Downfall(12)

It was easy to see he wanted to argue about me paying him back, but eventually, he relented. He seemed to know it was a sticking point for me. I couldn’t take something without at least the illusion of being able to give something back. The arm I was still clutching like a lifeline flexed again and then he shook me loose. Solo inclined his head toward the back door, wordlessly indicating I should put my sleeping child in her car seat so he could get back to his busy day.

After a sleepy Noble was situated, I straightened and blinked in surprise at the sight of the big man already behind the steering wheel of my car. Sure, the stupid thing had been nothing more than a paperweight before he worked his magic under the hood, but it was my paperweight. Shouldn’t he at least ask if it was okay for him to drive?

Our eyes met briefly in the rearview mirror and I watched with a mild flare of irritation as his mouth quirked up in a knowing grin. My aggravation was apparently stamped all over my face. He lifted an eyebrow and the grin morphed into a blindly attractive smile. He had straight, pearly-white teeth and a tiny dimple in one of his cheeks. When he relaxed and smiled, his entire face lit up and made him look younger and less intimidating. It was getting harder to remember why I didn’t think guys who looked like him did nothing for me, because there was a whole lot of something starting to happen deep down inside of me the longer we stared silently at each other in the mirror.

“The garage where I work isn’t exactly open to the public and it isn’t all that easy to find. It’s sort of a referral-only kind of place, way off the beaten path, even for this city. It’s easier if you let me drive there. I can get in no matter what I’m driving. If you drive, I’ll have to get out and explain what’s going on to my boss once we get there, and then there’s a good chance he might not let you through the gate. Get in and let’s get going. I swear I’ll have you tuned-up and on your way in under an hour. You just have to trust me a little while longer.”

Trust wasn’t something I had a wealth of anymore. Those reserves had been tapped and drained long ago, but it wasn’t as if I had much choice in this particular situation. Solo was the only person in recent memory who hadn’t let me down.

I rolled my eyes at him in the mirror and flounced my way into the passenger seat. It was a place I swore I would never be again once I took back control of my life. Even if I was going nowhere and running into dead end after dead end, I was determined to be the one driving. Except now this enigmatic, complicated stranger had the keys to my car and he was the one deciding where we were headed. A shiver raced up my spine when I realized I was less bothered by that fact than I thought I would be. Instead of bristling, I wanted to acquiesce and let him handle things for the rest of the afternoon. I wanted a brief reprieve from holding the entire universe together with nothing more than grit and determination. It was unnervingly easy to relinquish all the control over to him that I held onto so tightly.

That kind of thinking was going to get me in trouble. I knew what happened when you let someone else call the shots, and it wasn’t anything I ever wanted to relive again. I needed to accept the help Solo was offering, and then quickly rebuild all the walls I’d erected around my life since moving to the city. It was too dangerous for me to let anyone else in. The ledge I was clinging to was too narrow as it was, there wasn’t room for anyone else in the mess which was my life. He might not have time to hold my hand and show me the way the world worked in this broken city he seemed so fond of, but I sure as hell didn’t have a minute to waste on the kind of complication and heartbreak the man sitting next to me was sure to bring wherever he went.





Solo



I watched as the massive metal gates wrapped in barbed wire slowly slid open. I actually found the groan and creak of the motion comforting. Once I was behind them, the rest of the world fell away and it was just me and whatever project the Boss handed down for the day. I didn’t have to worry about the ever-expanding laundry list of things I had to take care of day in and day out. I didn’t have to think about the future or what it was going to look like for me. I didn’t have to obsess about my mother or all the different ways I wished things were different for her and if I was doing enough to take care of her. Once those gates slid closed, I knew my role and what was expected of me. It was about the only time while I was awake when I fully managed to switch the hyperactive, overachieving part of my mind completely off. Here, I wasn’t spinning my wheels, I was working on the Boss’s wheels, and I knew exactly what he expected of me: hard work and perfect execution.

I felt Orley tense up. Good Lord, was she an uptight little thing. I wanted to tell her she was too young to have permanent frown lines etched into her forehead. She was also too pretty for me to take the scowl cemented across her elegant features seriously. It was clear she had a redhead’s temper hidden under her outer shell of fear and unease, but her fire was barely a spark in a place that burned with rage and anger on a daily basis. She was going to have to let go of the rigid hold on her emotions if she wanted to compete with the torrent of fury that flooded the place we called home.

I nodded my head at Nestor, one of the guys who stood guard inside the gates. I noticed the way his gaze traveled over the woman in the passenger seat, but he waved me through without question, just like I knew he would. The barbed wire and armed ex-con were good indications that this side of the garage wasn’t exactly on the up and up. You wouldn’t find minivans needing tires rotated and four-door sedans waiting on an oil change back here. The Boss didn’t do those things. The Boss owned the entire block. This was the original garage Gus handed down to the new owner when he passed away. These cars weren’t going back to their owners unless they paid an astronomical amount. These cars were collateral. They were snatched in the middle of the night, and either held until debt was paid or stripped down and sent overseas. This part of the garage was the largest working chop-shop on the West Coast. The regular garage was on the other side of the block, and just like I told Orley, the only way you were getting your car through the bay door on this side of the street was by referral. The line between the legal and illegal sides of the Boss’s businesses was blurry, at best.