Page 13 of The Power Play

“I don’t know where the breaker box thing is,” I tell him when I see him looking around and it feels so personal to have him in here.

He nods, “Mind if I look around for it?”

I wave him off with a quiet, “fine.” I debate following him but don’t want to come across as overbearing. If he’s telling the truth then he probably knows what he’s doing and I can just sit and wait, hoping it’s an easy fix.

Part of me also recognizes I’m being more of a bitch than I probably should be. He apologized and I really don’t care that he stood me up. But at this point I feel like I’m standing my ground and that I’m not interested in him. Which is translating into bitchiness.

I sit back on the couch and scroll through my phone before I start to feel a little bad. With a groan I decide to extend an olive branch because he is over here helping me first thing in the morning when I know he doesn’t have a ton of down time during the season.

Charlie is up in the attic and clearly had no issues getting up there because once I’m upstairs the hallway is blocked by the pull-down ladder. I cringe looking up at it. I’ve seen enough horror movies to never step foot in places like that. No way.

“Hey, I might go grab some coffee if you want one,” I yell up from the safety of keeping my feet planted on the floor.

He doesn’t respond right away, and I hear some shuffling. I wonder for a moment if he’s ignoring me. I guess I wouldn’t blame him if he was.

Then I hear something falling and a soft, “shit.”

Cringing, I lean against the ladder, “You okay?” I call out.

“Yeah, one second,” he responds with a cough.

That can’t be a good sign.

I step back away from the ladder, hugging myself to try to keep warm because it’s still cold as shit in here. When he comes down a minute later I can’t help myself as I watch his thick jean covered legs climb down backward and once his ass is in view…damn.

I’m no better than a man.

There’s something about hockey butts, though, that is impossible to deny. Even his Henley shirt strains against the muscles on his back that move as he makes his way down toward me. I hate how hot this man is because it’llneverhappen.

He turns to face me, and I give him a small smile that may look a bit awkward.

“You okay?” he asks.

“Yeah? Why?”

“I don’t know, you’re looking at me a little weird,” he shrugs.

“I am not,” I insist.

He just shrugs again.

“Did you find it?” I ask through an eye roll.

“Yeah,” he looks down at our feet, clearly not at all pleased with whatever he found.

“So, what’s the damage?” I ask nervously. I’m not sure If I want to know.

“Um, well honestly I can’t tell too much without opening things up, but it’s not great.”

“What do you mean ‘not great’?”

“I think you have a bit of a pest problem and I’ve found some wires that aren’t attached to anything when I’m pretty sure they should be,” he’s cautious with relaying this news, I can tell because he’s still not looking at me.

“Pests like…what?” my voice cracks.

“Probably mice, or rats,” he winces.

“Ew, what the fuck?” I screech, “And they…what? Chewed through the wires?”

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