The Job (Auctioned) by Cara Dee (highly illogical behavior txt) 📕

“We threw our daughter to the wolves unprepared, in hopes she’d talk, so I don’t think I’m the only one nervous right now.”

He had a point.

I folded the sleeves past my elbows and then ran a hand through my hair and checked the rearview. No need to look like I’d just committed a crime.

“How did it go out there, by the way?” I asked.

Boone shrugged and cracked his knuckles absently. “It almost feels like a dead lead. We can’t find the new owner—if there is one—or link it to the Langes. And the site itself is a dump.”

Hmm. “What needs to be done out there? Like, if the Langes are planning to use the site for something when they arrive, can they?”

“Fuck no. We’re talking total renovations. The building is standing, but that’s about it. I peered inside, and it’s in complete shambles. At least two walls have met a sledgehammer, the stairs to the second floor are missing steps, there’re trash bags in the corners, a hole in the lobby area’s floor, and a couple windows are cracked. I took photos—you can see for yourself later.”

Part of me wanted to solve the puzzle, but a bigger part of me was ready to put all this behind me. We’d done our job. All we had left was to continue to provide Willow and Darius with the intel that ran through the channels we’d opened. Allegra was gonna give me a new report tomorrow, we had around-the-clock surveillance on AJ, we were about to map out Oliver Hansen’s work with the Langes, and we’d created a library of pictures that would help our cousins profile their targets.

I was ready for payday.

“I guess it doesn’t matter anymore,” I said, leaving my car. “We’ve done what we were supposed to do—and then some. I’ll send everything to Willow and update her whenever we find out something new, but otherwise…” I shrugged. “All we gotta do is wait for Darius’s call.”

Boone nodded with a dip of his chin. “It’ll be nice seeing him this week.”

Absolutely. He was driving here from Washington on Thursday—just him and his kids—with everyone else following this weekend. I didn’t know exactly how big their crew would be, but it sounded like several people would be involved.

The sound of a door opening had my attention, and just as I turned around, I heard Mom’s voice.

“You boys gonna stand there all day, or will you come inside and explain to me why Ace tells me her daddies are getting married?”

Welp.

Nerves tightened my gut, and I quickly snatched up the six-pack of beer from the back seat. Then I exchanged a brief, panicked look with my brother and dug out the scratch-off tickets from my back pocket.

“Here goes everything,” he muttered. “What if she doesn’t approve?”

That kinda calmed me down. She was our mother, for fuck’s sake. Of course she was gonna approve.

“She has to,” I replied firmly. “We’re her angels.”

Boone offered a dubious look and nothing else.

With the beer and scratch-offs in my arms, I took the lead and walked up the path to her house. “Hey, Ma. You look extra beautiful today.”

“Oh, cut the shit.” She had no problems accepting my gifts, but the ice in her tone would require more than that in order to melt. “Let’s talk in the living room.”

Fuck.

With those words, combined with the sound of Boone shutting the door behind us, I felt thirteen again. Even in our midthirties, we could shrink under Ma’s stare. Probably because she had the patience of a saint and rarely got really pissed.

Ace was waiting for us in the living room, and she jumped up at the sight of us. “Dads! I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to say anything.”

“You did nothing wrong, hon,” I said quickly. That was the last thing I wanted her to believe. “Boone and I just figured Gramma would never be mad at you, so it was better if you let something slip before we got here. Kinda like cushioning the blow.”

She blinked and plopped down in the middle of the couch again.

“Are you freaking kidding me?” Ma exclaimed. “You threw your own daughter under the bus?”

No! Sort of!

“We didn’t throw her,” Boone replied defensively. “We very gently placed her under the tires.”

“Also,” I added quickly, “if you refer to yourself as a big bus in this scenario, you might suffer from internalized misogyny. You should work on that.”

Mom did a double take at me, eyes filled with disbelief, before she pinched the bridge of her nose and pointed at the couch. “Sit the fuck down.”

Boone and I sat the fuck down.

I swallowed hard as Mom started pacing on the other side of the coffee table.

Ace glanced up at me, then at Boone. “You’re kinda roofless, Daddy.”

Boone’s forehead creased.

“Ruthless,” I supplied.

“That’s what I said!” Ace snapped.

I nodded. Bad time to disagree with the women in our family. Bad, bad time.

“Let me get this straight, Casey.” Mom came to a stop and faced us dead-on. “The time I watched Paisley at the Venetian, you returned drunk—in the middle of the night—and slurred about Boone kissing you. Did that actually happen?”

I’d done what?

I widened my eyes and tried to search through my memories. But honest to God, that night was kinda fuzzy. I remembered we had a good time. I remembered going to a bar, then a club, and there was no forgetting the fantastic make-out session. But exactly what I’d told Ma when we got back to the hotel room was asking a bit much.

Apparently, Boone recalled. “Yeah, that happened.” He looked too somber for my liking. It raised my hackles—I couldn’t fucking help it—because Boone was supposed to be happy and carefree. “I don’t know word for word what Ace told you, but Case and I are together. I love him.”

As if I could stop myself from smiling at him now.

“I told her you’re getting married,” Ace said frankly.

“We don’t know that, sweet pea,” I cautioned her. “Marriage isn’t on our radar.” I