AllFreeNovel
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He felt pretty good, actually. In fact, now that he’d noticed, he felt better than he had in a while. Not physically; he always felt physically good unless he was injured. He was healthy as the proverbial horse and rarely came down with so much as a cold. But his head felt more like his head. For months, the mess in there had been driving him crazy; right now his thoughts were orderly and normal.
Maybe it was working on the Sunfire. He’d hadn’t worked on a car since the setup crew had left Tulsa, almost six months ago. Maybe he’d simply needed to shove his hands in a car’s engine to feel like himself again.
Siena came out while he was drying her car with a chamois. Her arms were crossed tightly over her middle, and she had her bag on her shoulder and her shoes on her feet. She looked sheepish and guarded and a little sleep-drugged.
About three and a half hours had passed since he’d tucked her in.
“Hey,” she said softly.
“Hey.” He came around her car and stopped before her. “Was that good sleep?”
She nodded, but she was staring at the chamois in his hand. “You washed my car?”
“Washed it, replaced the fuel pump, cleaned the spark plugs. Cleaning spark plugs isn’t really amechanic-approvedmove, but I didn’t want to leave while you were sleeping to get new ones, so it’ll do for a while.”
Her lips pursed and blew out a shaky breath. “I don’t know what to say. I can’t think what I could do to pay you back.”
“You don’t have to say or do anything. I’m glad to do it—I mean it, I love being a mechanic, and I’m not doing that work anymore, so this was fucking therapeutic for me.”
Her eyes flashed up. “Really?”
“Really. It felt great to have my hands all up in this shitty car’s engine.”
She laughed, and he finally saw real humor and some ease in her eyes. “Okay. Good. Thank you.” Then her head tilted and she frowned lightly. “You’re not working as a mechanic anymore?”
“Nah. We couldn’t find the right property, so we’re opening a race shop.”
“Race shop?”
“You know, gear for street racing and off-road shit. But not a working shop. We’re just selling the crap.”
“That’s what your gang does? Run a race shop?”
“First: club, not gang. The Brazen Bulls Motorcycle Club. Second: yeah, here in Laughlin, the Bulls will run a race shop, as soon as we can get it open—we’re planning the grand opening for the spring.”
“That’s close.”
“It is. We’ll be ready.”
This was the first time, he thought, they’d talked about him and his life at all. Just small talk, but under it was something bigger.
Then her hand came up and settled on his chest. Her fingertips rested just above the neckline of his beater, and it was like her touch set his skin on fire.
She smiled up at him. “Can I at least make you lunch?”
He smiled back. “Sure. That’d be nice.”
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~oOo~
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When Cooper got tothe clubhouse later that afternoon, three bikes were parked beside the garage: Zach’s Fat Bob, Ben’s Road King, and Kai’s 70s-vintage ElectraGlide.
Parked beside that line of familiar Harleys was an unfamiliar 80s-vintage Dodge Caravan, complete with sun-faded ‘wood’ paneling and a blue sliding door. The rest of the van was gold. Who the fuck was that?
He parked his bike in front of the clubhouse and trotted onto the porch. Lyra had dug up a bunch of old-fashioned metal lawn furniture from somewhere and painted it all in different Crayola-bright colors like they were planning to be on one of those HGTV shows or some shit. As he opened the front door, he noticed that now there were fuckingpotted plantson the porch as well. Just since yesterday!
