Need You for Keeps (Heroes of St. Helena, #1)(8)

“He’s not my type.”

“If you say so,” Harper said.

“I do,” Shay clarified.

“Then why are you still staring at his ass?” Emerson asked.

“Doing my due diligence and inspecting his tail.”

“Does it pass inspection?”

Shay looked at her friends and smiled. “Oh yeah.”

It was by far the finest tail Shay had ever seen.





A week later, Jonah responded to a call at Valley Vintage, a senior community on the west side of St. Helena, and parked his cruiser behind the fire engine. It was nearly dusk, but he could still make out the perfect cut of steak and chilled six-pack sitting in the backseat. With one last look, he stepped out into the hot July air.

He made his way around the engine blocking the entrance to the complex, and when he saw his brother talking to a group of old ladies who weren’t even bothering to hide their ogling, he pulled a box of orange Tic Tacs from his pocket and popped one in his mouth. He had a feeling it was as close to dinner as he was going to get.

“Took you long enough,” Adam said, strolling over. He was three years younger, two inches taller, and one of the best smoke jumpers on the West Coast. Today, based on his dark blue work pants and a matching SHFD T-shirt, he was being an average fireman, rescuing cats from trees or some other BS, and had decided to rope Jonah in.

“That’s what happens when you call a man in on his day off,” Jonah said, thinking again about the steak he’d just picked up for dinner.

“You’re just pissy because you got suckered into spending it digging a trench for Mr. Barnwell.”

Actually, he was building a fence so Mr. Barnwell would retire the dog crate. And he was pissy because he was doing it to keep Shay Michaels out of trouble. The less chance for trouble, the less chance their paths would cross. A good thing considering every time he was around the woman she seemed to push every single button he owned—including the good ones.

“This had better not be another false alarm, Mr. July,” he said.

Ever since Adam landed the centerfold for the Cuties with Booties calendar, the number of female callers had tripled on the days that his brother worked. The weathered faces with bifocals dotting every window, looking their fill of St. Helena’s very own Mr. Smoking Hot only deepened Jonah’s suspicions.

“Don’t hate because you didn’t make the cut.”

Oh, Jonah had made the cut, and was even offered the cover, but posing in nothing but underwear with the department’s K-9 didn’t scream respectable sheriff. So he’d passed—and Shay had given the spot to Warren. Not that it had mattered, since Nora posted a photo of Jonah shaking his bills like a freaking stripper on her Facebook page last week.

“And I called because Giles is MIA,” Adam explained while sending a little wave to a group of senior ladies who were standing patiently with Sharpies in hand, calendars conveniently flipped to the center.

Jonah thought about the steak waiting in his car, begging to be grilled and paired with a baked potato and cold beer, and he sighed. Giles Rousseau was Valley Vintage’s most notorious escapee—he was also Jonah and Adam’s great-uncle on their mother’s side. On Tuesday nights he snuck out to watch the WWE Diva SmackDown on the jumbo screen at the local pub, on Friday it was to play a high-stakes game of Put Up or Shut Up in the basement of the hardware store, and any other time it was to cause trouble with his buddies. “Call Warren, he’s the deputy on duty.”

“Already did.”

“Then why am I here?”

“Because when the nurse reported Giles missing, Deputy Dickwad told her he’d look into it. That was right after lunchtime.”

“And?” Giles always made it home by dinner.

“And we already checked the Spigot, the bocce ball court at the park, and the hardware store, thinking he might be playing a few hands of cards.” Adam shrugged. “No luck.”

“This nurse,” Jonah asked, taking in the leggy blonde sitting on the end of the fire engine looking their way with Adam’s jacket wrapped around her shoulders. “What does she have to do with it?”

“Nurse Nikki?” Adam asked, flashing her that smile that got him laid on a regular basis. “She placed the call. First day on the job and the poor thing lost a patient.”

“Yeah, poor thing,” Jonah deadpanned, knowing exactly where this was going.

“Seems she needs some consoling,” Adam said, and the damn guy had the nerve to grin. “Said if I found Giles before her shift ends at seven then she’d be forever indebted to me.” Adam looked back over at Nurse Nikki and her double Ds, and let loose a low whistle. “Do you have any idea how much consoling Nurse Nikki and I could do with forever?”

“You’d be bored by Friday.”

Adam shrugged. “Friday, forever. Same thing.”

“Not when you’re the one getting laid.”

“That’s why you’re pissy,” Adam laughed. “You’re not getting any.”

No, he was not. In fact, Jonah hadn’t gotten laid in way too long. And maybe that was the problem. Ever since he’d pulled Shay over a few months back for driving with loose animals in the vehicle—a flock of goddamned geese—he couldn’t seem to stop thinking about her. He’d given her a ticket, she’d shown him the bird, and they’d been circling each other ever since.