by Cari Quinn
I motioned for Carter to come take my place, and then followed Dolan outside where the muggy air only seemed to make my shirt wetter. Holding it away from my body, I gave it a good shake to cool my midriff.
Wade and I were busted. I knew it. And there was no way to warn him. It’d only confirm what Dolan obviously suspected. I couldn’t afford to lose my job. I had a house payment. Not to mention Dolan could get me blackballed from working construction anywhere in Texas. Fuck a duck.
I’d acted carelessly and I had to suffer the consequences all on my own. There’d be time to commiserate with Carlotta and Lanie later tonight. After I cleaned out my desk.
I followed him to his Navigator, my stomach a tight knot of nerves and too much coffee, scolding myself and Wade in my head for screwing at work. That had to be it. Hal had to have heard us and retaliated by telling Dolan. It wasn’t any less than I deserved. Swallowing the lump in my throat, I slid my sunglasses over my eyes to shield them from the bright afternoon sunlight. Dolan’s Navigator sat parked next to Wade’s truck. He motioned to the passenger side door and on heavy feet, I climbed in.
"Care for a cigar?" he asked once the doors were shut and the Navigator was started, so that frosty cold air filled the vehicle.
I’m about to be fired and... "No thank you, sir."
"I would have been here earlier but I had a meeting over golf. I hate golf. In the good old days you just went out and built something. Now you gotta schmooze and grease palms to get anything done. Houston used to be a lady. Now she’s just a whore."
I winced at the word whore, despite the fact that he never took his eyes off of the half-finished building across the way. "What’s this about, sir?" I asked, wishing he’d just get it over with so I could go home and throw up. Then go get drunk with the girls.
"I like you, Alex. I really do, but I’ll be honest. I had serious reservations when Junior hired a woman.” He glanced in my direction. "You’ve proven me wrong more than once."
"Thank you," I murmured automatically, even though his words stung.
"I know there’s no love lost between you and Hal, and I wouldn’t have put you on the same crew if I’d had a choice...it’s a moot point now anyway," he added with a chuckle.
Fear mixed with a bit of annoyance gave way to mystification, and I frowned, trying to figure out what in the hell he was talking about.
He cleared his throat before he spoke again, "Sometimes my position requires me to go places that...to be frank, my wife would kill me if she found out about. Places like The Dollhouse."
Even as my own cheeks burned in embarrassment, he was kind enough to keep his focus on the scenery outside the SUV.
"I see," I said after I swallowed the lump of embarrassment in my throat.
"So, it was you."
I slowly crossed my legs and folded my hands in my lap as if needing some sort of modesty. "Yes...sir."
"I almost didn’t believe it." He chuckled again.
Snorting softly, I bit my lip and squeezed my eyes shut, not sure whether I wanted to die from embarrassment, howl with laughter or puke.
"Wade’s crew almost done with the sheetrock?"
"Yes, sir." I nodded slowly, wondering at the change of topics. "We’ve got most of it up, and they should be done with the tape and bed by Thursday or so."
"As soon as Wade’s crew is finished, I’ve got a new job for them. Next Monday a different drywall crew will come out to drop in the ceiling tiles. Make sure you’re ready for them. And I’ll have Junior see that you two don’t land on the same project again. Which shouldn’t be too hard since his isn’t the company’s only drywall crew, and you’ll be stuck here at the site for a while. I’m putting you in charge."
All I could do was bink in surprise. "You are?"
"Junior says you’re plenty capable...and he’ll take the heat if you screw up—which he doesn’t think you’ll do."
"I won’t. Thank you. I won’t, sir." My nausea turned to giddy bubbles as I pulled the door handle.
"My wife’s having a dinner party tonight, and I need to get going before she gets in a tizzy and fires the housekeeper."
With a nod, I pushed the door open.
"Alex," he said, stopping me, "from now on be careful what you do, where you do it, and who you do it with."
"I will, sir."
~*~
On shaky legs, I walked back to the building and gave Wade a huge grin. Peeking over my shoulder to assure myself Dolan was gone, I did a little dance over to Wade, my arms raised in the air and fisted in triumph, and all the guys slowly stopped working.
Wade stood, hands propped on his hips, watching me. "Well?"
"Say hello to your new Job Supervisor, guys!"
I accepted their cheers and congratulations while silently breathing a sigh of relief. I couldn’t even bring myself to think about how close I’d come to losing my job.
Wade had called it nearly right. We were done by 2:15 and the guys were gone by 2:30. Then it was just the two of us, making sure everything was where it was supposed to be. My shoulders were screaming and all I wanted was a long hot soak in the tub with the jets pounding my back and shoulders.
"How come you left this morning?" I asked as we crossed the parking lot to my truck.
"I figured it was best. I needed to be here early, but you didn’t."
"Is that the only reason?"
"You’re a grumpy-ass in the mornings." He opened the truck door for me.
"So you noticed." Grinning, I slid past him and into the truck.
Wade’s only reply was a snort.
"What are you doing for dinner?"
Crossing his arms, he leaned against the truck’s door. "I thought ‘our timing was off’?"
"It’s my prerogative to change my mind. Besides, apparently we weren’t the only ones at The Dollhouse the other night. Dolan also gave us a green light to date, as long as we were more discreet...in the future." Reaching out, I snagged his T-shirt between my fingers and tugged him closer, meeting his lips halfway for a warm, sweaty kiss. "Sooo, you go home, get cleaned up and meet me at my place with some Italian and those pornos you mentioned, or whatever, " I added with a soft laugh, "and we’ll celebrate. Deal?"
"Deal."
EPILOGUE
We’d had an adventurous week, to say the least, so Sunday with the girls was almost anticlimactic. Carlotta looked much more relaxed and Lanie’s smile, as we took our seats in the crowded restaurant, was positively triumphant.
Guess she got her "Suit".
"Dish it." I sat back with my legs crossed and sipped my mimosa, needing the fortification after another night short on sleep.
"He had the most amazing apartment—"
Carlotta interrupted Lanie’s gushing with a wave of her hand. "We don’t want to hear about his damned apartment. We want to know how he was in bed."
"Guess she didn’t leave him passed out on the floor with whiskey dick." I snickered and winked at Carlotta.
Our subsequent giggles and bad behavior earned us more than a few frowns from the Sunday crowd. Too bad. I wasn’t feeling terribly "good" today.
"He had the most amazing silk sheets." She opened the menu and pretended to study it. "I’m gonna have to get me some."
I snatched the menu out of her hand. "Screw the sheets, rate him!"
"Five stars," she muttered, frowning at both Carlotta and I. "I can see this is gonna be a fun breakfast."
"Sorry, I’m beat."
"We did it on his balcony too." She rolled her eyes and grinned.
Before we could comment on her five stars, we were forced to stop and order breakfast.
Lanie arched one eyebrow while from my other side, Carlotta groaned softly. "What the hell happened to you Friday night?"
With a sigh, I smoothed the starched napkin in my lap, then proceeded to fill them in.
"I can’t believe you got busted in a strip joint," Lanie said with a laugh.
"You know, now I almost think Dolan w
as as afraid I’d seen him as he was that he’d seen me. I hear his wife’s a real hard ass. Old school charm and all that, but a real sweetheart."
"I can’t believe you went to a strip joint! I mean, if it were Lanie, I could definitely see it. Especially on amateur night," Carlotta added with a wicked grin. "Then again, I have seen it on amateur night. So you and Wade patched everything up?"
"Yup. What about you? Get lucky Friday night?"
"No," she drawled, focusing her eyes somewhere near the ceiling, "but there was Thursday afternoon!"
Giggling, I forked up a bite of honeydew. "Was that your farewell fuck? No, don’t answer that. You like him, don’t you, Carlotta? You like the Geek Meister?!"
Leaning over, Carlotta covered her mouth with her hand and whispered, "He’s got a big dick."
"Lanie," I sighed, "better watch it, she’s after your title."
"Ain’t nobody takin’ my title. By the way I’m out this afternoon. I need to catch up on some paperwork."
"I need to catch up on some sleep," I said with a nod.
"I need to catch up on my sex."
I arched an eyebrow at Carlotta. "With Devon the Geek you swore off?"
She cut off a bite of her omelet and popped it in her mouth with a nod. "After Lanie ditched me Friday night, Cherise and I went to this swinger’s club. Guess who was there?"
"Fuck sleep." I laughed, setting my fork down. This was gonna be good. "I wanna hear about this."
Amie Stuart
Dear Reader,
Thank you for reading Against The Wall! I hope you enjoyed Wade and Lexi’s story as well as the other stories in the blue collar box set.
Thank you for helping me spread the word, including telling your friends! Reviews really do help readers find books, so please take the time to leave a review on your favorite site.
It would mean the world to me!
Thanks again,
Amie
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Unashamed
By Leah Braemel
Unashamed
Copyright © Leah Braemel 2015
Contractor Max Moretti knows that once he turns over the keys on his latest project, he and his business partner Noah McNaughton will have to say goodbye to shy but sexy house flipper, Hayley O’Connell. Something neither he nor Noah are ready for. When Max overhears Hayley discussing a ménage fantasy, Max wonders if she’s the woman they’ve always wanted. With Noah’s help, Max constructs a plan to find out if Hayley is their Miss Right or just Miss Right Now...
Being sandwiched between the two sexy construction workers introduces Hayley to pleasure she’d never known before, but watching the two men care for each other quickly becomes an addiction. An addiction that both intrigues and overwhelms her.
One passion-filled night turns into two, and Max and Noah find themselves faced with a bigger challenge than revealing their sexy secrets to Hayley—convincing her that forever is better with three.
CHAPTER ONE
The flare of light on the driveway drew Max’s attention away from the sink he was lowering into the hole in the quartz countertop. A thunk followed by his best friend and business partner’s cursed “for fuck’s sake, Moretti, you could have broken the damned thing,” could probably be heard out in the yard where Hayley O’Connell—the owner of the house he and Noah were renovating—opened the back door of her Honda. He completely forgot about the sink when she leaned inside, giving Max a perfect view of camo work pants tightening over a beautifully formed ass.
Man, she was brains and beauty wrapped in one perfect package. Where he’d gone straight into the trades after high school, Hayley had graduated from U of T with a degree in business economics. While working for one of the big banks down on Bay Street, she’d discovered she had a knack for choosing the right house to renovate and flip. Three years ago she’d ditched her high heels and pencil skirts for steel toed boots and a tool belt. Okay, so she didn’t really wear a tool belt—that was entirely Max’s fantasy—but for all the jobs he’d worked on with her over the past two years, she’d been on-site and totally hands-on for all the renovations, not afraid to pick up a hammer along with the rest of the crew.
Every single house she’d renovated sold for at least a hundred thousand dollar profit. Then again, between her eye for renovations and the Toronto housing market, Max would bet his half of M&M Construction any house she touched would sell at a profit.
“Stop mackin’ on my woman and hand me the damned number two Robertson, will ya?”
“Hey, I saw her first.” Max handed Noah the green-handled screwdriver but found himself drawn back to watching the woman of both their dreams. “If she’s anyone’s woman, she’s mine.”
As much as both he and Noah fantasized about her in the two years they’d known her, she had been dating someone else the entire time, which put her in the “hands-off” column as far as they were concerned. Then, four months ago, her investment banker boyfriend had been caught French kissing some chick at a Blue Jays’ game—and featured on the stadium’s huge-ass video screen. The moment her Facebook status changed from In a relationship to Single, Max’s hopes of dating her doubled.
She’d straightened, tucking a white hard-hat beneath one arm, and a bag of what were probably paint swatches and fabric samples in the other. Her shoulder-length blonde hair shone almost white under the late August sun, and her skin gleamed as sweat beaded on it now she was out of the car’s A/C. The multiple layers of tank tops she wore clung to her curves. They would cling more once she came inside—the AC hadn’t been hooked up and the house was at least ten degrees warmer than it was outside even with all the windows open.
“Why do women wear three layers of shirts like that?” he wondered aloud. “Especially when it’s frickin’ hot out? How come one shirt isn’t enough?”
“How am I supposed to know?” Noah cursed. “You gave me the wrong fuckin’ driver, dickhead. Give me the red one. You know, the one I was using before your brains migrated down to your nutsac?”
Max exchanged screwdrivers with him and resumed his gawking.
A Here comes the Bride ringtone from Hayley’s phone floated in through the open window. Max leaned on the counter, watching her answer it. She was a continual ball of energy even when she was just talking on the phone. There was always something moving—a hand brushing through her hair, her fingers drumming on the railing. Shifting from foot to foot. Her speech was rapid fire, clipped, especially when she was pissed off. As she was now.
Noah humphed. “Hey, doofus, we’re supposed to finish off this kitchen today and it’s going to take both of us to do that. So get your thumb outta your ass, will ya?” Noah continued with a bunch of other “still got the...to do” blah blah blahing that Max tuned out.
Max wasn’t normally a slacker, but when Hayley was near, it was like all his hormonal inner teenager genes made an appearance. He’d stumble over words, his palms got sweaty, and he was getting damned tired of having to position himself behind wallboard or counters to hide the boner that immediately stood at attention around her.
She was single. So was he. He should ask her out. What was he waiting for? Because she’d just gotten out of a relationship and he didn’t want to be the rebound date, that’s why.
That Dipwad might have made her skittish about getting into another relationship was a frickin’ chunk of rebar under his unmanicured fingernails. “Why do you think she stayed with Dipwad for so long?”
“If you love someone, you put up with a lot of shit.” Noah slid from beneath the cabinet and joined him by the window. “If I ever see that bastard again, he’s gonna need a nose job that requires a damned good plastic surgeon.”
If Max ever saw Dipwad again, he’d need not only a plastic surgeon but an orthopedist because he’d come away with a lot more bones broken than his nose. Years of playing hockey as his team’s enfor
cer had taught Max exactly how to inflict pain, not that he’d used that skill off the ice, but with Dipwad it was tempting.
Hayley stepped onto the porch which left her right in front of the kitchen window. Instead of continuing into the house, she dumped her packages on a pile of boxes and turned her back on the house, staring down the narrow road at the row of Victorian houses similar to hers. “Of course I’m going to be at the party on Friday night, Sophie.”
Party? Friday night? Max wondered if she had a date. He quickly ran through a variety of ways he could ask her out for Friday without being obvious. “Do you think she’d go out with me?”
“You won’t know unless you ask. Which I intend to do as soon as she gets off the phone.” Noah tugged at his belt, as if adjusting it to hide a woody.
Shit. He had competition. Of the worst sort. “I don’t stand a chance against you, do I?”
“Sure you do.” Noah frowned. “But why does this have to be a competition?”
“Because it’s Hayley O’Connell we’re talking about.” All he needed to add was the “duh.” Sweet, gentle, lovable Hayley. The type of girl you could feel confident bringing home to introduce to your mother, not share with your best friend.
“What makes you think she won’t choose you over me, doofus?” Noah cuffed the back of Max’s head. “I was razzing you back there. I’ve seen the way she looks at you.”
And Max had seen how Hayley eyed Noah. “Come on, I’m a first-generation Guido complete with big Catholic family who loves to interfere in every part of my life, not to mention my parents aren’t competing in the richer-than-Trump marathon like yours. Oh, and then there’s the whole man candy lottery you won. I mean, look at you” he waved toward Noah’s head, “you have this whole sun-kissed blond hair, blue-eyed thing going on that the chicks all dig. And that stupid single dimple they all go gaga over.”
“Geez, Moretti, women love dark-haired guys like you too. That’s where the ‘tall dark and dangerous’ saying comes from—they think you’re exotic.”
Hello, how the hell did Noah think he qualified under the ‘tall’ part – dark and dangerous, sure, but tall? Give him a frickin’ break.
