Page 33 of In the Shadows

“Nothing too fancy. I have a two-thousand-six GT that I custom ordered. Wanted her to look retro so I added the wheels with spinners. She’s windveil blue, which is as close to the baby blue of the sixties as I could get, with light grey interior. Not a fan of leather, having grown up in Arizona so I opted for the material seats with the ponies running across it. Upgraded the interior lighting so I can scroll through a hundred and twenty-five different color settings. Had them put on the raised rear spoiler and seven and a half inch Roush racing stripes. Didn’t need to add to it performance wise. Figured if I ever wanted to hit the track I’d pay to open up a Cobra or a Shelby while I was there instead of risking my baby girl’s life out on the track.”

“Stick or automatic?” I asked, how I felt about her all weighed on her answer to that question.

“Please, boy, five speed stick. What person in their right mind would purchase a high-performance muscle car with an automatic tranny,” she teased.

“I think I love you,” Joey mumbled. Staring at her like he did the first time he met Derek Masters fromMaiden.

Everyone laughed. I couldn’t help but smile. Joey and I had been talking since we were kids about rebuilding a nineteen sixty eight Mustang fastback since we knew what cars were.

“Ha-ha, you got a sweet kid, Joe.” She smiled.

Joe himself couldn’t take his eyes off her. That man was head over heels and I think my boy was quite smitten with her too.

“Ahem,” Joe cleared his throat, “he’s a chip off the old block. These boys have been working on cars with me since they were little. All four of them helped rebuild their tour bus along with Brett and me.”

After everyone left, Joey and I curled up with the laptop and started ordering the Christmas gifts we found off Amazon. But I still needed to figure out what to get him….

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