by Mary Manners
“I just came to let you know Wyatt Cutler called. His sister Maddie is going to bring one of their trucks by when she’s done with a delivery. He says you need to take a look at the brakes.”
“Thanks.” The mention of Maddie Cutler caused an unsettling twist in Gunnar’s gut, one he couldn’t put a label on. The only Cutler sister had been away at college when Gunnar found his way to Clover Cove three years ago. Then last summer she flitted into his shop, her fuel line torn to shreds and needing the tires rotated on her sporty little Mazda. He’d done the job while she stood in the doorway of the waiting area, one slender, jean-clad hip propped against the frame, talking his ear off.
Gunnar remembered how, at one point, he’d glanced over to see sunlight spilling over her through the bay opening, turning her waves of hair to a waterfall of copper. The image literally stole his breath, and his lower jaw could manage no more than a series of soundless flaps as he struggled to respond to the pair of questions she’d just asked.
What made you want to come here, to Clover Cove, Gunnar? Don’t you miss your family back home?
“Are you OK?” Kyle’s voice drew him back. Gunnar shifted feet as Kyle tugged at the sleeve of his grease-stained over-shirt. “Earth to Uncle Gunnar.”
“I’m fine.” Gunnar shook his head to chase the memory—and the unnerving feeling it created—away. He didn’t have time for a woman, especially one as off-the-chain as Maddie Cutler. “Go make a note about Maddie’s brakes on the intake board, OK?”
“Sure, and what about the bill for Mrs. Johnson? Sam told me to ask you how you want to handle it this time.”
“Just like always, there will be no bill. This repair is pro bono.”
“I thought pro bono was just for lawyers.”
“It works for mechanics, too.”
“Then, I wonder what Mrs. Johnson will cook for us this time…baked lasagna or eggplant parmigiana. I vote for the eggplant, even though it sounds gross. Eggs aren’t plants and they’re not purple, either. So why do they call that weird-looking thing that Mrs. Johnson fries and slathers in marinara sauce eggplant?”
“You got me. It ranks right up there with your question about linear equations.”
“Maybe I’ll Google it later.”
“Sounds like a plan…after your homework is done.”
“Anyway, even if the parmigiana does have something as gross-sounding as eggplant in it, somehow, the old bat manages to pull it off.”
“She’s not an old bat.” Gunnar’s head snapped up, his gaze full of heated warning. Had he made a statement such as that when he was Kyle’s age, his step-father would have slapped him upside the head. That or laughed right alongside him, depending on the amount of booze in the old man’s system at the time. But, Gunnar would do neither. Instead, he drew a deep breath and prayed for patience. “Where did you learn to talk so disrespectfully?”
“I dunno.”
“Well, it doesn’t fly here. Respect is the word of the day—every day and in all situations. Got it?”
“Sure.” Kyle shrugged. “No problem. I’m sorry.”
“OK, then.” Gunnar needn’t have asked where Kyle had adopted such behavior. His nephew had been left to his own devices way too long. It was a miracle the kid hadn’t yet stumbled into irrevocable mischief the way he was allowed to run the streets of Atlanta before he arrived in Clover Cove. Now Gunnar was left to undo the damage.
He grimaced, wondering how he’d manage without losing every ounce of his patience—and hair. Thank God he had plenty to spare…in the hair department, at least. “Mrs. Johnson doesn’t have to bake us anything, Kyle. Pro bono means free, not ‘let’s barter for a home-cooked meal’.”
“But I like home-cooked. It sure beats your soggy grilled cheese sandwiches and beans.” His gaze swept to Axle. “Geez, some days Axle’s dinner looks better than ours.”
“You’re welcome to commandeer the kitchen anytime you’d like. Maybe you can Google a decent meal…one that won’t set the kitchen on fire.”
“No thanks. I’ll stick to helping out in the garage. I like it here. You can get dirty and no one cares.” He tapped the car’s fan belt, tested it for slack the way he’d been taught, and grinned at the black smudges that tattooed his fingers as he pulled them away from the engine. “I like the way it smells, too…like hard work. Why are you so nice to the…um, to Mrs. Johnson?”
“Because I can be.” Gunnar handed Kyle the wrench and wiped his hands on a shop towel. Kyle was right—the garage did smell good in its own sort of way. A blend of motor oil and tire rubber mingled with coffee from the pot that always held fresh brew. The scent was a balm to Gunnar. He thought of Mrs. Johnson and felt a slight smile tug at his lips. Truth be told, the elderly woman held a soft spot in his heart. She’d been his very first customer when he’d opened shop in Clover Cove and had greeted him with a smile and kind words he hadn’t expected. She was the reason he’d joined Clover Cove Community Church, where he’d met the Cutlers and lots of other friends who also became his customers. And Mrs. Johnson had encouraged him to use his guitar music to grow the fledgling youth program there. The fact that he was so connected to believers, firmly grounded in his new-found faith, had saved him when his sister shipped Kyle off to live with him three months ago. The kid certainly needed a place to belong, and the Community Church was a much better venue than running the streets…not that the Cove’s streets offered much in the way of mischief. That was one of the reason’s Gunnar had chosen to plant some roots here…the quiet hometown hospitality. The other reasons, well, they didn’t much matter anymore. Gunnar stepped back from the car and slammed the hood before turning back to Kyle. “You should be nice to Mrs. Johnson, too. She’s always been good to me, to us.”
“If I’m nice, do you think she’ll send over more of that barbecue chicken I liked so much, with a side of homemade potato salad?”
“It’s a possibility. And, if she doesn’t, well, being nice never hurt anyone, anyway.”
Kyle’s gaze slipped to Gunnar’s arms, exposed by the sleeves he’d pushed up to his elbows. “Except—”
“No more discussion until your math is done.” Gunnar had no desire, at the moment, to discuss his sister or anything else from his past. And he knew, sure as he was standing, that’s where Kyle was headed. Sometimes the kid asked way too many questions. Gunnar tugged the sleeve of his work shirt over his wrist, covering a wide, jagged scar that ran the length of his right forearm. “Now, scoot. I’ll come to help you as soon as I’m finished here. Then, if you get everything done, I’ll treat you to dinner at Pappy’s Pizzeria. Deal?”
“Oh, yeah.” Kyle wiped his hands on his jeans as he turned away. “Stuffed crust pepperoni pizza and chocolate chip cheesecake’s the special on Tuesday night.”
“You mean you’ve memorized the menu?”
“Yeah. That place rocks. Yum!”
“Try memorizing the formula for graphing linear equations. Remember, no yum ’til the work is done.”
“You made a rhyme, Uncle Gunnar. Cool.” Kyle’s exuberant voice reverberated off the walls, playing havoc with the sound system. “I’ll get right to—”
He paused at the doorway, cocked his head to the side as his gaze suddenly darkened. “What’s that rumbling noise?”
As if on cue, Axle stood and bound from beneath the workbench. He growled as he bolted toward the bay entrance that fronted the boulevard. Hair along the length of his back stood straight up.
“What—” The walls began to shake, and it took only a moment for Gunnar to realize something was very wrong. He turned toward the bay opening, caught a flash of yellow before a grinding shriek rocked the building. Gunnar took two giant leaps toward the doorway, shielding Kyle with a body-slam that sent him sprawling into the waiting area, where he nearly landed on the coffee bar. A horrific crash was followed by an ear-shattering screech as Axle chased in tight circles, barking. Concrete dust billowed up in a mushroom-shaped plume as Mrs. Johnson’s poor, batte
red vehicle folded like an accordion against the far wall. For what seemed an eternity the shop was cast into shadows while a Cutler Nursery delivery truck split through the cloud like a raging solar flare. It came to rest merely inches from where Gunnar and Kyle were planted.
Kyle coughed as he waved the dust from his face. He fixed his huge, brown eyes on Gunnar as a box of spark plugs toppled from a shelf and bounced off what was left of the damaged car’s hood before scattering across the shrapnel-dusted concrete.
“Are you OK?” The shock of the impact had Gunnar’s heart pounding. Through the cloud, he glimpsed a waterfall of wavy reddish hair. His stomach lurched as fragments of what had transpired melded into a complete thought. Maddie’s in the truck. Maddie…
“I’m fine, but Maddie—”
“Stay back,” Gunnar bounded over dumped boxes and shattered glass, toward the truck…toward Maddie. “Hold on to Axle.”
“I’ve got him, Uncle Gunnar…” Kyle’s voice was filled with all the amazement of someone who’d just witnessed the unveiling of the eighth wonder of the world. “Wow, does this mean I don’t have to finish my homework?”
3
A scream buzzed through Maddie’s head, and it took a moment to realize the voice belonged to her. She opened her eyes to a cloud of smoke, and as the vapors thinned, she stared down into the gaping pit of an oil bay. The left driver-side wheel of the delivery truck had plunged through the opening, saving her from crashing into the back wall of Gunnar’s shop. But now, the truck was hopelessly jackknifed with her trapped inside. She felt as if she was on a roller coaster, crested at the summit and about to plunge into an abyss. Panic rose like a tidal wave.
“Kill the engine.”
Maddie turned in slow motion, as if mired in a murky swamp, to find Gunnar at the driver’s window. His words failed to compute as she lifted a hand to her forehead and winced. The thrust of the crash with the poor blue car that now sat crumpled along the wall must have caused her head to bump the steering wheel. It throbbed in unison with her galloping heart. Somewhere close, a dog yowled in deep, throaty protest.
“The fumes are going to choke us.” Gunnar reached through the window and turned the key in the ignition as he called, “Hush, Axle.”
The dog’s barks halted immediately. While the truck’s motor died a slow, clunky death, the room grew airless as the inside of a vault. Music drifted from some far-off place.
Maddie’s head throbbed.
“Maddie, are you OK?” Gunnar’s voice broke through as if from miles away.
“I’m…” She touched her forehead once more, felt a knot beginning to rise and winced at the sharp stab of pain that stole her breath. Even as she spoke, her voice sounded as if it whirled from the depths of a tunnel. “I’m so sorry, Gunnar. I tried to stop, but the brakes…they wouldn’t cooperate. I don’t know what happened.”
“Let me get you out of there.” He rounded the car to open the passenger door. It protested with a shriek of metal on metal. “You’ll have to scoot this way. Can you manage?”
“I think so.” The seat was facing downhill, like a black-diamond ski slope, and a grip of fear clutched at Maddie as the truck rocked while Gunnar leaned in. The smell of smoke choked her. Was the vehicle in danger of bursting into flames? She splayed a hand across the dashboard. “Wait, I’m going to fall.”
“It’s OK. I’ve got you. I won’t let you fall, Maddie.”
Gunnar wrapped an arm around her shoulder, and she was vaguely aware of the scent of him as it broke through the smoke…a blend of soap and oil and the grime of a hard day’s work.
As he tugged, she scooted until she came to the edge of the seat. Then Gunnar lifted her into his arms and carried her away from the pit before setting her gently on the ground. With her feet firmly on concrete once again, her mind began to clear. She glanced up into Gunnar’s grey eyes, now hard as granite with displeasure…or perhaps a measure of worry. The way his gaze narrowed reminded her of the mess she’d just caused.
“Th-thank you.” Her throat burned as if it had just been filed raw by sandpaper. She wrenched her gaze from Gunnar to scan the destruction. A wave of mortification—sheer horror—struck her and she pressed a palm to her mouth as the words came in a halting murmur. “Oh—my—goodness. What have I done?”
“Don’t worry about that now, Maddie. Here, you need to sit down, get some ice on that bump.” He placed his hand beneath her chin and titled her head back, then gently side to side. The room whirled and she closed her eyes tight for a moment, before allowing them to slip open once more. Gunnar studied her as if she was a fish that had flopped up onto the shore. His breath, minty with gum, warmed her cheek. “I don’t see any blood though, no cuts, so that’s good, at least. But you’re really pale.”
A kid loped up to join them. He seemed vaguely familiar, but Maddie couldn’t quite place where she’d seen him before. He looked a lot like Gunnar, only blond where Gunnar was dark, and brown-eyed to Gunnar’s grey. But they shared the same slope of a nose and chiseled edges along either side of their jaw that met at a deep cleft nestled squarely in the center of their chin. He surveyed the damage as a chocolate lab panted at his side. Both tilted their heads in the same manner, as if viewing the rude arrival of an alien spacecraft. The kid covered his mouth with one hand and his voice was muffled as he exclaimed, “Wow, look at Mrs. Johnson’s car. She’s gonna freak.”
As the kid’s words washed over her, Maddie had an odd thought that he and Gunnar were cut from the same mold but colored with different crayons. Unbridled laughter suddenly bubbled up from the pit of her stomach. That was funny, wasn’t it…thinking of Gunnar colored with a crayon? The room began to whirl once again as the kid’s voice floated by once more.
“Is she OK, Uncle Gunnar? She looks kind of wild-eyed. And that bruise…”
“Get one of the ice packs from the first-aid kit. I don’t think we need to call 911. I assume they’re already on the way. I hear sirens. Someone must have seen the wreck and placed the call.”
Sirens wailed, all right, and as they closed it, the shriek pierced like an ice pick. A quick, shaky glance toward the street told Maddie that cars had begun to pile up as people rubber-necked to get a glimpse of what had happened. Great, just great. Was that Mr. Robertson from the convenience store crossing the street? And Mrs. Tilson from the bakery?
“I’m OK.” Maddie struggled from Gunnar’s grasp even as the ground swam beneath her feet. Suddenly, nausea made her feel as if she were being tossed along a storm-crazed sea. The room morphed to a walk-in freezer, though sunshine streamed through the gaping hole the truck had made when it crashed through the brick facade. What had once been two separate work bays was now crudely transformed to one…a beast with a gaping, toothless mouth. “Let me go. I should call my mom before she hears about this on the street. I don’t want her to worry.”
“Sit down, first. I’ll phone Hattie.” Gunnar’s hand was warm in hers.
Maddie breathed a sigh of relief as he settled her into a chair and then eased in beside her. The carousel she was on slowed a bit, but a chill continued to surge through her, gaining strength. Gunnar wrapped an arm around her shoulders as her teeth began to chatter, drawing her close to ease chills that coursed from her neck to her knee caps. “There, that’s better.”
Maddie closed her eyes, praying for the room to stop spinning. Her throat tightened as flashbacks of the crash played like a slow-motion news reel through her mind. Bile burned through her belly as she choked, “I demolished your shop.”
“You sure did.” Gunnar’s voice held steady, calm, with a slow, southern drawl. “But I have insurance. It can be fixed…eventually.”
“But, your business, that blue car…”
“Yeah, I’ll have to phone Mrs. Johnson, too. Kyle’s right—she probably will freak out when she hears the news.”
“Mrs. Johnson—Vera Johnson?”
“That’s right. We’ll break it to her gently…if that’s possible.”
“Great.” Maddie groaned. She thought the car looked familiar, and now she knew why. Old Blue, as the car had long-ago been nicknamed, was ancient—most likely as old as Vera Johnson herself. The woman was a pillar of their church and had also been Maddie’s fifth grade teacher. Maddie could almost hear the pepper-haired woman’s voice as she sat in the dusty old classroom of Clover Cove Elementary so many years ago, admonishing Maddie to please hold her tongue as the class worked through a grammar lesson. Mrs. Johnson often narrowed a gaze over her tortoise-rimmed spectacles while pointing a finger and stating in a flat, agitated voice, ‘Maddie Cutler, your mouth overflows like Niagara Falls…’
So what if the statement held a hint of truth?
“Don’t worry about that now.” Gunnar studied Maddie, his gaze filled with concern that chased the chill away. “I’m more worried about you. Does your head hurt much?”
“I just feel a little woozy.”
“Anything else?” His free hand slipped over her with impossibly gentle butterfly strokes, down each arm and up one side, then the other, to flutter over her ribcage. “Does any of this hurt?”
“No.” His touch sent a bonfire of heat through her, and she turned away from him, wiggling from his grasp before he caught wind of the effect he had on her. “My ego is hurt more than anything. Wyatt tried to warn me about the brakes.”
Gunnar’s gaze narrowed and his lips flattened into a thin line that deepened the cleft in the center of his chin. “Warn you how?”
“He said they were loose, but I insisted on taking the truck anyway because Marcus needed supplies for the Oak Street project. The problem didn’t sound serious, so I didn’t think much of it.” She was rambling, but she just couldn’t seem to help herself. Tiny jolts of electricity raced along her spine at the thought of Gunnar’s touch. “Wyatt asked me to drop the truck off here when I was finished so you could check the brakes. That’s why I was headed this way. I almost made it without incident. Almost…”