For the rest of the meal he’d sat there, glaring at the smug bastard. Several times he’d dropped hints for the bastard to leave, but Aidan just sat there as content as could be while Danny had tried to look for an opening to ask his little neighbor out. Even that awkward moment when Aidan realized that he’d left his date in the hall hadn’t been enough to get him to leave. He’d simply shrugged, grabbed the bowl of mashed potatoes and finished them off while Danny had sat there, contemplating beating the shit out of his brother with the gravy boat.

When Danny offered to do the dishes to thank Tink for the incredible meal and to buy himself a little more time, he’d thought for sure that his brother would make a run for it. He’d never expected his brother to join him at the sink with a shit-eating grin. For the next thirty minutes he’d worked beside his brother, jaw tightly clenched until the last pan was placed on the counter to dry. Tink thanked them for doing the dishes and wished them a goodnight around a yawn.

Forced to put off his plans for another night, he’d headed for the door with Aidan trailing behind him whistling a jaunty tune. Once Tink’s door was shut behind them, he’d wished his brother a good night by placing him in a headlock. He’d brought the bastard to the floor where he used Aidan’s shirt to secure his hands behind his back and then dragged the whiny bastard down the hall and shoved him inside the maintenance closet. As he’d walked away he’d tried to figure out a game plan to get Tink to take a chance on him, but so far nothing.

“We’re going to have to replace these doors,” Trevor said when they reached the large, thick doors that made up the entrance to the old library.

Danny had a feeling the City Council wasn’t going to agree to that, especially since the doors were probably the original doors, but he didn’t say anything. Instead, he grabbed hold of one of the dull door handles and tried not to cringe when the door slowly swung open on rusty latches, emitting a high pitched noise that was barely noticeable over the sounds of children screaming.

“What the hell…….” Trevor mumbled at his side as they tried to make sense out of what they were seeing.

The large front room where he remembered Mrs. Pattinson, the old librarian who used to smell of butterscotch and dusty books used to reside, was filled with screaming children covered with what appeared to be glue and glitter. Frowning, he watched as the horde of screaming children clambered to get to the desk where-

“Oh, shit,” Trevor muttered just loud enough for him to hear when they both spotted Matthew, Trevor’s youngest son, sitting on the checkout desk with several large bottles of paste on one side and a pile of brown paper bags and baggies filled with cookies, brownies and cupcakes on the other.

While the rest of the kids were flipping out, fighting over small canisters of glitter, Matthew sat there, calmly eating what appeared to be a rather delicious looking sandwich. Danny’s attention shifted to a closed door where he could just barely make out the pounding and the sounds of women demanding that someone open the door. When Matthew spotted them standing there probably looking a little confused and horrified, he took another bite of his sandwich and gestured absently over his shoulder.

Almost too afraid to look, but unable to help himself, he looked past his cousin’s frightening child and nearly swallowed his tongue when he spotted that delectable ass that he’d been fantasizing about for the past two nights wiggling enticingly. This was definitely a pleasant surprise finding her here. He may have groaned. He definitely licked his lips as he watched Tink try to escape the clutches of two seven-year-old girls by climbing on top of a cabinet. Unfortunately for her, she was too short to pull it off and fortunately for him, he now had his game plan solidly in place.

Grinning hugely, and ignoring his cousin’s impending nervous breakdown, he sauntered over to the front desk to put his game plan into action.

Chapter 11

“Oh, damn,” Jodi muttered, trying to find purchase on the old metal cabinet, but there wasn’t any to be found.

“Alien!” one of the girls currently trying to pull her down so that they could douse her with more paste and glitter, screamed somewhat hysterically.

“Girls,” Jodi said, licking her lips nervously as she tried to pull herself up, but the small hands clasped around her ankles and the fact that she lacked any real upper body strength prevented her from doing that. “Matthew was only kidding,” she said, forcing a smile and trying to sound as nonthreatening as possible.

“We need more glitter!” she heard one of them yell as the little nails dug into her skin, trying to yank her back down so that they could dump more paste and glitter on her in an attempt to destroy her powers, the powers that Matthew claimed she had.

Man, when she got out of this she was going to-

Scream her head off as two large hands cupped her bottom and pushed her up, giving her no choice but to scramble into a sitting position on top of the metal cabinet. As soon as her butt hit the top of the cabinet she pulled her legs up, a tad bit concerned that the little monsters hell bent on destroying her would manage to grab hold of her legs and pull her back down. She pulled her knees up to her chest, scooted back until her back hit the wall and-

Frowned, as she looked down at the face of the obscenely handsome man, who up until two days ago she’d considered risking becoming Big Bertha’s bitch in order to wipe the smug smile that he was currently flashing her off his face, and wondered what he was doing here.

“So, here’s what I’m thinking,” Danny lazily began, that smug smile of his becoming increasingly sexier with every syllable that left his mouth and distracting her a bit from what he was saying, “I’ll pick you up at seven, we’ll grab a bite to eat and then catch a movie afterwards.”