"Holt?"
He looks up.
"Tomorrow. We're switching. I'm taking the couch."
His expression shutters. "No."
"Yes. You can't keep doing this. You're going to actually injure yourself—"
"Scout." Firm. Final. "No."
"But—"
"The room is yours. That was the deal." He goes back to his book. "Get some rest. We'll talk about it tomorrow."
Which means we won't talk about it at all. Which means he's made up his mind and nothing I say will change it.
I retreat to the bedroom, frustrated and guilty and something else I can't name. Leave the door cracked like always. Lie in bed listening to him settle, the familiar protest of springs, and think about stubbornness and sacrifice and men who show care through action instead of words.
I fall asleep thinking about the way he looked at me in that sundress. About heat and awareness and the space between us that feels like it's shrinking.
About how I'm not sure I want it to stop.
Chapter 5
I know something's wrong the second I walk into the shop Monday morning.
The air feels different. Charged. Like the moments before a storm except there's not a cloud in the sky and the heat's already climbing toward unbearable. I stop just inside the door, coffee in hand, trying to figure out what's setting off my internal alarm system.
Then I hear it.
Polka music. Loud, cheerful, aggressively German polka music blasting from somewhere in the garage. Not from Finn's usual radio—this is coming from somewhere else, echoing off the metal walls.
Finn's standing in the middle of his workspace, hands on his hips, slowly turning in a circle.
"HOLT."
Holt's at his workbench, back to us, working on something with his usual methodical focus.
He doesn't turn around. "Yes?"
"Where's my phone?"
"How should I know?"
"My phone, Holt. Where is it?"
"Have you tried calling it?"
Finn gestures wildly at the polka music still blaring. "WHAT DO YOU THINK THAT IS?"
"Music?" Holt's shoulders are shaking slightly.
"POLKA, Holt. It's playing polka. On repeat. And I can't find it to make it stop."
"Sounds like a personal problem."
I'm trying not to laugh. Actually biting my lip to keep it in because Finn's starting to tear apart his workspace—lifting toolboxes, checking under rags, moving parts around like his phone might be hiding beneath a carburetor.
