Page 30 of Love You Always

I nod. “Now we need to get these lug nuts off. And if you’ve had your tires rotated recently, they’re probably on pretty tight.” I give one a test turn with the wrench. “Do you have a rag or towel or something? Might help your grip.” While she searches her yoga bag for a towel, I quickly loosen all the nuts and hand her the wrench. While she uses it to twist each of the five nuts, I sit on the sidewalk next to her, giving her quiet encouragement. “You’ve got this, princess.”

She nods and keeps working. I see the side of her that mustshow up at work in long hours on the set. I appreciate her focus as a dribble of sweat runs down her cheek. I blot it away with my finger and wipe it on the hem of my shirt.

People mostly ignore us as they walk by on the sidewalk.

“Are you one of those Zero Club people,” I ask, crossing my arms.

“I have no idea what that is.”

“People who drive until their tank has zero miles left and then keep going to see how far they can go without running out of gas. It’s a thing.”

“That’s the dumbest club I’ve ever heard of. No, I’m just the regular kind of busy person who puts off getting gas until the last minute. Is there a club for that?”

“Prolly not. Membership would get too big.”

“Ah, see? You understand. I’m glad you’re not judging.”

“Who says I’m not judging? You’re outta gas with a flat tire in the middle of nowhere.”

“I tried to get gas at this place out of town, but it turned out to be only a self-serve carwash. Then I got sidetracked.” She pops her head up and looks around to where there are, admittedly, plenty of shops and people. “And we’re hardly nowhere. It’s almost as busy as San Francisco.”

And yet…she’s here in my neighborhood, yet again, without her fiancé. And here I am, yet again, warming to her when I had no intention of doing so. Only now, I’ve stopped resisting it.

With the bolts loosened, we pull off the damaged tire, which has a large nail deep in the tread. “This may be able to be patched,” I say, picking up the tire and stowing it back in the trunk.

“Cool.” Ella lifts the new tire on, and I watch her do everything in reverse, putting the lug nuts back and cranking down the jack. When she’s done, I stand up and help her to her feet, holding onto her hand and looking to see if she’s wobbly. But her wide grin is all I see. “I changed a tire,” she whispers. It feelslike a secret between the two of us, so I keep my voice equally low.

“You crushed it.”

“I did.” She brushes a strand of hair from her cheek, leaving a grease smudge on her cheek. Using the hem of my shirt, I wipe it away. “Can’t have you looking like you work in a garage or someone’s liable to hire you.”

I retrieve a container of wet wipes from my truck and wipe down her hands. With her new tire and a promise to hit up the gas station just outside of town, Ella thanks me with a hug that somehow manages to make me half hard. Fuck me. I need to send her on her way.

“You good?” I take a step back. She looks as startled as I am by the wild electricity that passes between us with every touch.

“I’m good.” Her voice is a quiet rasp.

“You going home by way of a nice, safe freeway at a reasonable speed? No driving through construction sites or fields of broken glass.”

She holds up a hand. “Scout’s honor, Grumpy Grape.”

I nod and she slides into the driver’s seat. I close the door, trying to hide my smile at the nickname I don’t entirely hate. Her smirk tells me she sees it anyway.

Trouble. Deep, deep trouble.

CHAPTER 14

Archer

“Isit weird to miss a person when they’re not a rightful part of your life? Wait, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know.”

Stopping at a lookout point on the hill that gives our winery its name, Colin holds up one of the hiking poles he insists on using. “What if I want to answer?”

I groan. “I still don’t want to know.”

It’s been a couple weeks since I helped Ella fix her tire, and she’s been an obsessive thought on my mind ever since. The image of her in those tiny shorts—and without the shorts or any clothes at all—continues to haunt me, growing stronger each day that I don’t see her. The way she reacted when I held her up to keep her from wobbling. Her surprised look after she hugged me. I refuse to believe she felt nothing. But the idea that she feltsomethinghaunts me even more.

Then what?

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