thoughts.” He hefted his drink and slid the other my way. “How’s working life? You seem like you’re in a foul mood, so I assume you’re more fulfilled than ever.”
Collin chuckled. “It’s crazy how well you understand him. He only lived at The Hutton Hotel for a month or two, right? I didn’t fall into a time warp while Harlow and I were gone and you two had years to bond?”
“Lucas doesn’t need to work that hard to understand Joe.” Harlow tossed a wicked grin toward her brother. “They’re both grumpy on the outside and sweet as candy in the middle.” She gave the two of us a look that said, “fight me.”
Lucas smirked, then offered me a high-five. “Team grump for the win.”
Never one to leave a friend hanging, I slapped his hand, then grinned at the couple across the table. “For the record, I am loving this job. I’ve got the front porch fully restored and it turned out really well, if I do say so myself. I hope I can do the rest of the place justice because under all that neglect is a gorgeous house.”
Penny Dreadful’s not-so-dreadful curves popped into my mind. The fact that I couldn’t stop thinking about the woman drove me crazier than she did.
Harlow leaned forward and met my eyes. I could have sworn the woman saw right into the dirty thoughts strutting through my mind. “Why do I sense a but coming?”
“Why do you always think you know everything about everything, Princess?”
“Because I do.” She gave me the sweetest smile that ever was.
I couldn’t fight her on that one. Harlow could cut through bullshit faster than anyone I knew. “Fine. There’s a but. And it’s a big one.” Or a fabulous one, depending on the view. “The woman who owns the house is a real peach. Her granddaughter? Not so much. She’s working an angle. I don’t know what it is, yet, but I feel it in my bones.”
Collin leveled me with a look that meant trouble. “You thought that about Harlow when you first met her.”
“Yeah, but this woman’s different. It’s like she wants me to hate her. She threatened to call the cops on me. Punched me in the face. Made me hammer off the nail on my middle finger.” I proudly held up the wounded digit and grinned as my friends flinched. “I can’t fucking stand her and the feeling is definitely mutual.”
“Does she live at the house, too?” Lucas sipped his beer, exchanging a glance I couldn’t decipher with his sister.
“Nope.” I raised my eyes to the heavens with a silent “thank you.” “I might have to quit if that was the case. And then I’d be screwed. I wouldn’t be able to open my business…”
Collin rolled his eyes. “What? Did the Huttons charge you for staying at the hotel? Did that ancient truck cost more than it should? You have a gambling addiction I’m not aware of? You have plenty of money to start your business without having to earn it. I know because my accountant had a lot to say about the significant chunk of payroll with your name on it.” He raised his eyebrows in exasperation.
The feeling was mutual.
Thanks to my brother’s generosity, I had an obscene amount of money in an account with my name on it. Since I hadn’t done anything to actually earn the fortune, spending it made me feel like the biggest mooch of all time. I’d used it for food, to buy the cheapest truck I could find, and that was about it. Every swipe of the card was another pebble in the pile labeled “Why Joe Channing is an Asshole.”
After years of living off Collin’s success, I needed to create my own. To find purpose and meaning the way he had. Building myself from the ground up on his dime felt like cheating.
“I didn’t earn that money, brother.” I glared, hoping to warn him off the topic, but he’d never been good at taking my advice.
Lucas lifted his beer and smirked at Harlow. “Here we go again.”
Collin rolled his eyes. “You gave up your job. Your life. You ditched your dreams to help me realize mine, stopped me from making terrible mistakes, fought off people who wanted to use me, and generally kept me sane. I’d say you fucking earned more than I paid you.”
“When you put it that way…” I quirked my head and took a drink. “You didn’t make things easy. But that doesn’t mean I