Playing With Trouble (Desire Bay 1)

He didn’t have time to look around for his crew, so he got his nieces some safe tools to play with—a.k.a. some Sharpies—and let them color on a two-by-four while he hopped in the bucket and moved the sawdust onto the dump truck in record time.

“Okay, who wants to ride in the big dump truck?” Jake asked, already sweating and thanking God he had a spare key to all the rigs at Baughman Home Goods on his key chain.

“Yay, dump truck!” the twins said. Jake hustled to get their car seats switched over to the truck and headed toward Russ.

Nothing about the situation was right. His anger was rising, and after having his ass chewed by Russ, only for Jake to smooth it out by offering a discount and ensuring this wouldn’t happen again, he was back in the truck with the kids and pissed as hell. He’d never had to fire anyone before, but this was crazy. Mannie was his most trusted guy. So something had better be wrong, or Jake was going to lose it.

His afternoon was already shot, and Erica would be back at his place in an hour to get the kids. But once again, he had to go back to Baughman Home Goods to switch out rigs and get the kids back in his regular truck.

“It’s like ring-around-the-rosy today, only with cars,” Lexi said when Jake finally had them fastened in and heading back to his place.

“It really is, huh, kiddo?” He glanced in his rearview mirror and winked at his sweet nieces. “You two have been so good while I had to work. What do you say to some ice cream when we get back?”

Their little arms shot in the air and happy exclamations burst out.

Heading back through town, he was trying to tamp down the pissy confusion rising in his gut. He was going over what the hell he was going to say to Mannie when the SOB finally did call him back. But then Jake saw a Baughman Home Goods utility van—one of the vehicles they used to move tools and smaller lumber loads, especially when it was raining—parked outside Goonies. And wouldn’t you know, there was Mannie’s truck parked next to it.

So his crew was at a bar in the middle of the day, and that’s why they’d missed an order?

Fuck. No.

Jake peeled out a little harder than he meant at the stop sign and

parked at Goonies. His sister wouldn’t love the idea of his taking the kids to a bar, but it was still before happy hour and lights out, and he had to figure out what was going on, so . . . the bar it was. Besides, there weren’t any other cars in the lot, so it should be pretty empty inside.

Carrying Bella in one arm, he held Lexi’s hand with the other and stomped toward the bar.

“Uncle Jake is mad,” Bella said to Lexi. “Whoever Goonie is better watch out!”

Lexi nodded. “Yeah . . . Uncle Jake’s muscles look angry.”

Oh, Uncle Jake’s muscles were very angry. It was time to figure out what the hell was going on.

“Thank you for your help, Mannie. You can set that last one right there,” Laura instructed the crew who’d just unloaded the centerpieces. They were really great help today. Loading the flowers in the van, then driving them over and now setting up. Granted, she might have told them that she was the boss just as much as Jake was and needed their help, but it was only for an hour, two tops, and then they could go back to the shop.

The bar was closed for the party tonight. So aside from Laura and the crew, they were the only ones setting up, and it was going to look beautiful.

The door boomed open, and Laura jumped. She turned to see who had just entered the bar.

Oh my goodness . . .

Baby ducks were cute. Basket of puppies? Super cute. But the hulking Jacob Lock, covered in a light sheen of sweat and wearing a tight T-shirt, all rippled muscle, holding a pigtailed little girl in one strong arm and the hand of another blue-eyed girl in the other, was about the cutest damn thing she’d ever seen.

That was, until she caught the look in his eyes. Which appeared to be irate.

“What’s going on here?” Jacob said, and the entire crew stilled like they’d been hit with some invisible freeze gun.

“Hey, boss,” Mannie said and set the last centerpiece down and made his way to Jake. “We were just heading out.”

“That right?” Jake said. She could tell by the strain in his jaw he was trying to hold back but was clearly pissed about something. “Heading back to do your job that you missed. Like Russ’s sawdust order?”

“I’m sorry,” Mannie said. “We had to help Miss Baughman.”

Jake’s eyes shot to hers. “The engagement party tonight,” he said and looked around.

“Yeah,” she replied. “How did you know about that?”

“My buddy Wayne is the one getting married, and I was invited.”