So I turned back to the engine. “You always say exactly what you’re thinking?”
“No. This is me filtering heavily.”
“Terrifying.”
“You have no idea.”
I did not need to like her.
I really did not need to like her.
I leaned deeper under the hood and went back to work. The coolant residue had dried in chalky trails near the hose clamp. Belt was cracked worse than I thought. Battery terminals had corrosion. Oil smelled wrong. The knock in the engine bothered me most, though. Deep. Ugly. Expensive. This wasn’t just a truck that had been pushed too hard. This was a truck that had been dying for a while and had finally found a dramatic place to collapse.
Sienna hovered beside me for another minute before she lost the fight with herself.
“What are you checking now?”
“The belt.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
I pointed. “Cracks.”
She leaned in close, her shoulder brushing mine. Her hair slipped forward, and that green apple scent hit again under coffee and heat. Clean, sharp, stubborn.
I didn’t move.
Neither did she.
For a few seconds, we were both bent over the engine, close enough that her arm grazed mine every time she breathed. HerT-shirt brushed my bare side once, damp cotton against hot skin, and my grip tightened on the wrench hard enough to bite into my palm.
She noticed.
Of course she noticed.
“Sensitive?” she murmured.
I turned my head.
Bad idea.
Her face was right there. Too close. Sunlight filtered through the carport beams, striping her cheek, catching the gold-brown flecks in her eyes. She smelled like coffee and borrowed soap and bad decisions waiting for permission.
“Careful,” I said.
Her gaze dropped to my mouth. Fast. Almost accidental.
Almost.
“Is that advice or a threat?”
“Depends what you do next.”
Her lips parted, but no sound came out. Not a gasp. Not some fragile little thing. More like her brain had run into her body at full speed and both sides were arguing over jurisdiction.
Then Bandit screamed from inside the truck.
Sienna jolted back so fast she nearly hit her hip on the fender. “I’m going to donate him to science.”
