Chapter 17 Gabriel
“Natasha.” It’s both my cousin’s name and a curse now.
I rub my temples, staring down at the absolute disaster that is her electrical system jutting out from the wall of her new home.
The breaker switch is busted beyond reason, and her cords are fried.
This thing is a total fire risk, and I wish she would have never purchased this home without having me do a walk through first. It didn’t even have to be a thorough one.
I would have taken one look at this place and decided it wasn’t worth the good deal she was getting.
I’m going to kill her brother when I see him next.
“I told you I’d have someone come fix this. What’s this mess?”
“Yeah, but you were taking too long, and I didn’t want to bother you,” she says, flashing me a sheepish smile. At least she looks like she somewhat regrets her decision to hire some idiot who didn’t know what they were doing and only made this shit worse.
I exhale sharply. “I’m very busy.”
“And I know that,” she says, all sweet and unapologetic. “You and my brother are slammed getting everything off the ground with the new business. I know you’re behind on deadlines and bleeding money. I thought I was helping. I’m sorry. I’ve made things worse, haven’t I?”
I nod. “You have.” But because I’m a nice guy, and a pushover when it comes to the women in my family, I soften my tone. “We’ll get you out of this mess.”
I flip the switch by the kitchen counter again, like maybe this time, some divine force of electricity will course through the wires, and everything will start working in the home.
It doesn’t. No surprise there.
Daylight is fading fast, and her house is practically a dungeon now. A very cold, dark one.
I sigh and shake my head. “You can’t stay here tonight.”
“I’ll be fine.”
I shake my head again. Because it’s not just Natasha I’m worried about—it’s Aly.
They’ll both freeze if they try to sleep here overnight without any power.
The snowstorms rolling through the northeast have been brutal, and now even the space heater I brought over for Aly two weeks ago won’t work because everything is shot.
“It’s not an option,” I tell her firmly.
“Everything’s going to freeze. I can bring over a generator to keep a few essentials going so that your pipes won’t burst, but it’s not enough to power the whole house.
You need to stay somewhere else until next week when my electrician can come fix this… mess.”
She sighs heavily, her shoulders slumping. “Fine. I can sleep at the bar. There’s a loft upstairs with a bed that the owners said is available if I need it. I practically live there anyway.”
“And Aly?”
“Well, there’s only one bed there, so if you’re hoping for a romantic comedy moment where two women are forced to share one bed and—”
I hold up a hand. “Stop.” Because the image of Aly in bed with my cousin is not one that I want to think about. Especially when I haven’t been able to stop thinking about Aly for the past two weeks since I showered with her upstairs.
She grins, grabbing her purse from the door. “Rhiannon’s old bedroom is free at your house, right? Looks like she’s moving in with you, big cousin.”
Wait.
That’s not… that’s not what I had in mind.
“I’m off to work,” Natasha tosses over her shoulder like a live grenade. “She should be home soon so that you can break the news to her that you’re her new roommate.”
She peeks through the glass of her front door, then smirks. “Oh. Here she is now. Bye!”
I rub my temples, bracing myself as I hear her greet Aly in the doorway. And then she’s here. The woman that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about. The one who’s pussy felt like heaven, who temporarily made me lose control and make a rash, very reckless decision.
She’s blowing through the door like a damn fever dream that I wasn’t prepared to confront today.
Dark curls cascading over her chest. A tight, red dress hugging every inch of her body.
Red-painted lips that could ruin a man if she’d just wrap them around my cock and leave a mark there.
And on her feet—black heels with red bottoms.
She looks like a fucking Valentine’s Day fantasy.
Which reminds me of the red thong that I took from her bathroom floor the night we showered together as a souvenir.
I need to find that thing...
My mouth goes dry.
It’s been two weeks since I last saw her. Since I got my hands on her, since she made those sweet, gasping sounds that I still think about at the worst possible moments or when I’m in the shower each evening, jerking myself off, wishing it was her holding me in her grip instead.
And now she’s here, standing in front of me like temptation wrapped in a red, silk dress.
I’ve been drowning in work. Long hours in the city with Roman, trying to keep the new building project on track while also remodeling a house for my family Boone and Rosie Tremblay in Brookhaven.
Natasha’s place? Yeah, I put it off. She’s not paying me to do this work, and my electrician wasn’t available until mid-February anyway.
I didn’t think it was urgent until today.
But now I’m only slightly regretting that decision.
Because now Aly is moving in. Under my roof.
She’s going to sleep just down the hall from me.
I’m going to smell her body wash in the morning when she gets up for work.
I’m going to sip coffee next to her at my kitchen table while she scrolls through social media posts and the news.
And I’m not sure if that’s a good or bad thing yet.
I’ve always been a protector. Had to be, after my parents passed and I had to make sure my sisters, Eden and Rhiannon, were taken care of, it came naturally.
But it’s not just about them—it’s who I am.
A hard shell, sure—tattoos, control, the kind of man who wants to bring a woman to the edge of pleasure and pain in equal measure.
I like the rumble of my bike beneath my thighs, and the vibration of a woman when she’s coming around my cock.
But underneath all of that I want, no, I like, taking care of what’s mine.
And right now—
In some strange way—
That feels like Aly.
“You look…” My voice comes out rough. “Fuck. You look good today.”
She blushes, biting back a smile. “Hi, Gabriel. How are you?”
Better now that you walked in.
“Fine,” I answer with instead, still looking at her thick curves painted in that dress.
“What’s going on? Natasha said you had something to tell me?”
I exhale, forcing my brain to function. “Yeah. Unfortunately, your electricity is shot.”
I motion toward the flickering candles Natasha lit—an absolute fire hazard that I can’t wait to put out—and the fact that, despite it being the middle of the afternoon, the house is already almost pitched into darkness.
Her face falls. “What does that mean?”
“It means you can’t stay here until I get someone out here to fix it. It’s a fire hazard and the heat doesn’t work. Not that it worked much before either.”
“Shit,” she whispers, glancing around. “None of the power works?”
“No. And it’s gonna get cold fast. I have a generator to keep your fridge running, but beyond that, you need to be somewhere warmer.” And safer.
She groans. “I really need to take a shower.”
“Water works. But if you need a blow dryer or a mirror with actual light…” I shrug. “You’re out of luck.”
“Ugh.”
I hesitate and then take a deep breath. “Good news is since Rhiannon moved out two years ago, I have a spare bedroom. You can stay there if you’d like until we get things working here.”
Her lips part slightly. “Where’s Natasha staying?”
“At the bar. She said there’s just one bed. If you wanted to share it.”
“That’s…unappealing.”
I chuckle. “Figured you’d say that.”
“So, you’re saying,” she bites down on her bottom lip nervously, “that we’d be roommates?”
I like how that sounds. “Yeah. With Eden. But she’s hardly around.”
I leave that last part hanging between us. A small nugget of information. A quiet invitation. A subtle way of saying—it’ll be just us, most nights.
She hesitates. “I see…”
I smile. “Need help moving anything over?”
“For how long?”
Okay, she isn’t as eager about this as I am.
“Should be just a week until my guy can come out and fix things up.”
“A week? There’s no one who can come fix this sooner?”
I shake my head. “Not unless you want to pay for it.”
She chews her lip, clearly unsure on what to do. “No, I definitely don’t have the money to pay for this and there’s no way I’m moving back in with my grandma. She’s already turned my old room into her own personal yoga studio, and the attic has… you know… the ghost.” She shivers.
I have no idea what she’s talking about, but I don’t ask about her grandma’s ghost.
“I’ll just grab a few things from my room and bathroom. Then I guess I’ll walk down.”
I nod, even though every inch of me wants to insist on carrying her bags myself, I can see she needs a moment to process the fact that’s about to share a home with me.
“Call me if you need anything,” I tell her, voice low. “I’ll see you down there in a bit.”
She hesitates, then nods, biting her lip again—like she’s still weighing it all out. “Thank you, Gabriel. For giving me a place to stay.”
I smile. “Not a problem.”
I’m already sure that this might be the best, house fail I’ve experienced yet.