“There goes the neighborhood.” Carlos, a regular at Hook & Hustle, slides onto the barstool. “Did you see the joint next door?” He pitches a thumb toward the window and shakes his head.

Carlos looks like he stepped right out of a halfway house before he wandered in. The man has money, but he refuses to wear fancy clothes, preferring to look like a regular schmuck than a man of means.

I grab a clean glass from under the bar top, already knowing his order without his having to say a word. “It’ll be fine.”

Every old-timer thinks the neighborhood’s going to shit because a new store or some swanky new restaurant is hanging their awning over the door. What they see as a demise of their old life, I think of as progress and the bettering of the community. It’s always doom and gloom with this bunch. When they’re not complaining about the neighborhood, they’re rehashing the olden days, which from what I remember, weren’t so fucking great.

Carlos stares at me with a straight face and his arms out wide. “I mean, who da fuck needs an entire store of cupcakes?”

“I miss the days when pimps and prostitutes were on every corner,” Wally, a complete drunk and asshole, tells us like it’s the most normal thing in the world. “Those were the good ole days. The only Cupcake I want is the one who gives me a five-dollar blow job and doesn’t complain.”

Wally’s about seventy years old and used to have a nice wife and was halfway normal. About ten years ago, she caught him banging the maid, and all hell broke loose. She took his ass for every dime they had and left him with nothing except the clothes on his back and the case of chlamydia the maid gave him as a parting gift.

“Dude,” I grimace, grossed out by the very thought of some toothless, drugged-up hooker going down on my cock for five bucks in the alley. “You’re fucked up, Wally.”

Carlos turns to face Wally, one eye looking at him and the other still on me. “You know Cupcake was a man, right, Wal?”

Usually, I barely notice Carlos’s lazy eye, but moments like this make it damn near impossible to ignore. I never know where to freaking look, and he’s never told me either. I think he likes to keep it a secret just to fuck with my head, and for that reason alone, I love him.

Wally’s head jerks back. “What?”

Carlos laughs and slaps the bar top, almost falling over. “I thought I had bad eyes, but come on, man. Cupcake had a five-o’clock shadow and absolutely no tits.”

Wally’s face turns a few shades of green, and he covers his mouth. “You’re lying,” he says from behind his hand.

“What was Cupcake’s real name, then?” Carlos raises an eyebrow above the eye that’s looking right at Wally.

Wally rubs his chin and is silent for a few seconds. “Terri.”

“Point made.” Carlos straightens, knowing full well he just ruined his buddy’s entire day. “You got a helluva blow job from a dude, my man.”

“I’m not gay,” Wally blurts out like he needs to justify something, which he doesn’t.

“No one said you were, dumbass. But there was a reason Cupcake was the cheapest hooker on the block.” Carlos is pretty satisfied with himself and does nothing to hide his glee at Wally’s agony.

“Well, fuck,” Wally whispers, finally coming to the realization that his bargain-basement BJ wasn’t as amazing a deal as he originally thought.

Johnny strolls through the front door, flanked by two bodyguards. “You see the fucking joint next door?” He ticks his chin toward his men before they shuffle into the booth nearest the door, watching for any trouble.

“How’s the arm?” I dip my head toward the sling around his chest and the cast still covering the lower half of his arm. The bullet shattered his radius and ulna into a million little pieces, leaving him pretty fucked up but lucky they didn’t have to amputate.

“Still fucked.” Johnny shrugs before taking the seat next to Carlos. “But I’m upright and alive.”

“Lucky fucker,” Wally mutters behind his beer glass.

“They ever catch the hooligans that did that?” Carlos asks Johnny but doesn’t look at him.

“Stupid shits picked the wrong guy to carjack. They caught them because I popped one of them in the ass as they tried to run away.” Johnny laughs, grabbing the beer from my hands before I have a chance to set it down. “Funniest shit I’ve ever seen.”

I stare at the three of them, all single, all sitting at a bar in the middle of the day with no woman waiting for them at home.

One day, if I’m not careful, it’ll be me sitting on that barstool talking shit. I’m sure the kids will visit their old man from time to time, but I’ll have nothing to sustain me from day to day.

“Back to the joint next door.” Johnny wipes away the foam clinging to his mustache. “Did you get a good look at the piece of ass working in there?”

Part of me loves these guys, but they’re way beyond old-school and so crass when it comes to women that sometimes I have to restrain myself from punching them in the face. If there were other customers here at this time of day, I’d shut their shit down. They know it too. But since the bar is empty, I let them have their say with only the occasional glare.

“She’s a sweet little thing.” Wally licks his lips like the creep he is.

“You two are sick fucks. She could be your daughter for Christ’s sake,” Carlos tells them, as if he’s not a pervert just like they are, which is laughable.

“I have a son.” Johnny smirks. “No hair off my balls.”

I throw the dish towel over my shoulder and lean against the bar. “You guys better start being a little more respectful to women. If Daphne were here…”

“Don’t tell her.” Wally’s eyes widen as he waves his hands in front of him. “She’d kick me right in the balls.”

“I’d pay money to see that.” Carlos laughs.

There’s a loud noise like a bomb’s gone off nearby. Johnny’s men are on their feet, surveying the outside, looking for any imminent threat to his life.

“Street’s clear, boss,” the thick-necked guy in the black suit says as he stands near the door.

“What the fuck?” Carlos clutches his chest as the color starts to return to his face. “I thought I was dying.”

“I almost shit myself.” Wally laughs and shakes his head.

“And that’s different how?” Carlos teases Wally.

Whatever happened, it can’t be anything good. The brick between our two businesses is thick and helps as a sound barrier.

“Stay here.” I throw the towel on the bar. “Watch the place for me while I check it out.”

“Take Maurice with you,” Johnny says over his shoulder before I can make it to the front door.

I stop, turn around, and put my hands up to stop the two lugs from following me. “No. I got this.”

The last thing I need is two mafia goons at my side when I knock on the front door of the cupcake shop. The girl would probably have a heart attack if she’s still alive inside after whatever the fuck happened.

From outside, I don’t see anything out of the ordinary. There’s an empty display case, a ladder in the middle of the floor, and other construction material, but the store looks in top shape and just as it did when I came in a few hours ago.

“Hello,” I call out as I pull the door open just enough to stick my head inside. “Anyone here?”

There’s banging coming from the back. “Fucking shit.” I hear the woman screech. “You’re a motherfucker. You almost killed me, you piece of shit.”

My eyebrows shoot up as I step inside.

“Hello,” I yell a little louder.

Whomever she’s yelling at sure is getting their ass chewed out. I don’t know if I should laugh or feel bad for the poor sucker.

Marissa used to yell like that sometimes. Especially when she was pissed at something. She never took her anger out on anybody, but objects…they were fair game.

I stand there, frozen and not sure if I should cut my losses and leave, or make sure everything is okay before I head back to the bar to keep the guys from draining a keg.

Taking a step forward, I brace myself for whatever I’m about to find on the other side of the door.

The last thing I expect is to see a woman standing by herself, covered in baking flour from head to toe, kicking the shit out of her electric mixer.

“Ma’am.” I clear my throat.

She spins around, eyes wide and wild. “Fuck,” she hisses and clutches her chest. “You scared the shit out of me. You should warn a person before you sneak up on them.”

There’s a twang to her voice, and it’s charming.

“I yelled.” I smile, trying to show I’m friendly, which I kind of am. On a good day. “A few times.”

She rubs her cheeks with the backs of her hands, smearing the white powder. “Oh.” She gives me a pained smile. “Sorry about that.”

“Everything okay in here? I heard a loud noise. Thought I’d check to see if everything was okay.”

She points to the mixer near her feet. “Besides my batch of turtle cupcakes being completely ruined, I couldn’t be better.” She swats at her skirt, kicking up more flour into the air and coughs.

We stare at each other for a minute.

Her eyeing me. Me eyeing her.

“Would you like some help?”

“With the cupcakes?” Her eyebrows rise.

“I’m a shit cook, but I can at least pick up the mixer for you. It looks pretty heavy.” I let my gaze travel down her body, landing on her way too high heels for cooking. “I’m sure those shoes weren’t built for manual labor.”

Fuck. The woman’s body is mint. Even covered in flour, I can tell whatever’s underneath is nothing short of spectacular. The guys said something about her being a piece of ass—their words, not mine—and I hate to say it, but I don’t think they were wrong.

“You’d help me?” She takes a step forward and grabs at her pearl necklace. “You’d help a stranger?”

“Ma’am, I may not know you, but when there’s a lady in need, it’s my duty to help.”

“Say that again,” she tells me, piercing me with her moss-green eyes.

“Which part?”

“All of it, handsome. All of it.” She smirks.

Fuck me. We have a live one, and from the looks of her, she has every ingredient necessary for an absolute recipe for disaster.