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“Got it.”

Moving forward, popping the bonnet, grabbing my tools, these were all pleasantly familiar, helping settle me, but Gary sidled up.

“You OK, Jamie?”

The man was over fifty, had a wife he’d been with since they were teenagers, so he was rocking big dad energy right now.

“I’m fine,” I replied with a smile.

“You make sure he treats you right, otherwise…” Ken had drifted closer, even Clinton dragging himself out of the engine bay of the car he was working on. “Brock might be the boss, but that doesn’t mean we won’t sort him out if he doesn’t treat you good.”

I smiled. The guys were grumpy, stuck in their ways or really annoying by turns, but sometimes, sometimes they said just the right thing.

“It’s fine,” I replied, “but thanks. Things are just casual at the moment. We just didn’t want to be sneaking around the garage.”

“So instead you’re gonna bang in the office?” Clinton asked, almost hopefully, only to have the air driven out of him by Ken’s elbow.

“No banging in the office,” I replied, “though the boss might ream you out if you keep standing about gossiping.”

I nodded to the stairs to where Brock stood, glowering down at the four of us as he stared through the window.

“Back to work then,” Gary said. “You can gossip all you like at smoko time.”

His gruff tone gave me permission to do the thing I needed to do. Focus on my job, on feeling confident and competent, on the things I could control. I clung to that with both hands as I picked up a wrench, because I’d need it to get through a week with my mother.

Chapter 10

Brock

“I need to get back to work.” I watched Jamie misunderstand everything I said, and why wouldn’t she? “Got it.”

No, I wanted to shout, crossing the floor and slamming the door shut before she could slip out of it. No, I’d say again and again, as I pulled her right back into my arms.

Where she belonged.

I knew it’d feel good when I held her for the first time, but fuck… I hadn’t expected it to feel so damn right. Like she was made for me, just as I was her, our bodies slotting together like two puzzle pieces, locking tight, never to be separated again. Instead, I was forced to watch her labour under the assumption that this wasn’t real, that I didn’t have the ghost of her body against my chest even now.

I strode over to my desk, jerking the chair out and then slamming my butt down, my hands forming a steeple as I stared at my laptop. There was tax stuff that needed to be done, bills to be paid, and a million other pieces of administrivia that demanded my attention. I could give it none. The same question that had me up half the night, rolling around in my bed, punching my pillow, trying to get some sleep, hit me now.

When was I going to tell Jamie how I really felt?

This wasn’t fake for me. Millie knew exactly what she was doing by suggesting this, giving me a legitimate place to pull a whole lot of feelings I kept hidden for far too long, but she didn’t know. This was like letting the blood flow back into a leg that had been sitting in the same position for hours. It stung so much my teeth locked tight to stifle back a moan of pain, yet I wasn’t moving, trying to increase the blood flow.

Which had me thinking.

Under the guise of acting as the perfect pretend boyfriend, there was no reason I couldn’t use this as an opportunity to show Jamie how good this would be. Working together, laughing together, being together… My hand ground down on my cock that throbbed sulkily in my jeans since the moment she walked in the door. Yeah, that. I needed to prove to her that I could be a good man, her man. That’s what had my fingers moving across the keyboard, bringing up a menu from a local cafe.

I’d gotten her lunch from there on her birthday, and she seemed to really like it. I scanned the menu, ordering this thing and that, not totally sure what she’d like, but that was OK. Rather than embarrass her, I’d get enough food for everyone. Sending the order off, I found I could finally take in a full breath. I had a chance. A slim one, but I’d take it, because it was more than I had before. With that sorted, I was able to focus on the pile of work waiting for me.

I didn’t need an alarm to tell me when the food was arriving. Some internal clock dragged me away from what I was doing ten minutes before the delivery driver was due to arrive. I pushed myself away from the computer and ran downstairs, walking past the workshop, only pausing for a second to stare at Jamie bent over an engine bay, then opening the break room door.

To find a fucking pigsty.

Being a mechanic was a dirty business, but that didn’t mean we needed to live that way.

“Clinton!” I shouted, the bloke’s head hitting the bonnet of the car he was working on before he winced and then ambled over. “What the fuck is this?”

“Ah… a sink full of dishes?”