
Rhiannon claps dramatically. “Wrong! Both of you! There is no conclusive evidence that links shoe size to penis size. Though, if you ask me, Cain’s a size 11.5, and well…”
She lets the implication hang there like low hanging fruit, and I immediately decide I’m not going to think about that. I’d rather not picture my brother-in-law in any scenario that requires imagination.
Cain’s a nice guy. Perfect for her. He’s the only man who ever managed to pull Rhiannon out of her own head long enough to take a real shot at love.
He was persistent about it, though. When we were in our twenties, we became stand in parents to Eden.
Somewhere between school drop offs and late-night panic attacks, the reckless, carefree years most people get just…
slipped past us. I don’t think Cain just fell in love with my sister.
He reminded her how to be herself again.
How to trust. How to relax. I’ll always owe him for that and the family that he’s built with her.
I shake my head and laugh, pressing my right hand onto a red circle. Alessia, of course, chooses the identical spot farthest from me like there’s a restraining order in place and we must maintain our distance.
“Next question! What’s the average length of an erect penis?”
Alessia hesitates. “Average? Um, five inches?”
“Erect?” Rhiannon whisper shouts a stage gasp as if that’s a horrifying response even for her, someone who talks about sex for a living.
Ah. Her ex must’ve set the bar low. “Average? Ah, seven inches.”
Rhiannon smiles at us both. “Look at how in sync you two are! You’re both right! The average penis length is between five to seven inches.” She spins again. “Left foot, yellow. Okay, how many nerve endings does the clitoris have?”
“One thousand,” Alessia answers confidently.
“Five hundred,” I toss out, skeptical because I’ve got no fucking clue on this one.
Rhiannon shakes her head, delighted. “Eight thousand! And Cain touched every single one of them last night!”
Laughter erupts around the room. Alessia even chuckles too, her posture loosening as she slides her foot onto yellow but maintains her social distancing. I match her stance, the proximity growing slightly tighter now that we’ve got our limbs on two spots.
Rhiannon’s eyes glint with mischief. “Time to up the stakes. Natasha, Eden, you’re in. Go join Gabriel and Alessia.”
They jump up eagerly, and it hits me, this is about to get crowded. Put four grown adults on one Twister mat and chaos is inevitable. For me especially since I’m easily two times the size of these women and much less coordinated.
Rhiannon spins the tiny black pointer again. “Left hand, blue. Question is how often do women orgasm during penetrative sex?”
Natasha and Eden toss out their guesses, ones that I don’t pay attention to because I’d rather not know what they’re thinking, and all eyes shift to Alessia, who looks suddenly nervous and unsure.
“Um, five percent of the time?” she ventures.
My gaze darkens as it settles on her, cutting straight through that easy, offhand tone she’s pretending to wear. Five percent?
If that’s actually been her experience, then the men she’s been with clearly didn’t have a clue what they were doing.
“One hundred percent of the time if they’re with me,” I respond.
Rhiannon laughs, Natasha and Eden make some sort of groaning noise and Alessia finally looks at me.
“You’re all wrong. It’s twenty-five percent of the time for intercourse, eighty percent if oral is performed. Move your arms, kids.”
We shift. This time, I watch Alessia move first, mapping my strategy around her.
Eden and Natasha claim the spots closest to me, leaving me with no choice but to stretch my arm all the way across Alessia’s back.
And the position we end in, well, let’s just say I’m practically hovering over her body underneath me, legs spread wide, my body angled far too suggestively for polite company.
My pelvis brushes against her ass and it takes everything inside me to breathe and not fall on her.
It’s been a long time. Okay, since that kiss that she gave me a few weeks ago, since I’ve touched a woman’s body.
Since I’ve really noticed a woman’s body.
And before that, it’d been months since I’d had sex.
“You could’ve gone under me,” she says, twisting her head slightly to meet my gaze.
Her eyes are the darkest shade of chocolate, warm and wounded, but there’s a new ease there now—something that’s a tiny bit softer.
She’s having fun. And that’s what matters most to me tonight.
She needs friends. My family can be her friends. That’s all she really needs right now.
I lean in slightly, “Would you like me to change positions?”
Her eyes widen a fraction. “I mean, if you think you can without falling and losing.”
I laugh. “Don’t underestimate my agility.” Or maybe she should. You hit thirty-years old and your whole body begins to crack like a glow stick which means making this change might be dangerous.
I do it anyway. I shift, slipping my arm out from over her and sliding underneath her instead.
Flipping onto my back with my hands holding me up in a position that’s not comfortable and I’m certain I’ll pay for tomorrow; I splay out like a starfish.
One hand is on yellow, the other on blue.
My legs stretch just enough to brush against the colors in front of us, and Alessia’s hovering above me now, arms trembling as she tries to hold herself up and not touch me.
We’re in some sort of cowgirl position that looks extremely suggestive and wholly destructive.
“Um,” she breathes, wetting her lips—a move that sends my pulse spiking. “My arms are shaking. I might fall on you now.”
I smile up at her, our lips practically a breath apart. “So, fall. I’ll catch you.”
The room fades. The laughter, the game, the pizza and the margaritas, my family watching—none of it matters anymore. It’s just us, suspended in this charged space, waiting for the shift. The moment where everything breaks.
I hear Rhiannon spin the board again, barking out a question but it’s too late for either of us to notice or catch it because her arms are giving out, a surrender both literal and figurative, and she’s collapsing onto my chest.
I catch her, of course, but that means I also lose my arms which sends us both in a thud to the floor.
She lands against me; her curves molded perfectly to mine in a way that feels so fucking good.
I brush a strand of her dark hair from her flushed face, our eyes locking.
There it is again—that tension, that pull.
Wounded, nervous, but undeniable desire is shining through.
“You okay?”
She bites down on her full bottom lip and nods. “Yeah. Are you?”
I smile. “Never been better. Let’s get out of here,” I whisper so that only she can hear that part.
She nods, a little breathless, a little nervous, but fully committed now. “Okay.”
Rhiannon’s voice shatters the bubble when she deadpans, “Well, you two are obviously out of the game. You’re touching every color and spot at the same time.”
“Obviously,” I chuckle, as Alessia scrambles to sit up, her face flushed with more than just exertion.
“Yeah, sorry, my arms gave out,” she mumbles, brushing herself off and totally avoiding my sister’s eye contact, though Rhiannon’s knowing smirk says she’s not buying it, nor does she care.
I stand, offering Alessia my hand, which she takes without hesitation. Her skin is soft when it connects with mine. I wonder if she minds how rough and callused my hands have become from years of working in carpentry and construction. She doesn’t seem to.
“I’m going to walk Alessia home,” I announce casually.
“Sure, you are,” Natasha snickers from the couch. I give her a smile.
“I’ll be home later,” I tell Eden.
“I won’t wait up!” she calls behind me.
I don’t let go of Alessia’s hand as I guide her to the door. I don’t pay them anymore mind, either.
“Come on,” I murmur, my thumb brushing over her knuckles tenderly. “Let’s get you home.”
I can’t wait to see how she is with her walls down, even if it’s just for a night. Even if I’m not the man who brings them down permanently, something tells me that tonight will help both of us.