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  Having the James brothers working this project was like winning the lottery. Not that he would ever admit it, but the James brothers were the best, even better than his team. They worked hard, always finished their projects on time, and their work was unquestionably the best in the area. He'd never admit any of that of course. Not when he was their main competition. His boys were good, very good, but they didn't have that extra edge the James boys brought to each job.

  What he wouldn't give to have even one of them on his crew, hell, running his crew. Over the past five years he'd seriously considered risking war with Rory and going after one of her brothers on more than one occasion. If he could get one, just one, he could probably lure the rest of them over to his side. His eyes moved over to the oldest brother, Craig. He was the clear leader of the group. If he came over the rest would follow.

  How they managed to end up working for their baby sister, he would never know. Any of those men could easily have started up his own company and given Connor a run for his money, but they hadn't. No doubt they worked for Rory out of fear of old man James. His boys might be grown men, but he still ruled the family with an iron fist. He probably told the boys to help their sister and they jumped to do it, afraid the old man would kick their collective asses. Hell, even Connor didn't turn his back on the sixty year old man. He wasn't stupid.

  Of course if any of the James brothers decided after working this particular project that they'd rather work with him, who was he to argue?

  "Did we get it?" Andrew, one of his oldest friends and one of his foremen, asked as Connor joined them at the round tavern table. The four other men stopped talking and sipping their beers to watch him expectantly.

  "Oh yeah," he said, grinning, looking towards the James brothers. "Maybe even more."

  * * *

  "Did you know Connor was gay?"

  That question had Rory stumbling even though she'd changed into her work boots, jeans, and customary gray tee shirt. Before she went head first into the brick wall, Sean reached out and grabbed her by the arm to steady her, which was actually impressive since he never took his eyes off the huge plate of food in front of him.

  "Thanks," she said, taking the empty seat next to Brian.

  "No problem," Sean said around a huge bite full of his cheeseburger.

  "Well?" Bryce demanded as he pushed a mug of steaming hot cocoa towards her while Craig gestured to Luanne, their waitress.

  "Well, what?" Rory asked before taking a fortifying sip of cocoa. Not as good as hers, but still doable.

  "Did you know he was gay?" Sean hissed as Luanne placed a large cheeseburger platter with extra fries, onion rings and coleslaw in front of her.

  Connor O'Neil gay? That was actually laughable. She snorted as she took another sip of cocoa and picked up her knife. Just as she finished cutting her burger in half, Brian reached over and took half of it. When she raised the bun of the remaining half, Johnny took her onions. Sean and Bryce took her french fries while Craig and Brian split her onion rings. When the only thing left on her plate was the coleslaw and half a burger, each man in turn dumped his side salad with extra creamy French dressing on her plate. It took a few years, but she had them nicely trained, she thought as she took a bite of her burger.

  "Why do you think he's gay?" she asked, spearing a delicious looking French dressing covered cucumber slice onto her fork.

  "He keeps looking over here at us," Brian said, jerking his head in the direction behind him.

  Sipping her cocoa, Rory leaned to the left to look between two of her very large brothers. Sometimes she felt like she had her own entourage of linebackers. Having large muscular brothers did come in handy when she needed help moving or someone to open a pickle jar.

  "He's doing it again," Johnny said, moving to the side so she could get a better look and sure enough he was looking over at them. Actually, so were his little buddies. They were talking and gesturing towards them. No doubt the men were pissed at the news. So was she, but she was willing to suck it up as long as he stayed the hell out of her way that is.

  As if he sensed her thoughts, he turned his eyes on her and narrowed them dangerously. She narrowed her eyes on him. Everything around them disappeared as they glared at each other. Sure it was childish, but she would not look away first damn it! Even when people walked between them neither looked away.

  The glaring was actually starting to make her feel dizzy, but she would not look away first! Not this time! She would-

  "They're probably just gloating. It's okay, baby girl, we'll get the next one," Craig said, pulling her attention away from the glaring bastard. She looked away, but not before she caught his triumphant grin.

  The bastard!

  "We got it," she said, taking a quick sip of cocoa.

  The men actually stopped eating to frown at her, which was pretty amazing since there was still food on the table and these were the James brothers.

  "What do you mean we got it?" Brian asked.

  She shrugged. "I signed the contract less than a half hour ago. It's ours."

  The men looked over their shoulders and then back at her in unison. "Then why do they look like they're celebrating? I can't imagine Connor being happy about losing to you," Bryce said, staring longingly at the burger left on her plate. So maybe they hadn't entirely forgotten about the food, she thought.

  "Yeah, he looks damn happy for a man that just lost a million dollar contract," Johnny said as his hand inched, almost as if it had a mind of its own, towards her burger. Before it touched her plate, Craig reached out and slapped his hand away.

  Johnny gave her a sheepish smile and a shrug. She knew he couldn't help himself. It was something she understood even when they were kids. Her brothers could eat their father out of house and home by the time they were six and often did. Considering that by six they were the size of twelve year olds that wasn't too surprising. If it hadn't been for Craig, she probably would have starved to death. He kept his younger brothers in line and made sure that she had enough to eat.

  "Yeah, well, he kind of sort of got the contract too," she said quickly, wincing in anticipation of their reaction.

  Instead of cursing and slamming the table with their fists like she expected, they just sat there staring at her. Finally Bryce spoke. "You're kidding, right?"

  She shook her head, taking another sip of cocoa. Again her brothers looked over their shoulders and this time the life ruining bastard had the balls to salute them with his beer and a cocky grin.

  Rory discretely flipped him off. Connor's cocky smile quickly turned to a tight frown as his eyes once again narrowed on her. Her brothers turned their attention back to her, clearly wondering what she'd done. She just gave them an innocent smile as she sipped her cocoa.

  "I don't understand," Sean said. "How did you both get the contract?"

  Darting her eyes away, she said quietly, "We both got the contract. We'll be working with Highland Construction on this job."

  Stunned silence met her announcement. She chanced a glance back up at her brothers, who were now looking at her as if she'd grown an extra head. She cleared her throat nervously and continued.

  "We each got the contract with a twenty percent markup and a nice bonus if we finish by the November deadline," she said, watching as the information sank in.

  Each of the men cursed vividly as they turned and shot another scowl to the man that once again smiled smugly in their direction. Slowly, her brothers turned back to face her, glaring.

  "Why didn't you tell them we could do it without Highland Construction?" Sean demanded. This time when Johnny tried to snag her burger, Craig didn't stop him.

  Great, the big babies were mad at her. Whatever. They'd get over it.

  "Does it look like I want to work with him?" she asked, making them frown. "I didn't have a choice. Even if we hire extra men we won't be able to train them in time for them to be useful. We wouldn't make the deadline. If we did this alone we'd also blow our profit on extra equip
ment. Extra equipment I might add that Highland Construction has. All we have to do is go in, work our asses off just like any other project, meet the deadline and that's it. The only downside is that it will be with the bastard, but if I can handle it, then so can you."

  Her brothers looked thoughtful as they considered what she said. Finally with a shrug, Craig said, "Fine, as long as he leaves us alone to do our job and lets us lead we won't kick his ass."

  Chapter 3

  "That's it, boy," Connor cooed as the hundred and fifty pound pain in the ass cocked his head to the side and studied Connor. "Come on, big guy, you know you want it," he said, holding the hot dog he dipped in peanut butter up higher as he moved it slowly from side to side.

  The demon spawn that Rory liked to call a dog licked his lips hungrily as his eyes zeroed in on the tasty treat. Grinning, Connor leaned over and reached for the laptop bag that he'd foolishly set down on the ground ten minutes ago so that he could grab his briefcase and the stack of files only to turn around and find the pain in the ass lying across it.

  Connor tossed the tasty treat onto Rory's property. The dog sent him one last glare before he took off. Connor wasted no time in grabbing his laptop, knowing the damn dog would be back. Sometimes it seemed as though the damn dog liked screwing him over more than Rory did.

  He was just about to head inside his house when a familiar red four door sedan pulled into Rory's driveway. Hadn't he already chased this loser off? It had been what.....three or four weeks since he last saw this asshole sniffing around Rory? Then again, most of the men Rory dated, all losers in his opinion, stopped coming by her house shortly after meeting him, which was the way he liked it.

  But clearly he hadn't done his job if this one was coming back for more. As he watched the asshole step out of his car as he smoothed his hair back and straightened his obviously new shirt and slacks, Connor couldn't help but wonder how dumb the man really was.

  When the man spotted him, he froze and noticeably swallowed. A loud menacing growl had the man taking a step back. Because that too pleased him, he pulled the second peanut butter dipped hot dog out of the baggy and tossed it to the dog Rory dared to name, “Bunny.” With a grunt, the dog swallowed the treat whole, but never took his eyes away from the asshole that refused to step away from behind his car.

  Like that would protect him, Connor thought with a sigh as he walked over to the corner of his large white Victorian home, which happened to be a mere twenty feet away from the corner of Rory's house, an almost identical house. When the homes were built over two hundred years ago they had been identical in every way, except the direction of the layout was opposite in each house. The Master bedroom suite of each house had its very own open porch that extended past the walls of the house by ten feet and cut the distance between the two houses to eighteen inches.

  It wasn't exactly a surprise that the house were built together since the houses had been built by identical twins. The brothers had built the homes for their wives only to discover later that their wives could not stand each other, at least that's what his realtor had told him. Whether or not it was true didn't really matter to him. All that mattered was that he could look forward to aggravating the piss out of Rory each and every night when she sat out on her porch to relax.

  When he'd first bought the place, the small strip of land that separated the two properties held not only a tall wood fence that started at the street and ended at the back of the property, but large arboreta trees that were nearly as tall as the house, completely blocking Rory's house from his sight. Since he'd bought the house for the entertainment value, he of course had the fence and trees taken down the next day.

  Rory had been pissed at the time, but she soon got over it and focused her attention back on fixing up her house while he did the same with his. It took him two years to get the house the way he wanted it, but it was well worth it. When he first bought the place he'd considered giving it a more modern look, but after his first night in the place he decided to go with what he thought it might have looked like when it was originally built. It took extra time, money and a lot of guessing, but he was happy with the results.

  When he originally bought the property he planned on fixing it up and selling it off, having Rory around to torture was just a bonus, but once it was done he knew that he wouldn't be able to part with it. He knew it was the same for Rory. Although he'd never seen what she'd done, and god how he wanted to see what she'd done, he knew that she loved the house and also changed her mind about selling when the renovations were complete.

  "Is Rory here?" the man asked as he shifted nervously.

  "Is she expecting you?" he asked, leaning back against the house as he discretely reached behind the rosebush one of his ex-girlfriends insisted on planting and flipped the switch off of what he liked to call his “Little Box of fun” and settled his fingers over the three black buttons on the small panel.

  "That's none of your business," the man snapped, noticeably bristling.

  "Then I guess you'll just have to find out for yourself," Connor said with a careless shrug as he watched the man shoot him a scowl just before he stormed up the walkway and damn near jumped out of his skin when Bunny decided to block his path.

  "Easy," the man said anxiously as he backed away from the dog. Even though it probably should be enough that the dog most likely made the man piss his pants, Connor felt that he needed a little more incentive to get the hell out of here and never come back.

  "What the hell!" the man yelled as Rory's sprinklers came on full blast. Connor waited until the man ran back to his car, only falling twice and ruining his clothes with mud and grass, and was peeling out of the driveway before he turned her sprinklers off.

  Best damn thing he'd ever built, he decided as he gave his partner in crime a mock salute and headed for the front door. It really was too bad he couldn't stand her dog since he did come in handy from time to time.

  * * *

  "Why are you covered in mud, sweetie?" Rory asked as she bent down to cup Bunny's mud splattered face. When she caught a whiff of peanut butter and hot dog she knew exactly how her poor baby got all dirty.

  "Connor," she bit out, momentarily forgetting that she couldn't kill him for at least five months.

  "You called?" the annoying bastard said, sounding amused.

  She looked up, not surprised to find him standing on his second floor porch, shirtless and holding a bottle of beer. Sometimes she wished that he hadn't cut down those damn trees. At least she could have pretended that he wasn't next door and probably would have enjoyed relaxing on her porch more if she didn't have to see him. Then again, he would have just found some other way to annoy her.

  "You want to tell me why you felt the need to soak Bunny?" she asked, resigning herself to waiting another hour or two before she ventured out onto her own porch. Not that it would make much of a difference since he'd just come back out again to aggravate her, but after three years she was used to it. She also loved her time on her porch too much to really care most of the time.

  "I will if you tell me why you named that poor dog, Bunny," he offered, taking a sip of his beer.

  Because the dog was her little honey bunny, but she would never tell him that. "Forget it," she said, sighing as she headed for her front door.

  "Come up here and join me," he called after her.

  "I'll pass," she said, wanting nothing more than a hot cup of cocoa as she went over the new plans McGill gave her earlier and work them into her plans. She also needed to figure out ways to speed up the renovation. Even with Connor's men and equipment they were looking at long hours. She needed to figure out how to get it all done without destroying their profit with overtime.

  "Don't you think the two of us should sit down and go over the plans for Strawberry Manor?" he asked casually, but she wasn't stupid. She knew the only reason that he wanted to talk to her was so that he could pick her brain and discover what resources she had at her disposal. It's exactly what she
would have done if she hadn't managed to corner one of his men an hour earlier and sweet talk him into spilling his guts about Highland Construction's equipment, its men and their skills. Now she just had to work all that newfound knowledge into her plans.

  "Not really," she said as she unlocked her front door and sent up a silent prayer to have a Connor-free night. Of course her prayer was ignored. They usually were where Connor was concerned.

  "That's too bad. I guess I'll have to tell McGill that you're not willing to fulfill your end of the contract," he mused loudly.

  She didn't say anything as she slammed the door behind her, because there was nothing to say. He knew he had her in a tight spot and had no problem screwing her over. If she didn't play nice he could cost her the contract and more importantly, her reputation.

  Clenching her jaw shut, she stormed into her kitchen and dropped her things onto the light oak country table. If she was going to deal with Connor and not kill him, then she was going to need a hot cocoa fix. As she waited for the water to boil, she fed Bunny and sorted through her notes. If he wanted to pretend that they were going to play nice that was fine with her since none of this bullshit mattered anyway.

  The real battle wouldn't begin until tomorrow and she was more than prepared to win. So, if he wanted to play these pointless little games now that was more than fine with her. After she mixed up her special hot cocoa, took a sip and sighed happily, she grabbed the top folder and made her way through the house.

  If she didn't absolutely adore her house she would have sold it and moved the hell away from Connor, but she did so she couldn't. This was her house, her baby, and nothing and no one was ever going to make her give it up. As she restored the house to its original condition she'd fallen in love with the large old house and couldn't imagine living anywhere else. Her only hope was that Connor got sick and tired of these games and decided to sell his house and move far, far, far, far, far away.