Can't Hardly Breathe (The Original Heartbreakers #4)

Not on my watch.

Daniel hid the sign in a drawer and taped a new one to the counter. “Office hours 7:00 a.m.–10:00 p.m. If there’s a problem after hours, take care of it yourself. You’re an adult.”

He sat at his desk and worked on answering questions sent from the inn’s website. Another job Holly clearly hadn’t done. There were hundreds of messages from people raving about their stay, complaining about the rude receptionist and asking about reserving a block of rooms for different festivals.

There were also two new applications. He placed them both in a To Be Read Later folder without reading a single word. He would look everything over in three weeks, when his tour of duty ended.

You’re welcome, Thea. Thank me with a kiss.

He answered the questions as best he could, apologized for Holly’s behavior and promised the new beefcake behind the counter was much nicer.

When he finished, he headed for the kitchen, Princess trotting behind him. The door was unlocked, the room empty. Guests could walk in and take anything they wanted with no concern about the money the food cost Thea.

He started a list of things he needed to buy for the inn, and digital locks took the number-one spot.

Harlow would begin painting her murals in the first themed-out room today, but not for hours yet. He might as well tape the door frames and windows, allowing her to concentrate on the main event. Again Princess trotted behind him, his own little shadow.

He frowned when he noticed the bright light spilling from beneath the door. Hadn’t he turned off everything before he’d left? Yeah. Definitely. He hadn’t wanted to add an extra expense to Thea’s electric bill.

Very quietly, he used his master key. The door—which would look cool with a twister carved in the center—swung open to reveal Thea in a T-shirt and raggedy jeans, her mass of curls piled atop her head. She had earbuds stuffed in her ears, and as she wrote on the wall, her hips bumped and ground just the way he liked.

A bolt of lust slammed into him, the trials of the night fading from his awareness. He wanted to groan and laugh at the same time. Such a gorgeous, silly girl, his Thea.

He flipped the light switch on and off to alert her to his presence. With a gasp, she yanked out the buds and spun.

“Daniel.” Her emerald gaze swept over him—and heated. “What are you doing here?”

Looks like I’m stoking a fire in you, my sweet. The same fire he’d noticed when they were at the Scratching Post, and Brock had mentioned playing a sex game with his hookups.

“I couldn’t sleep,” he said, hopeful for the first time in forever, it seemed. Finally he had a weapon to use to his advantage. “I figured I’d get started on the room.”

Compassion softened her features.

Just like that, irritation began to claw at him. It was the total wrong response, he knew. He was the one who’d told her there were horrors in his mind. Something that had shocked him as much as it had shocked Brock. They had an unspoken rule: Sharing Is Scaring. Civilians didn’t need to know the things they’d witnessed...the things they’d done.

“I couldn’t sleep, either. I was too excited.” She waved him over. “Come see what I’ve done.”

He’d have to be a stronger man to resist her. He eagerly closed the distance.

“Each wall will represent a different season but also different weather patterns, with a single tree spreading its branches across all four,” she said. “This one will be a winter wonderland with an ice storm...this one is a rose garden with a tornado...this one is a pumpkin patch with noctilucent clouds...and here, where the bed presses against it, a lush summer forest with rain showers. I’m hoping you’ll build a headboard in the shape of a tree. The branches can stretch out over the mattress, and I can drape them with a canopy of green fabric. Like the walls, different branches can represent different seasons.”

“Me? I’ll build a headboard?”

“Well, you took a woodworking class in school...”

She’d known his schedule?

He masked his pleasure by donning the most severe expression he could muster. “You want me to build a tree...you’ll have to negotiate.”





CHAPTER TEN

NEGOTIATE. LIKE EVERYTHING Daniel suggested, the idea was both a threat to her peace of mind and a delight. He wanted her in his bed. He’d made that clear...and it was growing clearer by the second. His jeans were unable to hide the massive evidence as he hardened right before her eyes.

A fact that didn’t embarrass him. No, he ran a hand down the entire length of it, as if he was proud of his reaction to her.

She swallowed in an effort to moisten her suddenly dry mouth. There was no way she’d give up her goods and services for a headboard...right? That would be bad? Right!

I’m worth more, blah, blah, blah.

“Provide the headboard,” she said, breathless, “and I’ll put your name on the plaque that will hang outside the door.”

His look was as pitying as it was carnal. “You think I’m going to spend days...weeks...constructing the headboard of your dreams just to have my name put on a plaque? Think again, pinup girl.”

Pinup girl? What a delicious nickname!

Do. Not. Soften. “You can stay in this very room, no charge, once a month for the next year.” And if he brought a woman with him? “Alone,” she added, and her cheeks began to burn.

“Now you’re just embarrassing yourself, sweetheart.”

Ugh! “You build the headboard, and I won’t tell Jessie Kay you made me cry.”

He pursed his lips. “You wouldn’t.”

“I so would.” Dorothea went in for the kill. “Jessie Kay texted to tell me she’d heard we’d hooked up at the Scratching Post, and that I should let her know when you mess up. When, not if. Said she’d take care of the problem—you—lickety-split.”

“Wait.” He shook his head, his expression twisted with horror. “I made you cry?”

Head slap. Why hadn’t she kept that bit of info to herself? “Not recently, no. And never you mind about that. Concentrate on the headboard.”

“I am concentrating, but you’re going to have to give me something I want. Make the backbreaking manual labor worth my while.”

“I’m not going to offer sex, if that’s what you’re hinting at.” The very idea should probably offend her, yet here she was, trembling like a teenage girl with her first crush.

Because Daniel was her first crush.

The look he gave her was ravenous. “The sex you’ll give me for free. Admit it, you crave me as much as I crave you. But there are other things we can do in the meantime...”

Other things? “I will not give you a...a...blow job. Do you hear me?”

One corner of his mouth curved up. “Someone has a very dirty mind, doesn’t she? But don’t worry. You’ll give me a blow job free of charge, too. And I’ll reciprocate. Gladly. For the headboard, I’m thinking...a kiss. Right here, right now.”