“It’s okay. I appreciate the encouragement, but I should really move on. What’s the use of wanting something you can’t have?”

Her question stuck in my head.

I thought about it that night when Griffin cleared space in his bedroom closet for me and watched me hang up some dresses. I thought about it Thursday evening as I cheered on his team during another big win, wearing his Bulldogs shirt from last year. I thought about it on Friday morning when the new furniture arrived and we set it up in the lobby together, and later that afternoon when we hung the canvas prints of his family on the walls. He looked at the photo of him and his dad for several minutes, saying nothing.

“You look like him,” I said. “Which is a compliment, because he’s very handsome.” It was the truth. Hank Dempsey’s good looks were a little darker than Griffin’s—although I could see where Cheyenne had gotten her wide brown eyes and full black lashes—but the bone structure was eerily similar. The cut of the jaw, the strong nose, the wide mouth.

Griffin put his arms around me. “He’d have liked you.”

“You think so?” My heart warmed at the compliment.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re genuine.”

Tipping my head back, I smiled up at him. “Keep going.”

He laughed. “You’re beautiful. You’re sweet. You’re funny. Even though half the time it’s unintentional.”

I stuck my tongue out at him.

“You work hard. You smell good all the time. And you’ve got this bottom lip that drives me wild.” He took it between his teeth and gave it a tug.

“I don’t think your dad would have cared about my bottom lip.”

“But I do.”

With my arms around his waist and my eyes closed, I pressed my cheek to his warm, broad chest and tried very hard not to feel like I was falling for someone that would never belong to me.

Sixteen

Griffin

Early Friday morning, a car was towed to the garage with a dead battery. We weren’t too busy, so I went into the lobby to get Blair.

“Time for a lesson,” I told her. “Go upstairs and put on something grubby.”

She touched her chest, looking slightly offended. “I don’t own anything grubby.”

I rolled my eyes. “Do you have a pair of jeans?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, put them on and take a T-shirt from my dresser to wear over it. Make sure to put your hair back too, and meet me out in the lot in ten minutes.”

She stood up and saluted me. “Yes, sir.”

Ten minutes later, she came trotting out to the lot. “Okay, boss, I’m ready.”

I took one look at her and started to laugh. She’d traded her usual sundress for a pair of baggy jeans, which were cuffed at the ankle, and one of my T-shirts, which was knotted at her waist. On her feet were a pair of pristine white sneakers, and her ponytail was pulled through the back of a Bellamy Creek Garage baseball cap.

“What’s funny?” she asked, looking down at her outfit.

“Nothing,” I said. “It’s just, you look like Auto Repair Barbie or something.”

She put her nose in the air. “Well, Auto Repair Barbie better earn her name by learning a skill. Now are you going to teach me one or not?”

“I will teach you one.”

She held up a finger. “Without laughing.”

I shook my head, grinning even wider. “I will really fucking try.”

“Okay,” I said. “So to review, once you have the two cars pulled up close enough for the jumper cables to reach, make sure they’re both in park, put the parking brake on, and take the keys out of the ignition.”

Blair nodded, looking back and forth between my truck and the Ford SUV with the dead battery. They were nose to nose in the lot with their hoods propped open, which I’d shown her how to do. “Got it,” she said.

“Okay, now let’s look at the battery of my truck. Get up on that stool so you can see.”

She climbed up on the stool I’d brought out for her and peered tentatively beneath the truck’s hood, almost like she was afraid something might jump out and bite her.

“Know where the battery is?” I asked.

She pointed at the carburetor. “That?”

I tried and failed to hide a grin. “Nope. It’s this box over here.”

“Oh.” She poked my shoulder. “You promised not to laugh at me.”

“I’m beginning to regret that promise.” I tweaked the cap on her head. “But I’ll keep trying.”

I explained how to identify the positive and negative terminals of a car battery, then asked her to locate the battery of the SUV—which she did.

“Good job,” I said, tugging her ponytail. “Now can you find the positive and negative?”

She pointed to the little red and black tubes on the Ford’s battery. “There. Right?”

“Good job. You learn fast.”

“Thank you.” She smiled proudly. “I didn’t think I’d be good at this stuff.”

“You’d be good at anything. Now let’s look at the jumper cables.”

Next, I showed her how to attach the alligator clips of the jumper cables to each terminal—starting with red to dead. “Always start with the dead battery first. That’s the safest,” I explained. “Leave the black end alone for now, but don’t let it touch any metal.”

“Got it,” she said.

“Next, you’re going to attach the red and black leads to the good battery. Start with red.” I held out the ends of the cables to her.

“You want me to do it?” she asked, shocked.

“Yes. I have confidence in you. Just don’t let them touch, and do it exactly the way I showed you.”

She took the leads from me, careful not to let them touch, and climbed up the stool again. With her bottom lip caught between her teeth, she attached the red clip to the positive terminal, then the black to the negative. “Like that?”

“Exactly.”

She turned to me and held out her palms. “My hands are shaking.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. I feel like one wrong move and your car will explode. Along with my face.”

I smiled. “I would never let anything happen to that face. You’re doing fine.”

“Thanks. So now do I attach the last black end to the dead black terminal?”

My heart rate tripled. “No!” I said quickly, shaking my head. “Never do that.”

“Why not?”

“It will cause a spark, which could possibly ignite fumes and lead to an explosion.”

She blinked at me. “I am so not qualified for this.”

“Yes, you are. Come on. We’re almost done.”

A few minutes later, everything was hooked up. “Now what?” she asked.

“Now I’ll start the truck, and we’ll let it run for two minutes.”

“I’m nervous,” she said, wringing her hands together as we waited.