Chapter 2
CHAPTER 2
A ce stormed into the back of Jacks only to be met with the sound of over dramatic gasps.
“Holy shit! Call the paper because I want everyone to know that it finally happened,” his youngest brother said with a smartass grin as he stood by their other siblings in the middle of the room. “The perfectly punctual Alfa Jackson is late for a staff meeting while the rest of us are on time. Someone better check hell because I’m pretty sure it’s snowing there.”
“Can it, Delta,” he growled, scowling at his younger brother. Del just grinned wider.
“Seriously, man, what’s the deal? I don’t think you’ve been late since…ever.”
“He was late to personality class,” their sister Charlie said. “That’s why he missed out on getting one.”
The two youngest Jackson’s high fived. Fuck sake. Why did the universe create younger siblings? To torture older siblings and cause them to age before their time he was sure of it. It was something Del and Charlie excelled at.
“Hey,” BJ tilted his head, concern in his identical eyes. “You okay?”
Ace nodded to his twin. If anyone could get a read on his discomfort it would always be BJ. The whole twin thing.
“Seriously guys,” Del continued. “This is a momentous occasion. We should celebrate with cake or something.”
Charlie frowned and waved her hand in the air at the large metal tins around them. “We’re in the middle of a distillery, why would we celebrate with cake instead of whiskey?”
“Because it’s ten in the morning on a Tuesday and we have job interviews to do. I’d think it would be a bad idea for the bosses to interview new employees tipsy.” Del lifted the clipboard in his hand filled with interview questions.
Now Charlie let out the dramatic gasp. “Delta Jackson being the responsible one, hell really has frozen over.”
“Will you two cut the shit.” He glared at his siblings. He knew they all loved to rib each other in good fun, but this morning he was not in the mood.
Not one to be yelled at by any man, especially her brother, Charlie’s eyes narrowed. “What crawled up your butt and died?”
A sharp pain throbbed behind his left eye. A headache was building. One started by a blue haired devil and fed by his annoying siblings. Seriously, what adult thought bright blue hair color was a good idea? For a second, he thought a birthday clown was breaking into his car. But no. It had been a small, feisty, woman with lightly freckled pale skin, gray eyes that reminded him of summer storm clouds, an upturned nose that fit her small round face perfectly, bright blue hair, and one hell of an attitude.
And she wasn’t breaking into my car, she mistook it for her own.
Didn’t make it any better. Sure, he’d confused his car with others a time or two. It was a very popular model in a common color. But he’d never gone as far as to try and get into someone else’s car. For one thing, he would never be so careless as to lock his keys in his car. And for two, one look inside and he would recognize if a car was his or not.
“Sorry,” he said softly, rubbing the throbbing over his eye. “I had a…weird encounter this morning and I apologize for being late. Won’t happen again.”
Dropping his hand, he glanced over to see his siblings staring at him, eyes wide with shock.
“What?”
Del looked to BJ and Charlie before speaking. “Nothing, man. It’s just I don’t think we’ve ever heard you apologize before.”
He sucked in a deep, calming breath. His siblings would be the death of him. “That’s not true.”
Charlie crossed her arms, carefully maneuvering her own clipboard so it rested under her left elbow. “Ace, we can count the apologies on one of our hands. Not that you have a lot to apologize for, perfect big brother.”
He frowned. He wasn’t perfect. Far from it. The fuckups in his life were too long to list, but he did try and keep his siblings from seeing them. Even BJ. As the oldest—by two minutes—it was his job to take care of the family. After his father died, he took that job very seriously. He was the oldest, therefore he had to keep the family afloat. It was his job to look after them all, make sure they were safe. He needed them to trust him, and they couldn’t do that if they saw all his failings.
“I’m not perfect,” he grumbled.
“As evidenced by your tardiness,” Del said with another smartass grin.
BJ sighed and raised his clipboard. “Can we all focus, please? The interview for servers starts in fifteen minutes and we still need to set up out front.”
Ace watched as Del and Charlie’s faces lost the teasing and turned into business mode. They all owned equal shares of Jacks, the distillery/bar and restaurant they ran together. They loved this place as much as he did. As much as they liked to joke around and give each other shit, his siblings cared about the family business. Something that warmed the heart his ex called cold and dead.
“BJ is right.” He nodded. “We need to focus on the task ahead. You all go set up out front and I’ll be right there.”
His siblings nodded and started to head toward the front where the bar was located. Ace hurried the few feet to the back office to grab his own clipboard. The office was small, but since most of their time was spent out in the distiller room, bar, and restaurant, they didn’t need it to be big. Charlie used it more than anyone else. As their bookkeeper she tended to do less front facing work. Last night he’d prepped all the clipboards with questions for the interviewees. He was glad he’d done the prep work last night. He hadn’t expected today’s…distraction.
Thinking about the incident had his headache ramp up with the force of Thor’s hammer. He rubbed the spot, willing it to go away. He had work to do. There wasn’t time to go over the bizarre and infuriating morning’s incident.
“Time to work. No reason to stew over blue haired spitfires who wouldn’t know common sense if it landed right on their head,” he grumbled to himself as he grabbed the item.
“What ‘blue haired spitfire’ you talking about?” Del asked, coming into the room.
Ace gripped the clipboard tightly. They needed their little brother to run the restaurant side of the business. He couldn’t kill him. Maybe he could just maim him a little? No. He couldn’t do that either. Instead, he turned, making sure the stern expression he used when Del had been a rowdy teenager getting into shit was etched clearly on his face.
“I thought you went up front with the others.”
Del smirked. “I was going to, but Charlie asked me to run back and grab her highlighters. She wants to color code the applicants’ resumes.”
He narrowed his eyes, suspicion filling him. “Why are you doing what Charlie says?”
If there was one thing he knew about his siblings, especially Del and Charlie, it was that they always bristled at doing what others told them to.
Del let out a heavy sigh. “Because at poker night last week, Charlie won, and the pot included a week of servitude. I swear she cheated, even Luc thinks so, but Cas was on her side. Can you believe it? My own wife turned against me.”
His little brother was laying it on thick, but that was Del.
“You’re the one who married our sister’s best friend.”
Del grinned like the lovesick fool he was. “I did, didn’t I. Best decision of my life.”
Del moved to the cabinet against the far wall and grabbed a box of highlighters out of it. “I better get these back to her Majesty Pain In The Ass.”
Ace snorted. “Are you supposed to call her that all this week too?”
“Not the last part.” Del grinned and gave him a wink.
He let out a small chuckle and followed his brother out of the office. He was glad Del finally found someone who got him. He’d been worried about his wayward little brother for a long time. Del had always seemed so directionless. A little while ago he came to Ace with an idea for expanding the bar into a restaurant. While he’d been skeptical, Del had proven to have a savvy business mind. He’d also fallen for their sister’s best friend under the guise of a fake engagement. A ruse that almost ended in disaster but turned out prosperous in the end.
All his siblings had found love recently. Charlie fell for a recent addition to the town of Kismet, Luc. A good guy who somehow managed to handle his sister’s temper with a grace beyond Ace. BJ had fallen for his own best friend, Penny, and they had baby. Even their mother had found a new gentleman friend to spend time with these days.
Everyone had someone.
Except him.
Which was fine. He didn’t need anyone. All he needed was for his family to be happy, safe, and secure. Would it be nice to have someone to come home to at night? Sure, but he was fine on his own. As long as the people he loved were taken care of and happy, he could find his own happiness in that.
“Yo, Ace. You coming?”
He glanced up, realizing he’d been standing in the middle of the back room staring into space for the past few seconds. Del gave him a puzzled expression.
“You okay?”
He nodded, not wanting to cause any worry. “Fine, just a few cups of coffee short.” He’d been meaning to grab some after his trip to the post office this morning, but then…Millie happened.
Del laughed. “You and me both, but I think Penny brought us over some. Should be out in the bar now.”
Catching the faintest hint of caffeine in the air, he hurried toward his brother. As they made their way into the bar, he saw that indeed, Penny was there with a drink carrier filled with four to-go cups from the local coffee shop. She placed the carrier down on the small round table where Charlie and BJ sat. Charlie immediately reached for the drinks while BJ reached for his wife, instead getting an armful of baby as his eleven-month-old daughter, Tilly, wiggled out of her mother’s arms into her daddy’s. His twin kissed her cheek, eliciting a squeal of delight from the baby as Penny laughed, happiness lighting up her face.
As he approached the table with Del, he heard his brother say,
“I’m serious ask my mom to take her. You need some rest, sweetheart.”
“BJ, I’m fine. She’s just being a little difficult with nap time right now that’s all. Now, will you please stop hovering. Ace,” she sent him an exasperated look. “Will you tell your brother to chill out?”
He lifted his hands in surrender before reaching out to grab a coffee. “Nope. I stay out of baby and wedding arguments.”
He learned that with Del and Cas’s wedding.
Penny sighed. She bent down, as much as possible with Tilly in the way, and kissed BJ on the top of his head before taking the baby girl back. “Stop worrying about me and focus on your interviews. Good luck everyone,” she said as she made her way to the front door of the bar. “I hope you find the perfect candidate.”
Ace would settle for an okay candidate. He knew the service industry had a high turnover rate for employees, but their last server had a family emergency that required them to move across the country right away. It left them in a bit of a bind, and they needed someone now.
Unfortunately, after an hour and a half of interviews, they hadn’t found one capable candidate that could handle the position of swing server. They needed someone with a flexible schedule who could serve in the restaurant and bar depending on the schedule’s needs. Everyone they’d interviewed was either too young or had evening conflicts to their schedule.
They were doomed.
“We’re fucked,” Charlie said, putting it blunter than Ace.
“We have one more candidate,” Del, ever the optimist, said. “Maybe they’ll be the one.”
Ace hoped so. They needed someone yesterday. A lot of the staff was already picking up double shifts and he hated to overwork his employees. Hell, he’d slept in the office twice last week to help cover shifts. This last candidate had to be it, their savior.
“I’m gonna grab a water,” he said, rising and heading toward the bar. “Anyone want one?”
“Yes.”
“Me.”
“Get a pitcher,” Charlie suggested.
He moved around the back of the bar and reached down to grab a pitcher from the bottom shelf.
“Hello!” A cheery voice called from the front door.
Ace paused as his hand gripped the smooth plastic handle of the pitcher. He knew that voice, he was sure of it. He couldn’t quite place it, but it sounded familiar. Liked he’d heard it very recently.
“I’m here for the interview,” the voice continued.
Oh no. No, it couldn’t be.
Now he recognized that voice and it could absolutely not be—
Lifting his head out from under the bar he stared at the small woman standing in the middle of Jacks, smile on her face, resume in hand, and bright blue hair practically glowing a big fuck you at him from across the room.
Millie Danes.
Not their savior, his fucking doom.