The Good Girl's Second Chance (The Bravos Of Justice Creek 2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

the giant, jeweled lizard brooch on her pink silk Chanel suit and said, “Thank you, my dear.”
    “Have a great day, Agnes.”
    The old lady sailed out the door.
    “Wound a little tight, that one,” Manny remarked drily once Agnes was gone.
    With a sigh and a shrug, Chloe joined the old man and the little girl at one of the worktables. “Now. What can I do for you?”
    Annabelle glanced up from coloring an enormous, smiling yellow sun. Chloe saw Quinn in the shape of his daughter’s eyes and the directness of her gaze. Really, the little girl was downright enchanting, with that heart-shaped face and those chipmunk cheeks. Chloe felt a bittersweet tug at her heartstrings. Annabelle reminded her of the children she should have had.
    But after that first time Ted punched her, having kids had never felt right. And Ted hadn’t really cared about children anyway. He wanted his wife focused on him.
    “I want a princess room,” the little girl announced. Chloe gladly put away her grim thoughts of Ted to focus on the sprite in the darling dress. “Manny says you can make me one.”
    “Yes, I can.”
    “I want
all
the princesses. Belle and Merida and—” Manny chuckled and tapped the little girl on the arm. She glanced up at him. “But, Manny—”
    “I know, I know. You want all the princesses and you’re gonna get ’em, but what did we talk about?”
    Annabelle huffed. “To wait my turn and not be rude.”
    The old man beamed. “That’s right.”
    Annabelle leaned close to him, batted those big eyes and whispered, “But I want my princess room.”
    “It’s yours. Promise. But the grown-ups have to talk now.”
    “Okay
.
”
Annabelle bent to her smiling sun again.
    Manny spoke to Chloe then. “Quinn’s pretty busy getting the business off the ground.” His gym, Prime Sports and Fitness, was just down the street from Chloe’s showroom, at the intersection of West Central and Marmot Drive. “You know Quinn, don’t you?”
    “Of course. We...went to school together.”
    “Right. So Quinn takes care of the business. I look after Annabelle and run the house. You ever seen the inside of our house?”
    Chloe blinked away a mental image of Quinn, up on his knees between her legs. Quinn, gloriously naked, his beautiful blue-green eyes burning down at her. “Erm, your house? No, I haven’t been inside.”
    “It’s a good house, big rooms, great light, four thousand square feet. But built in the eighties, and looks like it. Too much ceramic tile and ugly carpet.”
    “So it needs a little loving care?” she asked, trying to sound cool and professional and fearing the old man could see right inside her head to the X-rated images of Annabelle’s dad.
    “What it needs is a boatload of cash and a good decorator. Starting on the ground floor and moving on up.”
    “You want to redo every room?” That would be good for her. Very good. Not only for the money, but for Your Way’s reputation. She could put up a whole new website area, if Quinn and Manny agreed, showing the before and after of at least the main rooms. Their housing development was an upscale one. However, like Quinn’s house, most of the homes were more than twenty years old. Doing a full-on interior redesign always got the neighbors’ attention, got them thinking that their houses could stand a little sprucing up, too. She could end up with a lot of new business from the job Manny described. She asked, “What about the bathrooms and the kitchen?”
    “Like I said, all of it. Every room.”
    She couldn’t help wondering if Quinn was behind this? “What will you need from me? I’ll be happy to show you examples of my work—my portfolio? We can take a look at the website so you’ll have a better feel of what I can do. As for references, I—”
    “Naw. I already looked at the website and I liked what I saw.”
    Was she blushing? Manny had a gruff way about him, but he also knew how to turn on the charm. She really liked him. She liked