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The girl behind the Plexiglas looked like she might not be old enough to drive. She shrugged. “Sorry. I have no idea. My dad fixes all our cars.”
“Thanks anyway.”
Back outside, I leaned against my piece-of-shit car and dug my phone out of my pocket. I could’ve called Warren, but he hadn’t been able to get a piece of toast out of the toaster the other day when the edge got stuck. I’d had to stop him from sticking a fork in it while it was still plugged in. So I sucked it up and called the only man I knew who could fix anything, besides my dad. My dad was not who I wanted to call right now.
“What’s up, neighbor?”
I smiled. “Hey, Holden. I’m sorry to bug you, but I’m having a little car trouble. Uh, again.”
“Where are you?”
I looked around and sighed. “I actually have no idea. I’m not sure what exit I got off on. But I’m about halfway into the drive back from Philly.”
“What’s going on with your car?”
“It was driving along just fine, but then it started to slow down, even though I hadn’t taken my foot off the gas pedal. Even when I stood on it, it kept decelerating. By the time I got off at the next exit, I was only going about twenty miles per hour.”
“Could be a clogged fuel filter. Have you gotten gas anywhere you didn’t know lately?”
I cringed. “I actually got gas at some really sketchy place yesterday. I think it was called Joey D’s or something like that. The sign on the road was a piece of plywood with the name painted crooked. But I was running on fumes, and it was the only place around.”
“Welp, it might very well be a clogged fuel filter from bad gas then. Send me your location, and I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
“I can’t ask you to do that. I’ll just call a tow truck. I guess I hoped maybe you would know a trick for getting it to run right again.”
“First of all, you didn’t ask. I offered. And second of all, you shouldn’t waste money on a tow truck that’s going to take you to some mechanic we don’t know, at least not without me taking a look and seeing if I can get it fixed. A fuel filter is usually only about twenty bucks. A tow alone will be a hundred-and-fifty bucks or more.”
“Are you sure you don’t mind? I’m probably over an hour away still.”
“Not at all, sweetheart. That’s what I’m here for. That’s what me and all the guys are here for when it comes to you.”
For such a wise-ass jokester, Holden really could make my insides turn to mush.
“Thanks, Holden.”
“Send me your location. And if you’re waiting in the car, keep your doors locked. Roadside gas stations aren’t the safest places.”
After I hung up, I shot a pin of my location to Holden’s cell and decided to go back into the mini mart to treat myself to some junk food. I liked to have something sweet at the end of a stressful day, and this weekend had been full of those. But my fiancé was an ultra-healthy eater, so I always felt bad eating the stuff I liked in front of him.
It was going to take Holden a while to arrive, so I went on a little shopping spree, perusing the aisles and grabbing things with lots of gluten, extra nuts, extra dairy, and loaded with sugar. When I went up to the counter, the cashier wrinkled her nose. “You want all this?”
I narrowed my eyes. “I have six children.”
She looked like she didn’t believe me, but she rang me up without any other comments, at least. “That’ll be twenty-two forty-nine.”
I glanced down at the pile of candy. Maybe I had gone a little overboard. But what the hell? I swiped my credit card and rushed to the car to feast on my goodies.
Holden pulled up exactly one hour later. He parked next to me in the band’s van and, once I unlocked it, opened my passenger door. Unfortunately, I hadn’t cleaned up my sugar party, and his eyes snagged on the four—yes, four…don’t be so judgy—wrappers.
He picked up the Reese’s package. “Are these all from today?”
I grabbed the empty KitKat, SweeTARTS, and Utz Cheese Balls packaging. “I’ve been dying for some candy, but Warren is gluten free, nut free, dairy free, and sugar free, so I didn’t have much of anything this weekend because he was around.”
Holden’s brows rose. “Gluten, nut, dairy, and sugar free? Sounds like he’s fun free too. What the hell does the guy eat? Water?”
“Pretty much…”
He lifted his chin with a chuckle. “Pop the hood. I’ll tell you when to start it.”
“Okay.”
A few minutes later, he poked his head around the raised hood. “Okay, start it now.”
