The Good Ones Read online

  “Not unless you want to be dropped by a sharp knee to your junk,” Ryder said. “Last I heard, Savannah was still planning to get back to Manhattan by the end of the year. She wants her old life back. She’s a city girl through and through and living here in the Smoky Mountains is not her bag.”

  Ryder checked the temperature on the oil in the deep fryer. Then he hefted up the naked bird and gently lowered it into the boiling oil. Quino felt for the bird. Whenever the subject of Savannah moving back to New York came up, he felt exactly like that, a dead bird, hanging by a metal handle from his innards while being dipped in boiling oil. He clearly needed to step up his game.

  “Why the face, bro?” Desiree asked as she stepped through the French doors and paused beside him. “You look like someone ate the last piece of pumpkin pie.”

  Quino glanced down at his sister. She was twenty-five but to him she would always be fifteen. That was the day he stepped up and became her guardian. It hadn’t just been legalese so he could take care of her. Quino felt the need to protect his sister, the only member of his family to survive a horrible car crash, all the way down to the soul. He’d lay down his life for her without hesitation.

  “Ryder’s going to burn the bird,” he said.

  “I am not,” Ryder protested. “You’re such a doubter.”

  “Oh,” Desi said. She tossed her long black hair over her shoulder and gave him side-eye. “I thought you were frowning because Savannah is ignoring you.”

  “She is not ignoring me,” he protested.

  “Yes, she is,” Desi said. Then she grinned at him and hit him with a one two punch of deep dimples and twinkling eyes.

  “Snot,” he said. He tapped her nose with his finger, the same way he had when she was five and dragging her pink blanket behind her as she tried to follow him on all of his twelve-year-old boy adventures.

  Desi smacked his hand away. “Quit it. I’m not five. I’m twenty-five in case you haven’t noticed.”

  “Sorry, you’ll always be five to me,” he said.

  And she would. Not just because she’d been so stinking cute at that age but also because when it came to life skills and common sense that’s about where Desi would always be. Her insides didn’t match her outsides. The brain injury she had sustained in the accident that had killed their parents had left her as trusting as a child, and Quino was on constant alert to keep her safe from people who would use that to take advantage of her.

  Desi blew out a breath and it stirred the bangs that were cut in a blunt line across her forehead. She looked like their mother. The same round eyes with thick curly lashes, the same button for a nose and full mouth that was usually curved into a smile, as if Desi found the world to be a happy friendly place of which she was pleased to be a part. He never wanted that to change.

  “One of these days, big brother,” Desi said. She looked at him in exasperation, as if she was about to put up more of a fuss, but then the door to the kitchen opened and Maisy popped her head out.

  “How’s the bird coming?”

  “We’re calling him Dead Weight Dougie, or Dougie for short,” Ryder said.

  “Why?” Maisy asked.

  “Because he reminds me and Quino of our first boss,” he said. “He even looks like him in a bald and paunchy way.”

  “I am not calling my turkey Dougie,” Maisy said. “Perry, back me up here.”

  Ryder’s teen daughter popped her head out beside Maisy’s. “Yeah, naming the turkey is weird, and I say this as a teenager well versed in all things strange.”

  “She’s got us there,” Quino said. “How about we call him Dougie Fresh?”

  “No.” Savannah appeared beside the other two. “Focus, people. We’re at critical on timing if we want everything served hot. Cornbread and green beans are cooking, while the sweet potato casserole and mashed potatoes are warming up. Get cracking!”

  “Time for wine!” Maisy said. She disappeared into the house and Savannah followed with Perry and Desi right behind them.

  Quino wistfully watched the redhead, who’d been making him crazy for months, vanish from sight. When the door closed with a decisive bang, he turned back around to find Ryder watching him.

  “You got it bad, my friend.”

  Quino looked at him and said, “To quote your teenage daughter, ‘Duh’.”

  Ryder laughed and then turned away to tend his bird. Quino moved into position to help him hoist Dougie out of the fryer and onto a fresh platter on the table. When they pulled the bird from the oil, letting it drip for a bit, he had to acknowledge that his friend had done an amazing job. Dougie looked perfectly seared on the outside while the juices from the inside ran clear when Ryder stabbed him with a fork. Quino had a feeling this was exactly how his poor heart was going to look if Savannah left Fairdale without giving them a shot.

  It was in that moment of turkey clarity that Quino decided he did not want to look or feel like Dougie. It was time to work his magic. The question was how. How did a guy get a gal—who seemed to be attracted to him but was doing her level best to keep it on lockdown—to take a chance?

  Flowers? Nah, too cliché. Candy? Same. Plus, he needed to approach her in a way that made her want to spend time with him. She was a publicist. She had come to Fairdale to help Maisy open up her romance bookstore. He happened to know that she was trying to make Maisy’s bookstore a massive success not only to help her friend, but also to show the publisher from which she’d been let go, that she still had game. And that, in fact, hers was the best game in town.

  Once she succeeded and a job offer came from the Big Apple, she’d be gone, baby, gone. There was no help for it, Quino was going to have to make his move and soon.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Jenn McKinlay is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of Every Dog Has His Day, Barking Up the Wrong Tree, About a Dog, the Library Lover's mysteries, the Cupcake Bakery mysteries, and the Hat Shop mysteries.

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