Bliss

Being a woman, a petite one at that, life around Malone Construction was pretty much hell for Lindy. The standard issue hard hat continued to slide down over her hazel eyes, making her have to stop in the middle of whatever she was doing to push it back up again, ignoring all the snide remarks from the guys. Most of them didn’t mean any harm. They just liked to give her shit but still, being the butt of all their, ‘I-am-man-hear-me-roar’ jokes got old after a while. Her name didn’t help her situation very much.

Luckily, she didn’t follow the porn star path one would expect of a female with a name like Lindy Bliss. That didn’t stop the guys from teasing her though. How many times had they tried to get her to do a little dance on a wood beam like the damn thing was a stripper pole? She thought, after a while, it would get old for them, but it didn’t. Not with the crew at Malone Construction--Ethan Malone was the worst of all. Of course, fate stepped in--because he was such an ass, he had to be drop dead gorgeous and make her nipples pucker with a simple glance.

She loved her job. The guys she worked with ... not so much.

All her life she’d been a rough and tumble kind of girl. Her mom tried to put her in dresses; she still climbed the trees faster than any of the boys. She was good at what she did. Her five foot one inch frame made things tough for her sometimes but if something wasn’t tough, there wasn’t really a purpose as far as she was concerned. Ty Malone, Ethan’s older brother, took a chance on her when he hired her to work with all these knuckleheads and she wouldn’t let him down. If only his brother didn’t make me soak my panties every time I lay eyes on the guy.

“Hey Bliss, can you grab that slab of wood and follow me for a second?” Speak of the devil. Ethan walked past her, his arms full with heavy supplies.

“Hey, smartass, my name is Lindy.” She bent and lifted the load, which immediately made her arms ache.

“I like Bliss better. I could give you that, you know? Bliss. What do you say?”

She didn’t have to see his face to know he had a cocky smile plastered there. The man was never serious. He flirted with every woman in Last Chance, Oregon, and probably had most of them too. “I say, why you don’t go find one of your blond bimbos.”

“You’re blond.”

“And you’re an ass.”

He chuckled. “Yeah but you like me.”

Lindy tripped, almost losing the load in her arms. Ugh! She did like him. Why she didn’t know. Her life would be much easier if she didn’t.

“Need any help back there?” Ethan asked, turning to face her while he walked backwards with ease.

Damn evil man! “Quit yakking’ and get a move on. The boss wants us to finish this today and we can’t do that while you’re screwing around.”

“You’re forgetting I am the boss.”

Her muscles ached but she kept going. “No, Ty is the boss.”

“That’s my name on your shirt too, Bliss. Looks damn good stretched across your pert--” She dropped the load in her arms.

“Ethan. Hurry the hell up.”

Lindy looked up to see the third and youngest Malone brother, Shane, signaling them over. Thank God for small favors. He was just about to make a comment about her breasts and she had a feeling that if he did, she wouldn’t have been able to keep her nipples from showing him just how much she liked his attention there.

He winked at her. “Saved by the bell.” Ethan bent down, grabbed her load and heaved it onto the opposite shoulder as what he already carried. Good God, the man was hot. He made “The Rock” look more like a pebble.

Quit thinking about this man like that! “I don’t need your help, Malone.”

“I hate to see a lady sweat. Well, unless I’m the one giving her a workout.”

“You wish.”

“Yeah, I do.”

Ethan turned and left her standing there, shocked. Her pussy tingled. Her breasts ached. She’d wanted him since the first moment she laid eyes on him. Even though he teased her incessantly, he never gave her the slightest clue he might feel the same way. Stuff like that just didn’t happen to Lindy Bliss. She was the porn star named, tomboy of Last Chance, and now one of the town’s most eligible bachelors just told her he wanted her.

Lindy shook her head. He had to be tricking her in some way. She jogged to catch up with him. They had a job to do.


* * * *


A bead of sweat dripped into Ethan’s eye. Ignoring the slight sting, he used the back of his hand to wipe the perspiration from his forehead. Ethan stood up from his crouched position and caught sight of a petite blonde, holding up a wood beam that was at least two times her height. Lindy Bliss. His cock stirred at just the sight of her. She wasn’t like the women he usually went for. When he took a woman to bed he liked curves he could hold on to--heavy, size D tits, surgically enhanced or natural--he didn’t discriminate. He liked painted nails, perfume, and fast women who liked to have a good time.

Sexy ass name or not, Lindy Bliss was none of that. But he’d never wanted to fuck a woman in his life as badly as he wanted her. Everything about her got him. Her pert, little breasts that he wanted nothing more than to tease and taste, her tight ass, slender firm legs, and especially her feisty attitude. No woman ever gave him hell like she did and surprising as it was, that turned him on.

Truth be told, no matter how hard a time he gave her as well, he respected the hell out of her too. She worked twice as hard as most of the assholes out here. No matter how hot it got, how tough the job, Lindy was here working her ass off like no other woman he’d ever seen. Watching her feminine little body on the job site was a hell of an aphrodisiac.

He wanted her.

It was only a matter of time before he had her.


* * * *


Lindy walked into Smokey’s Tavern around seven PM for a cold longneck beer before heading home for the night. Still in her tattered work jeans and faded work shirt, the only primping she allowed herself to do consisted of washing her hands, and running a comb through her hair.

Flakes of dirt dropped from her work boots onto Smokey’s floor as she made her way to the bar. She pulled out a seat and waited for Smokey to get to her. Smokey’s, one of the few places she felt at home, had become her nightly routine. After dealing with conceited Neanderthals all day, she always needed a drink.

Country music flowed through the bar from an old fashioned jukebox in the rear of the bar. Cracked peanuts littered the ground on a regular basis, part of the reason why she didn’t bother to clean up the small amount of dirt she tracked in. The bar had multiple round, cracked, faded, wooden tables, two pool tables that had seen better days, a small dance floor, and the bar. Yeah, Smokey’s was just her kind of place.

“How’s it going kiddo,” Smokey said as he approached her at the bar. He always called her kiddo. Somehow he took a liking to her right off the bat. He always treated her like a daughter; hell, he treated her better than her own father did. Smokey was a sweet, old man in his early sixties, his bar was his life and he meant the world to Lindy.

“I’m okay, Smokey. How are you doing tonight?”

“Oh, I’m survivin’. The young kid I hired to help me clean up at night quit without notice so that’s been on my mind. Damn kids these days.”

She didn’t like the idea of Smokey cleaning the place up at night by himself. He had a waitress but she always had to leave directly after work to pick up her two kids at the babysitter’s. Being a single mom, Smokey helped her out with the job and made it so her kids wouldn’t have to be out any later than need be.

“Who is gonna help you tonight, Smoke?” She waited for a reply and listened to the soft wheeze in his breathing from years of Camels.

“I can do it myself, kiddo. A couple nights won’t hurt anything.

Not after all he’d done for her. “I don’t think so. I’ll help you out until you find someone else.”

“Hogwash.” He shook his head. “I’m not helpless. I can handle a night or two. Plus, you don’t need to stay here all night after working all day.”

“I have no place to be, Smokey. I’ll hang around. If I get tired, I’ll go home and come back.”

His face softened. “I appreciate the help. You always were a good kid.”

Lindy ordered her usual Coors Light and added an order of cheesy fries. Her stomach grumbled in anticipation for the grease and beer fest she had planned.

A few minutes later her meal arrived. She wasted no time diving in to savor the fries and cheese on her plate. Behind her, the rickety door creaked open. Loud footsteps crunched across broken peanut shells in her direction. Stuffing another gooey, clump of fries in her mouth she chewed like she hadn’t eaten in days when a familiar scent of freshly cut trees, and the musky smell of a hard-working man swirled around her.

“Been a while since someone fed ya, has it?” Ethan pulled out the barstool next to her and sat down.

Great. Just my luck.

Lindy finished her bite. “Well, I’ve been so busy picking up the slack for all the meat-heads I work with I hardly have time to do something as trivial as eat. Not used to a woman eating in front of you? I may be thin but I’m not a dry salad kind of girl, like the ones you’re used to, I’m sure.” She pushed another bite in her mouth. This one not as big as the last though.

Rich, hearty laugher erupted from Ethan’s perfect mouth snaked around her, causing goose bumps to pebble up her arms.

“I have to give it to you for your comebacks, Bliss. That one was pretty good. A crock of shit, but funny.”

Lindy downed the rest of her beer in one gulp. “Isn’t it bad enough I have to see you all day at work? Why are you coming into Smokey’s now too?” Ethan and his younger brother Shane did come in from time to time, but they spent most of their time at The Last Chance. Smokey’s was pretty far out of town. Not that Last Chance was all that big to begin with, but she figured the guys liked to hang out closer to town since that’s where they lived.

“Free country.”

He gave her a wink and smile. His smile made all the women in town melt like warm butter. It pissed the hell out of her that it worked on her too. Not that she’d let him know it. Before she could think of something smart to say, Smokey walked up.

“I’ll have a bottle of Coors.” Ethan tilted his head toward her. “Bring another light beer out for the lady, too.”

“I can order for myself, Malone.”

“Oh, come on, Bliss. Aren’t ladies supposed to like it when a man orders a drink for them?” The right side of his mouth rose as if he tried to hide his smile.

The man took pleasure in grating on her nerves. She could see it in the light in his sparkling blue eyes. “Only a woman without a brain--like the ones you usually date.”

“Usually, huh? Does that mean we’re on a date now?”

Oh yeah. He was enjoying this. Ethan Malone was the devil himself. He didn’t even try to hide his smile this time.

“I guess I’ll leave you two alone.” Smokey looked at her and winked. She hadn’t even realized he was still there. And what the heck was the wink about? She’d known Smokey since she was ten years old and the man never winked at her.

“Please, you know we aren’t on a date as much as I do. First of all, I don’t date jerks and second, I’m so not your type.”

Ethan took a swig of the beer. “What makes you think you’re not my type?”

“I have eyes.” He licked his lips and watched her. She kind of wished she was his type, which surprised the hell out of her. Honestly, even though Ethan was the hottest thing in a pair of faded jeans and a tool belt, he wasn’t really her type either. It wasn’t too often that Lindy dated, but when she did, the men sure weren’t womanizers. Or alphas, and Ethan was both of those.

“The women I date have eyes, Bliss.”

Lindy tried to hide her smile. “Good one, Malone. You know what I meant. I’m not stacked, flirtatious, and I don’t put out to any man with a six-pack.”

Ethan set his bottle on the bar. “So you’ve noticed my six-pack, huh?”

This time she couldn’t help but laugh. Part of her knew he was serious. The man really did know how hot he was, but that wasn’t his only quality, he had a good sense of humor. Ethan joked around more than anyone she knew.

“You’re incorrigible.”

“You like me.” He leaned toward her. “Admit it, Bliss. You want me just as much as I want you. You might not be my usual type, but you’re damn sexy and I have to tell you, I’m tired of pretending I think otherwise.”

Lindy knew she stared at him open-mouthed, but there wasn’t a damn thing she could do about it. Never in a million years did she expect to hear Ethan Malone come on to her. Hell, they didn’t even get along all that well. But he was right. She wanted him, but was it in her best interest to have him? Being the only woman on the site, she already had to fight for all the guys’ respect. If they found out she was sleeping with Ethan, one of the owners, she’d never live it down. “Listen, Malone.”

Ethan reached up and put a finger to her mouth. “Shh. Don’t even say it. I want you, Lindy Bliss, and when I want something, you can be damn sure I’m not going to give up until I have it.”