Seven Roses (Haremworld)

“We might get something.” I shrugged. “Jesse said he ran into a girl on the edge of town with a flat tire that's headed our way on a donut.”

“A girl? If she doesn’t have a name, she must not be a local.” He slammed his door and walked towards the garage.

“She’s Mrs. Grant’s granddaughter, here to deal with her estate.” I relayed the information given to my brother. “According to Jesse, she’s quite a looker.”

“I don’t care how pretty she is, but if she can cook a pie like Mrs. Grant, I might have to roll the dice with her.” He leaned against the garage and fanned away some of the smoke from my cigarette that drifted his way.

“Jesse said Axe already beat everyone to the punch.” I took another drag from my cigarette and blew smoke away from him.

“How the fuck did that happen?” Major put his hands on his hips.

“Axe changed her tire—you know pretty much anything is foreplay with that guy.” I laughed and shook my head.

“Shit, he’s probably already fucked her by now.” Major let out a sigh of defeat.

“I wouldn’t be surprised.” I nodded. “Anyway, outside of getting her a new tire, I don’t think I’ll have anything today.”

“Ah well, I guess I’m just going to go home and drink then.” He rubbed his chin for a moment and nodded.

Another car appeared at the end of the street and I turned to see if it was her, but I saw the mayor’s fancy Cadillac instead. Joe Danvers had been the mayor in Granite Falls for a couple of years. He was barely more than a kid, but he was the only one that ran for office when our last mayor retired after twenty-four years of service. He was a bit arrogant, but most of us liked him when he wasn’t on some holy quest to make Granite Falls better. The locals were already fairly happy with the town as it was, outside of the fact that we had a pretty terrible population demographic when it came to women. For some reason they seemed to flee Granite Falls, not wanting to live in the aging community. Instead of passing by the shop like he normally did, the mayor turned his Cadillac into the parking lot and parked next to Major. Major stopped and watched as the driver side door opened.

“Hey guys.” Mayor Danvers raised his hand and waved to us. “I’m having some trouble—I keep hearing some kind of knocking sound.”

“I guess we have a customer after all.” I snickered and looked over to Major.

“I’ll get it up on the rack.” Major walked towards Mayor Danvers and took his keys.

“What do you think it could be?” Mayor Danvers walked over to me and watched as Major climbed behind the driver’s seat and pulled the car into the garage terminal.

“Could be a number of things.” I shrugged and dropped my cigarette on the ground, pressing a boot to it as soon as it hit the pavement. “Want me to give you a ride over to City Hall?”

“No, I can wait around for a little bit. Things haven’t been that hectic the last couple of days.” He leaned against the wall. “I hear there’s a new girl in town.”

“Yeah.” I nodded and cut my eyes towards him with suspicion. “Interesting that you showed up the one place everyone seems to know she’s headed.”

“I told you.” He cut his eyes at me the same way mine were aimed at him. “I got a problem with my car.”

“He ain’t lying.” Major walked out of the garage shaking his head. “There’s a rod loose. We’ll have to order a part. Good thing you brought it in when you did—you could have sent that thing clean through your motor if you kept driving it.”

“See.” Mayor Danvers smiled, which was an odd reaction for a man who was just told he was about to spend a fortune in repairs.

“Let’s go inside and look it up.” I motioned for him to follow.

“Might as well leave it on the rack. You can’t drive it.” Major started following us as we walked into the shop.

Chapter 3: Samantha

There was no reaction when I arrived at the shop and called out for some form of assistance. I walked towards the glass doors that appeared to lead to some sort of office. When I got close, I could see three guys inside huddled over a computer terminal. They were so engrossed in it that they must not have heard me drive up. I could see two of them pointing and shaking their head as the one pushing the mouse started moving things around on the screen. It looked like they were obsessed with whatever was on the monitor. One of the men appeared to be a bit better dressed than the other two. He had slicked back hair that was almost black in color and a white button-down shirt with a purple tie. The other two were a little more ragged in appearance, and looked to be a little older. I assumed they worked at the shop—one of them was surely Steve, the brother of the sheriff I met on my way into town. I pulled the door open and heard the bells attached to it start to ring as they dangled freely against the glass.

“Hello?” I called out as I stepped into the dimly lit office.

“Oh, hi!” A man with a striking resemblance to Jesse stepped forward and smiled. “Welcome to Steve’s Repair Shop—I’m Steve. My brother said you would be stopping by.”

“Word travels fast.” I raised my eyebrows.

“Come on, let’s have a look at that tire?” Steve walked from around the counter, leaving the other two guys staring at us. After a moment, they turned back to the computer screen.

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