Unexpected Trouble (The Unexpected Series Book 3)

by Stacy Eaton

  Unexpected Trouble

  The Unexpected Series, Book 3

  Stacy Eaton

  Copyright © 2020 by Stacy Eaton

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  1. Chapter One

  2. Chapter Two

  3. Chapter Three

  4. Chapter Four

  5. Chapter Five

  6. Chapter Six

  7. Chapter Seven

  8. Chapter Eight

  9. Chapter Nine

  10. Chapter Ten

  11. Chapter Eleven

  12. Chapter Twelve

  13. Chapter Thirteen

  14. Chapter Fourteen

  15. Chapter Fifteen

  16. Chapter Sixteen

  17. Chapter Seventeen

  18. Chapter Eighteen

  19. Chapter Nineteen

  20. Chapter Twenty

  21. Chapter Twenty-One

  22. Chapter Twenty-Two

  23. Chapter Twenty-Three

  24. Chapter Twenty-Four

  25. Chapter Twenty-Five

  26. Chapter Twenty-Six

  27. Chapter Twenty-Seven

  28. Chapter Twenty-Eight

  29. Chapter Twenty-Nine

  30. Chapter Thirty

  The Unexpected Series

  Sneak Peek

  About the Author

  Also by Stacy Eaton

  Chapter One

  Gregory

  “Why can’t we just buy another damn coffeemaker?” I growled as I stared at the barren space on the counter in the small kitchenette of our office. “I’ll even pay for the damn thing.”

  Trevor chuckled as Alex responded with a smirk. “You haven’t been here long enough to realize how things go.”

  “Have you not figured out that Jake likes things a specific way, Blaire? He’d rather wait three extra weeks to get the coffeemaker that he wants than to replace it with something else.”

  “It’s fucking coffee,” I groaned. “You add grounds and water, and it brews. What the fuck does Screamer need a special machine for?”

  A hand slapped me on the shoulder, and I turned to find Jake behind me, a brow hiked. “I bet you are one of those guys who use tap water in your machine too and doesn’t care what kind of beans are in the machine, right?”

  “That’s exactly the type of guy that I am. It’s fucking coffee, Screamer.”

  “Yeah, and that’s why I’m not letting you buy the machine. God knows we drink enough of it around here, and if we are going to do that, the least we can do is have a good brew.”

  “When did you become such a coffee snob?” I asked. “Last I knew, you’d drink all the swill you could get, and you didn’t care where it came from.”

  “Yeah, well, some of us have grown up and acquired taste.”

  “Acquired?” I laughed. “Next, you’ll be telling me that you go to wine tastings now too.”

  He scrunched up his face. “I’m not quite that much of a dork.”

  We all laughed. “When is this new machine supposed to be here?”

  “I don’t know; the one I want is on backorder, so until then, you can schlep it down to the coffee shop on the corner and pick us up some for the meeting at nine.” Jake started to walk away.

  “Me?”

  Jake paused and glanced back. “Yes, you got a problem with that, Blaire?”

  “Can’t—”

  A woman’s voice called from down the hall, “Don’t even suggest it, Gregory Blaire. Go get your own damn coffee! I’m not the coffee girl.”

  I rolled my eyes as everyone laughed again, and I called out my response a little louder so I would know she heard me. “I was not going to suggest that, Alice.”

  Trevor leaned forward and whispered, “Yeah, you were.”

  I shrugged as I began to walk down the hallway. “Fine, I’ll go. What does everyone want?”

  “Ask Alice, she knows,” Alex said as he punched me in the arm and stepped around me.

  “How does she know?”

  Trevor grinned as he moved to my side. “Because she keeps track of those things for us.”

  “Yeah, right,” I muttered as Trevor and Alex walked away. She probably went to pick up coffee for them regularly. Why was I being sent out on this errand?

  I paused by her desk, and she didn’t even glance up as she reached into a drawer and pulled out a three-by-five card that was laminated—laminated!—and handed it to me. Printed on the card in neat handwriting was a coffee order for everyone in the office. Well, everyone but me. I frowned. “How come my name is not on here?”

  She lifted her warm brown eyes to mine. “Because you haven’t been in the office since the coffeemaker bit it.” She was right; I had been in training classes and traveling the last two weeks.

  “What did happen to the machine?”

  She glanced over her shoulder, leaned forward, and spoke softly. “Jake got pissed about something and took it out on Mr. Coffee. Picked the thing up and smashed it on the ground.”

  “Did the machine do something?”

  She shook her head and leaned back. “Nope, he was just in one of his moods. Make sure you pick up three more cups, black with sugar and creamer on the side for the clients.” She turned her head to the side. “And you better hurry. It gets busy around this time, and the clients will be here soon.”

  “I don’t see your name on here. Did you want something?”

  “No, but thanks. I already have mine.” She lifted her brown paper cup.

  I stared at the cup. “Isn’t that from where I’m going?”

  “Yes,” she said sweetly.

  “Why didn’t you pick this up when you were there?”

  She lifted her eyes to mine, and even though I knew she wanted to take my head off for that comment, that did not stop me from noticing again how beautiful she was. Her dark hair pulled back from her oval face, warm brown eyes almost the color of whiskey, and a breathtaking smile. Well, breathtaking when she was smiling. She wasn’t doing that now, though. “Because I’m not the coffee girl.”

  “Alright, sorry for asking.” I was about to step away when I saw the newspaper sitting beside Alice, and a small picture captured my attention.

  I collected the paper and turned it around to read the heading. Is he the man for you? Ten ways to know if he is. The name under the article was Maggie Valor, and I stared at her photo. Damn, she looked amazing.

  What was Maggie doing back in town? The last I knew she had moved to Atlanta. “Hey, Alice.” I held the paper up as she gave me her attention. “How long has this woman had a column in the paper?”

  She grinned. “Why? Do you need some advice on romance?”

  “Hardly, Alice, of course, you’d know that if you’d let me take you out.”

  “And I might have let you take me out if you knew anything about romance,” she quipped back, and I laughed.

  “Touché, but seriously, do you know how long she’s been writing this column?”

  “Um, I think it’s been a couple of months. The last romance guru kicked the bucket.”

  “Nice way to say she died.”

  Alice rolled her eyes. “No, she literally kicked the bucket and said she was giving up on romance. Said that all the advice she had ever given was bullshit and laughed at all the people who asked for her advice.”

  “You’re kidding?”

&
nbsp; “Nope, she slipped the article into the paper one night when the editor was busy, and when they saw it the next day, they tried to get her to print an apology, but that’s when she kicked the bucket and said love was dead. Of course, she was fired, and when Maggie Valor started, she had a lot to deal with after the fallout.”

  “Is she any good?”

  Alice barked out a laugh. “She writes a romance column, of course it’s good. She’s full of wit and sarcasm, and just enough advice to seem like she’s trying to help you. I love her. Why the interest?”

  “I knew her way back when,” I stated as I set the paper down. “Been a long time, but I knew her in high school.”

  “What are you still doing here?” Jake barked as he came around the corner.

  “Oh, he’s getting romance advice,” Alice said quickly and held up the paper, pointing at the column.

  “Get the fuck out of here, Blaire! The clients are going to be here in fifteen minutes.”

  “I’m going,” I told him and walked toward the door as Alice rolled her eyes. I would have joined her, but Jake might have seen my reflection in the glass.

  The sidewalks were busy with people hustling to wherever they were going. Alice was right; it was going to be hectic at the coffee shop if the number of cups passing by me was any indication. As I went on my way, I stayed closer to the buildings, rather than the curb, and watched every single car I walked past.

  I’d seen too many car bombs in my tours overseas, and having vehicles parked along the sidewalks still made me nervous—one of the gifts from my enlistment in the Marines. It’s a shame I didn’t have a return address, or I’d send it the fuck back.

  I stepped into the coffee shop and sighed. It was packed, and there were about ten people in line in front of me, with another six or seven waiting on the other side for their orders. Around the small interior, there were nine tables, all in use, and four chairs off to the side at a bar table area, all occupied too. A few people had computers open and appeared to be working; others messed with their phones, and a couple of people were actually talking to one another.

  Conversation was a lost art—sadly. I enjoyed talking to people, and just about anywhere I went, I tried to strike up a conversation. It made me more comfortable, especially if I was in a crowd. I glanced around again as I shuffled forward a few more steps.

  There was a constant level of noise in the place, the door opening and closing, the chatter of people, the clicking of keys, the whooshing of steam on the espresso machine, and the dinging of the cash register. If you didn’t bunch the sounds together in a group, it could have been overwhelming.

  Someone bumped me from behind, and I glanced over my shoulder to see a woman with her phone glued to her ear, her blond hair blocking her features and a huge-assed shoulder bag over her arm. That’s what hit me, not her, her damn bag. I shuffled a few inches to the side to avoid it.

  We moved up another foot as the next person was helped, and then someone leaving cut between the woman in front of me and me, making me step back to avoid getting stepped on. I frowned at the guy as he passed by, not even saying excuse me—fucking millennials. They thought they owned the world. I shook my head and got poked by the woman’s bag again.

  I ignored it and wiped my brow, which was starting to bead with sweat. It wasn’t just the heat in the room; it was the noise, the people, the feeling of being herded toward something.

  A sharp jab nailed me in my back near a bruise from a recent training incident, and I spun around. “Would you mind watching your bag, please?” I said roughly. Even though I was pissed, I was trying to keep my cool.

  The woman’s face snapped to mine, and we both jerked back slightly. “Mags?”

  “Greg?” she said at the same time. “Heather, I need to call you back.” She hung up without even waiting for a reply. “Gregory Blaire, what are you doing here?”

  “Getting coffee with the rest of the damn city. I could be asking you the same thing. Last I heard you were going to Atlanta.”

  “I did go to Atlanta, and the last I heard, you had gone back overseas for another deployment.”

  “Yep, I did. I just finished twenty. I’m out now.”

  She let her gaze drift over my face and down to my chest. “You look good, Gregory.”

  While she had been checking me out, I’d been doing the same, and she looked better than good. She looked fucking edible. “Thanks, you too, Maggie.”

  “Do you mind moving up?” the pregnant woman behind Maggie said abruptly with a bit of a bite to it. Someone needed a caffeine fix. Didn’t she know that wasn’t good for her baby?

  “Sorry, ma’am. I’d be happy to.” I gave her my best smile, and she relaxed a little—even smiled back. I turned my attention back to Maggie after I had shifted closer to the register. “How long you been back in town?”

  “A few years, what about you?”

  I grinned down at her, noting that she had a few lines around her blue eyes now, but they didn’t detract from her beauty. In fact, it was quite the opposite. “About sixteen months.”

  I glanced at the counter and saw I was up next, so I dug into my side pocket to retrieve the laminated coffee order card. I stared at it for a moment; who fucking laminates something like this?

  Maggie took the card out of my hand and laughed. “Are you serious? Your office needs a laminated list of how everyone takes their coffee?” She skimmed the list and laughed again as she lifted her pretty, smoky-blue eyes to mine. “Are you the coffee boy? Is that the best job you could get?”

  I removed the card from her hand. “No, I’m not the coffee boy. I haven’t spent much time in the office, so I got sent on the errand.”

  The barrister called out, “Next!” and I shifted to the register.

  I looked down at the card, ready to start reading it off when I thought better of it and thrust it toward him. “One of each of these, then four blacks with cream and sugar on the side to go.”

  The guy rolled his eyes but took the card and began to punch buttons faster than I could have read them. I had no fucking clue what half-caf-soy with an extra skinny shot meant. What happened to regular coffee with cream and sugar?

  “Is that it?” the clerk said, and Maggie pushed in beside me. “Add another large black with extra room for cream, please.”

  I raised a brow toward her. “Sure, by all means, add your order to mine.”

  She grinned and leaned forward slightly, lowering her voice, and seductively said, “With all that, I didn’t think you’d notice one more. Besides, I think you owe me at least a cup of coffee.”

  Damn—she kept smiling up at me, and I had this crazy-ass idea to lean forward and kiss those lips. Fuck if the idea didn’t get something moving below the belt too.

  I was opening my mouth to tell her just what I had noticed when the front door opened, and someone screamed. Two men with masks burst into the place, both holding handguns. I grabbed Maggie’s arm and pulled her behind me before I took hold of the pregnant woman’s arm, too, and yanked her around me also. They were no sooner behind me when a gunshot went off into the ceiling, and my demeanor went from sexual to lethal in the time that it took for the firearms slide to move backwards and then snap back in place.

  Chapter Two

  Maggie

  “No, I told you that I was going to break the segment down into more than one column—I specifically told you it would be ten days. I did say there were ten ways to know if he loves you.”

  “You should have just put all ten points into one column,” my editor complained.

  “Jeff, it would have been too long. There is no way I can put all ten reasons you should be with a man in less than five hundred words.”

  “You could have if you had tried, Maggie.”

  “No, I couldn’t, Jeff.” I stopped on a dime as a man barreled past me, almost plowing into me as he crossed the sidewalk.

  “Move.” The man glared at me, his hazel eyes devoid of emotion to the point that
I shivered and looked away, noting the black SUV parked at the curb, still running.

  Man, didn’t they know that was a crime? It was illegal to leave your vehicle running with no one in it. The two men had disappeared into the store, so I slipped closer to the vehicle and peeked inside, checking the back seat to see it was empty, too.

  “What are you going to do now?” Jeff asked, snapping me back to the conversation as I glanced over my shoulder and didn’t see anyone in the jewelry store. They must have gone toward the back.

  “I’m going to finish the series. Look, just give it a day. I promise you that more people will tune in tomorrow, and more will keep reading the column over the next ten days. They aren’t going to want to miss even one of the reasons that I give.”

  As I spoke, I went around to the other side of the SUV and tried the door handle. Unlocked, of course. I made sure there wasn’t a car coming, then opened the door, reached in for the keys, and turned the SUV off. I stared at the keys for a moment, chewing my bottom lip, tempted to throw them into the street, but I decided to toss them into the rear storage area behind the second row. With that done, I pushed the door closed, checked the traffic, and then ran across the street as my phone began to beep in my ear.

  I glanced at the screen. “Jeff, I will be in the office in a few minutes. I have to take another call.” I hung up on him before he even uttered a sound. “Hey, Heather, are we still on for tonight?” I asked as I cut through pedestrian traffic on the sidewalk to get to the coffee shop door.