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CHAPTER1
Frankie Valenti was just about donewith this shit. She grinned at the camera and prayed it wouldn't pick up her clenched jaw. If she needed caps on her molars, Jake Ryland was going to pay for them. She raised the can of ridiculous hot pink spray paint with her name on it and began marking walls.
“All right guys! It’s demo day. We’ve got three walls that need to go down quick. You two, grab a wall and a sledgehammer. First one to take down their section wins. Aaaannnd GO!”
She let out a berserker yell and tore into the wall nearest her. Coming up with silly shit on a construction site was easy. Keeping it fresh, but the same, for the camera was harder. She had one shot to get the first hit right if she didn’t want Trina to make her reshoot it by tearing into a wall she’d planned to keep.
Since she refused to let the guys beat her, she channeled all of her frustration into the sledgehammer she wielded against the drywall. The Kaufmans’ living room was toast.
Every stupid retake.Bam!
Every stupid delay.Wham!
Every stupid change Mr. High-and-Mighty Dick-rector Jake wanted to make at the last fucking minute.Slam!
Jake Ryland was getting on her last nerve with his controlling attitude and his know-it-all smirk and those damn forearms. She refused to examine why forearms pissed her off, and refocused her ire on the demolition.
A two-by-four stud splintered behind the force of her anger-driven sledge.
When her family had signed on for Million-Dollar Starter Home, she had been one hundred percent on board. She agreed with her father that it would help grow their business and solidify their reputation as quality builders in Silicon Valley. Leaning in to making the show a success made sense. She just hadn’t anticipated that she’d be cast as the class clown and forced to submit to the whims of an arrogant asshole. It had chafed for years that she'd had to bide her time and follow orders from first her dad, and then Adrian and Sofia. Jake added insult to injury. The thought of knocking him out with her hammer made her grin like a fool. A sweaty, manic fool.
Someday, Frankie thought as plaster dust rained down on her,I’ll be running Valenti Brothers…
Thunk!
…and then this…
Whack!
…will all be worth it.
Crack!
Until then though, she’d keep hustling and trying to prove that while she might look like her petite mother, she could absolutely fill her father’s shoes.
Frankie tightened her grip on the sledge so it didn't fly into the next room, and hit as high as she could reach.
Yes, she was the baby of the family, and yes, she was a woman in a man’s field, and yes, she was only five foot four, an injustice she intended to have words with God about.
But she’d be damned if she’d let any of that stand in the way of fulfilling her promise to Gabe.
Her entire childhood, she’d looked up to her big brother. They’d planned to run Valenti Brothers together, but then Gabe had gone off to war while she was still growing up, and hadn’t come back home. Chasing their dream kept him alive in her heart, and Frankie was more determined than ever. She just had to convince her father, and now Jake Ryland, to give her a shot.
The upcoming spin-off was the perfect opportunity.
“Hey!”
Frankie whirled, sledgehammer raised, and whipped off her much-protested pink safety glasses.
“What?”
Rico stepped back, hands raised. “You won.”
Frankie looked at the destruction she’d created and grinned. She’d gotten her whole section done while she’d been lost in thought. Mugging for Trina, the camera operator and only other woman in the room, Frankie shook her hips and pumped her fists in a victory dance.
“And cut.”
Speak of the devil, and he shall appear.
