Checkmate (Neighbor from Hell 3)

"Yeah, I'll get right on that," she said dryly as she sauntered past him.

His eyes dropped to her heart shaped ass and he just barely bit back a groan that would probably get his ass kicked by at least two of her brothers.

"What's the problem?" Rory demanded as she neared the men.

"Tell your men to get the hell out of the way so we can get some work done," David, a man he may have mistakenly promoted, snapped at Rory.

As one, all five of her brothers stepped forward as they scowled down at the much smaller man. "Watch how you talk to our sister," Bryce said softly, but the threat was clear.

David noticeably swallowed as he took a healthy step back. He shot a look of panic Connor's way and as much as he'd love to start shit just to piss Rory off, he couldn't. He needed to keep the James brothers happy if he was going to have any chance at getting them to come work for him when this project was finished.

"With our companies working together this might become a little difficult," he said to Rory, but his eyes were on the James brothers who looked more than eager to teach his foreman a lesson. That was one thing he learned early on, the James brothers had a zero tolerance policy when it came to their sister. They'd never gone after him, but that was only because Rory thought she could handle him.

Ridiculous, but true.

"Until we figure things out, David and the rest of my supervisors are going to check in with Craig and his men since they were here first and have a better understanding of what requires immediate attention," he said, shocking everyone into silence.

Rory frowned, but he didn't really care what she thought. As long she stayed out of his way, fetched his drinks and food, he would tolerate her presence. David looked pissed and ready to argue, but he didn't really care about that either. The only thing he cared about were the five large men sharing questioning looks.

He knew they hadn't expected him to give in so easily. Hell, they probably expected shouting, arguments and a lot of chaos, but they wouldn't get any. He wanted these men to work for him, and what better way to convince them to come work for him than letting them start now?

Chapter 5

"What are you doing?"

Rory didn't bother looking at Connor while she said, "Working. What does it look like?"

"It looks like you're getting in the way of my men."

She stopped what she was doing and looked pointedly around the large roof where four of her brothers were checking for weak spots and marking the areas.

"Exactly how am I getting in the way of your men if none of them are up here?" she asked, leaning over to mark a weak spot in the roof with a can of orange spray paint.

Connor glared at her as he stepped up onto the arched roof. Rory cocked a brow as she looked him over from his baby blue shirt with the dark blue tie pulled loose at the neck to his dark tan cargo khakis to his black leather hiking boots. Only a man as hot as Connor would be able to pull off that look, she thought with disgust as she turned her attention back to marking the roof.

They were going to have to replace the entire thing thanks to poor upkeep, but they liked to know which spots to avoid when it was time to rip it off. They'd learned that lesson years ago when they still worked for their father and Brian hadn't marked the roof before he started working. He fell through the roof, broke his arm and got his ass chewed out by their father in the ER while his arm was being set in a cast, scaring off more than a few nurses.

Brian sat there quietly, because he knew he f**ked up and what was expected of him. He didn't even complain when their father made him do all the grunt work for the next three months. It was a job they all hated and worked their asses off to avoid, but once you got grunt work assignment you knew that you royally screwed up. They worked hard to avoid grunt work, real hard.

"Because they should be up here doing this, not you," he said, stepping onto the roof and gesturing for her to get the hell off. With an amused snort, she continued to check the roof.

"And what exactly should I be doing?" she asked, not bothering to look up as she tapped her blunt metal pole against another spot.

"Getting my coffee. What else?" he asked in that cocky tone that always rubbed her the wrong way and worst of all, he said it in front of her brothers.

She looked up, hoping they were getting offended on her behalf and moving to throw Connor's ass off the roof, but of course they only let out amused chuckles as they continued to work. For a moment she glared at them, wondering not for the first time, why they hadn't beaten the crap out of Connor for her since they beat everyone else up.

Whenever she asked them about that, they either shrugged it off like it was nothing or told her that she was handling Connor well enough on her own. She secretly suspected that they said and did nothing because they got a kick out of this sick and twisted rivalry she had going on with Connor. Even her own father, who hated it when a man looked at her the wrong way, never mind made her life a living hell, said and did nothing.

There was something seriously wrong with the men in her life, she decided as she marked off another area. When she stood up, she nearly jumped off the roof, but Connor's grip on her h*ps kept her firmly in place. That was good, because it meant that it wouldn't take a year to heal in order to kick his ass. She could do it right now.

She moved to turn and let him have it, but he held her firmly in place. "You don't belong up here, Rory," he said, keeping his tone light even as his hands tightened on her hips.

"I'm not fetching your coffee, Connor, so drop it," she said, taking a step forward only to have the jerk move with her.

"I don't care what you do as long as you get off the roof and let some of my men up here," he said, keeping his hold on her as they continued to move forward with her ramming the end of her pole against the roof with a little more force than necessary. When she found a soft spot she bent without thinking and placed her bottom firmly against the front of his pants.

As soon as the action registered in her mind she stood up, praying that no one noticed the blush creeping up her cheeks, and tested the area around the weak spot. Connor's soft amused chuckle in her ear made the blush worse.

"Don't you have anything better to do?" she asked him as she tried to ignore just how good the brief contact had felt.

"Well, I do have about a hundred things that need my attention, but at the moment I'm stuck trying to get a pain in the ass woman off the roof so that my men can get to work. As soon as she moves her ass I'll be out of your hair," he explained, sounding amused.