Head Over Heels In Love (Jackson Family Distillery #4)

Chapter 1

CHAPTER 1

“W hat the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Millie Danes let out a small screech as her heart jumped into her throat. Not literally. She knew that wasn’t the way hearts work, but it damn sure felt like it. The organ pounded in her chest, reverberating up her throat at the loud demand from behind her. The bobby pin she’d been using—unsuccessfully—to try and unlock her car door fell to the ground with a tiny ping, so soft she could barely hear it over the blood rushing in her ears. Again, not how blood worked, but that’s the phrase people used in books and right now she couldn’t think of any other way to describe what her body was doing.

Panicking, Millie girl. We’re panicking.

Right, that. Loud sounds always startled her. Sound was always a bit tricky for her with her audio processing disorder. She turned to answer the very rude demand, but words escaped her as she stared up, and up, into one of the most handsome and grumpy looking faces she’d ever seen. The white guy standing behind her was tall. Not saying much since she barely topped five two, but he towered over her by at least a foot. His arms were crossed over his chest, and he did not look happy to see her. Weird since she’d never met the man in her life. What could she have done to piss him off?

His sandy brown hair was short and clean cut. His lips were pressed into a firm, disapproving scowl so she couldn’t tell how full they were. But she knew how loud they could be. His shout still rang in her ears. But what really got her were his eyes. Piercing blue, like the sky on a bright summer day. Not as warm, though. No, these eyes were cold and hard. He glared at her, opening his mouth to speak when she remained silent.

“I said, what the hell are you doing.”

The stun of his handsome looks wore off quickly as irritation set in. Who talked to strangers that way?

“I heard you,” she said, lifting her chin and affecting her most haughty tone. “I bet the whole town heard you.”

She hadn’t been in Kismet very long, two weeks to be exact, but she knew the place was smaller than most of the places she’d laid her head to rest.

“If you must know, Mr. Manners,” she continued ignoring his bushy arched eyebrow at her nickname. “I’m trying to get into my car. I must have locked my keys inside. I can’t find them and normally the bobby pin trick does the job, but it’s being a pain today.”

“Your car?” He said it like a question, but his face held a hint of amusement.

“Yes. My car.” Bending down she let out a huff of frustration, grabbing her fallen bobby pin and raising to glare at the sexy stranger who ruined her progress and her mood for the day. “Look, buddy—”

“Ace.”

“Huh?”

Mr. Manners uncrossed his arms and pointed to himself. “I’m Ace.”

“Like the hardware store?”

His brow drew down in confusion. She pasted a cheery smile on her face, doing her best to refrain from singing the company’s jingle. Something told her Mr. Grumpy Pants wouldn’t find the humor in it.

“Never mind. Hi Ace, I’m Millie and as I was saying I’m trying to get into my car so unless you have a lockpick or you’re a locksmith I’d appreciate it if you’d stop shouting at me and move on with your day.”

She turned back to the car, hunching down to inspect the lock again. It looked weird. Different than she remembered. Weren’t there a few scratches missing? She’d locked her keys in her car so many times. The hairpin trick usually worked—and left a ton of marks on the locks. Thank goodness she had to drive an old clunker. One of those new electric cars would be impossible to pick open.

“I’m not a locksmith and I don’t have a lockpick set,” Ace’s deep voice said from behind her.

She released a heavy sigh, wishing this man would just go away and let her work. What was his deal anyway?

“But I do have the key.”

At those words her hands stilled, pin hovering millimeters from the door. She stood and turned, confusion and relief swirling inside her. Why did he have her keys? Had she left them at the coffee shop when she grabbed a donut and latte? She did that sometimes. Once she left her keys in a men’s room gas station. In her defense the women’s was full and in her rush to get out of the smelly, dirty, room she’d forgotten to grab them from the sink. She really should get a lanyard or something for them. Keep them around her neck so she’d never lose them.

“You have my keys?” She grinned up at Ace, reaching out for the silver metal keys dangling from his fingers.

“No.” His hand closed around them before she could grab them. “I have my keys.”

She frowned, frustration mounting. What was this guy’s problem? All she wanted to do was get in her car and decompress for a few minutes before heading to her job interview. Why was he being so rude and cryptic?

“What?”

“My keys.”

He opened his palm and that’s when Millie noticed the keys in his hand were not hers. For one thing, the key ring was a simple plain, boring silver. It didn’t have her tiny squish gecko or her clicker fidget, or any of the tchotchke she kept on her key ring.

“How are you constantly losing something with so much shit on it?”

Her sister’s voice rang in her head. So what if she kept a lot of things on her keyring. It made it easier to identify when she lost it. But this was most definitely not her key ring. It had no pizzazz and more keys than she thought was possible. How many cars did this guy own? Maybe he had a few houses. Or maybe he was a security guard somewhere. Didn’t matter. What really mattered was…

“Your keys?”

He nodded, the frown returning to his face. “My keys. To my car.”

He pointed behind her and an uneasy sense of dread filled her.

Oh no. No, no, no, no, no. Please don’t let it be—

Yup. Upon closer inspection this was not her car. It was the same make and model, even the same color, but it was most definitely not her car.

“Not again,” she mumbled under her breath.

“Again?” Ace’s brow lifted. “Just how often do you mistake your car for other people’s?”

More times than she was going to admit to him. Wasn’t her fault entirely. Even though it was an older model, it was a very common car type and color. That’s why she got such a great deal on it when she bought it at the used car lot. They had a ton of them. All the same. It’d be easy for anyone to mix them up. Which was why she’d adorned her’s with personality. Looking closer she saw her mistake.

“I should have realized this wasn’t Little Blue.”

“Little Blue?” Ace’s confused voice sounded behind her, but her focus was still on the car, noticing all the differences she should have seen, but didn’t.

“There’s no pink fuzzy dice hanging from the rearview mirror,” she noted.

“Of course not, that’s a visual hazard.”

“None of my bobble heads are on the dash.”

“That’s a real danger if you get into an accident,” he said.

Boy, this guy was just a barrel of fun. She’d bet her last dollar he was a hall monitor in high school. Moving around to the back of the car, she nodded. Just as she suspected.

“You don’t have one single bumper sticker.” The back of his car was bare as the day it came off the lot she’d bet. Damn. If she would have seen this, she would have known it wasn’t her car.

“Of course not.” He frowned. “Why would I need a bunch of stickers cluttering up my bumper?”

She stared at him, wondering if he was an alien from Planet Boring. “They give your car personality.”

His dubious expression said he didn’t agree. Fair enough, she didn’t know him but from their small interaction she’d say the guy had the personality of a boiled potato.

“It’s a car. A machine. It’s not alive. It doesn’t have a personality.”

“Well of course it does! It’s an extension of your personality as the driver. Which I guess in your case is accurate since you have none and…” she trailed off as he stared at her as if she’d grown two heads. Okay so she was the weird one, right. Not Mr. Grouch with no personality. Plenty of people put bumper stickers on their car. Political ones, funny ones, stick families and loving adorations for their pets. She was not the weird one here.

“Bumper stickers cause fender benders,” he insisted.

“Pretty sure distracted drivers cause fender benders.”

He scowled. “Yes, and they’re distracted because they’re reading the bumper sticker on the car in front of them instead of paying attention to the road like they should.”

Good grief, was this guy for real? She’d bet he could suck all the fun out of free taco Tuesdays. Ha! Ten to one the guy didn’t even like tacos. No one this grumpy would ever love the pure joy and delight that was the combination of crispy tortilla shell holding spicy meats and veggies with a sprinkle of sharp cheese and flavorful salsa. The guy probably subsisted on oatmeal and dry toast.

“You’re just a ball of fun, aren’t you?”

His face scrunched up in confusion as his head tilted. “What?”

As much as she would love to stay here and try to inject a little personality into Ace—sounded like the worst community service project ever—she had places to be.

“Nothing, look I’m sorry about the,” she waved toward his car door. “Honestly, I didn’t realize this wasn’t Little Blue and I don’t think I caused any damage to your lock so—”

“Why do you keep calling your car Little Blue?”

She frowned, willing her brain to catch up from the interruption as she processed what he asked.

“Little Blue.” She pointed to the car. “Because it’s blue and my car has been with me for ages, outlasting cross country trips, storms, potholes. It keeps running like the Little Engine that could.”

At his frown she pressed on. “You know, the children’s book?”

“I’m familiar,” his tone held zero hints of humor.

“Let me guess, you didn’t name your car?”

“It’s a car,” he stated simply, as if the very idea of naming an inanimate object was ludicrous.

“Okay, well, Ace it’s been…something. Sorry about the mix up and have a good day.”

She doubted he would know what a good day looked like if it smacked him in the face with free cake and a winning lotto ticket. Turning, she glanced along the street, really wishing she’d taken a picture of where she parked her car. She was still getting her bearings in this town. It was small, but unfamiliar. She could have sworn she parked right here but… ah ha! There, across the street—of course it was across the street—was Little Blue. Fuzzy dice, bumper stickers and all.

She hurried across the street, not a car in sight to stop her. Glancing into the driver’s window she saw her keys still in the ignition. Bonehead move, Millie . At least no one had taken her car. She was thankful for that. Grabbing the handle, she let out another grateful sigh as the car door opened. She hadn’t even locked it. How ironic was that?

Right before she slipped into her car, she heard that deep, sexy, irritating voice call from the other side of the small street.

“Millie.”

She glanced up to see Ace scowling at her. Did the man have any other expressions than scowl and superior?

“What?” She looked around, but no one was on the street to hear their shouted exchange. Which was a good thing because the next words out of the man’s mouth made her hackles rise.

“Next time use a bit more common sense before you try breaking into someone else’s car.”

Irritation rose within her. Her mother always taught her to be polite and kind, even to rude people. She’d say you never knew what someone was struggling with, but whatever crawled up Ace’s butt and died wasn’t an excuse for him to treat her like a child that needed to be reprimanded.

“Solid advice Acehole,” she drug out the ‘ce’ part of his name garnering another trademark scowl. “And maybe you should visit a doctor to see if they can remove that stick from your ass.”

Giving him a middle finger salute, she slipped into her car and turned the key. Pulling out of her parking spot, she glanced in the rearview mirror to see Ace standing there, arms crossed over his chest, mouth wide open in shock. Hey, look at that. He did have more than two expressions.

As she drove through town a small pinch of guilt hit her. She had been breaking into his car—unintentionally—but that was enough to make anyone angry. She still maintained it was an honest mistake, and he didn’t need to be such a jerk about it. Whatever. Didn’t matter.

She took a few deep centering breaths as she turned down the road to the small park in the center of town. She was going to do some meditation in the sun, maybe a few yoga poses to center herself, then she was going to head to her job interview and knock it out of the park. No reason to fret further on the sexy yet infuriating Ace whoever he was.

Kismet may be small, but she was certain she could avoid the guy for the rest of her life.