I broke his bed frame. Then I broke his control.

My dorm is under construction and now I'm crashing in the spare room of a six-foot-four carpenter who smells like cedar and makes me grip the counter every time he reaches for the top shelf. He barely talks. He jaw-clenches instead. I've been cataloguing every single one.

There are eighteen years between us. I used to date his son. I live under his roof.

None of that stops me from dropping down on his workshop floor and asking him to be my first.

His restraint snaps like cheap lumber.

Turns out this carpenter knows exactly how to handle raw material—on the workbench, on the sawhorse, and in his bed where he's already decided I'm staying permanently.

A spicy age gap romance featuring a brooding older carpenter who falls spectacularly hard, a bold younger woman who kept a forty-point file on his jaw clenches and zero regrets about any of it, and the kind of forbidden claim that gets built to last. Includes first-time heat, a possessive silver fox who fixes everything except the way he looks at her, baby-making themes, and a filthy sweet HEA.