It took me a second to process the fact that my gorgeous tenant was one of the girls spinning on a pole in the window. But before I could tell myself, don’t look, she’s your tenant, dumbass, it was too fucking late. My baser thoughts took over, and I couldn’t look away. The same black leggings from earlier today hugged her long legs and curvy hips, but the baggy sweater and “Genie’s Bar” tank were gone, leaving her with nothing but a little black sports bra on top—holy hell. Her pale blond curls bounced behind her back in a low ponytail, almost touching her tiny waist. She was nothing but lithe, sexy grace as she moved. The sway of her hips and the shimmy in her shoulders mesmerized me, making me realize exactly how much trouble I was in. It was already hard enough to be around her without actually being hard around her. The blood that fed my brain steadily flowed out of my head on a southern trajectory as my jeans grew tight at the front. I slammed my eyes shut to gain control. Damn it, I wasn’t just in trouble anymore; I was completely fucked. Willa Faye Hill was like the Death Star and I was all caught up in her tractor beam. It was only a matter of time before my heart ended up in the trash compactor and smashed to bits—a.k.a. the usual ending of my romantic relationships.
“I guess everything will fit. There’s room for the tables, at least,” Garrett’s voice wrenched me out of my dirty thoughts about Willa and I jumped.
“Huh?” I turned from the window to focus on Garrett.
“Don’t be that guy, Ev. Show some respect.” He smirked at me.
Flipping him the bird, I stepped away from the window and added blinds to my mental list of things to buy for my shop. With the business I was opening, it would be necessary to block that view. Or it could be a draw. I was opening a gamer shop, after all. We’re talking Dungeons and Dragons, comic books, dice, and collectible figurines—tabletop roleplay gamer heaven. In other words, it would be geek central over here and having a dance studio full of hot women across the street could either be the best or the worst thing that could happen for my business.
Opening Twenty Sides and Sundry was my dream. Well, it was one of them. If life could be as simple as a game, then that would be a dream come true. Character sheets and dice made the unexpected somehow become expected. If only people in the real world were so easy to figure out. Games had rules. Life had no rules, and that had always been a problem for me. Scrubbing my hand down my beard, I sighed. I needed to get her out of my mind. Fucking impossible.
“You got it bad for her. I don’t blame you.” The slap on my shoulder made me jump again. “Caffeine jitters?” Garrett laughed at me. Yes, I’d been drinking a second cup of coffee every day at noon just to spend a few moments with her. So what? Garrett was just nosy enough to notice my change in lunchtime habits. Instead of meeting him at Daisy’s Nut House to eat lunch together, I’d been picking up doughnuts and rushing home to feed Willa breakfast. Yeah, I probably had it bad, but I couldn’t seem to stop myself. The pricklier she was, the more I liked her. Clearly, I was a glutton for punishment.
Town lore told me I probably had little chance of ever getting a date with her anyway. Everyone knew all about those wild Hill sisters, living with their momma up in the hills above town. Their reputations preceded them wherever they went—heartbreakers and hell raisers each one. I’d gone to school with the oldest two Hill girls, Sadie and Clara, but Willa hadn’t gone to Green Valley High School. She’d attended the private all-girls school in Merryville. I knew nothing of her reputation other than she had run away from home to marry her boyfriend when she was seventeen and only came back to town a few months ago. She was also best friends with my brother Wyatt’s new wife, Sabrina. Truthfully, I didn’t know that much about Willa’s past. The conversations we shared consisted of small talk, where she would be adorable and cagey while letting irresistible glimpses of her personality and sense of humor out for me to fall for. Either that or superficial landlord and tenant stuff, along with the occasional flirty interlude or hot look to keep me dangling on her line, where I suspected I’d be forever.
I shot Garrett a grin. “You should reconsider the shit you’re shoveling. Don’t forget I know things about you too.” I said his latest ex-girlfriend’s name through a fake cough, and he laughed.
“Touché, ya douche.” I smiled at his mispronunciation and smacked his outstretched hand. Of all my brothers, Garrett was the worst about minding his own business. Barrett, the oldest, was a vault. I was pretty sure he still had leftover secrets from our middle school years buried somewhere inside his subconscious right alongside the secret location of wherever he had hidden the original set of X-Men action figures we had collected over the years. But I was always closest to Wyatt, both in age and in temperament. We were stuck in the middle of our group of four and remained close even when he was off living in Nashville with his evil ex-wife and two adorable daughters.
“All kidding aside, thank you. Your help means a lot.”
“Don’t get all mushy. I’m here to help you clean up, then kick some ass when we finish the overhaul and get those gaming tables set up. I need to level up my Paladin.”
“Let’s get to it. The shelves and furniture will be here in a few hours.” The exposed brick was ideal for the vibe I wanted to create here, so there was no need to paint. I had enough of that left to do at home, anyway. Hours passed; we dusted, swept, mopped, and polished until the place was shiny.
“You should put the collectibles in that alcove,” Garrett suggested, indicating an arched inset in the wall to the side of the long wooden counter where I would place my cash register.
“Great idea.” The collectibles were my carvings, or “pointless wastes of time” as my father used to call them when I was a kid. Tiny dragons, wizards, fantasy creatures—little things I would create to escape the world around me—would be up for sale here. My father didn’t think whittling wood was a worthwhile way to spend my extra time. Not like making the furniture, custom cabinets, or any of the other stuff I did for Monroe & Sons, the construction company he owned and where I worked as a carpenter. I loved my job. I loved creating something out of nothing—whatever form it took—which was why I would not quit working for my father completely. I’d just switch to part-time.
Monroe boys always joined Monroe & Sons, generation after generation for over sixty years. The only exception was my brother Wyatt, a deputy sheriff here in Green Valley. My father had been the only boy born in his generation of Monroes. He inherited all of it—the business, the sterling reputation, and the massive Victorian house in the middle of town where he lived with my mother. He worked there too; the office took up the downstairs parlor. He was an old-fashioned hard ass, but deep inside his heart was gold.
“Yoo-hoo!” We spun around in comic unison at our mother’s voice in the doorway, just like when we were kids getting busted for doing something stupid. “I brought you boys dinner.” She entered, carrying bags of takeout from Daisy’s Nut House.
“You mean, you came to be nosy. I’m surprised you didn’t go to Genie’s to scope out Everett’s lady.” Garrett teased her. He was the only one of us with the guts to mess with our mother. Probably because he was her “baby.”
“Oh, pish. I’m not nosy, I’m just a momma who loves her boys.” With a flick of her wrist, she checked the time. “Willa never works this early at Genie’s anyway. It’s only six o’clock,” she said primly. She passed me the takeout bag with an expectant smile. “So, how is Willa?”
I huffed out a laugh combined with a sigh. “Fine.” My mother officially met Willa a few months back on Halloween when we joined Willa, Sabrina, Sabrina’s nephew Harry and Wyatt’s girls while trick-or-treating. Ever since, my mother had been asking questions, matchmaking and meddling, and trying to boss me into asking Willa out on a date. What she didn’t know was that ever since meeting Willa, I’d been slowly and steadily—but most of all, hopelessly—falling for her. I couldn’t ask her out until I knew she would say yes, which would probably be never. Willa was divorced and from what I could glean, it
hadn’t been pretty. Wyatt knew the details; they were friends when they’d both lived in Nashville. Willa’s ex-husband had been Wyatt’s partner on the police force. Plus, her ex, Tommy, was from Merryville. I’d played basketball against him back in high school, and he’d been an asshole. But Wyatt had yet to give me any real information, and Willa would never confide in me about that.
“Hey, y’all.” The delivery guy stood in the doorway. Parked behind him on the curb was a truck full of my dreams finally coming true. I grinned and took the electronic clipboard to sign my name. He grinned back and congratulated me with a hearty slap on the shoulder. This was Green Valley, so of course we’d gone to school together. Everybody knew everybody in this town. Which was why it drove me so crazy that I didn’t know Willa’s story—yet.
“Okay, boys, this is where I take my leave. I have no interest in unloading, building, assembling, or anything other than a nice hot cup of tea and the Downton Abbey marathon tonight on the television. Kiss your mother goodbye.” I exchanged a look with Garrett. We knew she would really watch The Real Housewives of somewhere and fix herself a huge martini, but we were both too smart to mention it.
Garrett kissed her cheek. “Bye, Ma.”
She patted my cheek on the way out of the shop. “I’ll stop by tomorrow, sweetie pie.”
“Okay…bye,” I answered distractedly. I headed to the delivery truck to make sure everything was there. This was like Christmas morning, but even better. This was a Christmas morning that would never end.
“Yo!” I glanced around the truck to see Wyatt and Frederick Boone, or just Boone as he preferred, headed up the sidewalk. Boone and I had been friends since our kindergarten days. He played football with Wyatt in high school, was a deputy sheriff, and not too long ago helped save his cousin Simone Payton and her man, Roscoe Winston, from being shot to death by the dickbag racist Sheriff Strickland. The Sheriff had lost his damn mind and shot up Daisy’s Nut House while they’d been inside. Boone had fired the kill shot and was still having a hard time with it. Sometimes, doing the right thing could leave a person shaken up, even when the action was rightly deserved it and it was done to save lives.
“Hey, y’all.” I patted the side of the delivery truck. “It’s here, and you’re just in time to help me put it all together.”
“As long as we can hit up Genie’s when we’re done and have a round. On you.” Boone laughed and slapped my shoulder as he passed by me to enter the shop.
“You got it,” I affirmed. I had always been a semi-regular at Genie’s. Shoot, most people over twenty-one in Green Valley were. I’d go with my brothers for dinner and darts, maybe a beer or two. However, since Willa started working there, I had become a constant fixture. It was only a matter of time before she figured out why I was there so often. I was taking a subtle approach with her—so subtle it was almost nonexistent. I had the feeling that a balls-to-the-wall approach would scare her away for good, and I didn’t want to lose my shot. However, we’d shared enough hot looks to keep hope alive and I was hoping tonight would turn the tide.
Chapter Three
Willa
“If you decide to run away from this house, Willa-girl, there will be hell to pay when you come back. You hear?”
Momma
“Have you seen your momma yet?” I finished making the margarita for my customer, passed it across the bar, steeled my spine, then turned to my Aunt Genie—my mother’s somewhat-estranged sister, and my port in every storm I’d ever faced in my life. I loved Aunt Genie with all my heart, but I did not want to talk about it. However, I knew I should get ready to face the music. There was only so long I could avoid talking about my mother, and I would have to go see her eventually. It surprised me she’d roped Aunt Genie into being her messenger. Genie and Momma butted heads over a lot of things, the main one being my mother’s method of child rearing.
“Momma, leave her alone.” I spun around to see my cousin Patty, ready as ever to take up my defense. I grinned at her and she bumped my shoulder with hers as she walked behind me to grab a beer from the refrigerator beneath the long wooden bar. Uncapping it with a flourish, she slid it, along with a wink, toward the hapless man hopelessly caught up in her spell. Patty was a looker: cute as a button with a brunette bob and athletic figure.
“Thank you,” I mouthed as she went around the bar to head back out front, where I would join her soon enough. We took turns covering the bar when one of Genie’s regular bartenders went on break.
With a salute, she disappeared, submerging herself into the crowd to dance her way across the wood floor toward the booths that lined the perimeter.
Genie’s Bar was crazy busy tonight, just as it was every Saturday. I hoped I would earn enough in tips to go toward my rent this month. It was busy here and tips were good, but it was nothing like what I used to make when I lived in Nashville. This would be a tight month after I paid my attorney. Divorces were not cheap, especially when one party fought it every step of the damn way like my no-good, dumbass, dirtbag, dickhead, finally ex-husband had done.
Aunt Genie sighed as she filled a pitcher of beer from the tap and smiled sympathetically. “Darlin’, your momma wants to see you,” she shouted over the pulsing country music rippling through the air. It pounded in my chest almost as hard as the dread that beat through it whenever I thought of going home to see my mother.
I huffed out a sigh as I uncapped another beer. “Okay, I’ll go up there tomorrow. Probably—”
Her eyebrows raised as her grin shifted sideways “I’m not here to push you, honey. But better you go there, rather than—shoot.” Her eyes widened on whoever had approached behind me on the other side of the bar before her hands hit her hips. “Girls, I don’t want any trouble.”
I spun around to follow her gaze and froze when I saw my two older sisters standing at the bar. Both looked gorgeous and were dressed up to the country-nines in their tight jeans, boots, and skimpy tank tops.
“I ain’t here to cause trouble, Aunt Genie,” Sadie, the oldest, said as she took a seat on a barstool. “Momma is keepin’ the boys tonight. I’m here to get drunk. Make me whatever will fuck me up fastest, Willa. I ain’t been out drinkin’ in years.” She smiled at me with a chin lift and a little wave before plopping her tiny purse on the bar and checking her lipstick in her cell phone camera.
Sadie had boys—I had nephews. Sadness washed through me at the realization that I’d missed being here for all of it. Years of family memories had happened without me because, like a fool, I chose my ex-husband over my own family. A nervous laugh escaped me as I started mixing a Long Island iced tea. Surely, they had something to say. I hadn’t seen either of them in almost ten years. Should I apologize for being gone so long? Should I hug them? I’d missed them so much; hadn’t they missed me?
“Well, that’s good to hear,” Aunt Genie said with a grin. “And what about you, sunshine?” She nodded to Clara, second in our sister quartet. I was third at almost twenty-eight. Our little sister was way too young to be here on a Saturday night. Gracie would be about sixteen now.
Clara tossed her long blond curls that looked just like mine over her shoulder and laughed. “I’m on the hunt tonight, Aunt Genie. Trouble with y’all is the last thing I’m fixin’ to cause.” She smirked and took the stool next to Sadie. “Hey, Willa.”
“Hey, Clara. Sadie,” I said, trying to keep my expression neutral. I loved them to death, but no matter what they said to Aunt Genie, I didn’t trust that they were here for any other reason than to start something. It used to be their reason for living.
Sadie rolled her eyes at me. “Clara’s on a man hunt tonight. I keep telling her men ain’t worth a shit, but she won’t listen.” I finished making her Long Island and placed it on the coaster in front of her. She picked it up and sucked half of it back with one long drag on the straw. Holy crap. Sadie had always liked to party. Momma had to stop keeping alcohol in the house back then because of her.
Clara laughed. “Sadie is
divorced. Her no-good husband left her and the boys and now she’s livin’ with Momma up at the farm. Her hootenanny is about to shrivel up and fall off, so she’s bitter.” She narrowed her eyes and gestured for me to come closer. I leaned in. “All the girls we went to school with are gettin’ divorces,” she stated in a loud conspiratorial whisper. “I’m about to find me one of their ex-husbands. All the good ones got snapped up and married straight out of high school and now it’s my turn to get a piece of one of those hotties. Have you seen Beau or Duane Winston since you’ve been home? Those two were always so cute. I haven’t seen them since I moved to Knoxville after graduation. A red-headed Winston brother sandwich sounds good right about now.”
“All the Winston boys are taken, you hussy!” Sadie yelled at Clara before smacking her arm. “Tequila shooters, Willa—I’m thinking three of them, if you please.” She slid her empty glass across the bar. Genie took the glass with a wink for me, then headed down the bar to help some customers. I lined up the trio of shot glasses, served up the salt and limes with a flourish, and got Sadie set up.
Clara stole one of Sadie’s shots. “Even Cletus?” she asked. Sadie nodded right before licking her hand for the salt. I guess it was time for her to catch up on gossip since she was in town. “Shoot, that boy always was hiding a lot of hot behind that scruffy exterior,” Clara continued. “I saw him at the Donner Bakery a few months back when I was visiting Momma up at the house. Dang, I wanted to shave that beard off and climb on his face. Or maybe just climb on his face without shaving it off.” She shrugged like it was all the same to her. “Who’s the lucky bitch who landed him? I missed that bit of gossip when I was here last.”
“Jennifer Sylvester,” I told Clara. Sadie was too busy with her tequila shooters to answer.
Carpentry and Cocktails: A Heartfelt Small Town Romance (Green Valley Library Book 5) Page 2
