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I scanned the trunk and then climbed into the back seat in a last ditch effort to turn up something, anything.
As I bent over to check the floor, footsteps rasped in the garage hall. I ducked down, my pulse skipping, peering between the seats. When a familiar chiseled face framed by dark red hair peered past the doorway, I exhaled in relief. Straightening up, I nudged open the car door. “It’s just me.”
Gabriel came out into the car bay, cocking his head. “Did you need a drive somewhere?” he said with a teasing note in his voice. “You’re more likely to get it if you come tell someone first.”
I mock-glared at him. “I was checking the car to see if my dad left anything here. Seems like no. But I can’t get into his office while Mrs. Gainsley is hanging around up there.”
“I would have thought you could find some way around that, Miss Witch.” He dropped onto the seat next to me and glanced into the storage nook on the door.
“Not so easy when the person I’m trying to get around is also a witch who isn’t supposed to know I’ve got magic yet,” I muttered. “I can’t cast anything on or around her.”
“I’ve worked on a couple cars where the owners wanted to keep certain cargo… discreet. Let’s check the usual suspects.” He prodded the base of the seat, I guessed to check whether it would open. When nothing happened, he moved to the padding at the back.
I watched him for a moment, torn between the tug I felt with him so near me and the distance I could still feel in his demeanor. We were friends, that tone, that smile, said. Nothing more. I got the sense he was going out of his way to make that clear. My throat tightened.
“I’m sorry about the other day,” I said.
Gabriel’s head jerked up. “What?”
“In my room, when I—” I gestured vaguely, my cheeks flushing. “I wasn’t trying to push you into anything. I wouldn’t want to. I guess I just misunderstood.”
Gabriel just looked at me for a moment, his expression unreadable. “It’s okay,” he said, not confirming or denying. “You don’t have to worry about that.”
“So we’re good?”
He gave me that characteristic grin. “We’re always good, Sprout.”
I wasn’t sure I totally believed that, but the tension inside me eased off a little. I shifted over so he could check the middle section of the seat. His hands moved with practiced certainty.
“Is this what you’d want to keep doing?” I found myself asking. “Here, or in town, after this mess is over—working on cars? In between all those trips you’re still planning, of course.”
Gabriel chuckled. “I think so, as long as I can find the work. It doesn’t seem as if people are going to stop driving cars any time soon. And I like working with the internal systems, figuring out how to boost their performance, taking care of them when they’re running down. Everything connects to everything else in a clear sequence. You can always see what needs doing, if you bother to pay attention.”
And Gabriel always did. There’d never been much that escaped his notice.
“Switch?” he said, and I scooted past him, holding my breath at the brush of his body past mine, so he could check the other side. More safe conversation topics—that was what I needed.
“Whereareyou thinking you’d want to get to now that you’ve been all over South America and wherever?” I said.
“Hard to say where I’d go first. I’d like to see more of the really big cities here—get out to New York, for example. And Alaska, maybe—it must be pretty amazing to experience the kind of stark wilderness you can get up there.”
“A pretty far cry from Argentina, I bet,” I said.
“Sure,” he said, glancing up with a twinkle in his eye. “But that’s the whole point. I want to experience at least a little bit of everything while I’m here on this planet.” He patted the seat. “I think we’re all clear as far as secret compartments go—”
One of the garage doors started to rumble open at the other end of the building. Gabriel stiffened.
“Get down,” he whispered. I was already flattening myself to the seat, snuffing my magical light with a flick of my fingers. He dove past me to tug the door shut with a soft thump and lay down next to me. I wasn’t sure which was more responsible for the pounding of my heart—the thought that I might be caught or the heat of Gabriel’s well-muscled body aligning with mine.
A voice carried down the bay. Tyler’s reedy tenor. “Where are you taking it?”
Matt’s lower, gruffer voice answered. “Just out to Farmington. Got to drop off some business contracts for the boss.”
Just the regular staff, not Mrs. Gainsley or anyone witching. It probably wouldn’t have mattered if they’d seen us by the car. Now that we were hiding together inside it, though, we couldn’t exactly casually climb out without raising a few questions.
I breathed in and out slowly as Matt started the engine on whichever car he was taking. Gabriel shifted his weight, staying on his side as much as he could so he didn’t squash me into the seat. His chest was pressed against my breasts, his thigh between mine. That slight movement sent a quiver of desire up from my core.
His breath spilled over the side of my face, slightly ragged. I swallowed hard, trying to focus on the sounds of the car, on what Matt had said, on anything over than the guy lying over me—
