Page 21 of All's Fair in Love and Blackmail
I jot down Crow Point and then bite my lip, thinking. “There’s the historic theater in downtown Lucky. Tickets are cheap, and on Fridays they do one-dollar matinee showings.”
“That’s good too,” he says. He glances over at me and then back to the road. “Seen anything good recently?”
“Eh,” I say with a shrug. “Not really. Me and Aurora and Jules went there after we said goodbye to our parents. It was a good place to cry in the back row, I guess.”
“All right,” he says, looking bemused.
“There are some hot springs just outside of town that are popular in the summer. There are some awesome indie bookstores around here too,” I go on, and I have to admit, it’s sort of fun to look at my little town as a place full of romance and whimsy. “A bookstore is a perfect place for a date.”
“Is it?” Felix says.
I turn to him, my jaw gaping. “Yes.Completely. How do you not know this? Haven’t you been on a million dates in your life?” Then I snigger. “Or is your normal type of woman not big on reading?”
“Uncalled for,” Felix says, but his lips are twitching. “You read a lot, though—Bingley and Darcy. That’s Jane Austen, right? You like her?”
I sniff and then say, “I dabble. But you don’t need to look so skeptical.”
“I have a hard time picturing you curled up with a romance novel, that’s all,” he says, his shoulders twitching into a little shrug. “So you dabble? What does that mean?”
It means I collect editions ofPride and Prejudice.It means Elizabeth Bennet is my patronus. It means that when I start dating, I’m going to have Darcy-level high standards.
“It means what it means. I dabble,” I say—unhelpfully, I’m sure.
“So you’ve been a secret romantic all along,” he says, grinning. He drums his fingers lightly on the steering wheel. “You’ve been holding out on me, Sunshine.”
“Turn right at the next light,” I say. I twist around to look briefly at Betsy; so far she’s doing fine. “It’s just a little ways up there. Sal’s Shop and Repairs.”
“Huh,” he says as we drive, craning his neck and peering out the windshield. “I’ve never heard of it. Didn’t know we had a place for motorcycles in Lucky.”
“You haven’t lived here for very long,” I remind him. “And I think the best things are sometimes hidden, don’t you? They won’t force themselves on you. You have to look to find them. It’s here,” I go on, pointing to the shining neon sign.
I met Sal a couple years ago when I brought Betsy in for the first time. “September” by Earth, Wind & Fire was playing over the speakers, and Sal was dancing around while he worked. We hit it off immediately.
“Sallywag,” I call when Felix and I roll Betsy out of the waning daylight and into the brightly lit garage. “You here?” I spot Ronaldo toward the back, one of the regular guys, and I wave at him before calling again, “Sal?”
From the office door to the left, a buzzed salt-and-pepper head pokes out. It’s followed by the rest of the man, short and portly and dressed in a blue-gray jumpsuit. Sal wipes his hands on a grimy rag as he heads toward us, a smile splitting across his face.
“There’s my girl,” he says. He tosses the rag onto a work bench as he passes. “Let’s have a gander, sweetie.”
Felix looks vaguely concerned, like he can’t tell if Sal is talking about me or the motorcycle, which is fair. It’s a mixture of both; Sal is the only man in the world who can call mesweetiewithout it feeling gross, but I’m pretty sure right now he’s talking to Betsy.
“She just got roughed up a little bit,” I say as Sal bends down and inspects the motorcycle.
“I see that,” he says. “Nothin’ we can’t fix, though. Leave her here and give me a few days, Indy.” He straightens up again, grunting, and then his eyes fall on Felix. His gaze lights up with a disconcerting mixture of mischief and delight. “And who is this?” he says, holding one dirty hand out to Felix. “New man in your life?”
“I’m the hired labor,” Felix says, and Sal lets out a boom of laughter that rings throughout the garage.
“She’s got you workin’ hard, huh?” he says as they shake. “Haulin’ and lifting’ and whatnot?”
Felix grins; his earlier hesitation seems to have vanished. “That about sums it up. She just likes me for my car.” He nods over his shoulder to his SUV, and Sal laughs again.
“I’m standing right here, gentlemen,” I say flatly. “Felix is my brother’s friend, and he’s benefiting from this arrangement too, so don’t let him lie to you, Sal. Andyou,” I say, turning to Felix—whose grin widens, theaudacity—“don’t make it sound like I’m working you to the bone. You literally lifted Betsy into the back of your car and that’s it.”
“My bad, Sunshine,” he says with a cheeky wink as Sal roars with laughter again.
These men are ridiculous.
“You know, in the time I’ve known India, she’s never brought a man around here,” Sal says, his smile still wide. He jerks his head toward Ronaldo in the back of the garage. “A couple of the guys have tried to get on her good side?—”
