Page 12 of Blueline Baby

He sighs. “Because I’m trying to help you, Chloe. Can you open the damn trunk?”

I click the button and the trunk lid opens and I watch while he finds the jack and the wrench instantly, then drops down onto the filthy concrete of the parking garage, and starts working the lug nuts off without even being asked.

The main problem is that he looks incredibly competent while he does it.

I don’t want him to be. I’ve met plenty of athletes and found every single one of them exhausting, but he works fast and he doesn’t glance up once to see if I’m impressed.

He hauls the spare out from under the trunk floor and drops it onto the concrete, where it lands with a completely hollow, rubbery thud.

“Well,” he says. “Your spare’s flat too.”

“Of course it is.”

“You never checked it?”

“Why would I check a spare tire? Isn’t that the entire point of a spare tire? To just sit there and be ready when you need it?”

He stands up and wipes his hands on his shorts. “Okay. Come on, I’ll drive you.”

“Absolutely not.”

“You’ve got a test and a car going nowhere. What’s the plan? Walk?” He’s already got his keys out. “Get in the truck, Chlo. You can be mad while we drive.”

His truck is meticulously clean and surprisingly doesn’t smell like hockey, which does nothing to ease my annoyance. He lifts a to-go cup of coffee out of the center console and offers it to me.

“No, thank you,” I say.

“It’s just coffee. I don’t have cooties.”

“I wasn’t worried about cooties.”

“No?” He pulls out of the garage, steering with one hand. “Then you just don’t want to put your mouth where mine’s been.”

I stare out the passenger window and swallow hard because the image that he just put in my head of places where his mouth has been isn’t something I want to think about at eight in the morning

“I don’t want to know where your mouth has been.” I hate how incredibly prissy I sound, but his casual, effortless confidence is infuriating.

“So what’s the test on?” he asks, completely ignoring my petty response.

“Cell biology.”

“You’re a bio major?”

“Pre-vet.” I don’t know why I tell him that. “I want to be a veterinarian.”

“Yeah? You always want that?”

“No.” I look down at the index cards clutched in my hand. “When I was little, I wanted to move to Alaska and race sled dogs.”

He laughs, a big, easy sound, and I don’t laugh with him. It takes him exactly one second to catch on.

“Oh,” he says. “Oh, damn. You’re serious.”

“I had a whole binder. I researched the breeds and mapped out the race routes.” I shrug, looking back out the window. “Then I found out you can’t exactly make a living doing it.”

He’s quiet for a second. When I glance over, the grin is gone, and he’s looking at me like I actually managed to surprise him.

“Are you always this quiet?” he asks as we stop at a red light.