Hot as Heller (Aster Valley 3)

“She’s pretty great,” I admitted, spotting the woman herself over his shoulder. He must not have realized she was coming to take me to dinner. “And I think she’d appreciate hearing you say so. She’s going through a scary time right now and can use all the support she can get.” I shot her a wink, but Shawn must not have noticed.

His grin dropped, and his face became serious. “I’m here for all of it. If she’ll let me. The baby and everything. I’m serious, Declan. This isn’t just a fling for me. I’ve had girlfriends before, and I never felt a fraction for them the way I feel for Tessa. I want to make her happy. Whatever it takes. And… I’m not in a hurry. I don’t want to rush her or pressure her right now. I just want to be there for her. I… I really care about her.”

Oh shit.

The tears came right on cue. It was the first big sniffle that clued Shawn in to his inadvertent eavesdropper.

His face dropped. “Baby, hell. Oh hell, I didn’t mean… Come here.” He held her in a tight hug and ran his hand over her hair, making sweet shushing noises and rocking her gently.

“I should have said those things to you.” He chastised himself quietly into her hair. I stood up and walked over to the pair of them before nudging them both into my office and closing the door to give them privacy. Then I caught Penny’s eye across the office. Her hand was on her heart, and she had a Kleenex under her eye.

I laughed. “There you go. An office romance and you didn’t even have to work for it.”

Finn had texted around lunchtime that he’d agreed to do the night climbing scene after all. He’d arranged for an experienced climbing instructor from over in Steamboat Springs to be on set for it to help oversee the safety issues, and I got the feeling he was paying for it out of his own pocket.

I tried not to spend too much time thinking about it or I’d need to get back in my office for the bottle of antacids in my desk.

Instead, I’d decided to reach out to Mikey, who reached out to Sam and Truman, who reached out to Winter and Gent, to see if they wanted to grab a beer somewhere. Julian was still in town, so he joined us at Pie Hole.

The first thing Truman said when I sat down was, “Tell me everything. Oh my god he’s so stinking cute. Don’t you think? Those freckles.” He clasped his hands in front of his chest and sighed. Truman’s blond, bearded boyfriend blinked at him.

“Do we need to give you a private moment?”

Truman laughed and leaned over to kiss the edge of Sam’s jaw. It wasn’t until his lips were on his big boyfriend that Truman’s ears turned pink.

“There’s only one man for me, big guy. Especially if that man knows how to hang closet shelving.”

Sam broke out in a laugh, trying not to spit out his beer. “Fine. Alright. Enough. I’ll do it tomorrow, I swear.”

Truman looked over at me with a grin. “The cobbler’s family has no shoes, or in our case the contractor’s partner has no handyman around the house.”

Mikey broke in. “Sorry, that’s our fault. We’re keeping him too busy with resort business.”

Julian nodded like Mikey was doing the same to him.

Truman agreed. “That’s true. But I know he’s loving every minute of it. Aren’t you, babe?” He turned an expectant expression on Sam, who gave a satisfied nod and stretched his arm around Truman’s smaller form.

“I never knew I could work outside all day in the height of summer and not think I was on the verge of heatstroke. Aster Valley summers beat Houston ones, hands down.”

I pictured Sam sweaty and shirtless on a Houston summer jobsite. That wasn’t a bad image, but my brain quickly replaced Sam on urban scaffolding with Finn on a rock face, shirtless and sweaty. His muscles stretched and bunched as he reached for the next handhold or toe hold. The rope harness cupped his junk, and his ass and veins were visible on his forearms.

“… homicide. I just can’t decide if I want to kill him slowly with a boning knife or quick-like with a semi-automatic.”

My attention snapped to Mikey, who was looking at me with mischief in his eyes. “What the fuck?” I asked. “Who are we killing?”

The table of guys all broke into laughter at my expense. Mikey pointed to me and called me out for zoning out during the conversation. “Dude, it’s nice to know when the convo around you turned to premeditated murder, your ears at least did you a solid.”

Truman stopped giggling long enough to add, “And I love the use of the word ‘we.’ No matter what nefarious plans were afoot, our intrepid sheriff was all in.”