Miss Mechanic

She stared at me.

“And while you’re getting rid of that worm infestation…Tidy those wrenches, would ya, darlin’?”

“Oh my God!” she shouted as I shut the staff room door behind me.

Hey.

Life was a minefield.

And she was a whole damn battlefield.

Chapter Nine – Jamie

“Spineless, selfish little prick.”

I slammed four wrenches into the box.

“Weak little dickhead.”

I snatched up three crosshead screwdrivers, yanked open a drawer, and threw them against the metal base.

It closed with a satisfying clang.

“Arrogant little pencil dick.” I tugged open the top drawer and dropped a handful of nuts into it.

Not the decent kind of nuts, either.

Clang, clink, clang, clink.

They rattled across the tiny drawer like a miniature, angry army. I pushed the drawer shut with some crazy vigor.

I was angry from my dream.

That was insane. It was completely fucking crazy that I was so angry from something my subconscious mind had dreamed up, yet here I was.

Alongside Dex. Wearing nothing but light-blue jeans with numerous stains and a light grey tank top that showed off all his muscles. If he’d set a rule about overalls, he hadn’t made it universal, clearly.

Thank God I was wearing nothing but a spaghetti-strap shirt and a pair of workout shorts.

What was good for the goose was good for the gander, my grandma had always taught me.

But she’d lived thirty years in England, so who the hell knew what she really meant by that?

I slammed a drawer shut. It clanged through the garage, clanging off the stone walls.

I didn’t even know what I was insulting. I think it was thin air at this point. There was something satisfying about shouting into thin air, though.

I glanced over my shoulder. Dex was bent over at the waist, fitting Mr. Daniels’ alternator. His light-blue jeans were low-slung and did nothing for the base desire I was currently battling. His shirt had ridden up, and as I peered across the garage, I could see the dimples that decorated the base of his lower back. The muscles that hinted at more to come.

The deeper the muscle, the lower it dipped, right?

Right.

Wrong, Jamie. Wrong, Jamie. That was not how we did this right now.

I shook off those thoughts and dragged my attention away. I was going to hurt myself if I carried on thinking these thoughts.

“It’s been five minutes since you insulted a tool.” Dex’s voice rumbled across the garage. “You all right, darlin’?”

“It’s been five minutes since I stopped killing you in my mind.” The words escaped me right as I twisted the cap on the oil tank and pulled out the dipstick. Too low. I tapped the end of the stick against the side of the twisting cap and set it to the side.

“Is that a record?”

I put a funnel in the hole and studied the height of the oil. “Must be,” I replied, dropping the stick. I crossed the garage and pulled the correct oil from the shelf.

“You sure that’s the right one?” Dex asked.

“Want me to pour it over you and throw a match to be sure?” I unscrewed the cap and slowly poured it into the funnel until the tank was full.

“I’m good. Double-checking is your friend, Jamie.”

I capped the bottle and re-shelved it. “Mhmm.” I screwed the cap back onto the oil tank and moved to the engine oil. The level read fine, but I topped it up a couple inches to be safe. Same with the brake fluid.

This was a standard service. Doubting me was such an insult.

Most non-mechanics knew how to do this, for the love of god.

Even Haley could top up her goddamn brake fluid. Why she couldn’t do the oil was nobody’s business.

I screwed the cap for the brake fluid back on so tight there was no chance Mr. Elvin’s grandson would try to top it up again—six months ago, he’d mistaken that for engine oil.

That had been a costly mistake for my dad…and for Mr. Elvin.

Mostly for Mr. Elvin, granted, but still.

I grabbed the sheets that detailed what other work needed doing on the car. It was only the windscreen wipers, so I crossed out what I’d just done and set the sheets down on the toolbox next to me. I unhooked the hood and pushed it back down into place.

“Done?” Dex asked.

I shook my head. “Have to change the wiper blades.”

“Back-ordered,” he replied, straightening up and only just avoiding banging his head. “Gonna be another two days.”

I blinked at him. “Why’d you book it if you don’t have them?”

What kind of garage was out of stock of wiper blades?

He came over and picked up the sheet. His blue eyes scanned it side to side before he shook his head and handed me the sheet. “I booked it two weeks ago. They’re back-ordered at the supplier. There’s nothing I can do.”

“I told him he’d have it today.” I slumped back against it. “Ugh. This is annoying.”