Six Stingers Stinging (Tinsel and Tentacles 3.0 #7)

Chapter 1

Kekoa

“Ech, new guy, care for a game?”

“I’ve told you my pronouns.”

“Right, not a guy, got it,” Nuno grumbled. “You wanna play or what?”

“Or what,” I replied, turning my attention back to the drink I’d been enjoying before he decided to saunter over to the bar being loud.

Why was he always so loud? And right there in my personal space, just like on the job site.

Being micromanaged was bad enough, but when the person doing it wasn’t even the foreman I was supposed to be reporting to, it got on my goddamn nerves.

I was beginning to regret jumping at the first job offer I’d received, but the motel would require more money from me in exactly three days, so I’d signed on with Tano Siha Renovations and instantly regretted it when Nuno started showing up at our jobsites.

“There’s darts, if you’d prefer,” he persisted.

“No, thanks,” I replied, hoping that would be the end of it.

Unfortunately, the universe had other plans.

“Awe, come on. Don’t be that way. I’ve already beaten the rest of these clowns a dozen times or more,” Nuno replied, jerking a thumb over his shoulder towards the group gathered around the pool table.

I knew several of the guys from the renovation site I’d been assigned to. All of them seemed like decent people, at least when they weren’t around him.

“I’m waiting for my food,” I explained, wishing he’d just go away.

“After you eat, then?”

Seriously, did this guy just not get it?

It was bad enough watching him swagger around the jobsite, micromanaging and sometimes contradicting the instructions our foreman gave.

There was no way I wanted to deal with him off the clock.

In the three weeks I’d worked for the company, I hadn’t seen him do a single useful thing while he was at the site.

If anything, he slowed us down with his incessant questions about what we were doing and why we were doing it that way.

What was worse was when he interrupted our work to show us how he did things, complete with a long-winded explanation and step-by-step instructions that half the time didn’t make any sense.

Everyone on the crew was a skilled contractor, most with more years of experience than I had, and yet he treated us all like rookies and then got pissy when we went back to doing things the way we knew best.

“It’s been a while since I’ve played,” I offered, going for half-truth, half-exaggeration, when he still didn’t go back to the tables and leave me alone. “I doubt I’d present much of a challenge.”

“No worries, I’d be happy to give you a refresher course.”

Holy shit, this fucker couldn’t catch a clue with a net.

Of all the arrogant, pretentious things to say.

Son of a bitch, I was going to have to play him just to shut him up, and it probably wouldn’t even end then.

At the very least it might wipe the smug look off his face, though, so I guess I’d have to settle for a small victory and an order of calamari as a consolation prize.

“Fine,” I grumbled as my platter of Bunelos Uhang and Bunelos Aga arrived. “Just let me enjoy my supper first.”

I’d been looking forward to the shrimp fritters and banana donuts from the moment I’d walked into the bar, and I wasn’t about to let them get cold dealing with him.

“Would you like another of these?” the bartender asked, gesturing to my nearly empty glass.

“No thanks, I’ll just take a Corona with lime, please.”

“No problem,” he replied, popping the cap off a cold one and pressing a lime inside the bottle before he set it down next to my cocktail glass.

The last thing I expected was for Nuno to belly up to the bar on the stool next to mine and demand a Budweiser while he stared at me.

If I’d been smart, I’d have parked my ass in that seat, since it was on the end and offered a better view of the door, and I enjoyed people-watching and blending into the shadows.

The problem was that it would have left me blind to anything coming up behind me, and I hated that.

He clearly had no issue with it, probably because he was such an arrogant asshole, or maybe he was just one of those shifters whose beast was high enough up on the food chain that danger was just an abstract concept to him.

I didn’t want to be around him long enough to figure out what kind.

His staring wasn’t good for the digestive tract, since he was making me twitchy, but I refused to rush through those crispy, succulent fritters.

“Don’t see a lot of folks like you on the job,” Nuno said as I was busy enjoying my first bite.

“Like me how?” I grumbled, though I had a good idea of what he was referring to.

“Feminine. Attractive. You’ve got nice hands. Why mess ‘em up swinging a hammer?”

“Because I can.”

I honestly preferred my meals without conversation, especially of the getting-to-know-you variety, but it seemed like the fates had other plans for me tonight.

“You ever been to the island before?” He asked as I sipped my Corona.

“Was born here,” I said. “Folks were military.”

“Ahh, gotcha. You came from the mainland though, didn’t you? California?”

“Hawaii.”

“Could have sworn someone said you were from California.”

“Once.” I replied before stuffing one of the delicious banana donuts in my mouth.

“How long ago?”

“Long enough.”

“What brings you back?” he asked, persistently pressing for more than grumbles and short answers.

Nosy much? Damn. I really needed to just beat his ass all over the pool table so I could enjoy the rest of my night. Grunting around a bite of shrimp fritter, I growled and let that be my answer, determined to polish off the rest of my food in peace.

“I’ve been here six years now,” he said. “Got me a spot down on the beach. Living like a king, I tell ya. No better sunsets anywhere in the world.”

Fine, if he wanted to talk, he could talk while I finished my food and let my mind wander away from the conversation like I did when I was underwater.

At least in the hazy fade of pleasant memories, his words filtered in and out.

Judging by his scent, musky with an overture of muddy earth and marsh weeds, he was a land shifter.

Even more reason to avoid prolonged time in his company.

No, it wasn’t me being elitist; more like exceedingly cautious considering the fear and misconceptions many of them harbored for the creatures of the sea, especially my species.

“Got me a boat a year ago,” Braggadocios declared, draining the last of my patience as I drained the last of my Corona. “Now all I do on my days off is a bit of snorkeling and deep-sea fishing. I can take you out on it sometime if you’d like.”

Aw, hell. So this whole chatting me up thing wasn’t just about a game of pool. Great. I shook my head when I spotted the bartender heading our way, popped the last banana donut into my mouth, and scarfed my last two fritters.

“You ready for that game?” I asked, hopping off the barstool as he started telling me about the time he’d spotted a design flaw in the renovation plans for someplace called Palm Paradise and had his team fix it on the fly so as to not slow down the project timetable.

“Yeah, sure,” he replied, sounding a bit flustered by my sudden enthusiasm. “You still want those pointers?”

“No, I think I’ll just wing it,” I declared as I spied the rack of sticks and headed that way.

I took my time selecting the least warped stick from the collection available, many of which appeared to be in desperate need of replacement.

Had I come in here intending to play pool, I would have brought my stick, since I hated playing with the ones everyone handled.

I didn’t care if they were inanimate objects or not; when you played with the same one over and over, you formed a bond with it.

You knew how it was going to handle the trickier shots, some of which I’d probably be afraid to try with the stick in my hands.

The one I was currently chalking was passable at best. I just hoped he was overexaggerating his skills on the table to the same degree as he overstated his importance on the job site.

“Do you want to break, or do you want to rack ‘em?” he asked as he wrapped up a lengthy diatribe about how he’d jumped the cue over a ball once to gently tap the eight into the corner pocket without touching his opponent’s three.

“You can rack,” I said as I gritted my teeth and counted backward from twenty rather than ask him to please shut up.

“So, how long is a while?” he asked as he positioned the balls in a rack.

His question caught me so completely off guard I was left clueless as to what he was asking about. “Huh?”

“Since you played last. How long is awhile?"

“Couple months.”

“That’s not so bad then.”

I split the triangle of balls apart on my break and sunk the two in the process before dropping three more before caution got the best of me and I missed so I wouldn’t tap one of the odd-numbered balls I’d left for him.

He was all power, slamming the stick into the cue ball, trying to jam the balls in the pocket on his next two shots.

Fortunately for me, that also meant he sent one of mine in too and ended his turn.

Eager to be done with him, I threw caution to the wind and ran the rest of the table on him, dropping the eight with a beautiful triple bank shot that didn’t even come close to clipping one of his.

“Did you just hustle me?” He snarled as he slammed his stick down on the table.

“Nope, hustling involves money, and I don’t recall either of us putting any on the rail.”

“But you said…” he began, grinding on my last nerve now.

“That it had been awhile since I’d played and that I probably wouldn’t be much of a challenge for you,” I pointed out. “Turns out I was right. It wasn’t much of a challenge. From the way you were bragging about beating everyone, I thought you’d be so much better.”

His eyes practically bugged out of his head when my words sunk in. “Oh, fuck off, you!”