Shifters on Fire: A BBW Shifter Romance Boxed Set (7 page)

He let out a sigh, but the fun of her current exchange was cut short when Mr. Dwyer walked out from the back office with a red face and a whole lot of aggravation very present in the wrinkles of his forehead. “Sheena?” he asked, “Are you flirting with a client? You need to be selling! Have you
seen the numbers?”

Stifling a chuckle, Sheena nodded to her boss and put her hand over the phone’s receiver. “This guy’s ordering a custom, but it’s dirty.”

“How dirty? I mean, are we talking the sort of dirty that if someone finds out we made we can go to jail for?”

“I don’t think that’s possible for a shirt shop, sir,” Sheena laughed. “He wants a shirt with a picture of a woman using the bathroom.”

When her boss looked absolutely confused and slightly confounded, she felt like she needed to continue with the explanation. “You remember the old Saturday Night Live sketch with Patrick Stew—”

“No,” he said with a wave of his hand. “Charge the guy a discretion fee of... say thirty percent and take the order. Also, make sure he orders at least ten shirts. I’m guessing it must be for some ridiculous mating party?”

Sheena shrugged, and chewed on her lip. The guy on the phone with the need for the dirty shirt was laughing
really
hard at Dwyer’s high-pitched near-yelp. “I don’t know, sir,” she finally said. “I’ll make sure to give him the surcharge. Anything else?”

For a second, Dwyer stuffed the left end of his mustache into his mouth and gnawed. That’s what he did when he was trying to hatch a scheme. And God knows that Sheena didn’t want to try and fleece some guy out of a bunch of money that she genuinely wanted to talk to on a more intimate basis.

Even if she wasn’t sure at all why she wanted to talk to him on a more intimate basis, she was quite sure she did. That’s the fun of being in Sheena’s head—not even Sheena quite understands what’s going on in there most of the time.

“How about a mating party surcharge?” He finally asked. “Maybe ten extra percent? We don’t need any bad press from someone finding out we made the shirts after all.”

“I’ll pay whatever he wants,” the guy on the phone said softly, “I was supposed to get these shirts made three weeks ago so I’ll pay double if he wants.”

“He says he’ll pay double,” Sheena said to her boss, whose face immediately lit up like a two year old presented with an entire bowl of buttercream frosting. “But I’m not sure if—”

“Double?!” Dwyer almost screeched. Two customers who had entered the shop, presumably to pick up their orders, turned like someone had fired a gun in the next room. “Yes, yes, yes! We’ll do whatever he wants for double cost. Have you
seen the numbers
?”

“No, Mr. Dwyer,” Sheena said, “but I’ll tell him he’s got an order.”

Without responding, Dwyer wandered off to the back, both wringing his hands, and also giggling to himself. She couldn’t understand the glee that came from getting a hundred extra bucks on an order, but what the hell? If it made her life a little easier, then fine.

“Right,” she said, removing her hand from the receiver, “you heard all that, so—”

If you’d like to make a call
, the operator said,
please hang up and try again. If you’d like to—

“Son of a
bitch
!” Sheena swore, before clapping her hand over her mouth.

Slowly, she put the shop phone back on the receiver and looked around at the customers who had backed away from her while she was getting upset. “Er,” she said bashfully, “sorry. That was just... you know what? Never mind.”

She put her phone on the countertop, almost chewing her lip in anticipation, hoping she’d get a notification from her callback service, but at least for the eight seconds she stared at it, none came. She chided herself for being both desperate and pitiful, and then let out a heavy sigh.

“Sorry,” she said, putting on her fakes smile ever. “How can I help you? Oh, hi Ms. Winterbottom. Here for the camp shirts?”

As she turned to collect the small crate of child-sized polos, her heart sank to her toes. She let out another sigh, and forced herself to just forget about what she’d just started thinking.

Never a good idea to get all optimistic
, she thought.
Just one more way to set myself up for disappointment. And I can’t take another shred of that shit, not now, not ever
.

Chapter Two

The entry door of the Mating Call Dating Agency, White Creek’s premier mate-finding epicenter, got an upgrade.

Instead of the old pair of cast-off Christmas sale jingle bells looped over the front door, there was now a perfectly good, and very inexpensive, electronic door chime. As the door opened and broke the magnetic seal, a high pitched, shrill tone angrily shrieked and filled the office.

Eve had decided that she’d be working from home for the time being, because if there’s anything an owl can’t stand, it’s high pitched, shrill tones that go on and on and on. Dora, on the other hand, wasn’t
about
to take her massive pile of files and folders and all the random things needed to make Mating Call work to her house. If she did, there’d be more random junk than there would be house for her to live in.

So here she was, and there went the door, and she stuck a pencil in each of her ears, eraser-first. “Son of a bitchin’ door, why won’t you stay shut unless you—”

“Hello?” a deep, growly voice slipped around the pink, rubber bits. “You open? God almighty that’s a horrible noise! Why don’t you just...”

She looked up just as the long, tall, lean man with the mop of black hair turned around and flicked a switch on the door doohickey. “There,” he said as it went off and peaceful silence returned to the world. “You had it on continual tone instead of just letting out one ring.”

“I could pretty much jump your bones right now,” Dora said flatly. “I mean I’ve got a mate, but still, he’d understand. Getting rid of that thing is going to make my life a whole hell of a lot better, I hope you know.”

The guy let out a chuff of laughter. “Yeah,” he said, “I imagine. That thing is uh... yeah, I can’t believe this, but my ears are still ringing a little.” He pushed a fingertip into the hollow behind his ear, and clenched his jaws a few times. “I feel like I just went to a KISS concert. Or at least a KISS cover band concert in a really small bar with very loud amplifiers.”

Dora laughed. “Yeah, well, that’s about the best description I’ve ever heard for that noise. I tend to use a string of profanity and free-floating hostility to talk about it, but,” she trailed off, sighed and then smiled. “Well anyway, thanks. What can I do for you?”

“I’m not sure I’m in the right place,” he said, looking nervously around the office. His eyes fell on the piles of folders, the mountains of papers and files and then moved back to Dora, who had been following his visual tour. “But one of my friends told me to come here if I needed—”

“Hard up?” Dora cut in. “Long dry spell I mean. Not getting the lovin’ you’re needin’?”

“I, uh...”

“It’s fine, sweetie,” she said. “Everyone goes through a long period of involuntary celibacy every now and then and it’s our business to put those to an end. Welcome to Mating Call, can I have your name?”

“Rex Steele,” the big guy said in the same growly, throaty voice from before. “I usually deliver that with a line that I think sounds cool, but—”

“It doesn’t,” Dora said without looking up, as she took down his name. “It’s nothing personal, I mean it’s just that I’ve never heard a good name-line. People with short names pull the Bond thing, people with names that sound like billionaire playboys say it like they’re the guy from
Gilligan’s Island
. Just for the hell of it, let’s hear yours.”

Rex laughed softly. “I don’t know if—”

“Oh, come on, don’t be shy. If you want a good story, I scared the shit out of my mate the first time we met. I got way too excited, which I’m sure you can’t imagine me getting excited.”

She was going a mile a minute, but the truth was, she talked like that because it gave her typing a rhythm. Little did Rex know that as Dora yammered on and on, she was filling out hundreds of words of information about him. She started to run scans on him through the Batman-esque computer that ran the backbone of Mating Call’s business. Background checks

“Go,” she said. “Go, go, go.”

Rex backed slowly away, not quite sure how to take the very excitable girl at the desk in front of him, but inexplicably liking her all the same. “Go?” he asked, even as he backed away. “Like leave? I’m sorry if I offended you, I—”

“You’re precious, you know that?” Dora asked, still not taking her eyes off the computer screen. “I want to hear your line, you big, beautiful dummy.”

“Steele, Rex Steele.” As he delivered the line in a vaguely British accent that recalled a mixture of the best of Bond and the worst of Bond, he arched one of his dark eyebrows and smiled in such a way that it caused a dimple in his left cheek.

“Cute,” Dora said. “But stupid. Although that’s an interesting twist. You heard what you did, right? You combined the two kinds of pick-up line I said people deliver. You’re better than that though, and I think you know it. Job?”

“Sometimes I feel like him.”

“No, that’s
Job
with a long ‘O’ sound. I’m guessing I’m not about to write ‘Biblical Scholar’
on this form.”

Rex laughed briefly and visibly relaxed. “No, I guess I’m not. My job is kind of difficult to describe.”

“Central Intelligence Agency? You don’t have to give me any specifics, I just can’t leave it blank because the last time we left it blank we ended up matching someone with a hitman.”

“Seriously?”

“No,” Dora deadpanned. “Of course not. You think there are hitmen in White Creek? If there are, I’d love to meet one.”

That time, instead of chuckling or softly laughing, Rex burst out with a bellow that shook the walls. “But seriously, no, I don’t think there are any hitmen around here.” He had this low, serious tone to his voice. “I believe I’d know.”

“That’s ominous,” Dora said, putting down the pen that she habitually spun while she typed. “Don’t tell me you’re being serious.”

Rex sat down slowly, languidly dripping himself into the chair in front of Dora’s desk. He leaned forward and propped himself up on his elbows. “I,” he said slowly, “am absolutely not serious. I’m a party planner.”

For a long moment, Dora stared at him and her mouth fell open little by little. “You,” she said in disbelief, “are the best kind of asshole.”

They both broke up laughing, and a moment later, Rex took a deep breath and let out a sigh. “No seriously, I’m a party planner. I was in Afghanistan, then I came back to no job and a whole shitload of college loans so I did what I did.”

“So you were a big drunk in college?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” Rex said. “But I
did
know how to throw good parties. It actually just all came together really quick. I didn’t exactly plan for it to work out, but—”

“Plan,” Dora snorted a laugh and then let out a very unceremonious honk. “You didn’t plan it, but you’re a party planner. That’s... I’m honestly not sure and I always get this wrong, but I’m pretty sure that’s irony.”

“
You
,” Rex said, “are
my
favorite kind of asshole. And I think that’s irony, but I don’t know. I’d look it up on my phone, but I’m not the sort who has a phone that has a screen big enough to look stuff up.”

Dora resumed typing. “Aren’t you supposed to be all slick and greasy? I mean when I hear that someone’s a party planner, I think of Tom from
Parks and Recreation
with his endless series of money making schemes and his lovable greaseball personality. I mean, he’s lovable and always seems to generally to be a pretty good person, but... Look, what I’m getting at is that you’re not a greaseball.”

Rex smiled slowly. “Well, good, because I don’t really want to be one.”

“So, what are you looking for in a mate? And don’t bother listing a bunch of physical traits because—”

“Sheena, from Dwyer’s Print Shop Supply,” he said. “Which is a stupid name because they don’t sell silk screening machines.”

“I’ve always thought that,” Dora said. “And I know Sheena, sort of, but... that’s not really how it works. First of all, I don’t think she’s even in our computer system.”

Dora typed like a machine gun, and then hit enter and stared at the screen. Rex watched the reflection of words scrolling by a mile a minute in her glasses. She was shaking her head, but the names just kept scrolling past, one after another. “Anyway,” she finally said as the names stopped and one of them was flashing, “we can’t just fix you up on request. We’ve got this long, complicated series of things we do to make sure the match is compatible. After all, if you can’t trust us in your matchup, then what the hell are we doing?”

“I can’t find her again,” he said. “I called the place back, but she didn’t answer.”

“Well people
do
have days off,” she said. “Why not just try back and—”

“I can’t,” he said. “I can’t wait. I had her on the phone because I wanted to order some shirts with a woman urinating behind some bushes and—”

“They’ll
do
that?” Dora said, mouth falling agape again. “I can’t believe... wait, that’s from the
SNL
sketch, isn’t it? With Patrick Stewart and the erotic cakes?”

“Yeah,” he said, “but that’s not the point. I need to get ahold of her. She gave me some number to send a text message to so that it would add me to her contacts or something.”

“Oh my God, you’re
really
precious. And you don’t know how it works.”

“And I don’t know how it works. I’m not even sure I can do what she told me to do on this phone. I mean, the number she gave me didn’t have the right number of digits.”

“Yeah it’s a callback service,” Dora said. “It’s a thing where you send a message to a particular number and then you—you know what? Never mind. This is absolutely not what we normally do, but... I keep saying you’re precious so I should probably stop for the sake of repetition. So instead I’ll say you’re adorable.”

“Thanks,” he said, “I guess. What you’re really saying is that I remind you of your octogenarian grandfather, but I’ll have you know that I can both program a VCR and also correctly navigate channels on a digital cable box.”

“Do you do that regularly?” Dora asked. “Programming a VCR, I mean.”

“Just for a few shows, why?”

“You have a VCR? Your house must be like a museum of sad, old, unwanted electronics, huh?”

“All right, all right,” Rex said with a smile. “Look, I like the stuff I grew up with. I don’t much like change.”

“You ain’t lion,” Dora said with a smirk. “Sorry, I shouldn’t make species stereotype jokes. But I’ve known a few lions, and they both love shitty puns and also hate change. I doubt I offended you though.”

“If you’re right, you’re right,” he said. “But look, I really need your help. I can’t stop thinking about her. She made me laugh, and it’s been a long time since I laughed like I did with her. We were only on the phone for a couple of minutes, but I felt this... I’m gonna sound like a cliché, but I just
knew
. You know?”

Dora sat there, considering what he’d said. In the back of her mind, she was thinking about how she’d met Monty, the man who ended up her mate. It started a whole lot like that, except he’d called to set someone up with Mating Call and ended up falling straight into Dora’s loving clutches.

And it’s real good loving
, Dora thought as she smiled. “Okay, this is all off the record. It’s not like Eve would be angry at me or anything, although she probably would. But I’ll find out when she’s there, and I’ll give you a call. I’m not doing anything super creepy like giving you her home address or anything because, well, what the hell, we’re not called Mating Call Stalker Agency.”

“No,” Rex said, “no, no, I wouldn’t expect that anyway. I just don’t want to keep calling that place every three hours and hoping for another answer than someone saying they don’t know when she’ll be back.”

“And you certainly don’t want to show up there over and over again. Dwyer’s not the brightest bulb in the socket, but he’d probably start getting suspicious.”

“That’s the last thing I want,” Rex said. “It’s just been a long damn time since I did this and I could use some help. I really appreciate it.”

Dora took her glasses off, folded them, and placed them on the desk in a slow, measured way. “No problem. But I’m not doing it for free. No, no, leave your credit card in the wallet, party boy. I want something priceless.”

“You’re not a vampire, are you?”

She snickered. “No, I want one of those shirts. Now get outta here, I got snooping to do. And listen – the only reason I’m doing this is because I know you’re not gonna hurt anyone, and also because in Sheena’s profile in our system, next to the question about what she’s looking for in a mate, all it says is “a man. Any man at all, preferably one that’s a halfway decent human being. That’s all I ask.”

“Wow,” he said. “She sounds like me.”

“Ahhh, I know better than that. You’re the type that’s picky as hell, aren’t you?”

He shrugged. “I’m the type that fell in love with someone during a five minute phone call, so I might be the type that’s kind of a lunatic.”