This is a three shot set before my other story Cora's Hero but it makes sense without it. I DON"T OWN HEROS

Claire Bennett was shocked. When her uncle had called her asking for her help in baking his girlfriend, Emma's, birthday cake she had thought that it was going to be the two of them (mostly her) baking a chocolate cake in his tiny kitchen. She hadn't thought that when she got there her uncle would be mysteriously absent from the apartment, nor had she expected the kitchen to look like a war zone. Flour, sugar, and other powdered baking ingredients were covering just about every flat surface, there were several broken eggs oozing off the edges of counters, and what looked like brown goo was dripping from the ceiling above the mixer and among the mess stood Gabriel Grey looking equal parts angry and amused.

"What the hell?" Claire asked as she stared at the former serial killer and her uncle's roommate. Gabriel turned toward the confused blonde standing in the doorway and couldn't help the small smile that crept up on his face as he watched her blue eyes take in the full extent of the mess.

"Peter started without you." He said, "I came home to this…" he gestured around the kitchen, "and Peter looking like a ghost from a bad horror movie. I banned him from the house until the kitchen was clean and the cake baked."

"How did he even manage to cause this much destruction" Claire asked in wonder as she tossed her purse and jacket onto the couch in the living room before entering the room.

"Peter can't cook; at all." Gabriel said as he shook his head. He picked up the mixing bowl, spoon, and spatula that Peter had used and tossed them in the sink. "I'll clean up these dishes then we can start on the cake. There's no use in cleaning this up till after the cakes in the oven."

"Sounds fine to me," Claire said somewhat dazedly as she watched the chocolate goop fall onto the marble countertop.

Forty-five minutes later Emma's birthday cake was made and in the oven while Claire and Gabriel were hard at work cleaning up Peter's mess. Both were already covered in the flour having it been hard to avoid and their footprints crisscrossed over the floor but the brown goo was gone thanks to Gabriel and the countertops were wiped clean. The floor was all that was left and as Gabriel left to get the mop Claire leaned against the refrigerator. Two years ago, heck five months ago, she would never have thought she would be baking a cake and cleaning a kitchen with Sylar. She would have had anyone who had even suggested the idea committed and yet here she was; the two of them were almost… friends even much to Peter's delight.

"Alright," Gabriel said as he brought in the mop. "Once we mop the floor I think we're done."

"Except for the small fact that we are now covered in this crap;" Claire countered as she gestured to the pair of them. She had to admit, Gabriel was kind of cute with egg and cake batter in his hair and flower all over his black clothes. She doubted she looked much better.

"Correction," he said as he ran water over the mop to wet it, "after the floor is clean and we shower we'll be done."

"Do you think this was Peter's plan?" Claire asked as she watched Gabriel mop the floor, absentmindedly admiring the way his muscles constricted under his black t-shirt. "I mean do you think he purposely screwed all this up just so we would have to make the cake for him?"

"It's definitely possible," Gabriel paused mid-swipe of the mop, "however I can think of worse ways to spend the evening." Claire smiled softly to herself, glad that Gabriel's back was turned toward her, and pressed her palms against the cool refrigerator door in hopes to cool down. She was sure it was just the oven making her feel hot all of a sudden.

"Yeah, it certainly beats sitting at home watching reruns of bad sitcoms." Claire agreed as she carefully padded over the wet floor to where her glass of lemonade was sitting next to the half empty bag of flower they had yet to put away.

"Peter loves to watch old sitcoms," Gabriel groaned, "they're all bad."

"Hey!" Claire shouted in mock outrage, "I happen to love watching old reruns!"

"Liar," Gabriel said as he glanced over his shoulder at her with a smirk. Claire rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, well…" whatever else she was going to say was cut off as she tried to hop up onto the countertop but ended up slipping on the wet floor, spilling her glass, tipping over the flour onto the floor, and tripping Gabriel all at the same time.

"Claire," Gabriel groaned when he had regained enough sense to realize he was on his back and once again covered in flour.

"Sorry," Claire squeaked out as she bit her bottom lip. "It was an accident."

"You're just lucky I love you." He muttered without thought. It wasn't until he heard Claire's gasp that he realized his mistake. He shot upright, "Claire!" he said panicked. "I didn't…"

"Did you mean it?" she asked softly as she stared at the stammering man. "Do you really love me?" Gabriel sighed.

"Yeah… I do." He admitted as he looked down at the floor. He hadn't meant to tell her that, not yet at least.

"Ok," Claire replied and before he knew it Claire's lips were on his. His only coherent thought was that he thought Claire tasted like chocolate.

There's part-one... Review please!