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Chapter One

Kingston

“A gain, I can’t tell you how sorry I am.” Peter Erickson’s wince came through the phone as clearly as if I was standing before the Academy Award-winning actor.

“Truly, Peter, I don’t blame you. These things happen.” I gazed at my wrapped ankle and tried to ignore the ache in my back.

“But…” He sighed. “If Skylar hadn’t locked my keys in my filing cabinet—”

“Really—”

“And then you rushed here to unlock the cabinet because all my keys were in there.”

“It’s fine—”

“Skylar didn’t mean to push her tricycle in your way just as you were stepping off the landing.”

“I know.” Which I did. The child never came across as a menace. She was just a curious three-year-old who liked mischief.

Or at least that’s what Peter’s husband Thomas maintained.

“When you went down…I saw it coming, and I couldn’t get there in time.”

Reliving the event wasn’t doing anything to soothe my nerves. “It’s not a big deal. You took me to the clinic to get my ankle wrapped. You and Thomas drove me and my van home. All’s good.”

“But now you can’t work.”

“Being a locksmith isn’t generally impacted by a sore ankle.” Of course the doctor had told me to keep all weight off it. Which really fucking sucked.

“But you can’t drive. That’s going to impact your income.”

“I have insurance to cover things like this.”

“But your business…” He sighed again—frustration truly evident.

“A few weeks off won’t make a difference. I was due for a vacation anyway.” Which was the European river cruise I’d planned for next month, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. No sense adding to his guilt.

“Hey, Kingston, I know a guy. He needs a job. He just needs a break. He's a little…weird, but his heart's in the right place. He won't let you down. He'll drive you around and lift the stuff for you at work and home.” Peter said the words in a manic rush. Almost like panic was encroaching.

“How do you know the guy?” Because, even with a recommendation from the Peter Erickson, I was still going to make this decision myself.

“He did some work for Thomas when I was down in LA for a couple of weeks last month. Between Thomas’s schedule at the studio and the kids getting sick, he just needed someone. This guy’s super reliable. He’ll be on time, take care of whatever you need, and everything will work out.”

I wasn’t really in a position to turn down assistance offered by Peter. I had helped people who worked at the studio a number of times over the years—including rescuing a fiery set designer and his straight-laced security husband who’d managed to get themselves locked in a closet. I hadn’t asked questions.

Probably for the best.

"Fine. Send him over to my house. Ten tomorrow morning." I’d meet the guy and make the final determination myself. “Thank you for arranging this.”

“You’ll adore Ethan. Very…unique. Oh, sweetheart, let me—”

A crash sounded.

“Uh, Kingston?”

“Go. Thank you.”

“Yeah.” He cut the line.

Apparently, even award-winning actors had domestic issues. Kids were far beyond my expertise. I was pushing forty with a few close friends, no romantic partner, and zero prospects.

Which was fine with me.

I struggled to my feet and hobbled into my kitchen. I heated some ramen noodles in the microwave and ate them before the water had even softened them. I just wanted to get into bed, take an anti-inflammatory painkiller, and try to put this horrible day behind me. I wasn’t a man who contemplated luck, but I’d have to admit tripping over a tricycle and twisting my ankle was pretty bad. The way I’d gone down had also pulled a muscle in my back.

Well, I supposed I was lucky that I hadn’t injured either wrists or hands—that would’ve been catastrophic for my work. My hands were my weapons of war against the locks of the world. I saw this job as a vocation—a calling—as much as an actual paycheck.

With all that in mind, I was ready to go the next morning, wearing my crisp black uniform with my name in gray lettering. Fortunately, I owned ten identical outfits, so I wouldn’t have to worry about washing anything for a bit of time. I might’ve been anal like that.

Or lazy .

Well, point taken.

My doorbell buzzed.

I shifted, reaching for my crutches.

The buzz sounded again.

I pushed myself off the couch.

Buzz. Buzz. Buzz.

I balanced myself.

More buzzes.

Jesus, is he leaning on the buzzer? What is he, ten?

Eventually, I struggled to the front door and threw it open.

The man who stood before me was just…a riot of red. Red shorts, red sneakers, red jaunty ball cap, and flaming red hair sticking out from underneath it. Hell, even his hairy legs were covered in red fuzz.

He wore a white T-shirt with a light-blue shirt over the top and was nearly bouncing on the spot. "Hey, dude. I'm Ethan. Great house you have here. I love the rosebushes out front. My gran has rosebushes. Uses lots of fertilizer on them. Bugger to prune. But I prune them for her. I could prune yours. And I love this area. Did you know Colin Firth lives around here? I dunno if it's true or not. I just heard it. But thanks for giving me a job. Peter said you needed help. I can help. Helping is great. What do you need help with? The roses? Your washing? Peter said something about driving. I can drive. Do you need to go now?"

I blinked.

Then I cleared my throat.

“Last I heard, Colin Firth lives in England. Somewhere near London, I think…?” Since I didn’t keep track of random British celebrities, I couldn’t be certain. “Maybe he was filming something in Vancouver.” I wanted to scratch my scalp, but my grip on my crutches prevented that. “And yes, I could use a ride. I have a customer waiting.” I managed to balance while pulling my keys out of my pants pocket.

“Oh great.” He snagged them. “Which is your house key? This one?” He held one up.

I didn’t even have the time to nod before he was closing the door and shoving the key in the lock. I winced, thinking of all the times I’d had to retrieve broken keys from locks.

“Perfect. Okay, so your van, right? Because you’ve obviously got all your work stuff in there. Is it armed? Do you worry about being broken into? Oh, you’ve got those surveillance signs. Warning people they’re on camera. Which is super important for privacy but I figure everyone’s got a camera, so if I scratch my ass, someone, somewhere, has it on video. But I see these signs and I wonder is there really a camera, or is the sign just there to make me think there’s a camera ? And I can see your doorbell cam, and does that cover your driveway as well, or do you have multiple—”

“Multiple. Shall we go?”

“Oh.” His eyes widened. “Well, yeah, of course. I just didn’t know if you needed anything from the garage—”

“Nope. We’re good.” With great effort, I descended the steps to the walkway, regretting the decision to buy a house with stairs. Classic Victorian design, but not the least bit accessible. If I’d wound up in a wheelchair for some reason, I would’ve been screwed.

Ethan had the passenger door open for me, which I grudgingly appreciated.

I managed to maneuver in, and he quickly grabbed my crutches—stowing them in the back. By the time I had my injured leg in the cab and the door closed, he was hopping into the driver’s seat. He buckled his seatbelt, then turned to me expectantly.

“I’ll program the GPS.”

“Oh great.” He turned the key in the ignition, and the engine purred to life.

I programmed the GPS.

“Turn left on Union Street.”

“Holy shit.” Ethan goggled at me. “Where’d you get that voice? I’ve never heard that voice.”

“He’s Australian.” Because if I was going to spend my days driving around the lower mainland, at the very least, I was going to have a sexy Aussie dude giving me directions. “Uh, Ethan, we need to be leaving.”

“Right.” He grinned. “I love that you live in Strathcona. All the big old houses. And such history.” He turned left on Union Street and headed west. “I live in Sunrise-Hastings. Lots of older homes, but without the character of yours. I mean, nothing wrong with the fifties, but the style is sort of all the same.”

“Do you rent or own?”

He merged onto the Georgia Street Viaduct as per the GPS’s instructions. “Own? Are you crazy? I’m twenty-four. Nah, I live with my parents. My goal is to move out by next year. Or maybe the year after. They live next to my gran, and I prune her roses, so I’d have to live close enough that I’d be able to visit to do her roses, and sometimes I mow her lawn as well.” He veered around a slower-moving car.

Slower moving being relative—the startled woman was going five above the speed limit. “Traffic usually slows up ahead…”

“Oh, I know. That’s fine, because I know a shortcut.”

I frowned. Downtown Vancouver was in a grid pattern—it didn’t have shortcuts. Even as I had the thought, he turned into an alley.

He squeezed past a garbage truck and tore down to the next street.

I grabbed my door.

He turned onto Smithe Street and barreled toward the west end, turning despite a very yellow light. The light turned red before we were safely onto Howe Street.

Don’t say anything. You won’t get a red-light ticket. There aren’t any cops. You’re grateful…remember that.

Yet, as we ran at least ten klicks over the limit as we headed south, I needed to bite my tongue.

“So, I love Kerrisdale.” He grinned. “Nice neighborhood with a mix of old and new houses. Do you know which one we’re going to? Because, personally, I don’t really care. I mean, I’d take anything. But I’ll never be able to afford a place in Vancouver. Totally out of reach. So I’m looking at the suburbs. Like Coquitlam, Surrey, or even Abbotsford. Oh, or Mission City. I love Mission City with that monastery. It’s just so pretty and—”

“Merge left onto Granville Street.”

Ethan, bless his heart, followed the GPS’s direction.

But that didn’t slow him as he tore over the Granville Street Bridge, weaving in and out of traffic. “I like pretty, but I also like practical. Like, I need to find a full-time job. I’ve been trying out different things—figuring out what I might be good at. I haven’t figured it out yet, but Gran says to be patient. That some people mature more slowly than others. How about you? Did you always want to be a locksmith? Because that’s a pretty neat job—”

“Red-light camera ahead.”

“Shit.” Ethan eased off the gas as the light turned yellow. “Guess I won’t run that one.”

Don’t say anything. Don’t say anything. Don’t —

“Do you always speed?”

“Oh, was I speeding? A cop friend of mine said you can go up to ten over the limit. Now, he got kicked off the police force for…well, the less said about that episode, the better. So maybe I shouldn’t be following his advice? But he seemed like a stand-up guy. He’s in private security now. He offered to get me a job with the company, but I couldn’t imagine just sitting around doing nothing all day. Although some of their jobs involve driving from location to location, and I guess that would be okay. I mean, I’m a good driver. But I think that would get boring as well.”

We climbed the hill heading south, and I winced. We’ll get out of this alive. We have to.

Even as I had the thought, Ethan approached a driver who was turning right. Very slowly.

My new employee wove between two cars in the passing lane and then swerved back into the right lane with inches to spare.

“And I love the idea of trying new things, but I think I need to settle on something eventually, right? Right?” He met my gaze for a fraction of a second before looking back at the road.

He has the most stunning bright-blue eyes. How had I not noticed them before? “I’m sorry—what was the question?”

“Well, like, did you always know you wanted to be a locksmith? Was it some family tradition? Like, was your father a locksmith? Or did you just have this innate curiosity? I mean, you get to see what’s in people’s safes and shit like that. Which is enough to blow my fucking mind. Oh, you don’t mind if I swear, do you? I promise I won’t be around your clients, of course. But Peter said you were a chill guy. Well, or something like that. And how cool is it that we both know Peter Erickson?” He hit the gas to fly through the intersection at West Twenty-Sixth just as a motorcycle was about to turn left in front of us.

The idiot, who didn’t have the right of way, swerved.

To my sheer relief.

“They call motorcycle riders something like, uh, organ donors. That guy was an idiot. I mean, the light was green. I had the right of way. I might’ve been going a little fast, but not so much that it would make a difference. Man, if I’d hit him, I would’ve felt really bad. Like, I probably would’ve messed up your van—”

“Probably—”

“And that would’ve sucked. And the guy might’ve died or some shit, and that would’ve really been awful. And—”

“Family tradition.”

“Huh?” He glanced over at me.

“Eyes on the road.”

He sighed. “Well, duh.”

To my relief, he faced forward again. “My father and grandfather were locksmiths. My grandfather came over as a young boy from Ukraine after the First World War. Most of the immigrants at that time chose an agrarian homestead, but we came all the way across the country. My great-grandfather had a farm in Cedar Valley, but he insisted his eldest son learn a trade. My grandfather chose locksmith and moved to Vancouver. He and my grandmother settled and had my father. He, in turn, married my mother, and they had me. I apprenticed with him and took over the business when he retired. My parents passed a few years ago after having lived into their seventies.”

See? I could totally rival his blathering on, and that was probably the most I’d said to anyone in…well, as long as I could remember.

“So you’re Ukrainian?”

“Well, my heritage is. I’m Canadian.”

“So what’s going on…?”

“Makes me very sad. And I send money to several aid organizations—”

“Turn right on West Forty-Ninth Avenue.”

Holy crap, I talked for like fifteen blocks. “And yes, it’s cool we both know Peter Erickson. I understand you were very helpful to his husband, Thomas.”

“I was. My friend Seamus works with Thomas, and when Thomas seemed overwhelmed, Seamus suggested Thomas hire me to help out. Seamus used to live near me. And he works at the studio as well. As a production assistant. And he’s married to this super gorgeous man named Valentino. I’ve met him a couple of times. He’s a bigshot executive, and I sort of find him intimidating, and I can’t figure out if that’s because he’s so handsome or just, you know, his status. I’ve only met Peter once, and he's super gorgeous, but I didn’t find him as intimidating. Which, given he’s an Academy Award-winning actor, would mean I should’ve been more intimidated—”

“Turn left on Balsam Street.”

Ethan, to my relief, managed to do just that.

“I try not to be intimidated by my clients.” If I keep him in the van, maybe he won’t recognize my client… Except I need him to carry in my equipment.

Fuck.

This isn’t going to end well.