Page 59 of Penalty Box

I raised an eyebrow. “You feel sorry for me?”

“Do you ever want to drive this thing, or are you happy to just tinker around with it for eternity?”

My heart sank, but I managed to hide it well. “You’re here to help.”

“If you want,” she said, coming into the garage. “Or I could just watch and tell you when you’re doing it wrong.”

I tossed the rag aside. “Wow. What a generous offer.”

She smiled faintly, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. We both knew this wasn’t really about the truck.

“Be my guest, grease monkey.” I motioned to the front of my truck.

She came around, sniffing the air. “Still smells like stale beer and achy breaky hearts in here.”

“That’s not heartbreak,” I chuckled, handing her the wrench. “It’s the ghost of the last guy who tried to change out the busted starter.”

Cass took the wrench, turned it over in her hand, then placed it down gingerly before picking up the tool she actually needed. Good start.

“And speaking of beer…” I went to the fridge and grabbed two cold ones.

“Show me,” she said, exchanging the spanner for a can of beer.

I took a long sip, then went back to what I was doing before. A whole lot of nothing.

“You sure you know what you’re doing?” The way she leaned over my shoulder made a familiar heat start up low in my stomach.

“Sure as I am that you didn’t just come here for car talk.”

She stilled. Just for a second. Then, breezy again, she said, “Maybe I missed your sparkling personality.”

“Careful,” I glanced at her, smiling. “Flattery’s how accidents happen.”

A beat passed. The tension stretched between us, tight and barely contained. Her arm brushed mine as she came to get a closer look under the hood.

“It’s going to cost more to get her running than if you were to buy a new truck,” she murmured. “Unless you like just hanging out with a pile of scrap metal.”

I snorted. “Joke’s on you. This truck and I are in a committed relationship.”

“Should I be jealous?”

I turned to her, leaning back against the truck, arms folded. “I don’t know. Are you?”

Something flickered behind her eyes, there and gone. The deep shade of pink in her cheeks stuck around a little longer, though. “Not my business, is it? We’re just friends.”

“Could be your business if you want,” I said with a shrug. Nonchalant when everything in me was decidedly nothing close to that.

Cass fiddled with stuff I wouldn’t have been able to name if someone paid me. “You like playing with fire, don’t you?”

I nodded slowly. “Never much cared about getting burned, though.”

That’s when something shifted.

Whatever thread we’d been walking, pretending things were fine, acting like last night hadn’t rewired everything… it snapped. I felt it. I saw it happen in the way she breathed. How her eyes flicked to my mouth before she turned away again.

I caught her hand.

She stopped. Didn’t pull back.