Dom and Kevin were whispering in the office; their lowered voices carried out into the work area, but Miguel couldn’t quite make out the words. He had his back to them, working on a faulty fuel injector that was pissing him off. The brothers were arguing. Pretty par for the course; they spent about half their time arguing and half their time defending each other. Although why they were doing it now, when they had work to do, Miguel couldn’t fathom.

The wrench he was using to remove the fuel rail from the intake manifold slipped, scraping painfully against his knuckles.

“Fuck.” Miguel dropped the wrench to shake his hand out, the clatter muffled by the oldies radio station Buck liked blaring another Led Zeppelin song. Miguel hadn’t changed the station; he’d gotten used to listening to it. “Fucking. Fuck.” By the time Buck got back, Miguel’s knuckles were going to be one big black-and-blue mass. He’d used most of the Band-Aids in the shop first-aid kit.

Sleep deprivation was not good. Miguel was still having a difficult time getting used to the noises of his new apartment. And getting used having space to himself. If he was honest, he was having a hard time being alone. He’d been spoiled after a year and a half of living at Buck’s and having people around all the time.

The lack of sleep was making him see things that just weren’t there. That morning, as he’d stumbled out the front door of his building, he thought he saw Justin drive by in a late-model Honda sedan. Gray. The color of almost every late-model Honda ever produced. His adrenaline had spiked, hard. Jumping into Sheila, he had tried to catch up with the vehicle, but it had turned, sedately—not as if it was being chased—onto Main Street and disappeared amongst the morning commuters before he could see who was driving.

Miguel had had to pull to the curb to get his breathing under control. Then it had seemed like a great idea to get a calming cup of coffee, since he was only a few blocks from the Booking Room. Angel was behind the counter taking orders. Miguel’d grabbed his coffee to go when a burly guy wearing real lumberjack clothing—not the hipster knock-offs—came barreling in the front door.

Angel looked cute today, for lack of a better description. He’d lined his eyes with a dark eyeliner, making them pop dramatically on his small face, and his dark lashes accentuated the effect. Miguel stopped in his tracks. There was something off about the customer, and no one was behind the counter with Angel. Miguel fiddled at the to-go counter with cream and sugar while he waited to see what was happening. Hopefully, as with the noises and possible sighting of Justin, he was just hyperaware.

Nope.

“Hey, little girl, can a man get a cup of coffee around here?” Every assumption Miguel ever had about small-town hicks was reaffirmed.

Angel froze.

“Come on, I don’t got all day.” The man’s voice boomed across the café.

Angel noticeably tried to make himself smaller. Miguel thought that if he had the power of invisibility, he would have used it.

Plaid-man must have felt Miguel’s eyes on him. Turning toward him, plaid asked, “Whaddya lookin’ at?” Murky, piggy green eyes stared into Miguel’s own, and he felt himself break out in a cold sweat.

The entire place went dead silent. If it hadn’t been for the ambient sound of humans breathing air in and out, he could’ve heard a pin drop. How was it that three words could have that much effect on a roomful of people?

One of Skagit’s finest chose that moment to come seeking caffeine. Directly across from headquarters, the Booking Room was often full of cops. Today there must have been an all-hands meeting, though, because the only cop on the premises was the one who’d just arrived.

She stopped in the doorway aware and assessing, in that way of experienced cops, her hands a little separate from her body in case she needed to reach her sidearm or grab somebody. Her badge identified her as I. Rouzanov. Miguel hoped Rouzanov could stop whatever was happening before it unraveled any further.

“Something I can help with, folks?” she asked the room. Rouzanov had a pleasant, lilting voice offset by her determined stance. The front door opened again and another cop came in. Miguel had never been so happy to see cops in his life.

Plaid man deflated somewhat in the face of two police officers. Angel was visibly shaking. The incident had taken maybe thirty seconds.

“No ma’am, just getting myself a cuppa joe for the road.” He turned his attention back to Angel. “Anytime now.” He mouthed something Miguel couldn’t hear, but Angel blanched.

Angel tried to be quick, but he was too anxious. Grabbing a sixteen-ounce to-go cup, he turned to the drip coffee station. In his haste, the empty cup flew out of his hand. The man sniggered. Angel grabbed another cup. Miguel could see his hands shaking.

Enough. Where were the other employees? He went behind the counter and gently took the cup from Angel’s hand.

“You’ll be okay,” he said softly. Miguel filled the cup with coffee, jammed a lid on top, and put it on the counter. “Here. Goodbye.”

Plaid took the coffee and threw a couple of dollars on the counter, didn’t bother saying “Thank you,” and left. The door swooshed shut behind him, and everyone left inside released the breath they’d been holding.

Miguel pulled Angel, who was shaking and beyond pale, into his arms, holding him tightly and patting his back. “It’ll be okay,” he said over and over again, as the kid broke down in tears, his face pressed against Miguel’s coveralls. Gently, he tugged Angel into the kitchen area—where there was no one to act as backup—so he could have some privacy while he pulled himself together.

A door at the back of the kitchen opened, and an employee Miguel had never seen before sauntered in, tying an apron around his waist. He brought with him the intense odor of a freshly smoked cigarette. Lovely.

“Get out there and pull your weight. Customers are waiting.” Maybe Miguel was learning a little managing the shop.

Slacker opened his mouth to protest, or something, and Miguel put out a hand palm forward. “Don’t start with me. I’d pray you don’t lose your job.”

 

He shook his hand again to try to get rid of both the sting and the memory from the morning, and glared at the manifold. Between lack of sleep and helping Angel regain his composure, Miguel was done with patience for the day. If Dom and Kevin didn’t get their asses out here and get back to work, he was going to rip them a new one.

“Hey, boss.”

Miguel started. “Jesus,” he snapped, spinning to face Dom. “Do not sneak up on me.”

Dom raised his hands in surrender. “Whoa, dude, you are super touchy. I was just going to tell you that I got the parts ordered for tomorrow, except for the carburetor for that ancient Toyota Land Cruiser you agreed to work on. We’re going to have to call around on that.”

“Yeah, okay. Sorry.” Regret welled; why was he snarling?

Dom cocked his head at Miguel, a question in his eyes. “You wanna hang out with us later? Kevin wants to grab a burger.”

Miguel felt too out of sorts and spiritually rumpled to hang out with the fresh-faced brothers. He was only six years older than Dom; today he felt a million times that. Joking around, trying to figure out who Kevin was mooning over or if Dom had met a girl who could stand him for more than a couple weeks… none of it sounded fun. Neither did his apartment.

“Nah. Thanks for the offer. I’m going to make a last sweep at Buck’s before the honeymooners get back. Water plants and stuff.” Catch up on his favorite crime shows. Snuggle on the couch he missed. Except it wasn’t the same without his friends there.

“All right.” Dom didn’t look convinced but didn’t press the issue.

 

After closing, Miguel changed into street clothes and headed over to Buck’s. Dutifully he watered the plants on the back deck and halfheartedly aimed the hose at the backyard lawn—it was kind of uncool to water your lawn in Skagit. It was still light, because it was July and the sun set late. Turning off the hose, he sat in one of the deck chairs for a while feeling very alone and sorry for himself, watching the bats swoop across the yard searching for bugs. Finally he went inside and turned on the TV, but even a rerun of Sons of Anarchy couldn’t get his spirits up.

His let his eyes drift shut, only to wake up hours later with a jolt. The living room was shadowed, and the TV was no longer on. He must have turned it off. Or rolled on top of the remote. Maybe that’s what had woken him.

The front shade was wide open. Buck’s house was set back from the street, but not so far that Miguel didn’t have a clear view of the jogger making his or her way down the street, away from the house. What was it with middle-of-the-night exercise? The only exercise Miguel liked at midnight was between the sheets.

 

The wall clock ticked past eleven-thirty a.m. Tuesday. Miguel was thinking about ordering lunch for the three of them when the office phone rang. Buck had a bad case of retro; the phone was an old wired-in wall mount. The coiled cord between the body of the phone and the handset was something like fifteen feet long, and Miguel spent more time untangling it than talking on the damn thing.

“Swanfeldt’s Auto,” Miguel said automatically.

“Hey, buddy.” Buck’s warm voice danced across the connection.

“Buck!” Miguel couldn’t believe how happy he was to hear his friend’s voice.

“Everything going okay?”

“Of course. The guys and I have everything under control. What are you doing calling, anyhow? You’re supposed to be on your honeymoon.”

Buck chuckled. “Joey told me you’d say that.”

“How’s the vacation?”

“Between you and me, it’s weird how many adults go to Disney World. We’ve had a great time, though.”

“Tell me you haven’t spent all your time there.”

“Nah, only five days. We went to the beach, and then Joey surprised me with tickets to a car show.”

“You got a nice tan, handsome?”

“I’ve got some color. Joey looks like a toma—”

There was rustling and then Joey’s outraged voice. “I do not look like a tomato, it just takes me a little longer to brown.”

“You’re not a turkey, Joey,” Miguel snickered.

“Annd, everything is okay at home, so I’m hanging up now and hiding the phone. We’ll see you this weekend.” Joey hung up.

Miguel stared at the handset, dial tone blaring before turning to the annoying bleep meaning the connection had been disrupted. He’d hadn’t told them he’d moved out—there’d been no time. He knew Buck was going to be upset; it felt like he was breaking up with his friends.

Absently he hung the handset back up, silencing the bleeping tone.

Nate Richardson walked into the shop. Miguel blinked. That stupid phrase, “A tall drink of water”—that’s what came to mind when Miguel laid eyes on him. Nate had been on his mind since the week before, seriously trying his semi-drunken vow of chastity.

Miguel wasn’t certain if it was cheating if he masturbated to thoughts of a fiery redhead or not. He’d done it anyway. The experience had been unsatisfying. Rubbing one off was fine, but Miguel preferred skin-to-skin contact.

And here was his current fantasy come to life.

“Hello, handsome. You are solace for my poor eyes. I’ve had to look at these two saps all day.” Dom and Kevin rolled their eyes at him in tandem.

Nate reddened and looked down at the floor for a second. “I was wondering, do you guys do oil changes and things like that?”

Miguel waggled his eyebrows. “I would be happy to change your oil.” Something about the quiet federal agent got his engines revving. He couldn’t help flirting with him just to see him blush. He wondered what Nate had been doing over the past week, since their impromptu shopping trip.

“Good lord, Miguel, the guy is going to burst into flame if you keep it up.” That was Kevin, adding his two cents to the conversation. Kevin needed lessons in how to flirt if that was his reaction.

“Look and listen, grasshopper.” Miguel felt more like himself than he had in days. Since the wedding. Since Nate had helped him move his stuff.

“Grasshopper? Miguel, you are weird.” Kevin shook his head in disgust.

“I don’t know,” Nate interjected, “seems to me somebody referencing a movie filmed in the 1980s may need to brush up on his moves. Wasn’t it Pat Morita who had that line?”

Miguel pretended to be horrified. “Are you dismissing my hero, Ralph Macchio?”

“I don’t know what either one of you are talking about,” Kevin muttered. “You flirt back with him at your own risk. That’s all I’m saying.” The comment was directed pointedly at Nate.

“Who’s flirting?” Miguel asked no one in particular. “We’re discussing movies.”

“So, can I get my oil changed or not?” Nate raised a hand to stop what Miguel had been about to say. “For real, oil, the stuff that gurgles out of the ground?”

“Fine. Yes, you can have your oil changed here. Your car’s oil. The other we have to do somewhere else.”

“Do you have no shame?” Nate paused. “Don’t answer. Nobody answer. I don’t want to know.”

Miguel took pity on Nate and belatedly reminded himself he’d recently taken a vow of chastity: no men, no women. No sex. That didn’t mean no touching, though, right?

“Can you come back at the end of the day?” Miguel asked. “We’ve got a couple time-sensitive jobs, but one of us can take care of you—your car,” eyebrow waggle, “before we close.” Besides, that way maybe he could get Nate to cash that rain check for dinner.

Eating wasn’t sex, after all. Eating was just talking and getting to know this person, who Miguel was far more interested in than he should be. And, okay, eating could totally be about sex.