I unlock the front door, immediately recognizing that the alarm is off. It’s silent, so I make my way into the back bar area. I see Gabby standing behind two sawhorses, with a piece of wood laid between. She hears my footsteps, and her head immediately snaps up in fear.
When she sees me, she places her hand over her heart. “Geez, Hunter. You scared the shit out of me.”
“What are you doing here?” I ask, completely bewildered that she’s working at… glancing down at my watch… three AM.
“I’m working,” she says, pulling her tape measure out and marking a line on the wood with a pencil, which she slips back behind her ear when she’s done.
“It’s fucking three in the morning. Are you crazy?”
She doesn’t even look up at me. “No, I’m just hard working. What’s got you in a snit?”
I ignore that question and ask another. “Is this where you’ve been each night?”
“Yeah,” she says as she picks up the circular saw that’s lying on the floor. She flicks the switch on and starts cutting through the wood.
I’m pissed that she’s ignoring me and pissed that she’s working at three AM. I bend down to grab the extension cord that has the saw plugged into the wall and yank it out, watching her glare up at me as the saw winds down to a dead stop.
“What the hell?” she asks in exasperation.
“You cannot be sane enough to think that this is okay,” I tell her. “You work all fucking day here, and now you come back and work in the early morning hours. No wonder you fall dead asleep as soon as I’m done fucking you.”
Her eyes narrow at me, and she stomps over to the wall outlet to plug the cord back in. “You hired me to do this job, but you have no fucking say-so in how I do it, so just back off.”
She walks back to her work area and, as she reaches for the saw, I grab the cord and yank it back out again.
Her head snaps up and flames shoot out of her eyes. God, she’s fucking gorgeous when she’s mad. She opens her mouth to lay into me, but I hold my hand up. Surprisingly, her lips snap together, although her glare is no less ferocious.
In a calm voice, I say, “Just tell me why you feel the need to work these hours?”
She takes a deep breath, closing her eyes. When she opens them, the heat has died down a little. “I need to stay on schedule to meet the deadlines we set. Since we added this project for the hanging wall for your trophies, I just need to put some extra hours in to stay on track. It’s no biggie.”
My heart flops over, and my pride and respect for her increases tenfold. I walk up to her and pull her into a hug, which she halfheartedly returns. Kissing her on the head, I tell her, “We can extend the deadline, Gabs. It’s not that big of a deal. Besides… I miss you in bed at night.”
I expect her to go all gooey and melt over my proclamation, so imagine my surprise when she pushes angrily out of my embrace. “Wrong! It is a big deal. It’s my reputation.”
I laugh, trying to ease the tension. “Seriously… no one is going to know if we extend the deadline by a few days.”
“Wrong again, doofus,” she says angrily. “When I make a bid for another project, they call you for a reference, and they ask if I stayed on schedule, are you going to lie for me?”
“Yes,” I tell her simply, because I have no qualms about doing that.
“No,” she says in frustration and stomps her foot. “This is important to me. A General Contractor staying on budget and on schedule is paramount to making it in this business.”
Okay, I’m starting to have a newfound appreciation for the lengths that Gabby will go to make it in this world. My mind searches frantically for a solution, and then it comes to me.
“Let me make sure I got this right. You had a set schedule based on the original bid, right?”
“Yes,” she says in a humoring tone.
“And we decided to do the additional wall after you started the project, right?”
“Right.”
“Then we should have re-done the original contract. The fact that I added on additional work should have included an extension of the deadline.”
On The Rocks
Sawyer Bennett's books
- Dance Upon the Air
- High Noon
- Moon Island(Vampire Destiny Book 7)
- Illusion(The Vampire Destiny Book 2)
- Upon A Midnight Clear
- Son Of The Morning
- MacKenzie's mission(MacKenzie Family Saga #2)
- Loving Evangeline(Patterson-Cannon Family series #1)
- A Billionaire's Redemption
- A Convenient Proposal
- A Dishonorable Knight
- A Headstrong Woman
- A Passion for Pleasure
- Atonement
- Beyond a Doubt
- Beyond Control
- Cavanaugh on Duty
- Colton's Dilemma (Shadow Breeds)
- Conceal, Protect
- Conflict of Interest
- Confessing to the Cowboy
- Dreams Don't Wait
- Explosive Attraction
- Find Wonder in All Things
- Forbidden Fires (Bondage & Breakfast)
- Galveston Between Wind and Water
- Game On
- Gone with the Wolf
- Honor's Players
- Illusions of Love
- Intaglio Dragons All The Way Down
- Just One Song
- Living London
- Lone Wolf (Shifters Unbound)
- Love Resolution
- Lyon's Crew
- Mountain Moonlight
- Need A Want Companion Novel
- Of One Heart
- Once a Bad Girl
- Once a Thief
- Once Again a Bride
- Once and Again
- Once Touched, Never Forgotten
- Once Upon a Kiss
- Once Upon a Prince
- One Desert Night
- One More Kiss
- One More Sleepless Night
- One Night of Misbehavior
- One Night Standoff
- One Texas Night
- Only Love (The Atonement Series)
- Operation Endurance
- Primal Bonds
- Questions of Trust A Medical Romance
- Reflection Point
- Retribution
- Savage Redemption
- Second Chance
- Secure Location
- Someone I Used to Know
- Son of a Preacher Man
- Soul Bonded
- Sunset Seduction
- Sweet as Honey (The Seven Sisters)
- Sweet On You
- Tempting Cameron
- That Carrington Magic
- The Bridgertons Happily Ever After
- The Demon's Song
- The Dragon and the Pearl
- The Lone Rancher
- The Millionaire Cowboy's Secret
- Translation of Love
- Twisted Perfection
- Vision In White
- When Love's Gone Country
- The Lost Tycoon
- Down on Her Knees
- Love, Your Concierge
- A Demon Made Me Do It
- Campbell_Book One
- The Lady of Bolton Hill
- Born to Ride_A Clubhouse Collection
- A Question of Honor
- Blood on Copperhead Trail
- Passion and the Prince
- Top Secret Twenty-One
- Dungeon Royale
- Make Me Bad(Private Lessons)
- My Fair Billionaire
- Writing Our Song:A Billionaire Romance
- Kissed by Moonlight
- Redemption in Love
- The Masterful Mr. Montague
- Diamonds are Forever
- Every Second with You
- If You Only Knew
- Unexpected Temptation