The Airbnb was supposed to be your escape—a quiet sanctuary where you could finally take a break from the demands of daily life. Instead, it had become a battleground, a shared space you were forced to endure with him. Sirius.

You hadn’t known his name when you arrived, but the moment he opened the door, tall and intimidating in his worn leather jacket, a flicker of disdain passed over his stormy silver eyes. That was all it took for you to know you weren’t going to get along.

At first, the disagreements were practical. The kitchen was your domain, but Sirius treated it like a personal art studio for brewing the world’s strongest coffee—leaving it looking like a battlefield of spilled grounds and empty mugs. He had no regard for the neatly labeled bins you’d painstakingly organized, and Merlin forbid he ever took out the trash. Meanwhile, he acted as if his side of the shared space was sacred ground, constantly complaining about your music (“Does it always have to be this loud?”) and your tendency to spread your things around.

And yet, there was something about him. Something maddeningly magnetic.

The man was, for lack of a better word, infuriatingly sexy. It wasn’t just his height—though the way he seemed to loom over you, his presence filling every corner of the room, made your pulse race despite yourself. It was the way he carried himself, with the kind of effortless confidence that came from a life spent rebelling against expectations. His silver-streaked hair fell in loose waves to his shoulders, as if he hadn’t bothered with a comb but still managed to look devastatingly put-together. And then there were his eyes—sharp and unrelenting, as though he could see straight through you, even when you were glaring at him.

“You call this clean?” he drawled one evening, gesturing vaguely toward the coffee table. His voice, low and gravelly, sent an unwilling shiver down your spine. “I think a troll could do better.”