Page 113 of Renard's Deliverance

She saw two teenage girls standing on the footpath.

Oh no. A date gone wrong?

Renard drove past before muttering something to himself.

“Not going to stop?” she asked.

“It’s their own problem. Kids should learn how to change a tire.”

“How can they learn unless someone shows them?” she asked.

He muttered to himself before pulling over and doing a U-turn. Then he drove back to where the boys were searching in their trunk for something.

A spare tire?

“Stay here,” he said.

“I can help.”

“You know how to change a tire?”

“Well, no,” she said. “But I could be your assistant.”

“You can assist me by keeping your butt planted in my truck.”

Yikes.

She wouldn’t want to be those boys. She could see their faces drop as he approached them and one of them shuffled his feet. Likely the driver.

Shit.

Was he eroding the poor boy’s confidence? Just as she thought she might have to intervene, the boy’s shoulders lifted, and he grinned at Renard.

Okay, whew.

Didn’t take them long to change the tire in the end and the boys did most of it, with Renard guiding them.

As he got back in, the kids all waved him off.

“Aren’t you going to wave back?” she asked with amusement as they drove off.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Don’t wave.”

She bit her lip to hold back her smile.

“Don’t say it.”

Fine. She wouldn’t. But she also thought that he was the gruffest, sexiest teddy bear she’d ever met.

She just wished he would touch her.

Fuck her. Spank her. She didn’t mind which.

“You all right, Gem?”

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