Brand New Me Read Online Free PDF Page B

yet at that price. And the shop had been empty now for a couple of months. They were too far up Main for a lot of tourist traffic. “A thousand a month. First and last month in advance.”
    “Oh.” The brunette’s forehead furrowed slightly as she chewed on her lower lip. “What’s the square footage?”
    Tom shrugged. “I don’t know off the top of my head. I could look it up. It’s a single room in front with a storage area at the back of the building. There’s access to the delivery entrance for the Faro at back too.”
    “Could I get in to look at it? All I’ve been able to do so far is peek through the windows.”
    Tom sighed. A more trusting man would give her the key and let her look. But trusting men didn’t usually own bars like the Faro. And if they did, they soon learned not to be so trusting. He himself had been born suspicious. “If you can wait a few minutes, I’ll take you over there.”
    “Of course.” The brunette turned as he signaled across the room. He watched her eyes widen in consternation as Chico lumbered toward them.
    “Chico’s the bouncer. His bark is usually worse than his bite,” he explained. “Although not always.”
    Chico pulled out a barstool and sat. “What?”
    “I need you to take over the bar for a few minutes while I show Ms. Brandenburg here what Ferguson’s shop looks like inside.”
    Chico glanced at the brunette for the first time, narrowing his eyes slightly as he studied her. “Why?”
    The brunette swallowed hard. Chico wasn’t making much effort to be charming.
    “I’d like to lease the shop,” she murmured, her voice dropping again.
    “What for?” Chico leaned back against the bar. “Crummy location. Lousy economy. What can you sell we don’t already have more of than we need right now?”
    Succinctly put . Tom leaned forward on his elbows.
    “Coffee,” the brunette muttered. She gave Chico a look of mixed terror and defiance.
    “We got coffee.”
    “Good coffee.” Her voice sounded slightly more firm.
    Chico shrugged. “We got good coffee.”
    Deirdre Brandenburg raised her chin. All of a sudden her eyes were flashing. “Not as good as mine,” she snapped.
    Chico grinned, slowly, which was a fairly terrifying sight in itself. He always reminded Tom of a smiling rhinoceros. “Well, then, you got something somebody’s likely to buy.” He turned to Tom. “I’ll keep an eye on things. All they want is beer with their burgers, anyway.”
    “Right.” Tom opened the gate at the end of the bar and motioned to the brunette to follow him.

    Craig Dempsey was summoned to the big man’s office at nine in the morning. He had a sneaky suspicion this had something to do with Dee-Dee, but he wasn’t sure exactly what. Big John might have found out about Dee-Dee’s breaking up with him, but he’d bet he hadn’t. Dee-Dee wasn’t the type to clue her father in on her love life. Or anything else, as far as that went.
    Fortunately . Craig still had hopes of getting her to rethink the whole breaking up thing. He wasn’t under any illusions about why Big John had hired him in the first place—it was the NFL-star shtick. Hire an athlete and pretend his accomplishments on the field somehow rubbed off on the company he worked for. Craig had no problem with that idea, as far as it went. His football career had opened most of the doors he needed to have opened. But marrying Dee-Dee Brandenburg would have made his position a lot more secure in the long run. And security was something he’d become very aware of over the past few months.
    People seemed to think he’d come out of his years as a player with enough money to see him set for life. And he probably would have, if it hadn’t been for that freakin’ car dealership his brother Arnie talked him into. Or those weekends in Vegas. Who knew a few hands of poker could end up costing so much? His cards hadn’t been that bad, all in all. He still had money left, but not enough to go on living the way