Daddy in Disguise (Crescent Cove 7)

Okay, maybe minus Dani.

It wasn’t her fault her father was an idiot.

It had been a week since our first date. A minor emergency at the work site had kept him busy. That did not help my current state. Especially since he wouldn’t let me over there to see what the hell went wrong.

He’d practically patted me on the head and told me not to worry about it.

He was very lucky that murder was illegal in New York. Okay, so it was a federal offense as well, but I was very creative. Besides, all I had to do was ask Vee how to hide a body. She listened to enough serial killer podcasts to give me a good lead on how to make sure he was never found.

Thankfully, the dinner crowd wasn’t as heavy as my lunch crowd. Most people shuffled off to the diner for full meals or went to the handful of eateries around town. Exactly why I was excited to get The Haunt moving.

I wanted to feed people coffee and light lunch fare by day and full food by night.

With the specialty nature of the restaurant, it seemed fitting that it was a nighttime venture. As with most horror features, the light of day wasn’t nearly as kind to monsters. Which suited me. If it really took off, I could always extend the hours.

Then again, I’d like to actually just get inside the freaking place and get my staff trained.

“You’re going to literally burn people where they stand if you keep staring people down like that,” Rylee said out of the side of her mouth.

“I’m just frustrated.”

“They have toys for that.”

“You need them? Thought you had a strapping man in your life these days.”

“I’m not the one growing laser beams in my eyeballs. Besides, toys enhance. You should try it.”

“Can you just make that latte, please?”

She shrugged. “I can do both at the same time.”

“Obviously not, since you’re still flapping your lips and not moving your hands.” I swung around the end of the counter with the plastic tub I used to bus tables.

Rylee was whistling like the asshole she was as I returned to dump the first load of dishes. Damn her. And damn Gideon for leaving me so worked up.

Luckily, it was too busy for me to think much about next door. All I could focus on was the next customer in line and badgering Vee into making another batch of the sold out double chocolate bat cupcakes.

Just as the crowd started thinning, Kinleigh Scott, from Kinleigh’s Attic across the street, muscled her way through the door with a huge wagon of pumpkins.

I was scrubbing a table near the window and rushed over to help her. “What the hell?”

“I didn’t know what else to do with them. One of my deliveries included a gorgeous armoire that I’m going to be convincing August to help renovate with me.”

I grabbed the side of the wooden-slatted wagon before it tipped. “What does that have to do with a dozen gourds and six weird looking pumpkins?”

“They were in the armoire.”

“You do know you have a window as well.”

“Yes, but this is more your thing than mine.” She flicked her fingers over the Halloween decorations from floor to ceiling.

Dani wandered over, her huge eyes brimming with trouble. “Oh, wow. Can we carve them?”

“No.”

“But they’re pumpkins. That’s what you do to them.”

“In October, sure. Now? They’d be mush before we get out of September. We haven’t even hit Labor Day yet.”