Next Door to You: A Steamy Off-Limits Brother’s Best Friend Romance
Scarlet V. Haines
One reckless hookup.
One brutal goodbye.
Now his brooding, ex-military shadow lives next door—
in the French Quarter, where secrets cling to brick and iron like sweat.
I came home to New Orleans with a ring-shaped bruise and a fresh-start lie.
But the Quarter doesn’t do fresh.
It does history—the kind that breathes.
Humidity clings. Neon hums. Jazz drifts through the alleys like temptation.
And Alex?
Alex is temptation with rules… until it’s me.
He watches from his wrought-iron balcony like a man trained to spot threats—
and trained even harder not to want what he wants.
He keeps his silence like a weapon.
He keeps his control like armor.
And when that control slips… it’s never gentle.
Everyone calls us poison.
I call it gravity.
He calls it mine.
He’s older. Harder. Built from discipline and damage.
The kind of man who scans a room on instinct—
and tracks me like I’m the only target that matters.
He’s my brother’s loyalty… and my private sin.
The man next door with a locked jaw and hands that remember exactly how I sounded when I begged.
He doesn’t flirt.
He doesn’t chase.
He holds the line—until he decides the line doesn’t apply anymore.
Then my ex comes sniffing around, mean and entitled, bold enough to corner me near Jackson Square like I still belong to him.
Alex steps in like a wall.
Like a warning.
Like a soldier who finally has permission to protect what he never stopped wanting.
Meddling family gets loud.
Old mistakes get louder.
And the secret heartbreak between us keeps breathing under the floorboards—
in the courtyard shadows,
in the hush between trumpet notes,
in every look that says I’m not letting you go again.
I left once with my pride in pieces.
This time, Alex builds something with his hands and calls it home.
And the line we crossed years ago becomes a boundary he refuses to respect—
because in his mind, I was never temporary.
I was always his.
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