Page 25 of Flare

“Yeah, well, this sink might not,” I grumbled, noting the way his hair was styled up off his forehead and held in place by some no doubt pricey concrete gel shit. It exposed his eminently nibble-worthy ears, one of which sported a silver ear cuff thingy fitted around its rim that shouldn’t look as filthily erotic as it did.

“What are you doing, Uncle Beck?” Jack dragged my thoughts back from the gutter.

“Not so much, as it turns out. Pass me a tea towel, will you?” Seconds later, one magically appeared. I wrapped the leak, then wiped my face on my sleeve and blinked rapidly to clear the mucky water from my eyes.

“Rhys gave me a ride home. Dinner smells great.” Jack’s face appeared above mine, nose wrinkled in distaste. “What’s that stink?”

“Our blockage,” I fired back. “If only I could find the bloody thing. Can someone pass me that bendy coil thing?”

“You mean theflexi-pipecleaner?” There was a smile in Rhys’s tone that I wanted to slap from the cheeky fucker’s face.

I peered up at him from inside the cupboard. “Exactly. I wasn’t sure you’d understand the technical term.”

He snorted.

“You two have obviously got this, and I’ve got homework to do.” Jack hightailed it out of there, no doubt in case he was asked to actually do something, which left the two of us... alone.

I wriggled free of the cupboard, acutely aware of my appalling state. Fuck it. If Rhys couldn’t handle a bit of dirt, it would put a much-needed nail or six in the coffin of my ridiculous crush. Bring it on.

But instead of a curling lip, I found smiling brown eyes and the beginnings of a smirk on those full, pouty lips. Fuck, he was beautiful, and I took a moment to simply drink in the sight of him standing in my kitchen.

“Damn, look at you.” I circled my finger in the air and he threw his arms to the side and did a slow turn while I did my best not to drool.

He wore an outfit trendy enough to put my teeth on edge: dark grey trousers rolled up to show a peek of ankle above pointy black shoes, a long-sleeved black T-shirt that fit his toned body tight enough to require vacuum extraction, a black leather jacket so soft I itched to touch it, and a green tartan scarf tied jauntily around his neck.

“Do I pass?” He sounded almost nervous, like he genuinely cared what I thought which surprised me.

I bit back the flippant comment poised on the tip of my tongue. “Yours?”

He nodded.

“Well, you look… amazing.” And I meant it. He looked gorgeous, chic, sexy and expensive, and so far out of my league I’d need oxygen just to survive the rarefied atmosphere surrounding him. I’d been an idiot. Of course he hadn’t texted me. He was a bird of paradise to my brown-sparrow life.

And yet he was here, in my house. I let that sink in as I struggled to my feet. He offered a hand, but I got there on my own. “Trust me, you don’t want to come anywhere near.” I wiped my filthy hands on my saturated jeans. “Thanks for dropping Jack home. You didn’t need to do that.”

When he didn’t answer, I looked up and stilled. He was standing, staring, his gaze travelling the length of my body in an excruciatingly slow crawl, and I suddenly remembered I was shirtless. And what Iwaswearing clung soaking wet against my skin. I attempted to suck my stomach flat, then cursed myself for being ridiculous and let it go.

I was forty, dammit. Gravity, genetics, and some excellent canteen food already had a death grip on my biology. No point pretending otherwise. If Rhys preferred his men cut and muscled, he needed to ride that train right on past me. The only thing cut and muscled about me these days were the two sirloin steaks I had wrapped in my fridge, and I could live with that.

His gaze finally made it back to mine, along with an appreciative smile, and I figured I could field just one more of those hot-as-fuck looks with my ‘get out of jail free’ card before I sported wood and got myself busted. So when he took a step toward me, I panicked and backed against the countertop.

As if he knew what I was thinking, Rhys snorted and crouched to check the problem under the sink instead of doing whatever it was I thought he was going to do, which shall remain nameless, and my face blew hot.

Feeling like an idiot, I stepped behind him to do the same, caught by the way the smooth, shiny weave of his trousers hugged every luscious curve. Okay, so maybe we weren’t looking at thesameproblem.

He pushed the disconnected pipes around a bit, shook a few drops of rank water from his impeccably manicured hands, and pushed to his feet. “You got a couple of towels?” He shrugged his jacket off his shoulders and put it on the breakfast bar before peeling off his shirt to reveal far, far too much smooth olive skin for a man of my age to be expected to cope with on a Friday afternoon without a drink in my hand... or two.

It took an embarrassing minute to peel the tongue from the roof of my mouth, but I managed. “And exactly what do you think you’re doing?” I arched a brow.

He turned and winked. “Fixing your pipes, Mister Northcott.”

And no, I wasn’t fucking going there.

He continued, “But I’m not about to ruin my clothes if I can possibly avoid it, so if you’ll just get me those towels to lie on, I can probably keep my trousers on. What do you think?”

Dear God.“Yes. Keep them on... please.” I mustered a stern look. “But you really don’t need to bother. I have everything under control. Another minute and I’d have had it cleared.”

“Of course you would. Now, go find me those towels and I’ll get theflexi-pipeready to go.” There was nothing but amused determination in those eyes.

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