Good Girls Don't (Donovan Brothers Brewery 1)

“Thank you.” She gave him another hug and added a kiss for good measure. “Now stay out of trouble.”

“I should be saying that to you,” he said quietly.

Tessa braced herself for another lecture, but even though she saw worry flash through his eyes, he just tossed the towel over his shoulder and went back to work. That was one nice thing about brothers. They rarely wanted to talk about feelings. That suited her just fine.

“Looks like a great night,” he said, glancing out at the tables that were already filling up. And the conversation was officially over. Tessa was free to escape and she started back to her office.

A careful hand on her arm stopped her. “Is Wallace here?” a soft voice asked.

Tessa looked down to see a woman so petite that half her height seemed to be made up of her perfectly round afro. “Hi. Yes, he’s in the back. I’ll get him for you.”

“Thanks. I’m Faron, by the way. If he asks.”

Tessa knocked on the door of the brewing room before she opened it, just in case Wallace was making love to one of tanks. “Wallace, there’s someone named Faron here to see you!”

The brewmaster popped up from crouching next to one of the mash tuns. “Faron’s here?”

“She’s in the front.” Tessa could’ve sworn he licked his lips when he glanced toward the barroom. “Do you want me to bring her back?”

“No, I…”

She watched in shock as the foul-tempered behemoth tried to smooth a hand through his bushy hair, then gave up and patted it down. “No, just tell her I’ll be out in five minutes. Comp her a beer?”

“Um, yes. Of course. Absolutely.” Well, this was new. Wallace’s dates were normally the nervous ones. He always stayed steady as a thousand-year-old tree. Until now.

More than a little curious, Tessa took Faron’s order herself, surprised when the woman ordered a porter. Faron looked like she had the appetite—and bone structure—of a bird. She wasn’t chatty, though. She took her beer with a simple thank-you and retreated to a table in the corner to sit quietly.

“Wallace’s date,” Tessa whispered to Jamie.

“That man is a god,” he said with complete sincerity. “He’s the one who should be tweeting. In his own name, I might add.”

“Hey, I gave you the chance to do it. You weren’t interested. Suck it up.”

“Get out of my bar,” he growled, and Tessa left with a laugh.

She made one last phone call, confirming with the human resources vendor that everything still looked good with the Social Security numbers. No alerts had been triggered. They’d dodged a bullet. Well, actually… Tessa had made a move toward stricter information protection. That hadn’t been dodging a bullet at all. It had been ass-kicking forethought.

She shut down her computer and headed for Luke’s house on a cloud of triumph. Tessa Donovan, protector of families and savior of breweries. Oh, and defiler of men, if she had anything to say about it. Yes, indeed.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

“SO WHAT’S MISSING from the files?” Simone asked, but Luke was distracted from answering. Instead, he frowned at the way she shifted in her chair, her hand going to her side.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she said, but he watched her ease slightly to the right. “What’s up with the files?”

“A couple of the later cases have references to interviews with a witness, but I can’t find the records. I called Ben. He’s going to look into it.”

She made a thoughtful noise. “So I thought Frankie was being truthful.”

“Me, too. He was already on for another two years of probation. No reason he wouldn’t want to bring the other guy down with him.”

“No reason except fear, and I didn’t get any of that.”

“I’ll swing by and check out the fencing behind the brewery tomorrow. See if that part checks out. Do you know what the layout is back there?”

She shook her head but fired up her laptop to access satellite images. The results weren’t promising. A neighborhood street dead-ended right behind the brewery. It was unlikely anyone had installed surveillance cameras at all, and certainly none that pointed at the street. They’d have to knock on doors, and the lieutenant likely wouldn’t want to alarm the community over a property crime.