Page 11 of Colton’s Mate

Colt came back to the edge of the foundation hole and hauled himself up, his shoulder muscles bunching and flexing. Mmmm. The memory of his lips on hers suddenly sent shivers down her spine.

Oops. Not the time for that.

Colt dusted off his hands and sauntered back to them. Callie’s lynx watched the way the rest of his chest muscles rippled under his tight t-shirt. Mrrrow, she murmured.

Her attention was diverted by Colt asking, “Who did the second inspection?”

Bobby stepped forward, still obviously annoyed about Colt entering his sacred contractor space. “I did it myself. I can show you the inspection report—”

Colt nodded amiably, then said in a friendly voice, “You’re fired.”

Chapter 5

“What?” Bobby spluttered. “You got no right to—”

What? He sure as hell didn’t have the right. Fucking with them was one thing. But this was Callie’s contract and Callie’s money. If anybody was going to fire this pecker-face, it was her.

She elbowed Colt in the ribs. Hard.

He turned on her with a What did I do? look. He said, “You get what they’re doing, right?”

“Of course,” she said. “And it didn’t even worry my pretty head. They filed a claim for the full cost of demolishing and re-pouring the foundation, which is structurally unsound. Then they were planning on patching it up, building on it, collecting the original claim amount from the insurance company and splitting the extra money between them. Who cares if my damn bar falls down in five years?”

Higgins shook his head. “Now, now, we’re not—”

Callie talked over him. “Which is why they wanted me to assign the payment to the contractor. They’d say they were going to give me a couple thousand, to make me think I got a deal, but then it would be regrettably eaten up in overages elsewhere in the budget. Which would be fake, because the money would be in their pockets.”

She turned to Colt. “How am I doing so far?”

“Stellar, babe.” He looked proud of her. Which might be cool, except that she didn’t need him to be proud of her.

Jackson H. Higgins actually had the unmitigated gall to not only try to save his pasty little butt, but keep the scam going. “I’m only trying to save you all some money,” he said plaintively. He turned to Bobby. “They all think they know better than the professionals.”

“Don’t talk to Bobby,” Callie said to Jackson H. “He’s fired.”

Colt said, “Wait, you’re right. That’s what we need. A professional.” He stepped back and did a Wonder Woman whirly-spin, then faced them again. “Well, sheeyit. One moment I’m a mild-mannered country boy from a major metropolitan university. The next—”

Callie chimed in, mixing her superheroes with reckless abandon. “Look, up in the sky! It’s a bird. It’s a plane. It’s a Hogwarts owl!”

Colt had pulled out his wallet, and now he extracted a business card. “It’s Colton McCall, licensed contractor, and civil and structural engineer.” He tucked the card in Jackson H. Higgins’ breast pocket and gave it a little pat.

Holy shit. He had actual credentials. Sweet. Callie jerked her thumb towards Colt and addressed the scamming duo. “He has a penis and he knows about buildy things. You guys are screwed.”

Their faces were absolutely comical.

Colt said to Jackson H. Higgins, “You’re fired too. Or you will be, as soon as I tell your company you and Bobby here are colluding to commit insurance fraud. Any construction contracts are null and void. As of now.”

And all of a sudden Colt wasn’t a goofy guy fucking with a pair of idiots. His face went hard and menacing, and Callie was suddenly aware of how big he was. The air around him seemed to crackle with dominance.

Bobby and Jackson H. both started looking nervous.

He went on, “You both will be getting a letter from our attorney shortly, stating that in writing. At that time, we’ll let you know if we’re pressing charges for attempted fraud.”

Higgins blustered, “You got it all wrong, and you can’t prove—”

“I’m pretty sure I can.” Colt smiled now, and his smile was even scarier than his menacing face. “If not, I can settle for punching you in the face really hard. In fact, we could just go ahead and do that part now.” He gazed from one to the other, a feral light in his eyes. “Thoughts on that? Anybody?”

Not surprisingly, their thoughts centered around hightailing it to their vehicles and peeling out in a cloud of dust.