Page 34 of Throttle Therapy

“The decisions thing.I’ve heard something similar before.Thank you for your service.”

He turned back to the road but didn’t respond.She hadn’t expected him to say anything.She’d seen a lot of vets who didn’t like to be thanked, still, she couldn’t not say it.She couldn’t imagine voluntarily leaving your family and everyone you know behind, never knowing if you’d ever see them again.There was so much more to it, she knew, but to her, that was the worst part.

“Have a good day,” Jenna called to Lacey as they reached the drop off line.“I’ll text you with the details about the bus as soon as I know.”

“Thanks, have a good first day!”Lacey called back as she hopped out of the truck, slammed the door, and raced toward the building.

“I’m sorry about that,” Jenna said with a wince.“I keep telling her she doesn’t need to slam the door.”

Roadkill shrugged as he pulled the truck out of line and back onto the road.

“Not a big deal.I’ve slammed it more than a few times myself.Did you want to stop anywhere before we hit the shop?”

Jenna shook her head.

“No.You’re already late to open the gym.I don’t want to make you any later.”

“Darlin’,” he paused and she turned to look at him, “I have Bobby Lee opening up.And I can do that as long as I need to.I just want to make sure you and your sister are safe.”

Jenna’s eyes watered and she blinked several times to keep the tears from falling.

“Thank you,” she said when she could get the words past the lump that had formed in her throat.

He pulled up in front of Savage Road Service and Repair and killed the engine.

“You don’t need to come inside.I can do this.”Jenna said, despite what felt like there was a whole kettle of red-tailed hawks dive-bombing in her belly.

“I know you can.I just wanted to do this first,” he said.

“What?”She frowned.

Then she felt his hand on her belt.The next thing she knew, she slid across the seat as he tugged her to him.

“This.”He lowered his mouth and covered hers with a brief, gentle kiss.“There,” Roadkill said when he broke the kiss.“Now you have something to think about other than how you’re doing.I’ll see you about five.”

She stared at Roadkill, not sure what to say or do.His kiss had made her toes curl, and every thought she’d had for probably the last year fly out of her head.

Roadkill tilted the top of his head toward the building.“You don’t want to be late, do you?”

That got her moving.She got out of the truck and went inside on autopilot.She wanted to press her fingers against her lips as she remembered the kiss.She wanted to go back out to the truck that was already backing away from the building and ask him to kiss her again.Neither of them would impress her new boss, and she needed this paycheck.Especially now that Mason had been arrested.She tried to push the kiss out of her mind and focus on what she’d need to do today as she went in search of Papa Smurf.

Thebellabovethedoor rang, making Jenna look up from where she was trying to calculate a repair bill for Papa Smurf to find Lacey coming in, the strap of her backpack over one shoulder.She frowned and checked the time.A little after three, how had it gotten to be so late?

“Hey, Lace, how was school?”

“Do we really have to do this?”Her sister said as she collapsed into one of the chairs in the waiting room.“It’s middle school, Jenna.The bus ride though, that as something.”

“What do you mean?”

“I didn’t realize there was a whole hierarchy of status tied to where you sit on the bus.”

“Yeah, I bet.Since you’ve never had to ride one, you wouldn’t know that only the little, little kids sit in the front, unless you’ve gotten in trouble on the bus.”

Lacey shook her head.“This is going to take me some time to learn, but at least I get to ride with Riley.”There was excitement in her tone that Jenna hadn’t heard when she was talking about school in quite a while.She’d always hoped some of her sister’s love for school would come back once she got to high school when the social shit wasn’tquiteso bad.

“What homework do you have?”

“Math,” Lacey said with a sneer.