Page 50 of Captive of Outlaws
“So, you just decided to abbreviate one day or what?” I can’t let it drop. He actually takes his eyes off the road ahead of us and looks at me.
“Do I look like a Johan to you?”
I swallow, my mouth unexpectedly dry. “No, you do not,” I agree.
“I don’t really like my father, who I was named for. And the feeling was mutual. So this is the best I can do to get away from that name.”
That feels like enough personal disclosure for one car ride, so I let the rest pass in silence.
Jimmy’s Auto Supply is a rusted-out, broken-down, ramshackle little joint, a good ten miles on the outskirts of Nottingham proper. It’s never busy, so the odds of me runninginto anyone, let alone someone who knows who I am, are very, very low. I pull us into the parking lot next to a newer model F-150, but don’t kill the engine.
“So, do you want to wait here, or...”
I don’t even finish before LJ holds up a metal card between two fingers. “I’ve got the money.”
“Oh,” I say. “Right.” It’s a good point. I don’t have any cash, let alone a fancy credit card. But I’m not even sure Jimmy has a swiper at the console. If anything, he has one of those old carbon paper ones you have to shuttle the card through to make an impression.
LJ gets out of the car without another word. He glances at the back of the Mustang, then at me.
“You’ve got a taillight out.”
For crying out loud. I roll my eyes. “What are you, a traffic cop? I know, okay? I’m getting around to it.” I’d actually completely forgotten about it until now, but whatever. I kill the engine and crack open my door. “Let’s just get this over with.”
The bell above the door dings softly, and a weathered man in a faded green feed supply baseball cap looks up from the counter when we walk in. There’s not much actually in stock here: some dust-covered bottles of Penzoil, a couple of display toolkits and creepers, beef jerky. But anything you actually want, you’re going to have to get from the man himself.
“Maren!” Jimmy’s voice sounds like a piece of sandpaper smoked a pack of cigarettes a day for about a century. But there’s a happy undertone to it, I can tell, and I soften a little. He always liked me, although it’s probably hard not to take a shine to the former fifteen-year-old kid who came in asking about engine parts. “Hadn’t seen you for a while. Was worriedsomething happened.”
“Just busy,” I lie, trying not to flinch as Jimmy’s steely eyes home in on my companion. “This is...” I falter. Why do I even need to make an introduction? I could just be cool and maybe everyone here would play along, but now it’s too late. So I forge ahead. “A friend of mine,” I finish.
“LJ,” LJ says, nodding. “Nice shop you got here.” He sounds like he means it. “I’m a biker myself, but I know a fellow gearhead when I see one.”
Jimmy cracks a rare smile. “Pleasure to meet you. Any friend of Maren’s is a friend of mine.” He looks at me. “What will it be, Maren? Another order for the shop? Because if so...” He breathes out, a wheezing, reluctant sound. “I know this ain’t your fault. But your uncle’s behind on settling his bills.”
My heart squeezes in my chest. “I’m so sorry, Jimmy.”
“Couple thousand,” Jimmy says. “I’m really gonna have to ask him to pay up. Even though—”
“I know, I know,” I say quickly. “I’ll make sure he does. Anyway, um, no. This is for a personal project. So we don’t need it to be attached to the account.”
“All righty then.” Jimmy doesn’t look like he fully believes me, but he respects me enough not to pry. “What will it be?”
I slide the smartphone back out of my pocket and read what I typed down. Jimmy’s wiry gray eyebrows go up as I do.
“Well, look at you, Miss Technology.” He squints, looking from the phone in my hand to LJ, to the phone again. “Are you sure you’re the same Maren?”
My heartbeat picks up in my chest a little. “Yep, still me,” I say, trying to affect cheerfulness. It’s like I’ve forgotten how I usually behave, what I’m actually like now that my life haschanged so much in barely a week.
I finish dictating everything that I need, and Jimmy laboriously copies it longhand onto a legal pad, along with some scratched-out notes. He then putters over to an ancient computer, a giant beige box sitting on the corner of his counter, where he pops on a pair of cheaters that slide to the end of his bulbous nose as he hunts and pecks the items into his software lookup.
“It’s going to be a couple of weeks on some of these,” he says, shaking his head. “Can’t find them aftermarket, so they’re gonna have to come from overseas.”
“That’s fine,” I say.
Behind us, the doorbell ding-ding-dings again. I glance back and see that two guys have entered, presumably the driver and passenger from that F-150. One’s short and stocky with hair that’s greasy as an engine block sticking out from his trucker hat. The other one’s long, lean, and tanned and wrinkled as an old baseball glove even though he can’t be much older than I am.
Maybe it’s my imagination, but I feel like LJ tenses next to me.
“Now, for that Japanese one,” Jimmy goes on, with all the haste of molasses. He taps his screen with his pencil eraser. “I could get you aftermarket. But if I’m being honest, I don’t think it’s worth it. You’d only be saving fifty, maybe seventy-five dollars, and it’s going to be mostly plastic.”
