Tattooed Troublemaker - Elise Faber Page 0,1

my tub.

But I got to build up good karma points by helping out a friend. Not that I was sure those karma points were enough to justify dealing with Garret McGrumpyFace. He might be pretty to look at, but I—

Eyes on the prize, McGovern.

And this was why I was a plumber instead of something else. My mind liked to drift, and there was nothing I loved better than to let my thoughts ramble while keeping my hands busy.

With pipes.

Heh.

And drifting again.

So anyway, I’d hit accept instead of reject and here I was—meeting the surly guest tattoo artist who was staying in the apartment above the shop. Tig had offered to leave his dinner, but he and his wife Delia were celebrating a much-needed night off.

I could handle a leak.

Whether I could handle Garret was yet to be determined.

I saw the puddle before I heard the hiss of water.

“I left my phone at my station and when I came down to get it, I saw the—”

“Towels,” I ordered.

“What?”

“Get some towels—”

“The leak is—”

“In the sink in the storeroom,” I said. “Yeah, I know. I told Tig that was a weak point when I came in to fix the toilet a month ago.”

“You—”

“Towels,” I repeated. “Before the floor is ruined. There are some in the cabinet.” I walked through the water and set my toolbox on the floor by the sink. “I’m turning the water off.”

“I tried to at the angle stop beneath the sink.”

“That’s not the right one,” I said, shucking my coat and hooking it over the top of the open door before lying down and reaching back behind the cabinet where there was a whole other set of pipes. “This plumbing is like a maze. The last tenant did a lot of under-the-table improvements, and everything needs to be replaced. I’m supposed to start working on that next week.”

Silence.

“Tig did mention some repairs.”

“Yeah.” A beat. “By me.”

“By someone named Charlie.”

“I’m named Charlie.”

“Oh.”

Where was the knob? My T-rex arms were always a disadvantage in cases like this. My fingertips grazed a U-bend, and I sidled closer to the old cabinet. It was just . . . there! I grasped the oval-shaped knob and turned it counter-clockwise several times.

The hiss of water cut off. I stood, feeling my jeans and T-shirt sticking to me like a second skin. I pulled the material from my body, wrung out some of the extra water.

At least it was clean water.

Garret blinked.

“Towels,” I repeated for the umpteenth time.

“You’re Charlie.”

“Yup.”

“You’re a plumber.”

My chin dropped to my chest, not going to point out the fact that I was wearing a company T-shirt that was emblazoned with Charlie’s Pipes above one breast and Charlie above the other.

Then I sighed and straightened, opening my mouth—

Garret’s lips curved, and I felt that smile like a punch to my gut . . . or maybe between my thighs, because it transformed his face from all hard lines and brooding brows into something soft and playful, giving a glimpse of something that was decidedly not asshole.

And so maybe surly assholes weren’t my type after all if they came in the form of six-feet-plus tattoo artists with playful edges to their smiles and piercing green eyes, who had at first appeared to be an asshole but then seemed to have the possibility not to be.

What? That didn’t even make sense.

Plus, no.

As in, no.

“Towels.”

I blinked. “What?”

He brushed by me, reaching for the cabinet that I knew held some linens, making me shiver. No, that was because I was soaking wet and cold.

Except, suddenly I was on fire.

“I’ll grab the towels from here then go up to the apartment for more.”

“Right.” I nodded, reining my mind back into focus.

I crouched, had started grabbing what I’d need from my box when Garret’s voice suddenly sounded very close to my ear. “I’ll clean up the mess.”

Another shiver.

He draped a towel over my shoulder.

“You just keep fondling those pipes, baby.”

Two

Garret

Okay, so I was an asshole.

That would come as a surprise to . . . exactly no one in the universe.

Charlie, the fucking slice of a gorgeous, curvy woman with deep chestnut hair and bright blue eyes, Charlie had lain back down in the puddle of water on the floor without a second thought and was reaching back behind the cabinet. Working.

Doing something.

Like I should be doing.

Stifling a sigh, I strode from the room and headed for the edge of the puddle, creating a blockade between it and the rest of the shop then ran back up to my apartment,