Hot and Handy: A Small Town Romantic Suspense (Shameless Southern Nights Book 3)

by J. H. Croix

  Chapter Nineteen

  Evan

  “Another family reunion?” I joked when Beau walked into my office on Friday morning. It was still early, and I was only just firing up my laptop after getting everyone’s tasks for the day up on the board.

  Beau shrugged and walked to my coffee machine. Making himself at home, he selected a coffee pod and readied his mug. “You never call. You never write. What choice do I have?”

  “Invite me for a beer at your place?” I suggested, smirking. “Do you even have a house anymore?”

  Beau scoffed, tossing a wink at me as he stirred his coffee. “Do I even have a house? I have the same great house I’ve always had. You and Sonny are just too busy to come over.”

  “And you work until practically midnight every night, so there’s that.” Beau was as much of a workaholic as the rest of us. Much like me, when he was designing, he lost all track of time.

  The difference was, I took my designs home with me and kept working on them there when inspiration struck. Beau needed all of his fancy equipment in the office.

  He chuckled, carrying his steaming mug over to my desk. “Don’t pretend you’re not the same. We all are. It’s a curse. I bet you still keep some of your sketches on your nightstand.”

  I shook my head. They weren’t on my nightstand anymore. They were on my coffee table, but I didn’t mention that. “Nope. I’m setting boundaries for myself.”

  Beau rolled his sky blue eyes. Those eyes, the thick blond surfer hair, and his lankier frame were why we always teased him about being the adopted brother. “Setting boundaries for yourself or because your girl told you to?”

  “She hasn’t told me to do anything. That’s not her style,” I replied. The last thing I needed was for my brothers to think Sadie had my balls in her pocket. I would never hear the end of it. “She has found some pretty solid leads on the case, though.”

  Beau nodded. He sat back in his chair and wrapped his fingers all the way around his mug, blowing air onto its surface. “I heard. Crazy how small the world is, that she would be working for none other than Ken Lyons.”

  “I know, but as Sonny says, it gives us ‘strategic advantage.’” I nearly choked on the words. Sonny was right, of course. But Sadie was risking a lot by snooping and taking those pictures. It seemed wrong to label her work as nothing more than a strategic advantage.

  “She’s found accounts linked to the chief?” he asked.

  I nodded. “A list of them. She’s also found references to offshore accounts in a string of countries and overheard them talking about money that was taken and how they can get it back.”

  “You think that’s money Dad took from them?” His gaze pierced into mine, ice-cold as he tried to put the pieces together. Sonny was the only one of us who got involved in this shit show voluntarily. Beau and I thought we’d put it behind us for good.

  We didn’t see our father, didn’t speak to him, and until recently, didn’t speak about him. Jeremy used to visit him from time to time. Neither Beau nor I were ever interested in getting updates from him.

  The way we saw it, he’d committed the crime, and he was doing the time. End of story. From the look in Beau’s eyes, it was as hard for him to accept that we were involved as it was for me.

  To an extent, I knew we were thinking the same thing. If Dad had taken that money, illegal or not, why were we helping him conceal it? Sonny knew about the money now as did Tyson if Beau had spoken to him like he said he would.

  We couldn’t get in trouble from the law about it, but neither of us ever wanted to sit around this particular campfire with Dad. If the money wasn’t his, why had I transferred it into an account only he had access to?

  Surely, I should’ve transferred it to the cops. Beau seemed to be going through the same thought processes I was, still waiting for my answer.

  I wished I had one to give. Lifting my shoulders, I said, “It’s probably the money he took from them. The timing adds up.”

  He nodded slowly, his gaze fixed on a point behind my head before he slid it back to mine. “He did it then.”

  “Stole the money?” I asked, confused.

  The corners of his mouth turned down. “Yeah. I never thought he was innocent, but with all that’s been going on, it’s easy to forget he was still on the wrong side of this. He was, maybe still is, one of them.”

  “Great realization for a Friday morning, isn’t it?”

  He grimaced. “Anything involving Dad these days is a great, big steaming pile of fun.”

  “I like to think of him as the gift that keeps on giving.”

  Snorting, Beau agreed. “Looks that way. What’s Sonny doing with all this information your girl’s getting for him?”

  “Following up. After all that went down with Maclin and Harris, he promised Niki he’d stay on the outside. He’s turning everything over to the GBI as we go along.” Personally, I was fucking relieved Sonny wasn’t rushing after every clue himself anymore.

  Wayne Maclin was an internal investigator brought to Cypress Creek to look into the police department a couple of months ago. The guy had it in for Sonny and his friend Zach. Both men suspected the guy was corrupt himself, and it turned out their gut instincts were right on the mark.

  Sonny followed him one day and ended up being a witness to Maclin’s murder. In broad daylight, he was shot in the Cypress Creek Cemetery. I learned from Sonny later that Maclin was also involved with Harris and Ken Lyons.

  It felt like the man had eyes and ears and people in his pockets everywhere. Beau scrubbed a hand over his face. “It’s better that our baby brother’s staying out of trouble. I only found out about everything after, but he was going to get himself killed if he kept at it.”

  “I couldn’t agree more.”

  Smirking, he said, “All my baby brothers are paired off and listening to your better halves. Props to Niki for getting his stubborn ass to back down, though. We owe her for that. Never thought I’d see you settle down, I must admit. You’ve been so damn cool about women for so long now.”

  “I’m not settling down,” I repeated what I told Sonny irritably but then realized I didn’t care what he thought. I hadn’t settled down with Sadie, but I wouldn’t mind doing it. Shrugging the irritation off, I tilted my head. “Your turn will come. I never thought I’d fall for someone either, but I did. When you meet the right woman, you’ll understand.”

  Beau chuckled and raised both eyebrows. “You guys can go ahead and do the romance thing. I’m not interested. I need to get this shit with Dad done so I can get back to my regularly scheduled life. We’ve got some big projects coming up, and I want in on them.”

  “So you say until you meet her,” I said, partly to annoy him and partly because recent events in my own life made me believe it was true.

  “Sadly, brother, I must disagree. There is no her, except for my one true love.” He sighed dramatically and brought his hands up to clutch his heart. “My only love is my work. Always has been, always will be.”

  There were so many arguments I could make on that one statement, but I let it go. “Keep telling yourself that.”

  “Thanks.” He smirked. “I will.”

  Draining the last of his coffee, he stood up and set the dirty mug down next to the machine. “Before I go, you should know I spoke to Tyson.”

  “What did he say?”

  Beau pressed his lips together, narrowing his eyes. “It might surprise you. I know I was surprised.”

  I lifted an eyebrow. From the looks of it, Beau was still confused about what Tyson had told him. “Yeah? What about?”

  He sighed and shook his head. “He was cagey, but that wasn’t the surprise. It was what I expected from him. The surprise was that he didn’t tell me we should stop digging.”

  My head jerked back. “He didn’t?”

  “Nope. You would think he would’ve, right? I mean, his office prosecuted Dad, so you’d think he knows all there is to know about this case. I honestly though
t he was going to tell me to butt out, but he didn’t.”

  Well, would you look at that? “You’re right. I am surprised. Maybe you caught him on a good day.”

  Beau’s head fell back as he laughed. “He has those?”

  “Fair point,” I told him. “Maybe he’s going with that whole ‘let the kids mess around for a bit’ approach. If he doesn’t think there’s anything for us to find, he could be biding his time to say I told you so before rapping us all over the knuckles.”

  He shrugged as he walked to my door and opened it. “Maybe, but I think there may be more to it. Anyway, I have to get back to my love. She’ll be pining away without me. See you later.”

  “Later,” I called out as the door shut behind him.

  Tyson’s reaction to Beau telling him what we were doing was strange. I kept thinking about it as I finally got to taking care of accounting I’d meant to get started before Beau showed up.

  Just as I was clicking into the accounting program, Phoenix popped into my office. “Hey, boss, there’s a man outside who wants to talk to you.”

  I groaned internally. No doubt some customer wanted to try talking me into a discount or something again. I really didn’t have time for this, but I also didn’t have a choice. “Thanks, man. Send him in.”

  Shutting the laptop’s lid, I did a double take when the man who walked into my office wasn’t a customer. It was Ken Lyons.

  “Mr. Lovett,” he said curtly, closing my office door behind him. It clicked shut, blocking out the noise from the workshop beyond. “How are you?”

  “Both of us know you’re not here to inquire about my general health and well-being,” I said calmly, keeping my voice even. “What do you want?”

  Ken deftly undid the button on his jacket and sat down smoothly in the chair Beau had vacated. “I’ve come to talk to you.”

  “Clearly.” My eyes narrowed on his. “I don’t have anything to say to you, though, so you’re wasting your time.”

  Cocking his head, he ran a hand along his perfectly straight tie. “I’ll ask my questions anyway. If you don’t have any answers, as you say, you might want to listen.”

  Arms crossed, I sat back in my chair and jerked my head to tell him to get a move on. I didn’t have all day to get threatened.

  “Your business is doing well,” he said.

  Narrowing my eyes to slits, I didn’t respond. Ken wasn’t fazed by my lack of a response. “It makes me wonder if you still have access to all those fat family accounts your father used to administer for you boys.”

  Jutting out my chin, I met his gaze dead-on. “That’s none of your business.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong, son. It very much is my business. I will find out what I need to know. You should be careful when that day comes.”

  I rolled my shoulders back, shooting him a disbelieving look. “I don’t appreciate vague threats, especially not when made in my own office. My family has nothing to hide. You’re barking up the wrong tree, so just fuck off. Would ya?”

  Chapter Twenty

  Sadie

  “Em, did you put sunscreen on your face?” I called out to Emery as she bounced between me in the kitchen and Evan out by his truck.

  “Yes, Mommy,” she yelled, barreling past me with a towel and a sweater. “Evan helped me. He said I looked like a warrior princess with all the lines on my face.”

  Laughing, I wrapped up the last sandwich I made and placed it in the cooler standing on the counter next to me. “Okay, honey. Just remember to grab the bottle before we leave it here.”

  “I already got it,” Evan said, striding into the kitchen. Hooking a strong arm around me from behind, he pressed a kiss to my temple and released me. Putting a hand on the cooler, he asked, “Can I load this up yet, or are you still busy?”

  “One minute,” I told him, walking over to the fridge to get bottles of water, juice, and soda for Evan. “There you go. I’m done.”

  Evan peered into the cooler, grinning as he looked back up at me. “You know we’re only going to the beach for the day, right? You packed enough food for a week-long expedition. Plus, there are shops and cafés around there.”

  Feeling heat creep onto my cheeks, I shrugged. “I’d rather go prepared. I know Emery will eat everything in there. This way, we don’t have to leave our stuff behind while we go for lunch.”

  Evan hoisted the cooler and came over to kiss my forehead. “Good thinking. Those sandwiches look awesome.”

  “They are,” I told him confidently. Evan had texted early this morning to tell me it was a perfect day for the beach, and I’d agreed. When I woke Emery up with the news that we were going to the beach with Evan, she was ecstatic. It’d been a long time since I’d taken Emery to the beach.

  The last few months, I had been too worried about covering the distance in our beat-up car. Before Evan fixed it, of course. Emery loved the beach, though, and was running around like a wild child because of her excitement.

  Evan grabbed onto her shoulder when she came hurtling past him again. “Hey, speedy, why don’t you grab that last bottle of soda from your mom?”

  “I will,” she insisted, beaming up at him. “I’m just getting her beach bag first.”

  Watching her run toward my room, I said, “I never asked her to do that.”

  “I think she’s in a hurry to leave,” he said with a low chuckle.

  When he turned to take the cooler to the truck, I commented. “She’s not the only one. What’s going on with you?”

  Shrugging, he looked back at me. “I just want to get out of town for the day. Escape the madness, so to speak.”

  I smiled. “I get it. What are you waiting for then? Go load that up. When you’re done and Emery brings my bag, we can go.”

  “We’re finally going,” Emery exclaimed, bursting into the kitchen. She was carrying the bag I packed earlier. I took it from her and handed her the soda instead.

  “Okay, let’s go. Let’s go,” Evan said, carrying the cooler to the truck with Emery hot on his heels. The house was quiet for the first time this morning as Evan installed Emery’s seat in his truck. I could hear them laughing and talking outside and felt a pang. I already missed the brief burst of morning activity in our home. It was filled with such excitement and enthusiasm.

  Walking out to where Evan and Emery were waiting for me in the truck, I couldn’t stop smiling. It was hard to believe that in a few short months, my life had gone from bundling a sick Emery onto the bus to this.

  “Can we play the animal game again, Mommy?” Emery asked from the back seat when I buckled myself in.

  Evan frowned at her in the rearview mirror. “What’s the animal game?”

  Emery explained it to him as Evan got us onto the road. When she was done, he glanced at me. “If that’s the game you play on the way to the zoo, what game do you play on the way to the beach?”

  I shot him an exasperated glare. “I don’t know any beach-themed road trip games, do you?”

  Shaking his head, he laughed. “The only road trip game I know is I-Spy.”

  “Let’s play I-Spy, Mommy,” Emery cheered, clapping her hands. “Evan knows it, so he can play too.”

  “Evan can learn new games too,” he offered.

  Emery shook her head. “No. We have to start now.”

  Evan and I exchanged a look at her insistence and then started playing the game. The drive to the beach went by in a flash. Gorgeous, clear blue skies stretched overhead, and there wasn’t even a breath of a breeze. We were going to have to be careful about applying sunscreen, but we couldn’t have chosen a better day for the beach.

  When we got there, Emery and I pulled off our sandals to dig our toes into the soft sand while we went in search of a spot. Evan off-loaded the truck, bringing our umbrella, towels, beach bags, and the cooler out.

  Huddled in the shade of the umbrella, I rubbed another layer of sunscreen onto Emery’s back and shoulders. “Okay, you’re ready for action. Go ahead.”
<
br />   She jumped to her feet and looked at Evan. “Will you come in and jump over the waves with me?”

  “Sure thing.” He grinned. “Let me get some sunscreen on. Then we’ll go.”

  Turning his back to me, he handed me a bottle of sunscreen over his shoulder. “Get me ready for action too.”

  “I’m surprised you didn’t turn that into a double entendre,” I murmured, feeling his muscles ripple under my palms as I lathered the sunscreen onto his warm skin. Touching him sent a sizzle of arousal to my core, but it so wasn’t the time for that.

  Evan groaned softly as my hands glided across his back. “I was this close, but I figured it wasn’t the right time.”

  “Great minds think alike,” I murmured.

  He turned his head to smirk at me. “Yeah, but fools never differ. I’m sure there’s a place somewhere here…”

  I clasped my hand over his mouth. “Don’t even say it. You’re going swimming, remember? The cold water will help you cool off.”

  “Who needs cooling off?” He jumped to his feet, tossing his sunglasses down at my feet on the towel. “If either one of us needs it, it’s you.”

  “Ha ha,” I teased him, pulling my paperback out of my beach bag and waving it at him. “Since you two are going to go splashing around, I’m reading.”

  Evan’s smirk transformed into a soft smile. “Enjoy your book. Em and I will be gone for a while.”

  My heart melted as I watched Evan take Emery’s hand when they reached the shoreline. She let go of it occasionally, but as the waves rolled in, she would reach for him and hang onto him.

  Evan got into the swing of things quickly, not surprising given that he had two younger brothers, and lunged for Emery whenever she didn’t see a wave coming. Eventually, they were both soaked and went into the water for a swim.

  There were crowds of people in the water on such a nice day, but I never lost sight of the two of them. In-between reading pages of the book I’d had for at least a year and never got around to opening, I looked up to marvel at them before carrying on. Falling for Evan wasn’t on the forefront of my mind anymore. I was past that. I was in deep with him now, but I was trying not to freak out about it.