Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
NASH
Nothing kept me from an honest day’s work—not even the Fourth of July. Never mind that it was my favorite holiday, or that Havenbrook on the Fourth was a sight to behold. When duty called, I answered.
Today alone, I’d fixed a screen door that’d come off its hinges, replaced a rotted front porch step, and repaired a window thanks to the impromptu summer storm that’d cropped up a couple nights ago.
In this economy—not to mention the fact that I hoped someday soon to buy out my old man and take over King Construction—I couldn’t be picky about who I took on as clients…even if those jobs happened to be on the Fourth.
I glanced at the clock on the dashboard of my beat-up truck and swore under my breath. If I had any hope of making it to the field for the annual baseball game before Finn Thomas—team challenger to the Havens for the second year—had my balls in a sling, I needed to haul ass.
My cell rang, and I glanced over at the caller ID. Speak of the devil… It wasn’t Finn, but his twin was a close second.
“Yeah, Drew,” I answered, setting my phone to speaker.
“Hey, man. I need a favor. Well, Finn needs a favor, but as usual, he’s sent me to do his dirty work.”
I laughed. “Whatcha need?”
“I can’t find Rory anywhere, and she’s not answering her phone. You know she’s gotta be here for this. You have any idea where she’s at?”
“You sure she’s not out there bossin’ everyone around?”
Drew snorted. “I thought y’all would’ve gotten over this rivalry shit after workin’ together on the bar for so long.”
One would think, but no. If anything, those months of working side by side with Rory had only fanned the flames licking inside me. Flames I’d been trying to put out for too damn long.
“She with her sisters?” I asked.
“Nope, and I can’t exactly grill ’em on why she’s not here.”
“Town hall? Her house? Parents’ place?”
“Nope, nope, and nope.”
“Well, shit.”
“You’re not helpin’ me, man.”
I laughed. “I’m not a fucking psychic. Gimme a minute.”
Havenbrook wasn’t exactly a metropolis where someone could hide in plain sight. It shouldn’t have been this hard to find someone…unless they didn’t want to be found. And as long as I’d known Rory, she’d always stepped straight into the limelight. Had reveled in it, in fact.
Of course, she hadn’t always been on the receiving end of the town’s whispers about her recent divorce, so maybe hiding out was exactly what she was doing.
That thought pinged something in my mind. I’d just finished up a remodel for one of the oldest and stubbornest of Havenbrook’s residents. Miss Norma might’ve been ninety-five, but she was bound and determined to stay in her house until the bitter end—and do so with a brand-new kitchen. All that was left on the remodel were the finishing details, which meant I’d had a partner in the form of snooty, pretentious, overbearing, bossy…and hot-as-hell Aurora Haven for the past too-long-to-count.
“I’ve got one place I can check.” I made a U-turn and headed in the direction of Miss Norma’s house. “Let me see what I find, and I’ll call you back. You better not let ’em start without me. I don’t wanna miss the fireworks, and you know I’m not talkin’ about the ones in the sky.”
Drew laughed. “Wouldn’t dream of it. You’re our ace in the hole on the team. Can’t win without you.”
I snorted and hung up, not bothering to say goodbye. It only took a minute to drive the couple blocks to Miss Norma’s place. Sure enough, Rory’s car was parked right out front. I sent off a quick text to Drew as I got out of my truck, letting him know I’d found Rory and would send her on her way as soon as I could.
I climbed the porch steps, pushed through the unlocked front door like I’d been doing every day for the past month, and stepped over the threshold. Music played softly somewhere inside, so I followed the sound straight into the kitchen—and stopped short, my mouth going dry.
Jesus , did the universe hate me?
That was the only logical explanation. Because if God loved me, there was no way the big guy upstairs would force me through this agony day in and day out. And it was agony. Pure, deep, and unrelenting.
Across the room, the one and only Rory Haven shook her fine ass while teetering high up on a wobbly ladder. She wore fitted, bright-red pants that cupped her backside perfectly and ended at her shapely calves—something too fancy, considering the paintbrush she held. Humming along with the ancient radio on the counter, she rocked her hips to the beat of an old country song, and I tried to talk down my cock, which had leaped to life as soon as I’d laid eyes on her.
She was…stunning. There really wasn’t another word for her, because God knew she’d stunned my ass over and over again—had been stunning me for years. She’d pulled her long, dark hair up in some kind of fancy ponytail, the ends curled and bouncing along the exposed skin of her back as she danced. Her sleeveless, white tank-style blouse was tucked into her indecently tight pants. Only Princess Rory would think it okay to wear a white—and what appeared to be silk—blouse while doing some touch-up painting.
The song ended and another started right up, Rory’s hips not missing a beat. There was no denying it—she was heaven and hell all rolled up into one perfectly petite package. A perfectly petite package I’d love to have wrapped around me until we both collapsed from pleasure. And then maybe once more after that just for the hell of it…
I leaned against the doorframe separating the kitchen from the living area, my hand tucked into the pocket of my shorts. “You should try performin’ that in the Square tonight.”
Rory screeched, arms flailing as she teetered on the already wobbly ladder. I didn’t stop to think as I lunged, hoping to catch her before she fell off the six-foot ladder and straight onto that perfect, heart-shaped ass.
But Rory, being Rory, caught herself. One hand gripping the top of the ladder and the other pressing against her chest, she twisted in my direction, her eyes narrowed and lips pinched in a nasty scowl. “Nash King, what do you think you’re doin ’? You can’t just creep into kitchens and scare the livin’ daylights out of people!”
Fuck, I wished I didn’t get half hard every time she yelled at me, because God knew she did it every damn day. If there was one thing that got Rory riled up, it was when I simply smiled in response to one of her tirades. And because I was a masochist, I did exactly that. I’d had a lot of practice riling her up, and I’d gotten good at it.
“You think I turn this charm on just anyone, princess? I save the kitchen creepin’ only for you and your sweet, swayin’ hips.”
When we’d first started working together more than a year ago on The Willow Tree—Finn and Drew Thomas’s baby and Havenbrook’s first bar—saying things like that to her had actually left her speechless for all of fifteen seconds. Had made her turn the brightest shade of red, and I hadn’t been able to avoid wondering how far that blush went. The thought still haunted me.
She might have still turned pink, but those days of her staying silent, for even fifteen seconds, were long gone.
“You may think the sun comes up just to hear you crow, but I’m not one of your little pet chickens.” She turned up her nose, dismissing me as best she could, and brushed a hand down her front…right over the splatter of paint she’d gotten on her pretty white blouse. Gasping, she dropped the paintbrush in the tray and wobbled again as she pulled the shirt away from her chest, nearly toppling off the ladder as she did so.
“Dammit, Rory!” I surged forward again, gripping the sides of the wooden death trap and securing her on it with nothing more than my body. How did she manage to do this to me? Make me want to pull out my hair, while at the same time cut off my own arms if it would keep her safe.
I tightened my grip on the sides of the ladder, if for no other reason than so I wouldn’t be tempted to run my hands over her body just to make sure she was okay. Her scent enveloped me—something light and floral—and as soon as I took my first deep inhale of her, goose bumps erupted all over her exposed skin.
Her breaths puffed against my lips, and mine parted in response. Even halfway up the ladder and wearing heels, she was only just my height. The rise and fall of her chest pulled my gaze down to her breasts. Small, round, perfect little mouthfuls. Not that I knew that for certain, but I could imagine.
And, shit, had I imagined. For years, I’d been imagining.
“I’m—” Rory’s voice came out breathless and scratchy, so she cleared her throat and tried again. “I’m a perfectly capable adult, thank you very much. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to…” She gestured down the front of her shirt to the paint splatter.
“At least you’re festive.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Red pants. White shirt. Blue paint.” I shrugged. “Seems like a winning combo on the Fourth.”
She huffed, stomping her foot as best she could on the ladder. “Of course you’d make light of this. This is your fault. If you hadn’t surprised me in the first place, none of this would’ve happened. I can’t go out lookin’ like this. I’m gonna have to run on home and change. Heavens, I’m gonna be late…” She placed a hand on my chest and shoved me away so she could climb down the ladder.
I ignored the feeling of her hand on my body, ignored the hitch in her breath as she touched me, and glanced at my watch. We only had fifteen minutes before the start of the annual baseball game her family played in each year. There was no way in hell I could let Rory go home. If she did, she’d miss the opening pitch. And if she missed that, she’d miss the show Finn had been planning for months. If she missed the show… Well, her sister Will would be upset, which would upset Finn, who would, in turn, make my life a living hell for causing his girl grief.
It was a clusterfuck, and I didn’t want any part of it, but I’d lost that possibility the moment I’d answered Drew’s call. And considering Drew and Finn’s bar was the main reason I was well on my way to buying out King Construction, I owed them both a hell of a lot. The least I could do was make sure Rory got where she needed to be when she needed to be there.
“Sorry, princess, there’s not enough time to fuss with all that.”
Rory breathed out a disbelieving laugh as she blinked up at me. “Ex cuse me? I must’ve heard you wrong, because I know there’s no way you’d be tryin’ to tell me what I can and cannot do, considering I’m a grown woman whose decisions are of absolutely no concern to you.”
Aw, hell, I’d gone and awoken Pissed-Off Rory. I’d become well acquainted with this version of her in the past few months—ever since she’d been helping out here and there with the residents’ designing needs. Construction and interior design went hand in hand, which meant we’d been working side by side for days… weeks on end.
As such, I knew I had to play this smart. If I pressed Rory to go to the baseball diamond, she’d only push back harder. But if I guided her in that direction… Well, she just might go willingly.
I held up my hands. “Fine, fine. You do whatever you’d like.”
“That’s what I thought. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m gonna run?—”
“I just thought, what with your daddy countin’ on you for their team since y’all lost last year and all, that you’d wanna get down there just as soon as possible and not cause any more grief. You know, for the family. But that’s my mistake.” I shrugged as if whatever she chose was no big deal to me.
She opened her mouth, then promptly snapped it shut as she glanced down at her paint-covered blouse. “You can’t be suggestin’ I show up lookin’ like this ! On time or not, this—” she gestured down the front of her “—would be a disgrace. You may not care about things like that, but I ?—”
“Course I’m not suggestin’ that.” I reached back and grabbed the neck of my shirt, pulling it off in one fell swoop before holding it out to Rory. “You can borrow mine. It’s even white.” I raised my eyebrows. “Unless you’d rather be the one out there without a shirt on?”
Under normal circumstances, a jab like that would’ve had Rory spouting off and giving me a fifteen-minute lecture on appropriate talk in the workplace. Now, though, she stood in front of me, her lips parted, her eyes raking over my bare chest. And, fuck , I loved every imagined caress of her gaze on me. So much so, I had to force myself not to move a muscle. Not a single damn inch. Because if I did, I wasn’t so sure I wouldn’t back her into the wall and kiss the living daylights out of her.
There were a whole lot of inches moving behind my zipper, though, and every one of them wanted Rory.
We’d been doing this dance for too fucking long. Since The Willow Tree when Finn, Drew, and Nola—the third partner in the bar—had hired me as a contractor. They’d budgeted for that, no problem. What they hadn’t budgeted for was a designer, and they had been in desperate need of one. So Rory, being Rory, had elbowed her way in to help. She’d done so without charging a cent, though, so I had to admire her for that.
Trouble was, the two of us were combustible when we were in the same room. It hadn’t always been like that. Though that was probably more because she hadn’t known I’d existed, rather than our personalities changing all that much. Being the age of Rory’s youngest sister, Natalie, automatically took me off Rory’s radar. But she’d always been on mine.
And then there’d been the night last year when I’d found her, drunk as a skunk, at The Willow Tree. She’d gone to surprise her then-husband for their anniversary and instead found him balls deep in his assistant. She and I had shared more than just a bottle of Grey Goose that evening. She’d opened up to me, let down her walls more than I’d ever seen. And in doing so, we’d more than just gotten along—we’d connected . And I’d soaked up every ounce of it.
And then the next day, it was like it’d all been a dream.
I snapped back to the present as Rory licked her bottom lip—no doubt an unconscious gesture—and stared at my chest while I grew hard as stone behind my zipper. “Tick-tock, princess,” I said, my voice gruff with restraint. “What’ll it be?”
With a huff and a gorgeous flush to her cheeks, she turned sharp eyes on me, snatched my shirt from my hand, and spun on her heels to stomp off down the hall.
“Hurry up, now,” I called. “You don’t wanna be late.”
Her growl was drowned out by my answering laugh. I knew baiting her was a bad idea. Nothing could ever come of this back-and-forth between us. Because she was a scorned, still-mourning divorcée, and I was the pain-in-the-ass, immature prick who made her daily life a living hell.
So instead, I’d get us both worked up, and then I’d walk away. I’d have to, just like every other day. Because it’d be a cold day in hell before there was a future for me—Mr. High School Dropout—and the reigning princess of Havenbrook.