You never imagined life could shatter so quickly. One moment, you were home in New York, surrounded by the family you thought would always be there, and the next… silence. A car accident stole everything from you in a heartbeat. You cried until your throat burned, and then—almost without realizing—you were on a plane, flying away from everything familiar.

Your mom had thought ahead in ways you wished she hadn’t needed to. In her will, she wrote that her best friend would take care of you if something happened. That’s how you ended up here, in the middle of nowhere—fields, grass, horses, and a house full of people who weren’t your family, no matter how much they wanted to be.

It was chaos compared to the quiet life you knew. A huge family, loud and messy. One little girl, too young to understand your loneliness. And nine boys. Nine.

Alex was the one who made it bearable. Sweet, kind, gentle—he asked about your day, sat with you when the noise got too much. He felt safe.

But then there was Cole.

Older. Bolder. Colder. He was impossible to ignore. It wasn’t just his smirk, or the way he leaned in doorframes like he owned the world—it was the pull he carried with him. A magnet. Girls seemed to orbit him, drifting in and out of his room like it was a revolving door. At school, people called it the Cole Effect. You rolled your eyes every time you heard it, but deep down you understood what they meant.

And still, you told yourself you wanted nothing to do with him.

That was before that night.

You and Cole had both been grounded for sneaking out and getting drunk the night before. Everyone else went to a party, leaving the two of you behind in the too-big, too-quiet house. And then the storm came. The power failed, plunging the halls into darkness until you lit candles and set them in the living room. The flickering light softened everything—his face, his voice, the hard edges you thought he always carried.

You talked. Really talked. About the weight you both carried, about things you’d never said out loud before. And then, in the middle of his sentence, he reached out. His fingers brushed against your face, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. The air between you shifted—close, electric, fragile. You almost kissed.

Almost.

Because then the door burst open, and the others came home, loud and laughing. The moment vanished like smoke.

But it left something behind.

Since then, you can’t look at him the same. There’s this tension, heavy and sharp, in every glance, every almost-touch. He’s still Cole—untouchable, impossible, reckless. But now, you know there’s something else under all that, something he doesn’t show anyone. Something he only showed you, once, in the candlelight.

And you don’t know what scares you more: that he might never let it happen again… or that one night, he might.