A Slave to Love, Broken Hearts, and Everything In Between

Chapter 21: Renovation Hell

This takes place after A Slave to Broken Hearts and after the Tortured three part collection stories. Enjoy <3

Kiana POV

"You do realize I'm not the one who is going to be living here right?" I asked.

"You do realize you're the only human I have constant company with and therefore your opinion on the kitchen matters most?" Blade replied.

We were in the kitchen of Blade's new house, arguing about what he wanted to do with it. The entire upstairs had already been gutted and demolished to its barest bones, but he wanted to know what to do with the kitchen before gutting the downstairs; if it needed expanding or if its basic structure needed changing, how best to organize it in the space.

His new house was two floors and decently sized, but it was nowhere near the sprawling castle he'd had before: not in size and definitely not in quality. While the outside was a pretty country house, red with white trim and a white wrap around porch, and matching shed, the inside was pretty much an outdated disaster. It hadn't been taken care of and the previous owner was either blind, lazy, or had no taste whatsoever.

Even the outside, a sprawling property of several acres, had been left unloved and uncared for, with tall grass and weeds claiming the land as their own right into the treeline of the forests surrounding the property.

For Blade, this was a godsend. It meant months of work ripping it all apart and building it back up, and having a project and means to keep busy was exactly what he needed right now to feel better instead of rotting away in bed alone with his thoughts.

"I'm sure Jordan would have way more insight into a functional kitchen than I ever could," I pointed out, pulling myself up to sit on the hideous and cracked brown countertop by the sink.

My favorite part of the kitchen was the big window over the double kitchen sink; not only was the sink bigger than mine, but the view looked out onto the sprawling greenery of Blade's property and out into the trees surrounding the land. Nothing but grass, trees, and skies. It reminded me of his old place to be so surrounded by nature, hidden and protected by it from the eyes of the world, and the view here at sunset and sunrise was sure to be just as spectacular.

In my apartment, all I had to look while doing dishes was the wall. Didn't exactly make the chore a great time and my window views looked out on the street or the parking lot of the building.

Not exactly picturesque.

"Jordan isn't the one who's going to be cooking here all the time," Blade replied.

"Who says I'm going to be cooking here at all?"

He fixed me with a sharp look, splaying his palms on the kitchen island and the papers littering the surface where he'd been trying to draw up sketches of possible configurations. "That's the dumbest shit I've ever heard. First of all, if you're going to be hanging out here, you're going to need to eat. Second of all, I'm putting in an air conditioner so guaranteed you're going to be here cooking in the summer because your apartment is a fucking oven on a regular basis and there's no way you can do any of your cooking or baking assignments in that kind of environment."

"Rude. My apartment isn't that bad." It absolutely was.

"Third of all," he continued, "To keep our bond strong, we'll need to spend time together. If you're busy with work and school, you coming here to cook is a good way to multitask so you don't get burned out and stressed trying to fit everything in."

"Just say you want me to come hang out with you. You don't need to use a kitchen to entice me over."

His eye twitched. "I'm going to remove the entire kitchen if you don't help me figure this shit out."