Handled

Free with Kindle Unlimited

He moved in broke and broken. The man downstairs decided that was his problem now.

Jamie Cole is a disaster. Twenty-five, broke, barely eating, freelancing from a top-floor apartment he can’t afford. His ex called him “a lot of work.” His bank account agrees. He doesn’t need rescuing. He needs to be left alone to fall apart in peace.

Ethan Ward is the gruff, broad, silver-threaded handyman who lives directly below him — and hears everything through the floors. The pacing. The skipped meals. The 2 a.m. panic attacks. He shows up with a toolbox and a plate of stew and no intention of minding his own business.

When a blown fuse turns into a kiss against the door Jamie’s been slamming all week, what starts as neighborly caretaking becomes something far more dangerous: a forty-year-old man with capable hands and a praise kink that could restructure Jamie’s entire nervous system — and a twenty-five-year-old who’s never once been looked after the way Ethan looks after everything he decides to keep.

But Ethan’s last partner walked out the day he didn’t need him anymore. And Jamie’s one bad invoice from proving he’s exactly the disaster everyone says he is. When Jamie secretly plans to leave before he can become a burden, the man who fixes everything will have to decide if he can fix the one thing that’s actually breaking: himself.

You’ll love this book if you enjoy:

✅ Gruff caretaker with a praise kink and zero chill
✅ Age gap (25/40) where the gap is the point
✅ Neighbors to lovers in a building with zero soundproofing
✅ “Good boy” deployed as a structural engineering term
✅ Panic attacks soothed, dinners enforced, orgasms supervised
✅ A black moment that hits both wounds at once
✅ HEA guaranteed — they literally buy the building