Don’t even think about trying to figure him out, she warned herself. Darn it all if Drake wasn’t one of the worst things on the planet. He wasinteresting. That was hard to come by in her neck of the woods. Heck, interesting things were hard to come by in her life.
She liked it that way.
Except now. Now she may not be able to go back to her cabin and live the quiet life she’d so carefully constructed. Drake’s brand of mystery man wouldn’t get out of her head. It didn’t matter if she spent twenty years alone in the woods, she’d always wonder.
“Well, shoot,” she mumbled, because the only way she was going to figure this out was to ask all her questions. Once she satiated her need for answers, she’d be able to let him go and not look back.
How hard could it be to figure out a man, anyway?
CHAPTERELEVEN
Drake made his way back to Otis’s shop to see if he’d been able to tow the trailer yet. Going back to the B&B meant talking to Hannah and Judy. While the women were full of holiday cheer–Hannah overly excited about the chance to save Christmas–he couldn’t sit by the fireplace and hang out when there was so much to do. Movement, work, and solving problems with his own two hands would do his nerves a lot of good.
That moment in the snow with Clove so close he could have kissed her was illuminating. She’d been pretty–gorgeous, really–from the moment he’d laid eyes on her. She was also every bit the cantankerous woman who threatened to put a restraining order on him if he didn’t stop calling her about Felix. But there was a wink of time when he’d seen past her walls and his heart opened up to wrap around hers–claiming her. All of her. The soft parts that loved Felix and Hannah and the prickle parts that pushed him away.
He chuckled happily thinking of her kicking snow on him in frustration. At least he’d gotten a reaction out of her. Maybe not the one he wanted but a reaction, nonetheless. Or, maybe it was what he needed at the moment. Kissing her would have overwhelmed him and not allowed him time to process everything. He still hadn’t processed it. He did that best when his hands were busy–therefore; he needed to get to work.
Otis’s shop was made of thick wooden beams overlaid with gray sheets of metal, heavily insulated on the inside, and finished with unpainted plywood walls and tons of homemade 2x4 shelves. It was like a lot of mechanic/welding/wood shops in his hometown where farmers knew everything from diesel mechanics to soil pH and needed the equipment to do it all themselves.
An oversized garage door took up half of one wall. A dump truck could fit through there–and probably had. Which worked out well for Drake because the stock trailer was taller than the average vehicle.
Projects cluttered the corners. He used the termprojectslightly, as it was unlikely Otis would have or make the time to finish them. If he had children, they’d end up hauling most of this to the scrapyard after he died. Pax kept their welding shop clean–he couldn’t stand to have things half-finished. If you started something–you’d better finish it or he would.
He’d parked the stock trailer inside. A wood-burning stove, sitting on a bed of cinderblocks, blazed in the corner away from combustible materials. It baked the chill off and made it possible to work without coats. Drake removed his and laid it on an old metal desk that had paint thick enough to keep it from rusting for a thousand years. He cuffed his hoodie sleeves.
“Do ya need gloves?” Otis called from under the trailer. His overall-clad legs and work boots stuck out. Three jacks kept the trailer up high enough for him to work. Drake checked their placement and the stability–good job.
“I have some in the tack room.” He went there and found leather work gloves, tucking them into his back pocket. Moving around the trailer, he squatted next to Otis’s legs. “What’s the verdict?”
Otis wiggled out. He’d cut open a cardboard box and laid it down on the oil-stained concrete floor. His dark blue overalls wore thin at the knees and his heavy flannel shirt had a hole in the shoulder and dark stains. “You’re in luck. We can take this piece off and get her straightened out today.”
That was a lot of work to do in five hours, but if Otis thought they could accomplish it, then he was game to try. He’d mentally prepared himself for a week in Windy Planes–with two days of welding on this section alone. “That’s great.”
“Don’t get too happy on me. The axel is another story. We’ll have to clean off all the rust, fabricate a new wheel disc and weld them together.”
“I don’t suppose you have a new axle just lying around here, do you?” He craned his neck to look around. Christmas miracles happened all the time–wasn’t he due for one right about now?
Scratch that. His motives might be in the right place, but his deeds didn’t line up with a few of the Big Ten Commandments.
Otis chuckled. “Nope.”
Drake’s hopes fell like sleet with a vengeance on a cold winter night. “I didn’t think so.”
“But I have enough metal that we can fabricate one. Shouldn’t take me more than a few hours.”
Drake considered him. “Really? Just a few hours.”
Otis nodded, scrubbing at an oil stain on his pant leg as if it would come off with a bit of spit shine and was much more interesting that whatever Drake wanted to talk about.
Fabricating parts was precise work that required a lot of training and even more skill. If Otis could do that, then his time was worth a lot more money than the deal they’d made on a handshake. Drake felt humbled by his obvious gift. He didn’t know Drake from Adam and yet he spent his time before the holiday getting him back on the road.
Rather than embarrass the man by gushing with gratitude, Drake clapped him on the back. “Let’s get started.” They began by removing parts. Drake deferred to Otis, taking instruction and doing what he was told. Grunting, sweating, and muscling heavy things freed his mind to concentrate on other things. He continually went back to Clove and the entrance to her heart, wondering how he could get inside. She had it locked up tighter than Santa’s workshop.
His next thought was why he would even want to try. Nothing could happen between them. They lived in different states and he had no intention of becoming romantically involved long-term with any female. Still, he sensed she needed someone she could count on, and a part of him wanted to be that man. Could he do that and not be more to her? A bigger question was, could he be her Superman without falling in love with her?
When his puzzler became too puzzled to puzzle over her more, he applied his problem-solving skills to the broken grandfather dog sled and Otis’s dreams.
Drake grunted as he lifted a section of metal to the worktable. “Are there any rules about sled construction? Like what it’s made of or the shape?”
