From Grumpy to Forever (Trickle Creek: The Lyons #1)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

Reid

The only thing worse than ripping out century-old hardwood floors from a heritage house was doing it for a privileged asshole and his plastic trophy wife who’d just moved to my quiet, small town with plans to “modernize and improve” things.

And there was no way I was going to do it.

To hell with the fat paycheck that would come with the job.

Never mind that the money these assholes were willing to pay me to destroy their beautiful house and turn it into a McMansion with no soul was enough to buy me a new set of woodworking tools.

And maybe even my own workshop, too.

“Not fucking worth it,” I muttered, pissed at myself that I’d even considered taking the job in the first place.

I tugged my gloves off and shoved them in my back pocket before grabbing my toolbox.

“Off to get supplies?” The bottle blonde with tits almost as big as her head stopped me before I could make my escape. She wore skin-tight jeans and something that could barely be considered a bra the way she spilled out of it, with a silky plaid shirt tied around her waist. No doubt in an effort to look small town.

“Changed my mind,” I told her. “I can’t take the job.”

“Sure you can.” She wiggled herself closer and pulled her shoulders back to give me a better view of her store-bought assets.

“No.” I turned away and headed for the door, almost sorry to leave this beautiful house, knowing that soon it would be a whitewashed, sterilized version of its former glory. “I can’t.”

I wasn’t an idiot, and I also wasn’t the only handyman in town. Someone else would take the job. Of that, I had no doubt. But it wouldn’t be me.

“Stop!” the woman shrieked, when she finally figured out I wasn’t playing. “Phillip! He’s leaving!”

I had already loaded my toolbox in the back of my truck, when Phillip caught up to me. “Where do you think you’re going?”

“I’m not taking the job.”

“You already did.”

“Then I quit.” When I turned around, he was so close, I almost bumped into him. If he was trying for intimidation, it wouldn’t work. He might have more money than me—by a lot—but I was at least half a foot taller, with a good fifty pounds of muscle on him. Not that I actually thought this man had ever used anything but his wallet to get what he wanted.

“You can’t quit.”

“Already did.” I put my hand on the door handle. I was already done with this conversation. “I’m not going to be part of you destroying this gorgeous old house just so you can turn around and sell it to some other outsider for double market price. I won’t be part of it.”

“We’re improving the property.” Phillip obviously didn’t like to be told no. His face turned a very unnatural shade of purple. “And this entire backwoods little town. You’re an idiot if you don’t want to?—”

“What did you just call my town?” He cowered just the way I knew he would when I took a step toward him. “Call me whatever you want. But you don’t fuck with my town, got it?”

The man nodded and swallowed hard before I stepped back and swung the truck door open. “Do yourself a favor, Phillip. Spend your money on your wife’s next boob job and leave my town alone.”

His bravado returned the moment I fired up the old truck. He was yelling something about me never working in this town again as I peeled away from the curb and the entitled asshole.

Okay, I might have gone a little too far with that last comment about his wife’s tits, but I couldn’t stop myself. It was people like Phillip and his plastic wife who would be the end of our town and everything that made it special.

It was bad enough with the ski resort and the new fancy golf course drawing in tourists both summer and winter, but now the city folk were starting to buy up properties. Things were changing in Trickle Creek, and I didn’t like it.

I was still simmering in my shitty mood when I pulled up in front of the hardware store. The last thing I should be doing was tool shopping with my bank account looking as anemic as it did, but it was the one thing that would make me feel better.

Well, maybe not the one thing. But the odds of me finding a woman willing to put up with my mood was even less likely than me walking out of the store with the new thickness planer I’d been eyeing.

“Reid.” My twin brother, Grayson, greeted me the moment I stepped through the doors. He’d been more or less running the store for the last few years since Old Man Holbrook broke his hip. “What are you doing here? I thought you took that job over at?—”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Don’t tell me you got fired again.”

“Actually, I quit.” I glared at him. “And I’ll have you know, I didn’t get fired from the job up at the Carlson condo units either.”

“Oh, right.” Gray didn’t even bother to hide his smirk. “I suppose you quit that one, too. It had nothing to do with Asher telling you it wasn’t okay to be rude to the guests?”

I didn’t bother to answer him because he wasn’t entirely wrong. Although it was more of a mutual understanding between Asher and me. Still, Grayson’s comment pissed me off.

“Listen, Reid. I know you don’t like it, but the tourists are here to stay.” Grayson moved around the counter and started to walk down the aisle toward the plumbing fittings.

Against my better judgment, and my lack of interest in listening to a lecture, I followed him.

“And whether you see it or not, it’s good for the town.”

He wasn’t wrong. A fact that pissed me off even more. The Carlson family had done a lot to build up the tourism industry in Trickle Creek, effectively saving the town from ruin after the old mine closed and so many jobs were lost.

But it didn’t mean I had to like it.

“You know,” Grayson looked at me while he reached into a box and started restocking a bin of parts, “maybe instead of fighting it, you should try embracing the change. You could do really well here if you stopped fighting with all your potential clients.”

“But they’re all such assholes.”

Grayson shot me a look and leaned past me to greet the new customer the bells over the door just announced. “I’ll be right with you.”

He dropped the part he was holding back in the box and looked me in the eye. “You know the other perk of all the new faces in town?”

“What’s that?”

Grayson wiggled his eyebrows and chuckled as he gestured with his head toward the front of the store. “A lot of those new faces are beautiful women.”

Instinctively, I turned around. My gaze landed on the firm, round ass of Grayson’s new customer, bent over looking at something on a bottom shelf. My long-dormant dick twitched to life. “Fuck me.”

My brother laughed. Before he walked past me, he turned. “You know the best part, Reid?”

“What’s that?”

“If they’re new to town, they don’t know what a grumpy asshole you are yet.”