I’d love to meet him first…
Elle’s stomach lurched in comprehension. She was “him.” Oh, Lord, what would Jack do if she knew?
“Well if anyone could do it, you could.” Hailey returned with a plate stacked three high with brownies. “You could sell flying lessons to angels, Miss Jacqueline.”
“Pah. I’m not that addled.” The fire in Jack’s features settled back to normal. “As I said, it’s a mother’s neurotic fantasy to be able to bubble wrap her kids.”
“Hey, Elle, come on and give me a hand with the coffee,” Hailey said.
Elle stood, a little too eagerly wondering how she was going to get out of this one. Her mother had taught her that truth was always the best, but she couldn’t make herself open her mouth. As Jack and Edith’s conversation turned to other subjects, Elle followed Hailey into the kitchen, more than grateful for the excuse to leave, even for a moment.
The relief lasted about the length of time it took for Hailey to hand over two empty coffee mugs so Elle could set them on the counter.
“So what brings you to Sapphire Falls? Don’t mind me asking—the whole town is naturally a little nosy. Plus, it’s rare we get another girl who’ll fit right into our group—and I already think you will.”
Despite the nerves filling her insides with micro riptides that drowned her calm, Elle had to laugh a little. Hailey was like a full-fledged gale approaching without warning.
“I like groups. I’m usually the most obnoxious one in any I join.”
“I don’t believe that. You seem polite enough.” Hailey’s laugh was sophisticated despite her enthusiasm, as if she was very used to handling any conversation.
“My mom tried to teach me.”
“So you’re here for a job I think you said? Where are you going to be working? Or, wait, are you just looking for something?”
There was no way out of this one. Under no circumstances was she going to lie. It wouldn’t take any time at all for a fabrication to come back and bite her on the butt. Even a dodge, as hard as she tried to think of one, wouldn’t really help. She’d only be left explaining herself once everyone knew she was working for Harley.
She couldn’t keep a groan of resignation inside.
“What?” Hailey asked.
“You won’t believe this. I’m just not sure I want Jack to know now that she’s told me about her son’s death and what she hates about Harley’s life passion.”
“Okay. I have no idea what you’re talking about, but you know you’re going to have to spill the story now, right?”
“I’m here to work as a mechanic. A car mechanic,” she amended.
Confusion settled onto Hailey’s features, but as Elle was about to explain, she was saved—or maybe it was actually swamped and capsized—by the back door slamming open and a tall figure striding through it in cadence with some choice words.
“Damn it to hell and back, if this day got any worse I’d—”
Harley Holt in the flesh froze when he’d fully entered the kitchen and his eyes locked on Elle’s. A jolt of power so strong it nearly buckled her knees slammed through her, and she tried with no success to look away. Electricity, forceful as a downed powerline, tethered her to him and all she could do was stare.
The picture with which she’d become so familiar had to have been years old. This man was the same, but his face had widened, his eyes turned from fun-filled to soulful and unreadable, and his hair, though still blond and long, no longer shone like a California surfer boy’s. She honestly had never seen anyone so magnetic in her life.
Finally, almost painfully, feeling returned to her limbs and her torso, bringing with it tingling and a residual internal shimmering. She swallowed. Harley’s Adam’s apple bobbed at the same time.
“Dang it. Somebody call the fire department. I haven’t seen heat like that since Ty looked at me the first time.” Hailey’s voice broke through Elle’s fog and she took a step backward.
“You.” Harley paid no attention to Hailey’s comment and continued staring at Elle although his eyes softened considerably. “First on the road outside of town, then at the store, now here? Why are you following me?”
“Believe me it is not intentional.”
A short, hard breath blasted from Harley’s mouth and he pressed his hands to his face. Scrubbing as if trying to get the day’s troubles from his skin he finished by ramming his fingers back through his hair and scrubbing on his scalp.
“Hello, Hailey,” he offered. “This is a surprise.”
“We brought your mother home from the store so she wouldn’t drive herself.”
“How the hell did she get to the store? She’s supposed to be resting.”
“This is your mother we’re talking about.”
“I’ll strangle her.”
“How can you not have known she was at the store?” Elle couldn’t stop her accusatory tone. “You practically ran through her at the checkout line.”
“What?” He turned back to her, eyes dark once more. “I’m sorry, but who are you again?”
Hah, she thought, he honestly didn’t know yet. Well this was all just fantastic. She’d only been in Sapphire Falls for five hours and was already in a sit com with no hope of anything but a ridiculously stupid ending. Dewey would be choking on his I-told-you-so’s.
“Harley? Honey, are you back already? Did you get Chris to the field?”
Jack entered the kitchen, perkier than she’d been since Elle had met her.
“I did. Barely. What the hell were doing out and about?”
“I needed some simple things for the salad I want to bring to the game later, and I felt so good I completely forgot about the Percocet.”
“Mom, that’s because you’re on Percocet. Jiminy Christmas do I have to write big notes on the doors so you don’t leave?”
“Maybe.” Jack smiled, but she nailed her son with sarcasm nobody could miss. “I’m sorry. You’re right. But thank goodness these lovely ladies were there to take care of my doddering, drugged up self.”
“I’m not kidding. You drove under the influence. I should ban you from the game tonight and make you stay here as punishment.”
At that he stepped forward and gave his mother a kiss on the cheek. Elle scowled, unable to reconcile the jerk from the road and grocery store with the chastising but cheek-kissing son.
“You won’t. Even though that’s what I’d have done to you, you know I have plenty of friends who’d come get me anyway.”
Harley growled at her. “Crazy woman.”
“Can you stay for a while? Edith is in the living room and we’re about to have girly tea time. You could add some interest to the party.”
At that request the anger returned full force to Harley’s features. His lips firmed into two terse lines as he spoke through his teeth.
“I don’t, thanks to the piece of crap in the driveway. It belched oil and smoke the entire way home, and I don’t honestly know how it got me here since it seized up in the driveway. I’m a frickin’ mechanic, and I can’t get an old car to run for five miles to the shop. I can take your car to the game, but only if I can move this one to get yours out. I also have to get Howard Schmidt’s truck running before tomorrow, too, or the parade down in Pigeon Cove will be out its Grand Marshall’s vehicle. I’d hoped to start that before the game, so, I’m outta here. No time for brownies.”
“I can take a look at your car,” Elle said quietly.
If she was going down, she might as well do it with flair.
“Pardon me?” Harley’s eyes trapped her again, surprising her even more this time. But, even though her heart continued pounding to some strange beat she’d never felt before, she managed to let go of the virtual electric fence she’d grabbed when he’d appeared.
“I’ll look at the car. It’s what you hired me for, right?”
She was being too flippant, but she couldn’t help it. The look on his face was totally worth the cheekiness.
“H
ired?”
She held out her hand. “I’m Elle Mitchell. Nice to meet you. Boss.”
Chapter Four
Harley stared at the outstretched hand in complete shock. Although aggravation dogged him on a daily basis, discombobulation was foreign, and the tall, beautiful woman in front of him had him thunderstruck.
Elle Mitchell? Here? Now? Why? How the hell?
His brain raced through questions he couldn’t spit off his tied-up tongue. Her presence in his mother’s kitchen made no more sense than her soft, perfect hands that looked far too elegant to be those of a mechanic.
“You are Harley Holt,” she continued, her voice amused even though her eyes betrayed a little of the same shock he was fighting. “You do remember hiring me?”
He finally managed to grasp her fingers for a brief shake. Her hand slipped into his and squeezed. At the zip of electricity from her touch, he relinquished the contact as fast as he could and forced his voice to work.
“Of course I remember. And I think our first meeting is scheduled for next Monday, so I’m sorry if I seem surprised to meet you here.”
The edge of defensiveness creeping into his voice annoyed him. He might be in the throes of a top ten rotten day, but this was his turf; he had no need to apologize.
And then she laughed, her voice a clear, warm bell that soothed his insides even as it sent a flush of mild guilt up the back of his neck. “I guess surprised isn’t the right word, is it?” She smiled, a self-deprecating, friendly lift of her lips. “This is pretty much the last place I expected to be right now so, yes, I get it.”
He didn’t know what he’d expected when he’d hired her. That she was a woman hadn’t ever come into play as more than an interesting fact. Her credentials and the knowledge she’d displayed during her phone interview were what had impressed him. His sexism shone now, however, in the realization that he’d assumed she’d be a hard-talking, rough-and-tough, grown-up tomboy who’d be one of the guys. His heart sank. A guy simply couldn’t win. Was being shocked and thinking she was gorgeous making him an asshole even now?
“So you aren’t stalking me then?” When in doubt go for humor.
“Nope.”
“Elle?” His mother’s quizzical frown told him this was a surprise to her as well.
“Oh, Jack. I’m sorry.” Elle Mitchell’s distress seemed genuine. “As soon as I saw your pictures in the living room I realized you had to be Harley’s mom. I swear this is all a huge cosmic coincidence. I didn’t know how to tell you.”
His mother nodded, her mouth twisted in apology. “Especially once I said I wanted to send the new mechanic packing.”
“Y’what?” Harley couldn’t help himself. “Send my mechanic away? What the hell, Mom?”
“Don’t get in a lather.” His mother gave him her famous “stop talking” warning look. “You know me by now. I was airing my fears to women who would sympathize.”
Harley sighed. This was an old topic and about the only thing his mother ever did that made him feel terrible. He hated scaring her. He did all he could to mitigate her fears. But he’d told her long ago he couldn’t live by her wishes and give up his passions. Nor had she ever taught him to live that way. He took two steps to where she stood and kissed her cheek.
“Stop worrying. Are you all right?”
“I’m fine. I’m looking forward to the baseball game, so go get that car running. These lovely ladies will never let me drive there alone, so don’t make me miss it.”
“We’re going,” Hailey said. “We’d make sure you got there.”
“Brown-noser,” Harley growled, and sent Hailey a sneer. He’d known her and her husband all his life, so he had no trouble treating her like a sister. She stuck her tongue out and laughed.
“What’s wrong with the Cutlass?” Elle, who’d been quiet, turned eyed the back door. Harley caught those eyes, immediately transfixed again by the bright, smart curiosity so clear in their blue depths. Everything about her suddenly confused him—her tall, leggy beauty was like Hailey’s but without the movie star quality. Elle held herself like a confident athlete, wore loose, boot cut jeans and a fitted, worn Beatles T-shirt, neither of which should have been attractive but were. Even so there was, as he’d seen in her hands, an elegance about her. How could she possibly be the talented grease monkey she advertised herself as being?
She belonged on stage somewhere, wowing a crowd.
He blinked and found his tongue.
“It randomly started backfiring yesterday. It loses power when I put the pedal down, gains it when I back off.”
“Backfiring through the carb or the exhaust?”
He stared. If she hadn’t been sexy before, she sure as hell was now. And maybe that was sexist but he no longer cared.
“Both. Depending on the speed. I could drive it like that, but on the way here the engine started rattling like a bucket of bolts and it died after I pulled in and stopped.”
“The backfiring sounds like a timing issue. The rattling and stopping? You’ll have to pull the valve covers and take a look.”
“Holy crap, she is a car chick.” Hailey clapped her hands, delighted. “Elle, you’re the first person ever to make Harley’s eyes light up like that. Take him outside this minute and look at his car.”
He swallowed as if she’d told them both to strip naked and go skinny dipping. He wanted Elle to look at his car all right, and he hadn’t felt this brainless and stupid-teenage-boy since staring at Heather Olson and the rest of the cheerleaders in high school. He shook his head. What the hell was going on here? After all these years was it turning out he really was this shallow?
“Fine. Come on,” he croaked. “I’ll show you.”
“Wait!” His mother stopped him as he reached for the back door. “Elle came for the brownies. She gets her brownie.”
Harley turned back to Elle, and when she laughed that bell-like laugh again, all his inner irritation melted. Time? Who cared about time. Let there be brownies.
“I’ll agree to that,” Elle said. “We’ll think better dosed up with chocolate.”
“Okay.” Hailey took her arm. “I officially like you. A lot. You might be a car chick, but you’re a proper woman who knows what’s important. We’re having brownies. Then you can play with Harley’s motor.”
Even his mother laughed, and that’s when Harley’s brain started to function again. This was not good. He’d lost his mind and his way and walked straight into the middle of an estrogen minefield. Now he was thoroughly stuck. No matter which way he turned, he could make something blow. Only one option was available to him.
“Brownies,” he agreed helplessly.
“It wasn’t a very auspicious way to meet.” Elle said ten minutes later, standing in front of the Cutlass’s hood, licking the chocolate from her second brownie off her thumb.
“Auspicious.” Harley laughed. “There’s a fifty cent word for you.”
“You don’t know what it means?”
He shot her a wounded grimace. “Of course I know what it means. Just—who uses a word like that?”
“A smart person?”
A snort escaped him. “Touché. You’re right, meeting you wasn’t what I expected. But maybe it was serendipitous.”
It was her turn to laugh. “You did that on purpose. Why? To show me you’re not just a dumb grease monkey?”
“I went to college. I know words.”
“Good to know.” She seemed to be thinking very hard for a few seconds, and then she faced him, her features determined. “Sorry, but I can’t not say this. You know words but I’m not too sure you’re big on manners.”
Something about her accusation actually stung.
“Hey, come on. What did I do now?”
“Well there was this incident on the road into town. Then there was some bulldozing of women at the grocery store. I guess I want to know what I’ve gotten myself into. You aren’t being a jerk right now, so, what is it? Are you mostly an ass or mostly not?�
�
A smile possessed his face without his permission. She was so matter-of-fact and non-judgmental it was slightly sweet. But then a momentary wave of annoyance washed over him at the reminder of his day. Here he was acting like a moony teenager, and he had serious time issues.
“I am never an ass.”
“You rode my bumper like one earlier today.”
“Okay, that was a mistake—I was trying to figure out the damn backfiring, and I misjudged your speed. I admit it—my bad. But you did a dangerous brake tap. You have to know how stupid a stunt that is. I think we’re equal on road assery.”
She had the grace to blush, and it turned her righteously indignant sweetness into flustered cuteness.
“Conceded. But the grocery store…”
He sneered and let a frustrated growl escape. “Open the hood, new employee. You do not want to hear about my day.”
“Oh, I see how this is going to go. Okay, boss. I can deal with rude.”
This was not turning out like any employer-slash-employee relationship he’d ever been part of. She held her own with no effort and a few smiles, and already his concentration around her was nil. He was going to have to fire her before she even got started.
“Fine. It started when my real car threw a tie rod this morning, right as I had to leave for Omaha to pick up a part that was supposed to have been delivered yesterday.”
She popped the Cutlass’s hood and stared into the old engine. “Oh, you mean that happens in Nebraska, too? Another good thing to know. I thought I didn’t want to hear about your day.”
“I changed my mind. You have to suffer, too.”
“Ahh. Then continue. I’m guessing if these problems just started you haven’t done a vacuum test or checked the timing? Cripes, this engine is a mucky mess.”
“That would be right. And since I’ve had this car a grand total of thirteen days—I wonder if that’s significant somehow.” He laughed humorlessly. “I’ve barely had time to look under here.”
Sapphire Falls: Going Zero to Sixty (Kindle Worlds Novella) Page 3