Page 1 of Crowbar

Chapter One

Spencer

I glanced into the gerbil pen and counted six of them running on a wheel like their lives depended on it. Which, given the state of my employment history, made us kindred spirits.

Day one at The Cat Nap and I was already sweating through my polo. The shirt was a medium because they didn’t stock smalls, and the extra fabric billowed around my torso like a sad green parachute. SPENCER was stamped on the name tag in crooked block letters, courtesy of the label maker I’d wrestled with for ten minutes before my manager, Deb, had taken pity on me and done it herself.

Deb was somewhere in the back, doing inventory. She’d left me alone on the floor with a cash wrap, forty fish tanks, an entire wall of squeaky toys, and a parrot named General Patton who had called me an asshole twice since nine a.m.

“Right back at you,” I muttered, passing the bird on my way to restock the cat litter display.

General Patton ruffled his feathers and fixed me with one beady orange eye.

The bags of litter weighed twenty-five pounds each. I weighed 105 soaking wet. Doing the math on that ratio was not encouraging.

“You can do this. Just drag the bags from the pallet to the shelf. Engage your core muscles, not your back.”

Gripping the first bag by its handle, I dragged it off the pallet, my sneakers squeaking against the linoleum as the stubborn bag slid across the floor with all the grace of a body bag being disposed of.

My little pep talk wasn’t working.

A family browsing the hamster aisle glanced over. Their kid pointed at me. I smiled like this was a totally normal way to transport cat litter and not at all a cry for help.

By the fourth bag, my arms were trembling and a line of sweat had carved a path from my hairline to my jaw. A goldfish in the nearest tank pressed its face to the glass and stared at me with what I could only describe as pity.

“Don’t judge me,” I told it. “You live in a box.”

The store smelled like cedar shavings, kibble, and the faint musk of animals who hadn’t consented to being displayed under fluorescent lighting. Somewhere near the reptile section, a heat lamp buzzed. A lovebird whistled three notes of something that sounded suspiciously like a car alarm. Two kittens in the adoption window by the front door were engaged in a wrestling match that had drawn a cluster of teenagers with their phones out.

This was my life now. I’d applied to fourteen places in two weeks, and The Cat Nap had been the only one desperate enough to call back. During the interview, Deb had asked if I had experience with animals. I’d said yes with the confidence of a man who had once fed a neighbor’s cat and only gotten scratched four times. She’d hired me on the spot, which said more about her staffing crisis than my qualifications.

Stacking the last bag onto the shelf, I stepped back and admired my work. The display leaned dangerously to the left. I nudged the bottom bag with my foot, which made the top bag slide sideways and land on the floor with a thud that echoed through the store.

General Patton laughed. An actual laugh. Like a person.

“Noted,” I said, hoisting the bag back into place. “You and I are going to have problems.”

A bell chimed over the front door. I straightened, wiped my palms on my khakis, and plastered on the customer-service smile I’d been practicing in the bathroom mirror. The smile that said I am competent and love animals and definitely know the difference between a cockatiel and a cockatoo.

The man who entered did not belong in a pet store.

Everything about him screamed wrong building. A leather cut hung open over a black T-shirt that strained across shoulders wide enough to block the doorway. Dark hair fell across his forehead, pushed back from a face half-hidden by a full beard. Tattoos crawled from his wrists and disappeared under his sleeves, and another line of ink peeked above his neckline, disappearing into the shadow of his jaw. A small hoop earring caught the fluorescent light. Between his lips, a toothpick rested like it had been born there.

But the eyes.

God, the eyes.

Storm-cloud blue, dark-lashed in a way that had no business existing on a man built like that. His gaze moved across the store in a single sweep—exits first, then occupants—like the habit was older than he was.

When they landed on me, I forgot every word I had ever learned. Two full seconds of open-mouthed silence, a bag of cat litter propped against my hip like an infant.

His expression said don’t start with me before coffee, which was both terrifying and deeply relatable. Lines bracketed his mouth, the kind carved by years of squinting or frowning or hopefully smiling. He moved silently through the store. It should have been impossible for someone built like a refrigerator. His boots barely made a sound on the linoleum.

“Hi!” My voice cracked on the single syllable. Clearing my throat, I tried again. “Welcome to The Cat Nap. Can I help you find something?”

Those blue eyes found my name tag, lingered there, then traveled back up to my face. The toothpick shifted from one corner of his mouth to the other.

“Looking for a puppy.”