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Colleen sighed. “So go help. Be manly and heroic, Lucas. You do it so well.”
“You’re right,” he murmured. “Nice to see you, hotshot. Stop throwing rocks through windows, okay?”
With that, he walked toward the front yard.
“Dude, thank God!” Bryce said.
“Hey, Paulie,” he said. “You can put the car down now. I got this.”
A minute later, he heard a car start and looked down the street. There was Colleen, behind the wheel of a MINI Cooper convertible.
Hot girl in a red car.
Worked every time.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“IT’SGOODTOsee you, Lucas. Even if you did break my baby girl’s heart all those years ago.”
“Oh, snap,” said Bryce, grinning. Mrs. O’Rourke smiled fondly at him.
Lucas nodded. “Good to see you, too, Mrs. O’Rourke.” It wasstrangeto see Colleen’s mother, that’s what it was, and even weirder to be back in the house he’d visited when he was Colleen’s boyfriend. It hadn’t changed much.
“Call me Jeanette. I’m thinking of going back to my maiden name anyway. Come on, I’ll show you what I’m thinking.” She led the way to the back of the house. “This was his study. Where he called That Whore for phone sex, no doubt. I’d like you to rip it down. Burn it, if possible.”
“Better late than never?” Bryce suggested.
“Exactly, sweetheart. It’s been ten years. Men. They really suck.”
“Not me, of course,” Bryce said.
“Well, not yet,” Jeanette murmured. “I’m sure you have it in you. Are you seeing anyone, Bryce, dear?”
“Why? You wanna go out sometime?”
Colleen’s mother smiled and slapped Bryce’s arm.
Jeanette O’Rourke had tracked Lucas down and said she had a project for him. Given that he was trying to train Bryce, and construction hadn’t started on the public safety building yet, he agreed to come over and take a look.
The study was typical of 1970s architecture; a long room with a few small windows and some built-in cabinets on one end, and still a shrine to Pete O’Rourke—a picture of him with some minor politician on a golf course, a trophy from high school, a slew of Robert Ludlum novels. A picture of a college-age Colleen, her cheeky smile, gray eyes soft, hair gleaming in the sun.
Seemed like he was staring.
“Maybe you could remodel, rather than rip it down and burn it,” he said, turning to Colleen’s mother. “Seems a shame to waste the whole room.”
“Good point. I could have an art studio, maybe. I’m taking classes.”
“What kind of classes?” Bryce asked.
“I paint nudes,” she said, giving him a speculative glance. “They pay the models, you know. We’re always looking for new talent.”
“Cool!” Bryce asked. “How much?”
“Not enough,” Lucas said. “Anyway, we could put in some skylights, since you need a new roof anyway, and bigger windows. You’d have great light. French doors on that wall, maybe a little deck.”
“Wonderful! When can you start?” she asked.
He turned to look at her. “Are you sure you want me to do this, Mrs. O’Rourke?”
