Chapter 3

 

Joey Hill hooked his sunglasses into the open neck of his shirt as he stepped into Total Service Automotive. The windows filtered out more sun than they let pass, giving the garage a subterranean feel. The taste of oil hung in the air. It was cool in here, but he’d rather take the September heat in the open.

At the service counter, his friend Ron greeted him and ran a broad, grease-stained fingertip along the day’s work schedule. “Let’s see. Oil change, tire rotation, and the chance to meet a lady. That’s her over there.”

Joey glanced at the waiting area. The only occupant was an attractive blond, sitting with her back to the window and flipping through a Readers’ Digest. He blinked. Not quite what he’d expected. “Thanks, man. I appreciate it.”

Ron kept his voice low. “I hope you know what you’re doing. Remember what I said about relationships. Tangle up with a woman who isn’t a Christian, and she’s more likely to weaken your faith than you are to help her find any.”

Joey bounced his knuckles against the counter. “I told you, it’s not like that. She’s a regular caller to my radio show, and I wanted to meet her.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Then why did you tell me she made the appointment?”

Ron stretched out his palm for the car keys. “To thank you for the referral. Do yourself a favour, Joe, don’t do anything stupid.”

Joey snorted. “That’s my new motto for life.”

He took a deep breath before he approached the cluster of chairs. The blond woman frowned at the magazine and pushed up her dark-framed glasses as if taking a closer look.

“Excuse me… Carol?”

Her head jerked up, and cool blue eyes assessed him. “Do I know you?”

It was her voice, all right, but with a chill factor that didn’t do much for Joey’s confidence. He looked back at the service desk. His friend had gone. “I’m Joey Hill. From All-Request Oldies?”

“Joey!” The lines around her mouth softened, but as he stepped closer they firmed again.

Joey dropped into the chair across from her, leaning back to show non-threatening body language, and tried to find a trace of the Carol he knew in the perfect features and confident hairstyle. He’d imagined her to be a bit older, pale with worry-lines. The packaging didn’t match what was inside.

After a minute she smiled and lowered the magazine. “I thought you’d be different, somehow.”

He nodded. “Yeah, I get that a lot. I sound taller on radio. Sorry to disappoint you.”

“No! It’s just you look normal.”

Joey’s eyebrows shot up.

Carol blushed. “I didn’t mean that like it sounded. It’s — you look as friendly as you are on the radio. I thought it was part of the show, and you’d be more formal and polished in real life.”

He grinned. “You mean handsome.”

“No, intimidating.”

“Well, no worries there. I can’t even intimidate Ron, there, to give me a discount.”

Carol glanced at Ron as he walked past them from the service bays. “He offered me a discount today because you referred me. That always seems backward. Shouldn’t you reward the existing customer instead of the new one? Not that I’m complaining. And he was really good about fitting me into his Saturday schedule when I mentioned your name in the first place.”

“I’m glad.” Joey had arranged her discount to be added to his bill. Ron’s prices were too low for wiggle room, and Carol and her son didn’t sound like they had a lot of extra money. Joey hadn’t liked the thought of her driving to work every day in a car that could drop a wheel or something.

He tapped his fingers lightly on the armrest. “I’m spoiled, working nights. I usually come in on a weekday. So, is Toronto starting to feel like home yet?”

“Getting there. My son adjusted faster than I did. Between school and friends, I hardly see him.”

“It must be tough being a single mom. Do you have a dad or a brother to be a role model for him, even long-distance?”

Carol’s glance pierced his and skittered away. “No. Just me.”

“That’s hard. But it sounds like you’re doing everything you can.” A metallic clang came from the shop. Joey settled deeper into his chair. It was so good to sit and chat in person, instead of talking on the phone in his lonely sound studio at the station.

Next to the music, his callers were the best part of the job. Most of the conversations kept to the surface. Sports scores, movies and of course, singers and songs. But something about the faceless contact with a friendly voice let some of the regulars open up to him. That’s when Joey felt they crossed the divide from acquaintances to friends — even if he wouldn’t recognize them on the sidewalk. That’s where he tried to make a difference, by his words or with a listening ear.

He’d never had this push to actually meet a radio friend before. Joey looked around the waiting room. At his shoes. His hands. At Carol. “So here we are, able to talk for more than twelve minutes at a time, and we’re quiet. I guess the best conversations only happen in the middle of the night.”

Carol lifted one shoulder. As it came down she seemed to draw into herself. She looked away. “They haven’t all been so good.”

“Not the nightmares, no. But we’ve had some good laughs.”

She nodded, eyes still fixed on a point off to the side. “It’s — easier — somehow, talking on the phone. Nobody can see you.”

“I think lots of people feel that way.”

Carol’s brow drew into a slow furrow, and the corners of her mouth pressed in. She looked back at him, head tipped to one side. “You set this up, didn’t you?”

“You don’t believe in coincidence?”

“No.” The distance was back in her voice.

Heat tickled the back of Joey’s neck, and he hoped he wasn’t blushing. “Ron thanked me for recommending him, and I asked him to book me in too.”

Joey had thought of going to the café where she worked, but surprising Carol in her own territory could have felt like an invasion. Neutral ground was safer, if maybe not safe enough.

He spread his hands. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. I just wanted to meet you. No agenda, no expectations. And no song line-up to keep on top of.”

“And you didn’t think to ask?”

“Would you have agreed to meet some faceless guy you only knew through the radio?”

Carol’s hands curled the magazine in her lap as if she’d like to take a swipe at him. “Then what —”

The service bay door banged. Ron tromped toward them and dropped into the chair next to Carol’s. “Ms. Daniels, I’ve got good news and not-so-good news.”

Joey thought he heard a faint hiss of indrawn breath, but Carol revealed no other sign of stress. Ron kept talking. “That knocking sound was nothing.” He opened his hand and held out a pair of scuffed-up dice. “Some joker put these inside your tire rim.”

Carol’s lips tightened. She took the dice in her fingertips and frowned. “Skulls.”

Ron shrugged. “Yeah, little cartoon skulls instead of pips. Weird.”

Carol passed the dice to Joey. “I found a couple of these on the doorstep last week, around the same time the car started making such a racket.”

Joey bounced them gently in his palm. “If you stepped on one of these, you’d take a nasty tumble. Do you have a lot of stairs?”

Her gaze locked with his, eyes wide. “He couldn’t have found us. Wouldn’t have done that to the car. It’s just a prank.”

Joey’s heart stopped. “He? Are you in some kind of trouble?”

“No. We’re good.” She turned to Ron. “You said there was bad news.”

Ron glanced from Carol to his clipboard, then back to Carol. “You’ve got a rear strut leaking. It doesn’t have to be done today, but I wouldn’t want you to drive too far before having them replaced.”

Carol’s face looked stiff as wax, and about the same colour. “Them?”

Ron nodded. “They have to be done in pairs, front or rear.”

Her tongue darted over her lips. “How much?”

Ron held out his clipboard and touched the work order near the bottom. Carol looked, scanned the paper. Looked again. It seemed to Joey that she shrank in on herself, as if this new burden pulled her a little closer to breaking. Or as if she gathered resources to fight one more battle.

Her eyes glistened, and she blinked a few times. From the service area came the high-pitched, stuttering whine of a car’s lug nuts being torqued off. Ron waited, studying his feet. No doubt he’d been through this before. Carol probably had too.

Joey’s battles had been different, but watching this one made him squirm. “Uh, Ron, Carol said something to me about a first-time discount. If you do the work today, can the discount apply to that too?”

They both stared at him. Carol had a dark look in her eye. Wondering if this was a con he and Ron had set up?

Ron’s frown said more along the lines of “Do you have any idea how much this is going to cost you?”

Joey drew in a slow breath. The overnight stint at City Classics paid the pits even without comparing what he’d earned in his prime-time slot in Vancouver. But he’d seen the look on Carol’s face.

He met Ron’s gaze with a fractional nod.

Ron sighed. “If I can get the parts, I can maybe squeeze it in at the end of the day. Dylan’s ahead on his brake job and he should have time. Ms. Daniels, I can take you out to the bay and show you what I’m talking about. Like I said, it doesn’t have to be done today, and if you want a second opinion, go ahead. But it does have to be done.”

He stood and gestured for Carol to follow him into the service bays. “Stay close to me and watch your step.”

Joey sat and listened to the vague shop noises. He’d come to meet a friend. Only a friend. Until he figured out how to do life as a man of faith, he didn’t dare complicate it with romance. But he couldn’t kid himself. The protective surge he’d felt for Carol just now — had felt when they talked before, now that he thought about it — was something more than friendship.