Tempting the Deputy Read online

  “The site engineer hit us with some bad news after his first inspection yesterday,” Todd continued. “The structure has drainage problems, which is going to mean some major investment up front, which we weren’t expecting and which the money raised so far isn’t going to cover.”

  “So where does the ninety days come in?” Charlie asked.

  “The house was gifted to the community on the understanding we’d have it up to code by a certain date. They gave us ninety days to get the work done. We don’t meet that target and we’re screwed. We figured…” Todd indicated the group with his thumb “…all of us. That as Marietta’s First Responders it was way past time we stepped up to the plate and did something. We all knew Harry. He was an amazing guy. Always willing to lend a hand. Nothing was ever too much trouble for him. He was the first guy who I spoke to when I arrived here in town.”

  “How did he die?” she said.

  “He got taken out by a hit-and-run on Highway 89 just after the canyon bend while changing a tire for an elderly couple. And he died in the ER at Marietta Regional Hospital later that night.”

  Logan felt the guilt engulf him, the silence in the bar heavy with their combined grief.

  “He sounds like a very special young man,” Charlotte said, sounding genuinely moved. But then she looked directly at him—and the familiar jolt of arousal was joined by a powerful sense of connection. Had she guessed, that the spot where Harry had died was the same stretch of road where he had insisted on picking her up? “A special young man who deserves to have his legacy honored,” she added. And the weird moment of connection was gone. “I have an answer, which I think could get you the money you need in the time you need it,” she continued. “But you have to keep an open mind. Because what I’m going to suggest may be a bit outside your comfort zones.” Her gaze drifted over all of them, but when it stopped on him, he could see the challenge in her eyes, and he did not like it one bit.

  “Don’t keep us in suspense any longer,” Lyle said, his flirtatious grin breaking the moment of melancholy. “What have you got in mind? Because whatever it is, it has to be better than Kurt Mayall’s lame suggestion of a sponsored three-legged race down the middle of Main Street.”

  The other guys laughed, even Kurt, who had made the suggestion out of pure desperation. Everyone except Logan, who had the distinct impression that whatever Charlotte Foster was about to suggest, he was not going to like it.

  “Okay, to lay the groundwork: I’m a photographer. A professional photographer. I did a charity commission last year in Chicago that earned over fifty grand in less than a month and eventually a great deal more than that. And you guys …” She stared at them all in turn, the appreciation in her eyes surprisingly dispassionate—until her gaze landed on him, and he felt it burn. “You guys would definitely qualify for a similar project.”

  “Hell, you’re not the Charlotte Foster. The one who did that photo-essay on the final shift at the Penn Ridge Steelworks for National Geographic?” Todd asked.

  “That’s right, that’s me,” she said, a pleased smile bursting over her face and making him wonder for the first time exactly how old she was, because she suddenly looked very young—a lot younger and less smart-assed than her smoky voice and provocative behavior had suggested up to this point.

  “You really captured the essence of what it meant to those guys having to give up a job that defined who they were,” Todd added, sounding more lyrical than Logan had ever heard him. He might have guessed the guy would be a National Geographic nut. The man was a Forest Ranger, so being interested in nature probably went with the job description. But who knew he had an opinion on photographic art?

  “Thank you,” she said, clearly pleased and even a little embarrassed with the praise, the light flush on her cheeks making her seem oddly vulnerable for a moment. Logan would have been charmed except that her not being just another tourist snapping off shots for her Instagram account, the way he’d assumed, only made her more dangerous.

  “Get to the point, Charlotte. What project do we qualify for?” he said, ignoring the sharp looks from some of the other guys as they took exception to his pissed-off tone. If they’d been on a knife-edge of sexual tension for four solid hours—and this woman was the cause—they could tell him to lighten up. Until then, they could get lost.

  “How would you feel…” she hesitated, the sparkle of humor in those emerald eyes making her heart-shaped face look even more arresting “…about all posing for a nude calendar shoot for me?”

  What the ever-loving fuck?

  Logan was so shocked he was struck dumb.

  From the coughing sounds, as a couple of the other guys choked on their brews, and still more hissed cusswords under their breath, he knew he wasn’t the only one.

  From his earlier run-in with her, he’d expected something wild. If nothing else Charlotte Foster had balls. He could almost admire that about her.

  But this went way past wild to totally fricking nuts.

  “Damn it, Charlie, that’s genius. I love it.” Lyle was the first one to manage a response. And being Lyle, it was totally the wrong one. “Count me in,” he added, the wicked glint of mischief in his eyes matching Charlotte’s.

  “Hang on just a minute, little bro, you are not serious?” Logan managed, finally downgrading his shock enough to speak.

  “Why not?” Lyle said, all nonchalant like, as if he had just agreed to play checkers for an afternoon with the ladies at Nell’s Cut and Curl, not strip jaybird naked for ten bucks a pop.

  “Why not?” Logan’s blood pressure climbed into the red zone. Damn it all to hell and back—so now his troublesome kid brother was joining forces with the crazy lady. Could this actually get any worse? “You really want to take your clothes off so everyone in the whole wide world can check out your junk?”

  Why should this even surprise him? From the way Lyle charmed every woman he met, there probably weren’t that many who weren’t already on a first-name basis with his brother’s dick.

  “Hey, there’s nothing wrong with my junk, bro,” Lyle said, actually sounding offended.

  Charlotte raised her hands as the two of them squared off. “Chill out, lads. No junk viewing will be required. What we’re talking about here is discreet nudity.”

  “How discreet?” Jonah asked, looking as uncomfortable about the prospect as every other guy in the room, bar Lyle. Who—on top of all his other sins against seriousness—was clearly a goddamn exhibitionist.

  “Here, I can show you.” She whipped her cell phone out of her back pocket, scrolled through a few things, and then held it out. “These are some of the shots from the Local 32 Hot Stuff Calendar I did.”

  She swiped through a bunch of shots of guys, all shirtless, some with their butts hanging out, stripping out of their fatigues to reveal pumped-up pecs that glistened as if someone had dipped them in a vat of baby oil.

  Hot Stuff Calendar! Holy crap, just shoot me now.

  “They look real tasteful. I’m still in, even if you don’t need to see my junk,” Lyle teased, still batting for the dark side.

  Kyle Cavasos took the phone as the others gathered round to look over his shoulder. “How much did you say this earned?” he said, still sounding reluctant, but not nearly reluctant enough for Logan’s liking.

  Kyle wasn’t seriously considering going to the dark side too was he? He would have said the guy was the least likely of all of them to go for a dumb idea like this. He’d kept a real low profile ever since moving to town after a stint in the Marines, to the point that he’d turned down an award for bravery a few months back, just to avoid getting his picture in the local paper. The guy had put in a lot of hours at Harry’s House already fixing stuff up, which was how Logan and the others had gotten to know him, because he hardly ever hung out in town. Surely a guy who had virtually no social life wasn’t going to want to strip off for strangers?

  “It made fifty grand. Your target. In less than a month,” Charlotte announced, p
roudly. “And that’s fifty grand in profit after the print and marketing fees are taken off. Obviously I’d be happy to waive my fee.”

  “You’d do that? Why?” Todd sounded suspicious.

  Even if he was a fan of Charlotte’s work, the guy was no fool. Logan didn’t know much about Todd’s time on the force in Chicago—it wasn’t something the guy ever talked about—but when he’d arrived in Marietta, he’d been pretty burnt out. Even now he was a fairly jaded guy. Logan wanted to applaud him.

  “Apart from the fact that it’s a worthy cause.” Charlotte met Todd’s gaze head on and without flinching. “I’m not going to lie, I’d love to use some of the shots on my website and blog, with your permission of course,” she said, her no-nonsense tone one hundred percent sincere. “And if the calendar’s a success…and I know it will be with me behind the camera and you guys in front of it…then the added exposure won’t do my career or the prospects for a book I’m currently working on any harm at all,” she continued, with total honesty. “But I can guarantee you that every shot I take will be the very best shot it can be. And one hundred percent tasteful while also being fun. I don’t compromise on my work. Ever. I may not have known Harry and I may have only arrived in your town four hours ago, but if you guys decide to go with this idea, I will be fully invested in delivering something incredible—that each and every one of us here can be proud of.”

  Her skin had flushed as she spoke, and even Logan was convinced by the impassioned speech. Whatever reasons she may have had for suggesting this dumb idea in the first place, she would be committed to making it work.

  He still wasn’t on board, though.

  “How are we going to sell a calendar in spring?” he said, prepared to nip this thing in the bud with cold hard logic. “Which is what we’d need to be doing to meet our ninety-day target.”

  “We can make it a term-time calendar, running August to July for a first print run,” she said without even missing a beat. “Given your ages and your fabulously macho professions, believe me, this is going to sell very well with the college demographic. If we get a designer on board, they can reconfigure it for next year and we can do a new print run in January. Plus I’d suggest doing a stud-of-the-week shot in the lead-up to the launch. We can promo it on social media and put him on posters, cards, mouse mats, mugs, et cetera, which could drive pre-sales figures for the calendar itself, but also supply an early revenue stream, so you can add it to your Bake-Off total and get any structural work on the House underway.”

  “Charlie, you are a genius. Can I be Mr. Fourth-of-July? With the Stars and Stripes shielding my junk?” Lyle said, still joking around, while everyone else fell silent, no doubt mulling over the horrifying prospect of being stud-of-the-week.

  “I’m not getting butt naked outdoors for anyone, especially in March. But shirtless I could do,” Todd said, breaking the silence first, once again using more words than Logan was used to hearing him string together in one go. “For Harry.”

  “Way to go, Todd.” Lyle high-fived the Forest Ranger. “Anyone else willing to freeze their nipples off for charity? And for Harry?” Lyle added. A couple of the other guys followed Todd’s lead and agreed to the project, his kid brother’s humor and enthusiasm proving infectious.

  As infectious as a damn wiener rash, Logan thought bitterly.

  It was all downhill from there. With Lyle and Charlotte pimping the project for all they were worth—they took a vote. Nine in favor, with him, Jonah Clark, and Kyle abstaining. Logan figured Kyle’s abstention had something to do with the prospect of having his naked pecs pasted all over social media from the way the guy had stiffened right up when Charlotte had mentioned it.

  The motion was passed.

  Logan was just getting to grips with the prospect of having to do this thing, when Charlotte dropped her second bombshell.

  “This is fantastic, guys,” she said, positively beaming with excitement. “If I could take all your contact details now—” she whipped her cell out again “—I’ll be in touch in the next couple of days to arrange your shoot dates. Once we’ve nailed down a schedule, I’ll talk with the beauty salon I passed on Main Street to see if they’ll donate free treatments to get you prepped for your shots.”

  “Free treatments for what?” Logan said, the urge to give Little Miss Troublemaker a damn good spanking starting to get the better of him again. He hadn’t failed to see the smug half-smile aimed at him when the vote had gone her way.

  She might be dedicated to this project, but this whole campaign had payback written all over it. Payback for their earlier altercation. Payback that he was increasingly determined to make her suffer for. Somehow.

  “Because I draw the line at getting my hair and makeup done,” he said, satisfied when he heard a chorus of agreement from the other guys.

  All except Lyle, of course, who couldn’t resist another dumb joke at his expense. “Stop being such an old man. Everyone knows real men use guyliner these days.”

  Logan ignored him, well used to his brother trying to get a rise out of him. The fact that Lyle never took a damn thing seriously could be annoying as hell at times, but his kid brother’s optimism and enthusiasm, which was the flip side of his dumb sense of humor, was also one of the things that had seen Logan through some of the darkest days of his childhood—so he never got too worked up about it. Charlotte though, and the way she seemed to be able to challenge his cast-iron control without even trying, was not nearly as easy to dismiss.

  She lowered her phone. If she sensed there might be a mutiny afoot, she didn’t look concerned, just confused. “It’s okay, no need for hair and makeup or guyliner, the rugged natural look totally works for you guys. The free treatments are just to get your chests waxed.”

  “What the…” And there he went sputtering again. “We’re not allowed to have hair on our chests?”

  “I’m afraid not,” she said. “The buyers will want to see every slope of muscle and sinew. Get the full Marietta Men for all Seasons effect. And a hairless chest works much better with the oil. You’re not scared of a little hot wax are you?” she teased.

  Logan’s thumb strayed to his chest, as his mind yanked him back to a dark time in his life. And an old panic kicked him square in the chest with the force and fury of a bucking rodeo bull.

  “No,” he said, but the trickle of flop sweat working its way down his spine called him a big fat liar.

  Chapter Three

  Charlie fired off a couple of shots of the quaint western storefront on Main Street that housed Main Street Style, the beauty parlor-cum-hair salon where the first of her First Responder dudes were scheduled to start operation bare chest.

  She grinned as she lowered her camera and spotted Clara Marbles inside, who she’d spoken to yesterday. The feisty older lady, and part-time receptionist, had been more than happy to offer the guys free waxing appointments once she’d got the go-ahead from Main Street Style’s owner Amanda Wright.

  Charlie fixed the lens cap on her camera, slung it over her shoulder, and headed into the parlor. Only three days after the guys had agreed to do the calendar in Grey’s Saloon and already she’d arranged the first waxing appointments and begun to nail down shoot dates. She’d started a blog, set up an Instagram account, had a great chat with McKenna Sheenan—the smart and feisty proprietor of Big Sky Photography—about using her state-of-the-art iMac equipment to do the proofs.

  Not only that, but there was already a great buzz around town about the new fundraising project.

  Particularly among the women of Marietta—which might explain why the beauty parlor this evening was a whole lot busier than it had been yesterday. Apparently Clara had gotten news out and chest waxing had now become a spectator sport.

  “Hey there, honey, you come to check up on the boys to see if they turned up for their torture…” Clara paused to give a theatrical cough. “I mean waxing appointments?”

  “As if, Clara.” Charlie grinned, enjoying the woman’s mischievo
us smile—they’d hit it off straight away the day before, when Clara had been positively ecstatic at the prospect of arranging to have twelve strapping First Responders relieved of their chest hair. “It just so happens I’m not a sadomasochist like you. Actually I’m here hoping to waylay Lyle Tate,” Charlie added. “Did he turn up for the five o’clock?”

  The truth was it wasn’t Lyle she needed to see, it was his brother. Logan Tate was now the only one of the twelve who had yet to respond to a single one of her texts or emails to set up a waxing appointment. Even Jonah Clark, who she suspected was an even more reluctant participant, had finally given her an excuse this morning for not fixing a date. But Deputy Hard-Ass was playing even harder to get. And giving her the silent treatment. So she planned to use his much more amenable brother to give him a message that he couldn’t ignore.

  “Holy Mother of God! Ouch!” The manly shout coming from the back of the shop where Charlie assumed the temporary waxing parlor must have been set up had all the women in the place roaring with laughter.

  “That’d be Lyle now, discovering the true meaning of pain from Kelsey who I got to help us out with the waxing,” Clara said, far too gleefully. “Poor boy’s been shrieking like a stuck pig for twenty minutes.”

  “Stop enjoying it,” Charlie said, feeling momentarily guilty. So far Lyle had been the project’s biggest supporter. Introducing her around town over the last couple of days—and talking up the project to such an extent that she had begun to feel like a VIP. In the last few days, she had been offered everything from a free veal parmigiana at Rocco’s Italian to complimentary fly-fishing lessons from Oscar Jenkins who had approached her in the Western Wear shop while she was getting fitted out with some decent boots.

  Although she’d declined both offers, she had been both humbled and touched, not just by how quickly the town had embraced the project, but also by how keen they seemed to be to embrace her—everyone that was, except the man who had inspired the idea in the first place.