George leans in, lips brushing my hair.
“Come with me.”
The words hit like a spark on dry tinder. My entire body reacts. There’s a rush of want so strong it nearly knocks the breath out of me.
We slip out to grab our coats. George drapes his heavy wool overcoat around my shoulders without asking, the fabric still carrying his warmth. It swallows me, and for a second I let myself drown in it.
Side exit. The Seattle night hits cold as we step into the alley. No one follows. George keeps one hand at the small of my back as we walk, guiding me left down the quiet side street, away from the valets and lingering guests. The award is tucked under my arm. My dress shoes click on the damp pavement. Two blocks of charged silence stretch between us, thick enough to taste. The coat helps, but the real heat is coming from inside me, from the way he’s walking half a step ahead like he knows exactly where this night is going.
George stops under a streetlight.
I step up beside him, and my brain stalls out completely.
No. Fucking. Way.
I turn fully toward it, staring like an idiot. It’s the Gran Torino Sport in a shade of green so dark it’s almost black under the lot lights, chrome catching what little glow there is. Hood scoop. Perfect lines. The whole beautiful, ridiculous machine.
“Is that…”
George grunts beside me, watching my face way too closely. “That’s the one.”
I blink at him, then back at the car.
I move before my better judgment can stop me, circling slowly around the front. By the time I reach the front passenger’s side, I rest my hand on the roof. The metal is cold under my palm.
“Your dad’s dream car,” I say, almost a whisper. “You actually finished it.”
“A while ago,” he responds. He sways a bit, looking strangely unsure of himself for a man built as huge as him. “Had it shipped here.”
I face him, and there again—that tightly controlled hope he’s been carrying these past few months. Seeing it almost hurts.
“Would you like to ride with me, Lance?”
The invitation catches me off guard, and then I suddenly remember that night in his garage back in San Diego. Me sitting on his workbench, making him promise I’d be the first passenger once he finally got this thing running.
Apparently, this stubborn bastard remembered it too.
I hold his gaze over the roof of the car, and then reach for the handle. I climb in before my brain reminds me this is still the man who broke my heart.
49
Lance
The interior smells like leather and something faintly mechanical. The seat is wide and low. The dash is original, with gauges lit soft amber.
George slides into the driver’s seat beside me and turns the ignition.
The engine kicks hard before settling into a rumble that vibrates through the entire frame of the car, deep enough that I can feel it through the seat.
It feels nothing like modern cars. It feels alive.
George pulls out onto the road. I watch the city pass through the window and don’t say anything, and neither does he. Five months since I left San Diego, surviving him in pieces instead of all at once, sitting here beside him feels dangerously close to slipping backward in time. I feel something close to a heartbeat coming back into my chest.
Knowing he’d been sick for over a week made me feel things I had no business feeling. The mental image of him alone in his place, powering through it with no one checking on him, cuts sharper than it should have. I had to dig deep for the scraps of dignity I have left, that means no jumping on the man the second I see him from that fucking stage tonight.
He drives west, and I don’t ask where. The road climbs and then opens up, and suddenly there’s water on our left, a stretch of coastal road with nothing but sky above it, and the sound of the engine, the heater running low.
“If you’re here,” I ask after a while, keeping my tone even, “who’s looking after the shop?”
