“You should be wearing hat, scarf and gloves,” he said as we climbed in.
In the dim garage, I could only make out the strongest angles of his face: slope of nose and curve of jaw. My breath misted before me, and I rubbed my palms together, afraid to touch the steering wheel. “How old are you again? Forty-six? Besides, I thought I’d be working in your nice, warm house all day, no need for winter bundling. So you should really apologize for springing surprise stick lessons on me. I’m coping like a champ, right?”
He grinned and reached over to stick the key in the ignition. Ridiculous as it was, when his arm brushed close to me and the metal clicked in, my stomach fluttered. I was too flustered to listen when he explained how to start the car, so he had to repeat himself, and then I felt like such a dipshit that my cheeks burned like twin emergency flares. So much for learning to relax around him. Somehow I managed to pump the gas while doing whatever with the clutch well enough to start the motor. The truck sounded like it was in good shape.
“Let it run for a few minutes, get the engine good and hot.” Seriously, did he have to say stuff like that? In anyone else, I’d be sure it was a double entendre, but that wasn’t how he operated, and certainly not with me. He proved it by continuing, “It’ll take a while for the heater to kick in, too.”
Nodding, I rubbed my hands together, trying and failing to warm them. Rob took over, pressing my fingers between his palms. My toes curled. “You know, the ancient Norse had a long tradition of warming their hands on each other’s bellies.”
I didn’t expect that to work, but Rob rewarded me with another smile. I’d say all kinds of crazy shit to keep him looking at me like that...while holding my hands. The next moment proved definitively that I didn’t have mind-control powers, though, because the frantic refrain of kiss me kiss me kiss me running through my head didn’t stop him from letting go.
“Good thing I’m not Norse,” he said, checking the vents for hot-air flow.
You’re better, like Thor’s hotter, sweeter cousin. But I didn’t say it out loud. He didn’t enjoy being praised for his looks; in fact, it made him feel bad, probably because nobody but me could find any other good points to mention. I could’ve written a dissertation on The Ways Robert Clayton Conrad Is Completely Awesome, but for some reason, no graduate program was offering credit for this expertise.
“Explain the gears to me one more time?” The imprint of what gears were located where had faded somewhat over the years. Rob doubtless knew it by touch, but I was a manual novice. Any other guy would be making all the penis jokes in the world, but he only repeated the information with imperturbable calm.
“Got it?” he asked.
I huffed out a breath. “I’m freaking out. I’ll ruin your truck. You shouldn’t trust me to do this—there’s snow on the ground.”
“But not on the roads,” he said patiently. “Put it in Reverse, give it some gas. You can do it, Lauren. You’re smart and it’s not that hard. If I can learn, anyone can.”
Only the fact that I was doing things with both feet and backing out of his garage while trying not to hyperventilate kept me from yelling at him. Even though I grew up multitasking, I could only do so many things at once. Swear to God, I was seeing stars by the time I cleared the doors, and my hands were shaking on the wheel.
“You weren’t kidding,” he said, brows furrowing. Then his hands were on my shoulders and he brought my face really close, to the point I could feel the warmth of his breath and see the dark stubble on his chin. I’d never been this close to Rob’s mouth, his amazing, perfectly shaped mouth. But he maintained eye contact, intent on calming me down. “It’s okay. You’ve got this. You can do it. Breathe for me. Okay? In. Out.”
He probably didn’t mean for me to think about sex when he said that, but I couldn’t help where my mind went. Ironically, it took care of my nerves and made me squirmy, suddenly aware of the powerful engine rumbling the seat of the old truck. I’d much rather climb on top of Rob than learn how to drive stick, but he registered that I was no longer a vibrating anxiety ball and let go of me.
“Better? I don’t want to force you.”
This wasn’t even a full-on panic attack. Imagine how he’d react if he ever saw one. Because I couldn’t stand for him to think of me as broken, I nodded. “Let’s do it.”
Then the lesson commenced for real. I stalled out the first time I switched out of Reverse and it took me forever to turn the truck around. But I did not launch the vehicle through the wall of his house and I eventually made it down his driveway. I had another mini-panic attack about getting out on the open road, but once I made the turn, upshifting wasn’t such a problem. He explained how I’d likely have the most trouble at stop signs and traffic lights—that downshifting was trickier, unless I was going up a mountain.
At that point, I laughed and shook my head. “I have no plans to take your truck any farther than work and home. I’m afraid I’ll ruin it.”
“Don’t be nervous,” he said. “You’re already better than I was my first time. My granddad predicted I’d strip the gears, the way I was going, and the transmission would fall out.” He paused. “That didn’t happen, either. In time, you’ll be so good at this, you’ll wonder why you were ever scared. Turn here.”
Here was the Walmart parking lot. I managed to stop the truck and shut it off without anything catastrophic happening. “Thanks.” At the inquiring tilt of his head, I added, “That wisdom applies to every new thing I’ll ever try in my life.”
He shot me a surprised look. “Seriously?”
“Well, yeah.”
“Nobody’s ever said that to me...when they weren’t fucking around.”
“It’s good advice.” Hesitating, I wondered if I should admit this, but he’d said that we were friends. “I’m not very adventurous. It stresses me out to change my routine. In some respects I’m close to obsessive about doing things the same way.”
That was part of why I was so unhappy in Michigan— because I was fighting my instinctive tendencies, playing a role and thinking if I just tried hard enough, I could just feel like other people did, and I could act like the stress of seeing hundreds of people daily didn’t bother me. Nadia was fine with it, but she was closer to normal. She didn’t spend an hour bracing for social contact and when we went out, she was more or less herself whereas I was always playing a part—the role of extrovert Lauren.
For a few seconds, he didn’t reply, and I wished I hadn’t opened up. Swallowing hard, I dredged up a cheerful expression. “Too much, huh? So did you want to get something or—”
“I count things,” he said.
“Huh?”
“I don’t like odd numbers, either.”
Astonished, I studied him, trying to decide if he was screwing with me. But the slightly anxious pleat between his brows promised sincerity.
“I’m not crippled by it or anything, but when I take nails out of a package, I always get two, and I decided not to buy the first house I liked because the address ended in three.” He stared at his hands like he expected me to condemn him for being weird, when I’d just confessed to being overly attached to my little rituals.
Learning this made Rob feel more like a real friend, less the guy who solved my problems and who I’d never get to be with for oh-so-many reasons. It helped to discover he had quirks, too, in addition to the insecurity over the looks-versus-brains dichotomy I already knew about.
I leaned over and bumped my shoulder against his. “Your secret is safe with me.”
Rob’s gaze was steady on mine. For a few seconds, I felt like he actually saw me—not as Nadia’s friend or his surrogate sister, but as a person—and that moment was electric. His fingers flexed against his knees, then he