Joy Ride

“Well, if you’d hit the deer, the car would be worse, probably.”

“The deer probably would be, too,” I say, deadpan.

Leon laughs lightly. “True, that.”

I hang up the phone, check my messages, and then I kick the wall.

Slamming the toe of my work boot against the concrete of my shop doesn’t magically deliver a message from Henley to my phone. Nor does it get her to pick up when I call. Every time I try her, it goes straight to voicemail. I’m not sure if she’s ignoring me or if her phone is off.

I’m not sure of anything, especially what to do or say to help her.

This isn’t the engine in a Challenger. This isn’t a set of spanking new features on a Lamborghini. And this sure isn’t Livvy’s old Rolls restored to tip-top condition.

Hell, this is more like my Triumph, bent so far out of shape that even I had to send it to an expert. I know how to fix cars, but that sort of repair job is for someone who specializes in mangled beasts. I build and refine. I don’t pull snarled cars off the side of the road and untangle their broken parts from their whole ones.

I pace around the garage as night falls, wishing I had another vehicle to work on, something to shape from the ground up. Something I know how to do. I don’t know how to make things right with Henley.

I putter around the shelves with my tools for another hour, cleaning and polishing and generally making sure everything is spit-shined. But when I’m done, and she’s still not answering, it’s time for me to get serious.

I lean on the hood of a car and dial my sister’s number.

“Hey, you,” she says on the first ring as the honking of a horn sounds close to the phone. “I’m almost late to a business dinner. I need to be there in one minute.”

I curse under my breath.

“What’s wrong?”

I square my shoulders. “Nothing. I’m fine. I’ll catch you later.”

“Max,” she says, chiding. “Is it Henley? Did you tell her how you felt?”

“That’s not entirely the problem.”

“Then what is entirely the problem? Give it to me in twenty seconds.”

“She lost a huge business deal because of me. Because of us. She’s not talking to me right now.”

“But she’s in love with you, too?”

“What? I didn’t tell her I was in love with her.”

Mia sighs then laughs. “Seriously. It’s like you never learn. Now listen, I need to go, but I’m going to tell you what to do, and if you don’t follow my instructions, I will beat you up with my furious fists and powerful muscles, like I did when were kids.”

“I don’t remember it working out that way.”

“Then you’re remembering wrong,” she says, and then she gives me her recipe to fix my broken relationship. And recipe, I suppose, is fitting, since she sends me to a baker.

48

Chase wears a stethoscope when he answers the door. He sets the disc on my chest. I swat it off. He places the back of his hand on my forehead.

“Mild fever,” he declares, then pats my throat. “Tender glands.” He taps on my skull. “Oh, wait. I found the cause.” He turns to Josie, who’s wiping flour off her hands on a cherry-patterned apron. “Nurse, it seems our patient has a case of man-itis.”

She shoots him a doubtful look. “Are you sure, Doctor? I thought he had acute man-itis brought on by complications of lovesickness as well as failure-to-tell-the-woman-he-loves-that-he-loves-her.”

I point my thumb at the stairwell. “What do you know—there’s an opening for me at urgent care right now, and it comes without any hazing. See you all later.”

I turn to go, and Chase clamps a hand down on my shoulder. I could shrug it off. I’m bigger and stronger than he is. But his words keep me here. “C’mon, jackass. What did you expect? You gave me a hard time about Josie, and look where I am.” He gestures to the woman of his dreams making cinnamon rolls in his kitchen on a Sunday evening. The bastard is ridiculously happy, something I was twenty-four hours ago. Now, I feel ridiculously clueless.

I sigh and head into his apartment. “Mia made me come over,” I mutter.

“Sisters are so smart,” Josie says.

“Take it from her,” Chase says. “The woman has two older brothers of her own. She knows her stuff.”

“That I do. Also, Mia texted me a nine-one-one.” Josie pats a chair at the kitchen table and tells me to sit. She sets her chin in her hands. “I understand you need a little help from a lady to sort things out with your lady.”

I hold out my hands, showing there’s nothing in them. I’ve come up empty. “This isn’t an engine in a Dodge. I don’t entirely know what to do. But Mia said I’d need a woman to walk me step-by-step through how to properly apologize, and she was heading into a dinner. So here I am.”

Josie smiles and pats my hand. “Well, first, you’re going to take some of my cinnamon rolls when you go see her, and you’re going to tell her they’re an invitation to come over for dinner when you sort this out. But before you do that, tell me what’s going on.”

Chase joins us, parking his butt on a chair, too. They listen as I tell them the basics. “And honestly, I feel like it’s all my fault,” I say, when I’m done.

Josie gives me a sympathetic smile. “Some of it is.”

“But that doesn’t mean you can’t fix it,” Chase adds, this time without teasing or giving me a hard time.

I scrub a hand across my jaw. “What do I fix? Does she even want to see me again? Is what I did so awful?”

“Let’s break this down,” Josie says. “You held something back, and you covered it up. I get that you had your reasons, but you need to apologize. You also need to let her into your whole heart. She’s going through something tremendously shitty. Having a huge deal pulled out from under her is awful.”

“I can’t even imagine,” I say, because the reality is I’ve been both good and lucky in business. I learned my trade, put in my time, and then moved up. Each year I became better, and each year my business grew.

Henley has been dealt some bad breaks. In some cases, she bore a decent part of the responsibility, like in our split. But this one? This one is Grade A, top choice, absolutely unfair, and not her fault.

“Let me help you imagine how she feels, then,” Josie says, meeting my gaze. “She probably feels like a failure. She probably feels like she’s been judged. And she probably also feels like she put herself on the line for you.”

Chase chimes in, “You just need to let her know you’re there for her.”

I flash back on one of the last things she said to me at the train station. She wasn’t even sure if she had a job anymore, and she wished she could have come to me for advice.

That’s when I know what to do. I know exactly how to restore this old junker of mine.

I push back on the chair and stand up. “I’ve got it.” I clap my brother on the back. “Thanks, man.” I give Josie a hug and then head to the door.

“Why do I feel like he’s about to make things worse?” Chase asks Josie nervously.

I glance back, and Josie shrugs. But the look in her green eyes is a hopeful one. “I bet he knows what he’s doing.”

She hands me a bag of cinnamon rolls, and I go.