Hard as Stone (Passion in Paradise: The Men of the McKinnnon Sisters) (57 page)

“I do not like
this,” Zeke bit out, not answering the question.

“Yeah, I think we
all get that by the vein sprouting its own mouth in the center of your
forehead,” Patience remarked dryly.

Ignoring Patience,
Jake frowned.  “You got something you can haul ‘em all in for and lock them up,
be my guest, Sheriff.  Barring that, even I’ve been around long enough to know
this look they’ve got on their faces,” he said, sweeping his arm out to
encompass all the women.  “I don’t like it any better than you do, man, but
they aren’t gonna let this one go.” 

“Fuck.” Zeke swore
again as he began to pace the kitchen floor.  “I’ll pull two deputies for as
long as I can and post them at the front and back entrances of the restaurant. 
I don’t have the manpower for any more than that.”

Jake nodded.  “Then,
we’ll make do.  Between your men and us, we can make it work.”

“If something
happens to one of them, Stone….”

“Again, you got a
reason to arrest them?” Jake questioned sharply, his eyes glinting as they
stared into Zeke’s.

“He does not,”
Honor replied with a hard look at Zeke.

“Don’t push me,
Honor,” Zeke growled, narrowing his eyes on the youngest McKinnon sister. 
“I’ve still got charges I could press against you.  You threatened me with a
butcher knife not fifteen minutes ago.”

“I’ll claim
entrapment,” she retorted huffily.  “It shouldn’t count if I’m goaded into
picking up the knife and using it against you.  Besides, I’d get off on
temporary insanity.  God knows, the entire town is aware you’re driving me
crazy!”

Patience rolled her
eyes as she said sarcastically, “So, we’re back to being one big happy family. 
And we’ll all be working together again,” she commented, looking around at the
people in the kitchen.  “This ought to be a hoot!”

Three days later,
Harmony was beginning to regret her staunch demand to be allowed to return to
work.  Mondays at the I Don’t Care Café were sheer insanity.  Already that day,
she’d had to wrangle the bread man into upsizing their order at the last
minute, fought the dairy deliveryman for the diner’s standard order of milk,
and been forced into helping Honor with employee evaluations and creating the
next month’s budget.

And her day wasn’t
done yet.

She still had to calculate
the payroll taxes for their employees, call the accountant for the cafe, arrange
for an officiant for the upcoming Miller wedding,
and
find a free priest
for the Sanders baby’s christening.

It was safe to say
that Mondays sucked for small business owners.

Blowing her hair
off her face as she headed for the time clock on the wall to grab their
employees’ timecards, she nearly crashed into Jake as he came through the back
door.  Smiling when she saw him, she felt her shoulders relax slightly.  Their
argument about coming back to work aside, things between her and him had been
good.  Better than good, actually.  They’d been great.  Over the last few
weeks, she’d come to feel like she had a partner she could depend on.  He was
wonderful with Heaven and her sisters.  For the most part, he was an easygoing
guy unless they were talking about her safety.  She was slowly learning to
forgive him the secrets he’d kept from her when he arrived in town, and he was
showing her every day that he was nothing like Tanner.

All in all, it was
the best relationship she’d ever had.  They were both nurturing it, growing it
into something that would hopefully last a lifetime.

So, when Jake steadied
her with his hands at her hips and pulled her against him, she went willingly
into his arms.

“Hey there,” she
greeted him, lifting on his toes to brush a kiss against his cheek.  “I like
the new haircut,” she praised, reaching up to touch his now short hair. 

She meant it, too. 
He looked good.  Mouthwateringly good.  When he’d mentioned popping over to the
barber shop across the road this morning over coffee, she’d nearly spit out her
eggs. But seeing the end result now, she was glad she hadn’t tried to talk him
out of the haircut.

“Less thug and more
respectable businessman, I hope,” he replied with a sexy grin, wrapping his
arms around Harmony’s waist.  Glancing at the tattoo sleeve on his arm, he
shrugged.  “Not much I can do about the tats, though.”

“The tats are hot. 
The tats stay or
I
go,” Harmony declared decisively, offering him a playful
smile.

“Then the tats
definitely stay where they are because there’s no way in hell I’m turning you
loose.  It’d hurt like hell to remove all this ink, anyway,” he returned,
dropping his head to steal a quick kiss from her lips.  Squeezing the curve of
her hip, he winked. “Gotta a lead on some office space from Walter, the guy
that cut my hair.  He said a shop front opened up the road on the other side of
Violet’s Bridal Boutique, and that I should give that Henry Watson guy that
Margaret mentioned the other night a call.”

“That’s great,
Jake,” Harmony replied happily, squeezing his shoulders.  She loved that he was
moving ahead on plans to open his own security firm in town.  Sure, he’d bought
a house in the area, but witnessing him lay more roots was more than a little
comforting.  “You should get Honor to call for you.  Henry’s my age, but he’s
always been a little sweet on her.  That’s really not saying much.  Half the
town is sweet on Honor.”

“Well, I like Honor
just fine, but you’re my dessert of choice.  I might do that, though.  I think
I might need to use every advantage I can get,” he said with a wide smile.  “Things
are comin’ together, darlin’.  Now, if we can just get a lock on Tanner and his
merry band of bad guys, we can start moving forward.”  Looking around the
kitchen, he asked, “You about ready to get out of here?”

“I wish,” she
snorted, watching through the order window as Patience walked in the front door
and waved at her.  She gave her sister a chin lift in lieu of greeting and
turned her attention back to Jake.  “I’ve got about a half dozen more items on
my to-do list, and Honor wanted to get a start on tomorrow’s pies before you
take us home.  Want me to make you a sandwich while you wait?”

“I’m good, baby. 
I’m gonna go ahead and change those lights out front in the parking lot that
Patience mentioned last night.  Then, Honor asked if I would take a look at
some of the shingles on the roof.  That oughta fill my time while you sort out
what needs sorted.”

“Well, you’re
becoming quite the go-to guy to the McKinnon girls, Jake.  You might wanna
watch that.  A girl could get attached to that kind of dependability.”

“That’s what I’m
countin’ on,” he countered with a wink, stealing another quick kiss before letting
her go and striding toward the front of the café. 

Aunt Orla whistled
softly from behind her niece.  “Love to see that biker man comin’, but watchin’
him go almost sets my garters on fire.  Fine lookin’ man.”

Giggling, Harmony
turned to look at her aged aunt.  “You know, you keep talkin’ like that, and
Honor’s gonna make good on that threat to find you and Uncle Jethro an
old-folks’ home.”

“Ha!  Of all you
girls, Honor’s still the one that needs me most.  I think Jethro and I are safe
for a few more years.” Orla dismissed her with a wink.  “Did you call and check
in on Heaven and Ice?”

Laughing, Harmony
nodded.  “Yep, evidently my four year old has Ice trussed up in a feather boa
and
tiara.  They’re having a tea party.  I’d pay money to get pictures of that.”

“Actually,”
Patience announced, breezing into the kitchen in her standard uniform of tight
jeans and tee, “I did!” Holding up her camera, she wriggled it in Harmony’s
direction.  “I made Abel stop and check in before he brought me into work.  And
let me tell you, your daughter has mad skills if she can convince a tough guy
like Zachariah Monroe to wrap a pink scarf around his neck, put a crown on his
head,
and
paint his nails red.  I think this is gonna be my new
screensaver!”

Aunt Orla squinted
at the small screen picture over the top of her glasses.  “Well, I think he can
really work pink.  Not a lot of men can pull that off, but that one sure gets
the job done.  Really sets off his muscles.”

Patience giggled. “Aunt
Orla, you’re worse than a hound dog, I swear.”

“I’m old, not
dead,” the woman replied easily.  “And I’ve caught you lookin’ a time or two.”

“Well, I’m young
and very much alive,” Patience returned, wriggling her eyebrows.

“What’s going on?”
Honor asked, walking through the swinging door and dumping an armful of dishes
at the sink.  Wiping her hands on her apron, she walked over to stand at Harmony’s
shoulder and stared at the phone screen.  “Oh my Lord!  Is that Ice?”

“Uh huh,” Harmony
grunted, still giggling.  “Look how he’s holding up his pinky from that
teacup!  He’s gonna make a great dad one day.”

“Send a copy of
that to Zeke’s phone,” Honor demanded as she laughed.  “He deserves a chuckle.”

“Zeke’s already
here,” a deep voice replied from behind the women as he strolled through the
back entrance.  “Jesus, is that my brother?” he asked when he peered over
Honor’s shoulder.

“Yep!   The poor
bastard never saw Abel lift the camera and when he did, he couldn’t do much but
smile with Heaven sitting right there.”

“You know he’ll get
even, right?  And he’s pretty much a trained assassin,” Zeke warned with an
amused smile as he dropped one hand to settle against Honor’s back.

“Ice loves me,”
Patience returned in an unaffected voice.  “Besides, he knows if something
happens to me, I’ve set this baby up to go viral.”

Rolling his eyes,
Zeke looked down at Honor.  “Any trouble today?” he asked in a low voice.

Shaking her head,
Honor replied quietly.  “It’s been a typical Monday, but nothing that I’d
consider out of the norm.  Jake has been in and out all morning, but when he
wasn’t here, either one of your deputies or Cain was close by.”

Zeke nodded once,
his cowboy hat shifting slightly.  “Good.”

“Jake’s outside
replacing those bulbs in the parking lot,” Harmony remarked with a grin at the
Sheriff. 

“Yeah, Abel and
Cain went out to help him as I was coming back here.  Faith was still nursing
her flat coke at the counter.  I swear if our sister turns any greener, I’m
gonna start calling her Kermit.”

“She’s pregnant,
Patience,” Harmony chastised her sister.  “Have a little compassion.  I can
tell you from experience that the road to motherhood is paved with potholes
full of morning sickness, hemorrhoids, breast tenderness….”

“You need to stop
before
I
start hurling.” Patience grimaced with a shudder of contempt. 
“The whole experience sounds….for lack of a better word,
disgusting
!”

“It’s amazing.”
Harmony shook her head.  “Personally, with the right man,” she said with a look
out the doors of the café where Jake climbed down a ladder in the parking lot,
“I’d be all for doing it again.”

“You and Jake have
fun with that,” Patience muttered, then turned to strut out of the kitchen.  “I
personally hope I’m barren.”

Laughing at her
sister, Harmony looked at Honor.  “We should pray she never breeds.”

“Are you kidding? 
I’ve been offering up that particular prayer since I found her hosing off your
daughter in the sink when she was six weeks old,” Honor replied, shaking her
head. 

“That wasn’t as bad
as the time she called 9-1-1 and told them the emergency was that her niece was
exploding from both ends,” Zeke interjected with a long suffering sigh.

“That was an
emergency!” Patience yelled from the front of the café, still able to hear her
sisters.  “I thought the kid had been possessed by some kinda demonic entity
‘cause the stuff comin’ out of her was by its very definition unholy!”

“Well, that totally
justifies it then.” Harmony giggled, following her sister out to the front of
the restaurant.  Grinning at her sister, she muttered, “I’m gettin’ back to
work.”

**~~**

Ninety minutes
later, Harmony had figured the payroll taxes, called the accountant with the
figures, found a reverend willing to perform the Miller wedding on short notice,
and she had a short, but workable, list of Catholic priests in the tri-county
area.  Stretching her arms above her head, she arched her back and rolled her
neck to relieve some of the knots that had taken up residence in her spine.

All in all, it had
been a productive day.

Rising, she walked
out of the office and through the kitchen into the central dining area of the
café.  She smiled when Jake looked up from his position on a stool in front of
the wide counter. 

“We done?” he asked
hopefully, his lips quirking up into a sexy grin.

“I think I am,” she
agreed with a nod.  Glancing at where Honor stood wiping down the other end of
the counter.  “What about you?  You ready to go, sis?”

“I’ve still got two
cherry pies in the oven in back.  Zeke said he’d give me a ride to the house
after I pulled them out,” she replied with a nod to where the Sheriff leaned
against the wall sipping a cup of coffee, his eyes watching Honor work.