Southern Storms (Compass 1)

“What in the hell is stuck in there?” I grumbled as I glanced down the clogged-up sink of the Jeffersons’ master bathroom.

Marie Jefferson was an older lady with kind eyes. She was in her early sixties and always wore her pearls around her neck, along with the most expensive, vibrant clothing known to mankind. She was always wearing designer clothes, and if it wasn’t designer, it was still expensive as hell. Most people in Havenbarrow received hefty paychecks or came from a family with hefty paychecks, and Marie was no different. She simply didn’t have the same snotty attitude as a lot of the town did.

On the scale of people I hated, she was one of the few and far between who I could tolerate, which was good considering her husband, Eddie, was my therapist and had been since I was thirteen years old.

“Oh, well, you know…” Marie shrugged her shoulders and twirled her finger in her dyed rose-gold hair. “Last night, Eddie and I got a little wild, and well…” She cleared her throat, and her cheeks turned a bright shade of red. “Jax, it’s a little embarrassing. Eddie told me not to tell you the truth, but I’m a terrible liar.”

Her stare moved past me and landed on Connor, my assistant, who’d recently finished his junior year of high school. He was my one and only employee for one simple reason—no one else in town had enough nerve to work with me. Connor was different, though. He was the town’s hustler through and through. If there was a way to make a profit, Connor was all over it. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was a millionaire before he turned twenty-one. The wheels in his head were always turning with ideas on how to make more money for himself.

I’d been working with him for almost a year now, which was a lot longer than any of my other employees had lasted. Everyone before him either left crying or calling me an asshole. Some cried and called me an asshole at the same time.

Connor was different. He didn’t take any of my aggressive, short comments personally. He was determined to show up for his paycheck and have a good time doing it, too. Even when I was in a shitty mood, Connor acted as if we were the best of friends.

It actually worked pretty well in my favor. We were the perfect odd couple. It was as if Oscar the Grouch had a plumbing business with Big Bird. When I came off as a grump to customers, Connor used his charm to win them over. He walked away with more tips than I did on the regular because people liked him. I couldn’t blame them.

Sad to say it, but over time, the little shit had grown on me, too.

I brushed my arm across my forehead. “Now, don’t be embarrassed, Marie. Either you can tell us now, or I’ll take apart the pipes. We’ll find out what’s in there regardless, but if you tell me now, I can avoid doing extra work in case it doesn’t need as much as I might think it does.”

“Oh, heavens.” She blushed and clutched her pearls in her slender fingers. “Okay, well, I’ll just spit it out. There are anal beads down there. Not big ones or anything! Just a very small string of them.”

Connor instantly burst out laughing. I shot him a stern look to tell him to shut the hell up as my body flinched at the idea of what Marie had just told me. The idea of sweet, little Marie using anal beads brought about a level of discomfort I wasn’t ready to face. What kind of freaky shit was my therapist into? Disturbing didn’t even begin to cover what I was feeling.

Hell, now I was clutching my own damn pearls.

“We only used them once while Eddie and I were…um, well…” She blushed more and leaned in toward me. “You see, I was on my hands and knees on the sink counter.” She paused and gestured around. “Don’t worry, I bleached everything before you came over. There’s no cu—”

“Oookay, you know what, Marie? I think we got it from here. How about you go ahead and tend to whatever else you need to get done around the house? I’ll be done in here in no time.”

I glanced over my shoulder to see Connor standing there with his arms crossed and the reddest face in the history of time. His cheeks were puffed out like Alvin the damn chipmunk, and I knew if I poked him in the side, he’d explode.

When Marie was out of sight, Connor released his laughter, hunching over and gripping his stomach as he howled in a fight of giggles.

“Oh my gosh, that’s the nastiest shit I’ve ever heard! She’s like a hundred years old!” he exclaimed.