Chapter 9

Jamie

Was there anything dumber than hanging around my place, even though I was all ready for work, delaying the inevitable? I didn't want to be in the workshop early, I reasoned. Me and Brock together in the same space… My whole body shivered, but was that from anticipation or fear? I didn't know and I didn't want to. Finally, the clock ticked past the point I needed to leave if I was going to beat peak hour traffic, so I grabbed my stuff.

And a bag of nice clothes I'd packed last night.

Would I put them on after work? Would I go and have pizza with Brock and then go walk along the beach? All of that sounded relatively low key, so it was no big deal, right? Right? I'd packed the bag, unpacked it, then repacked it, reasoning that I'd leave it in the back of my car, ready to use if I wanted it and not if I didn't.

And now I needed to get my arse to work.

I pulled up outside the garage with a minute until starting time, feeling tired and wired. I hadn't had time to grab a coffee on the way, so I'd need to throw down a mug of the gross instant stuff in the break room before I got to work, the thought of that preoccupying me as I walked in the door.

Only to find Brock standing there with a takeaway cup in hand. It smelled freaking amazing, and Clinton grinned at the sight of it.

"Got me a coffee, boss? Thanks!"

He went to reach for it, earning him a growl from Brock, but right as I came to a standstill, those pale-brown eyes swung my way.

Shit.

Shit, shit, shit.

He went to give it to me instead, everything happening in slow motion. I caught Clinton's gleeful look, as he whacked Ken in the guts and gestured. All the guys were turning around to watch the moment when Brock handed me the coffee like a relay racer would a baton. Eyes went wide, fingers pointed, elbows went into ribs, but all that was blocked out as Brock came to stand in front of me. Reality snapped back abruptly as his hands went around mine, forcing me to clasp the coffee.

"I figured you might need this to get through the day," he said, his voice a low rumble.

"Mouse gets a coffee?" Clinton complained. "Where's mine?"

"In the bloody coffee pot, where it always is," Brock snapped.

Clinton shouldered forward, looking the two of us up and down. I was forced to jerk my hands back, bringing the cup with me.

"What, no special coffee for me?" Clinton asked. "What do I need to do to have you standing by the door with a drink for me when I arrive?"

"Do some fucking work for a change?" Brock replied, shooting him a withering look, but it'd take more than that to keep Clinton down. "That'd be real special."

"So what did Mousey do that was special?"

Clinton sounded like a teenager, all ooh, Jamie's talking to a boy shit, so I pushed forward.

"Turn up to work on time." I poked him in the chest, forcing him back. "Get my jobs done." Another poke. "Not spend half the day outside on a ‘smoke break.' Keep my mouth shut and?—"

"Date me." You could've heard a pin drop in that moment, the rough industrial sounds of the warehouses near us fading away, replaced by the thudding of my heart. Each of the men I worked with came to attention like a hound on the hunt. I swallowed, went to say something, to deny this, argue, explain, but no words came out. "Isn't that right, babe?"

Damn Millie and her plots , I thought dimly, as Brock's arm snaked around me, unable to avoid the satisfying sensation of having its heavy presence around my waist. That feeling of pleasure, of being sheltered and protected from the world only intensified as my back hit his chest. It was the feel of his nose nuzzling in my hair that had me stiffening, that move far too personal for this situation.

This man.

Clinton's lips twitched, his eyes dancing with a manic light, right before he turned to Ken and Gary.

"Told you! Pay up, bitches."

I frowned as I watched the two older men grumble and drag out their wallets, twenty bucks each handed over. "I knew they were into each other. There's no other way Jamie could resist my charms."

"Oh my god, I'm going to throw up," I mumbled.

"Now, fifty bucks they're banging before the end of the week," Clinton continued. "Any takers? Anyone?"

Thankfully the other guys just shook their heads, obviously not wanting to get involved in this, but Clinton was too stupid to know when he was crossing a line. The only warning I got was the tensing of Brock's arms, right before he snapped.

"You'd do well to never mention the word sex and my girl in the same sentence." Brock sounded more animal than man. "Everyone's got work to do. Let me know if you don't."

All the humour was sucked from the air and the guys nodded and turned to wander off into the workshop. I went to do the same, but Brock's grip on me tightened.

"If I could have a quick word?" I said between gritted teeth. "Babe?"

"Anything you want," he said with a grin.

This was a terrible, terrible plan. The warmth in his voice seeped into me like the heat from the coffee cup, driving the morning chill from my bones, but once we were upstairs and in his office, I turned to face him.

"What the fucking hell?" I hissed, shooting a look at the glass windows that displayed a view of the workshop below. Everyone was doing as they were told and getting on with their work. "What was that?"

"How are you going to convince your mother you're dating me if your own workmates know nothing about it?" he asked, that little smug smile of his driving me mad.

"She's not likely to come by here!" I snapped. I tried to imagine Mum picking her way up the driveway, across the wet and muddy gravel, and failed. I'm fairly sure Dad handled all the car services.

"I didn't do that so your mum could gossip with Clinton and get the details on our relationship," he replied all too calmly. "I did it because if we can convince the guys we work with that there's something going on, then we've got a chance of tricking your mother."

"Oh." Seconds ago I was feeling flushed with anger, but that all washed away abruptly, leaving me a little cold. "I didn't think of that. I thought…"

What had I thought? There wasn't a lot of conscious thought in my head when he was holding me, and as I looked up, there wasn't much more as I stared at him. Brock was a good looking guy. With a tousled head of brown hair and a neatly trimmed beard, his flannel shirt had him looking a little lumbersexual. Like he could pick you up and toss you over his shoulder with little effort, then drag you off to his lair. Maybe he did that with the girls he dated, though I'd never met one. Maybe he carried them kicking and screaming over to his bed and then when he threw them down… I stopped that train of thought abruptly with a shake of my head.

"I'm sorry. I know you're just doing this…" I held up the coffee. "As a favour to Millie. I didn't plan for her to ask you, to put you in this position. That…" I jerked my head towards the front door. "Makes sense now. You're just trying to help me make a lie look like the truth. I guess we should've talked about that before now." I stopped, pursing my lips and then forced myself to smile. "So…" I turned to face him. "How did you want our fake relationship to go? Can we avoid a big, messy breakup that will make everything awkward?"

"If you want."

Sometimes it was like you had to drag every word from Brock, and I felt that right now. One of us needed to grab the bull by the horns and apparently that was me.

"So the date tonight…" I blinked. "We go on that, make sure everyone knows?—"

"They will when we up and leave the pub," he reasoned, stepping closer in the slow way one might use with a frightened animal. "That's why I figured I'd broach the issue now. If everything's out in the open?—"

"They won't spend the night gossiping their heads off, coming up with crazier and crazier stories about where we've gone." I nodded. "OK, so we've hard launched… whatever this is." I flicked my finger between him and me. "So I guess we need to establish the ground rules, get our stories straight. You're gonna call me… babe." I snorted. The awkwardness of this threatened to overwhelm me, but I had to remember I was the one doing this to myself. "Should I?—?"

"Call me whatever you want," he said, still closing the gap between us.

"Honey pie?" His look of horror inspired me. "My sweet pumpkin munchkin? Love nuggets?"

I grinned when he winced.

"Maybe something that won't get me harassed by the fellas?"

"Love?" Nope, no way, that was too big a word to use. "Darling?" That sounded like something a grand lady would say. "Honey? Sweetie?"

I let out a hopeless groan because every word felt like an ill-fitting pair of overalls. The straps were sagging, but the seam was creeping up my butt, until he grabbed my hands.

Was it just that it'd been over a month since a man had touched me? That had to be the explanation for why a thrill went through me the minute our hands joined. I felt the calluses, the coarse skin as his fingers rubbed against mine, somehow better than the softest of caresses, silencing the frantic shriek of my thoughts until I could finally take a full breath. He watched me let it out again, all the tension washing away with a nod.

"You don't have to overthink it. I didn't walk in here this morning and wait for you to arrive thinking I was going to call you babe in front of the guys." He bent down slightly to ensure he met my eyes. "I didn't anticipate they had a betting pool going." I winced. "I'll have a word with them about that."

"No, it's fine." I squeezed his hands and then pulled away. "Everything will be fine. In a little over a week, all this will be over with and Clinton will be focussed on something else." I smiled. "I've just got to pretend that you're not my boss, not the guy who saw me strip nuts and nearly use the wrong oil when changing it over. Not the guy that used to frown at me when I was a little girl, hanging around your house way too much."

I poked a finger in the air.

"If I put all that history aside and replace it with something else." My mouth moved faster, the words spilling out as I realised a way through this. "Saw you as some guy I met at the pub one night…"

As a man, that went unsaid, my mind bucking and twisting like a wild horse in response to that idea, the labels of Millie's grumpy older brother, my boss, too big and expansive to allow that. It was OK, I only needed to pretend for a bit over a week.

"I'll just wing it," I said finally, "though we need to talk about how we're going to break up."

"Not yet," he said with a deadly finality, forcing me to look up at the clock. Minutes were ticking by, minutes he paid me to work.

"I need to get back to the cars," I said with a nod. "Got it.

It was a relief to turn on my heel and walk back downstairs. Clinton looked up and shot me a mischievous grin, but a dark look from me had him turning back to whatever job he was working.

"What needs doing?" I asked Gary.

"The Ford Falcon has an engine whine," he said, pointing to a newer model car parked in the garage.

"Got it."

Moving forward, popping the bonnet, grabbing my tools, these were all pleasantly familiar, helping settle me, but Gary sidled up.

"You OK, Jamie?"

The man was over fifty, had a wife he'd been with since they were teenagers, so he was rocking big dad energy right now.

"I'm fine," I replied with a smile.

"You make sure he treats you right, otherwise…" Ken had drifted closer, even Clinton dragging himself out of the engine bay of the car he was working on. "Brock might be the boss, but that doesn't mean we won't sort him out if he doesn't treat you good."

I smiled. The guys were grumpy, stuck in their ways or really annoying by turns, but sometimes, sometimes they said just the right thing.

"It's fine," I replied, "but thanks. Things are just casual at the moment. We just didn't want to be sneaking around the garage."

"So instead you're gonna bang in the office?" Clinton asked, almost hopefully, only to have the air driven out of him by Ken's elbow.

"No banging in the office," I replied, "though the boss might ream you out if you keep standing about gossiping."

I nodded to the stairs to where Brock stood, glowering down at the four of us as he stared through the window.

"Back to work then," Gary said. "You can gossip all you like at smoko time."

His gruff tone gave me permission to do the thing I needed to do. Focus on my job, on feeling confident and competent, on the things I could control. I clung to that with both hands as I picked up a wrench, because I'd need it to get through a week with my mother.