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Bart kissed her cheek. “I think you’re higher than that. Not much maybe, but higher than middling,” he joked. “Come on, let’s go get you fed.”
Tucker got up off the floor and studied the bike. It had an RC car on it. Not her first choice for painting, but Mr. Paradisi had three great loves: his motorcycle, his RC car club and his family. He said the pecking order changed daily. “What do you think?”
“I think the Paradisis will be thrilled. You made an RC car look cool. And I love how you worked the gas cap into the remote control picture.”
“Yeah, I thought that was inspired, too. “
They walked out to the front garage and Lou slapped Bart’s back. “Figured you’d talk her out of her hidey-hole. Now, on to supper, boy.”
Tucker loved seeing the guys interact with her son. Bart might not have had a father in the picture growing up, but he had her father, and the guys at the shop. It seemed to be enough for him.
He grinned at the older man. “Sure thing, Lou.”
“Hey, how’s the new guy?” Tucker asked.
“He did a great job today. Knows his way around cars, that’s for sure.”
Tucker couldn’t help but wonder why a guy who knew his way around cars felt the need to have someone else service his vehicles all these years. Even things as simple as new spark plugs or oil changes. It didn’t make sense. She glanced at her son. “Let me check in with him, then we can go. Want to meet him?”
“Sure.”
She found Tyler Martinez underneath a 1953 Volkswagen Beetle. She’d always referred to him as Mr. Martinez when he was a customer, but now that he was an employee, that sounded odd, so she called, “Tyler?”
His creeper zipped out from under the car and Tyler smiled for a minute, then his expression froze when he spotted her. “Yes?”
“I wanted to introduce you to my son. Spencer Tucker, otherwise known as Bart, this is Tyler Martinez, the garage’s newest employee.”
“You can call me Spencer,” Bart told him. “Everyone in the real world does…it’s only here in Mom’s mystic workplace that my childhood nickname still haunts me.”
“That’s because you are not a Spencer,” Tucker assured him. She enjoyed falling into their old argument. “I mean, I thought you were when you were born. I looked down and thought, Spencer. But I was wrong. You’re a Bart, through and through.”
“And that, Mr. Martinez, is why you might as well call me Bart, too. Because Mom will pretend not to know who you’re talking about if you call me Spencer. Just like she doesn’t know who you’re talking to if you call her Angelina.” He singsonged her name and laughed as she scowled.
“And that’s the problem with giving babies names at birth. They’re not fully developed. They’re tiny little blobs of humanity. A good name—a true name—tends to become apparent within the first few years. I’m Tucker, he’s Bart. Do you have a nickname?”
“No. Tyler is fine.”
Tucker noted that Tyler wasn’t enjoying her banter with Bart. His face was frozen into an expression of polite interest, but it was apparent he was anything but.
Not for the first time, she felt foolish in front of him. “Well, we’re heading out. See you in the morning.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Tucker,” she assured him. “Not ma’am.”
“Or Angelina,” Bart said, still kidding around.
“No.” She tossed her son a motherly glare of warning. “It’s simply Tucker.”
“Tucker,” Tyler parroted. “See you tomorrow morning, Tucker.”
“Come on, Bart. Let’s go get something to eat, I’m starved.” She clapped her hand on her son’s back, and for a moment, she thought she caught the ghost of a smile on Tyler’s face, but it happened so fast, she couldn’t be sure. His face was once again expressionless as he gave her a nod, then slipped again under the car.
“He seems nice, Mom,” Bart said.
“Yeah, he seems nice, but meeting someone for a minute doesn’t give us enough information to really discover if they’re nice or not. It takes—”
“Another Mom-lecture, ladies and gentlemen,” Bart teased. “You know, I have friends whose parents wallop them when they make a mistake. Sometimes I wonder if that’s preferable to being lectured to death.”
“That wasn’t a lecture,” she protested.
“No, that was your chance to work in one of your famous life lessons, and those are so close to lectures, it’s hard to tell the difference.”
She playfully slugged his arm. “Well, you can rest assured I can wallop you if the lectures don’t work.”
Bart laughed. “Oh, Mom, you try to be tough. And I imagine there are many people who believe you are, but no one who knows you would believe that for an instant. And I know you, Mom. You’re a marshmallow.”
“Take that back. I work in a garage full of guys and I am not a marshmallow.”
“Oh, yeah. You’re like a great big candy bar. Crunchy on the outside, and all soft or mushy on the inside. Maybe that’ll be your new nickname… Candy.” He sprinted across the yard toward her father’s, hollering “Candy” over his shoulder.
“I’ll show you how tough I can be,” she shouted, taking off after him, laughing for the sheer joy of laughing.
And at that moment, chasing after her son as they both teased each other and laughed, Tucker decided it wasn’t such a bad Monday after all.
CHAPTER TWO
TWO WEEKS.
Tucker stared at the calendar hanging on the wall next to her desk and was struck by the fact that it had already been two weeks since Tyler Martinez had started working at the shop. He was, on paper, the perfect employee. He was the first one to arrive every morning, and the last one to leave every night. He knew as much about cars as anyone in the shop. He got along with everyone, never caused a problem.
But…
Yes, there was a but dangling there at the end of her thoughts.
Tucker tried to put a finger on it. Tyler wasn’t standoffish. He joked around with the guys, and they all seemed to accept him. He didn’t actually joke around with her, but he was polite.
No, standoffish wasn’t the word she wanted. Maybe, closed book was a better description of Tyler Martinez.
Back when her friend Eli was expecting her son and having man troubles of her own, Tyler had actively pursued Tucker. Tucker had said no, of course. After all, Tyler was a successful businessman, and she worked in a garage. He was a carefree bachelor, she was a mother. He wore designer suits, she wore jeans. They had no common ground.
Maybe day-to-day proximity had convinced him that they weren’t meant to be anything more than a boss and employee. Or maybe prison had changed him. Whichever it was, the man she remembered was gone.
And if he didn’t want to nag her for dates anymore, that was fine with her. She wasn’t looking to date him, though she wished he wouldn’t treat her as if she had a case of playground cooties. Even when she’d said no to dates, he’d laughed off her refusals and told her he’d simply keep trying until she said yes. He’d been open and engaging back then, and somewhere between then and now, he’d closed up tight.
Tucker forced herself to concentrate on payroll in front of her. She didn’t have time to ponder the mystery of Tyler Martinez. She went back to tallying hours and calculating checks, when the sound of voices pulled her from her math. She stared out her window, past the mulberry tree, and at the edge of the building she saw Tyler and some tall blond guy.
She couldn’t make out more than a murmuring of voices, but it was obvious it was a serious conversation. The stranger’s voice rose enough for Tucker to hear, “It’s done, Tyler. You can’t undo it. They know the truth.”
Tyler’s voice rose as well. Tucker could hear the utter frustration in it as he said, “A father’s name is the most important thing he can pass on to his son. Hell, you literally passed on your name. Jason Emerich Matthews, junior. Let that mean something to him.”
“I want it to. That’s why I’m doing this. I want my name to mean something. I want Jace to know his father made a mistake—it might have been for all the right reasons, but it was still wrong. I need him to know that I was willing to own up to it and pay the consequences.” The blond guy turned and walked around the corner of building, out of Tucker’s line of sight.
“Jason,” Tyler called and followed him.
What was that all about? Tucker wandered into the garage at the same time Tyler slammed the door and strode over to a workbench.
“What’s going on?” she asked Lou, jerking her head in Tyler’s direction.
The old man shrugged. “Some guy came by, asked for Tyler and they went outside. Whatever they were talking about, it obviously didn’t go well.”
Part of Tucker wanted to see if Tyler was okay, but she suspected he wouldn’t appreciate her concern.
Even from across the shop, she could see the tension practically radiating from him in the way he held himself—stiff and unapproachable. “Right. Holler if you need anything.”
Lou nodded and went back to a car on the lift. Tucker went back to payroll, anxious to finish so she could get back to the paintroom and determined not to think about the garage’s newest employee. He did his work well, and that’s all that should concern her.
She wondered why it wasn’t.
TWO DAYS LATER AFTER Jason’s visit to the garage, Tyler’s phone buzzed in his pocket.
In his old life, his phone rang nonstop. These days it was mostly silent. Old friends avoided him like the plague, as if doing a stint in County was contagious. As if they were afraid they’d develop a sudden yearning to wear orange jumpsuits. As if they’d never been his friend at all.
Well, that was fine with Tyler. He didn’t need them. He knew who his friends were—strike that—who his friend, singular, was. One was more than enough.
Jason was more than a friend, he was like a brother. Tyler knew he’d do anything for him, and vice versa.
His phone buzzed again, and since he was in the middle of eating lunch, he pulled it out and checked to see who it was.
Jason.
“Jason, what’s up?”
“Mr. Martinez?” a woman’s voice said.
“Yes?”
“This is Jessica Ahearn at St. Vincent’s. There’s been an accident…” The woman explained she was a nurse, that Jason was in an accident and Tyler’s number was under ICE in his cellphone.
“Ice?” Tyler asked, because it was easier to ask a question than to have the nurse tell him things he didn’t want to hear.
“In case of emergency—ICE. Mr. Matthews’s car hit an embankment. He’s in surgery now.”
Tyler had barely processed the thought of Jason being in an accident when he remembered the baby. “Jace?”
“He’s in surgery,” she repeated.
“No, Jace. His son. A baby. Was he in the car?”
“Only Mr. Matthews was transported here, sir.”
“I need the names of the guys in the ambulance, or the police, or…” Jace’s sitter. He knew her name. He couldn’t think of it. He knew her name.
“Pam.”
“Pam?” the woman repeated.
“That’s the babysitter’s name. I’m going to call her. Could you check with the ambulance crew and call me back. I’m on my way.”
“Sure, I’ll do that, Mr. Martinez.”
“I’m in Whedon. I’ll be at the hospital in under a half hour.” Tyler had always thought the half hour distance between Erie and Whedon wasn’t bad, but suddenly it was too far. He needed to be there now.
“Mr. Martinez, he’ll be in surgery for hours. If I find out anything about the baby, I’ll call right away.”
“Thank you, Ms. Ahearn.”
Tyler hurried over to his coworker. “Lou, I need to leave early. It’s a family emergency. I’ll make up the hours, or you can dock my pay, or hell, fire me if you have to. I’ve got to go.”
The old guy had been decent to Tyler, so had everyone else at the garage, so it came as no surprise when he said, “Don’t talk crazy, kid. You go do what you have to. Can I do anything to help?”
“No. I’ll handle it. But I’m not sure when I’ll be back in.”
“Go do what you have to,” Lou repeated. “We’ll manage.”
Tyler ran to his car and tried to think as he headed toward the interstate. What the hell was Pam’s last name? He’d met the woman the few times he’d picked up the baby for Jason and Mellie before he’d gone to County.
No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t remember her last name. Why hadn’t he ever thought to get her name and number from Jason?
He decided to drive to her house and see if Jace was there, then he’d go to the hospital.
Shit, he had to call Jason’s mom and dad, too. They’d moved to Florida when they retired.
Heartsick, he called their number as he barreled down I-79 toward Erie and told them what little he knew. “I’ll call as soon as I talk to the doctors,” he promised.
“I’m making arrangements for the earliest flight I can get,” Jason’s father promised.
Neither of them asked the question that was hanging around like a white elephant in the room. What if Jace had been in the car with his father?
Tyler drove faster than he should have, but hopefully not fast enough to attract police attention. The last thing he needed was to be pulled over by the cops and questioned. He was still on parole, and while he didn’t think a speeding violation would send him back to jail, he wasn’t sure and he couldn’t afford to take the chance. He had to be there for Jason.
He drove slowly up the big hill and into the babysitter’s drive, praying that Jace was there. He felt sick to his stomach as he knocked on the door. Pam opened the door, Jace on her hip.
“I’m not sure you remember me—” he started.
She interrupted. “I definitely remember you, Mr. Martinez.” Her words were said with that certain tone that let him know exactly how she felt about criminals darkening her doorstep.
“Jason was in an accident and I didn’t have your number and was praying Jace was here.” He held his hand out to the baby. Pam hesitated a moment, then handed him over.
