Then she gave herself a little shake. What did the difference in their ages matter? She’d barely been introduced to the man. He’d offered to carry her box, not take her out on Saturday night. She was getting way ahead of herself.
“Say hello to your dad for me?” asked Patsy.
“Absolutely,” Crystal said, nodding.
Softco Machine Works had provided custom machining to NASCAR teams in Charlotte since before Crystal was born. Her father was friends with most of the NASCAR families.
She gave Dean and Patsy a cheery wave goodbye as she headed back to the van.
Larry was in the bay’s doorway, talking to a red-shirted race official. Crystal grabbed the rope on the rear rollup door. She caught herself in time to keep from tugging it down too quickly. She didn’t want the clattering metal to scare Rufus.
As the door lowered into place, she caught Larry’s movement in her peripheral vision. She gave him a wave goodbye. He smiled and nodded, and she felt an unaccustomed pull toward him.
Strange. She rarely had a desire to prolong a conversation with a man. It inevitably became complicated and uncomfortable. It didn’t seem to matter how plain her clothes, or how understated her makeup and hair, she had to remain on guard for leering looks and blatant sexual innuendo. Her late husband had treated her like a sex object and she would never let that happen again.
Ignoring the urge to move in Larry’s direction, she secured the door latch and strode back to the cab and Rufus.
The dog lifted his head to blink at her as she clambered back into the high seat, but he immediately settled down again. She supposed the comfort of the truck seat, along with his three-quarters of the large butterscotch cone, were enough to keep him sleepy and content for the moment.
She pushed the truck into gear, refusing to glance in the rearview mirror for a final glimpse of Professor Larry.
STRETCHING OUT HIS STROKE, Larry made a beeline down one of the fast lanes at the Northstar Recreation Center’s pool. He touched the wall, did an underwater turn and counted fifty in his mind, the blue lane buoys a blur beside him. He was halfway through his workout, had burned approximately four-hundred calories, and had compensated for five hours of sedentary, computer time on his major muscle groups. He made a mental note to check the wall clock on his next turnaround to make sure he was on pace.
When his fingertips brushed the painted concrete at the shallow end of the pool, he glanced up. His view of the clock was blocked by a pair of tanned legs-female legs that curved into smooth hips and a snug, ocean-blue one-piece bathing suit.
“Hello, Larry,” came a voice that triggered something primal in his nervous system.
Facts and figures fled from his brain as he craned his neck to look up at…the woman from the garage. Crystal Hayes, his brother had told him.
His vocal chords didn’t immediately form words.
Her brow furrowed. “Do you remember me?”
Did he remember her? Hell, yes. He’d dreamed about her last night, spent most of this morning reliving their short conversation, cursing the fact that he was so formal around women, that he couldn’t carry on an easy, bantering chitchat like most men could.
He’d also cursed the fact that he’d offended her by offering to carry her package. He’d wondered if she was still annoyed with him. He’d also wondered if she’d caught on to the fact that he considered her one of the most beautiful women he’d ever seen.
Which was a totally inappropriate thought, and one he’d fought hard against.
“From yesterday?” she prompted into his silence. “At the garage?”
“Yes,” he blurted out.
And then she smiled. “Oh, good.”
He smiled in return, searching his brain for something intelligent to say.
Imagine, a tenured professor, published in the American Mathematics Journal and Quantum International, a NASA consultant, and he couldn’t think of a single intelligent thing to say to a beautiful woman.
The large pool facility was almost eerily quiet for 2:00 p.m., save for a couple of swimmers splashing a few lanes down.
“Strange that I’ve never seen you here before,” said Crystal. Her gaze took in his arms, chest and shoulders, apparently concluding it wasn’t the first time he’d been swimming.
Okay, his ego could handle that.
“I usually work out in the pool at State,” he said, grateful he hadn’t completely lost the power of speech.
“Your brother said you were a professor?”
Larry nodded. Words, man. Words!
“I teach mathematics.”
“Interesting.”
“That’s not what most people say.” Most people’s eyes glazed over at the mention of his profession.
She grinned, and something about her smile warmed him inside.
“You here to do laps?” he asked.
“Three times a week.”
“You can burn up to eight hundred excess calories doing an hour of freestyle.”
She glanced down at herself.
He cringed. “Not that I’m suggesting…That is, of course, you don’t need to worry about burning excess calories.”
She chuckled at his horrible faux pas. “Trust me. I do it to feel good. I couldn’t care less about the visual pleasure of others.”
She moved to the next lane and sat down, dangling her feet and calves in the water.
Larry noticed that she was providing him with all kinds of visual pleasure at the moment, from the curve of her tanned hip, to her nipped-in waist, to the hint of cleavage. Visual pleasure didn’t get much better than this.
“Guess I’d better get going,” she said, slipping into the water.
“And I’d better get back at it.” He’d never stopped in the middle of a workout before. It simply wasn’t a logical thing to do. He quickly decided he’d better add a few laps to get his pulse rate back to optimal.
“See you later,” she called, pushing off the wall, arms curling, legs scissoring, gorgeous derriere poking out of the water.
Larry cursed between clenched teeth. The woman’s derriere was absolutely none of his business. He stretched into his own length, deciding three extra laps would do it.
He arrived at the far wall of the pool and was surprised to discover he hadn’t passed Crystal. Logic told him to stick to his own pace, but his ego urged him to swim a little harder. In a rare move, his brain let emotion override logic.
But at the end of the next lap, she was still ahead.
He pushed harder, determined to catch her.
Five more laps, and they were even at the turn.
She flashed him a smile that said she was onto him then pushed hard off the wall, obviously prepared to give it all she had. They moved neck and neck the entire length, both laughing when they reached the wall.
“How many’ve you got to go?” she gasped.
“Forty-five,” he responded.
“Might want to pace yourself,” she suggested.
“What about you?”
A competitive gleam grew in her green eyes. “Looks like we tied in the sprint. I’ll race you again for distance.”
“Forty-five laps?” he asked.
She nodded toward the scattered tables of the on-deck snack bar. “Loser buys fruit smoothies.”
“You’re on.”
Larry pushed off with determination.
At ten laps, he was surprised by her strength.
By twenty laps, he realized she must have done a whole lot of swimming in her life.
By thirty laps, he began to fear she might actually beat him.
But by forty laps, her speed began to slow.
He drew a deep breath of relief. He could have kept up the pace right to the end, but he might not have been able to walk afterward. He let himself slow down with her, and touched the final wall mere inches ahead of her.
She smoothed back her slick, dark hair, smiling brightly at him, looking like something out of a fantasy movie. “You’re very good,” she acknowl
edged.
“What about you? I take it you’ve done some swimming in your time?”
“Wesleyan College swim team.”
“You telling me I’ve been hustled?”
“Fork over the smoothie, baby.”
“I’d call it a tie.” He was prepared to be gracious.
She placed her palms on the pool deck, slipping her slick body out of the water. “Photo finish, but I won.”
“You sure?”
“I’m positive.”
He laughed and gave it to her, resting his gaze on her clinging swimsuit. Fact was, he’d buy her a hundred smoothies, or anything else she wanted, no race necessary.
He hopped out of the pool beside her. She was taller than most women. He had maybe four inches on her, and he couldn’t help thinking she was the perfect height.
“Do I get a rematch?” he asked.
“Not today.” She made a show of stretching out her arm muscles.
He smiled at that. He didn’t have a rematch in him today, either.
They strolled across the deck in silence, stopping at the bank of lockers for their towels.
Larry draped his around his shoulders and retrieved his wallet. “You live in Charlotte?”
She nodded, rubbing her towel over her hair before securing it at her waist. “I grew up here. Funny that we’ve never met before.”
“I don’t spend a lot of time in the garage.” When he came to a race, he was often in a motor home or up top with his son Steve who spotted for his nephew Kent, another NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver.
“And I’m usually somewhere else,” she said, as they headed for the all-weather carpet and white plastic deck furniture of the snack bar.
“Do you watch the races at all?”
“If I’m at my parents’ house, yeah. My dad hasn’t missed one in about thirty years.”
“But you don’t come out to watch at the track?”
She shrugged. “Occasionally.”
They crossed into the snack bar where a dozen tables were clustered in an atrium. About half were full of families or couples.
“Ever seen a race from the pits?”
“You mean a hot pass?” She stopped beside the semicircular counter and gazed up at the painted menu.
“A hot pass,” he confirmed. The pits during a race had to be experienced to be believed.
“Never had one of those.”
It was on the tip of Larry’s tongue to make the offer. She was obviously cleared through track security for her job. He could get her a hot pass for Sunday, and they could watch the cars thunder down the straightaway together. But it would be almost like asking her on a date. And he was pretty sure that was inappropriate.
“I’ll take a strawberry-banana,” she said to a teenage clerk with short, streaked hair and a silver ring through her eyebrow.
Just like that, the moment was lost.
“Pineapple-mango,” said Larry, dropping his credit card on the green Arborite.
“I guess you have access to everything behind the scenes,” she said.
There it was again, another opportunity to invite her to the track. “Some things,” he said, wondering if he could phrase it in a way that didn’t make it sound like he was coming on to her. He could invite her to meet the family-his brother Dean, son Steve and nephew Ken. Would that make it better or worse?
The whine of the blender filled the air.
“Do you like racing?” she asked.
“I love it,” he answered honestly.
“But you’re not involved?”
“I love it as a spectator and a fan. But I’m not mechanically inclined, and I’m definitely not a driver.” Larry had learned a long time ago that his brain liked concepts better than hands-on. He might be able to help design a racing engine, but somebody else had to put it together.
Crystal looked him up and down. “You’d look cute in one of those uniforms.”
Even though he wasn’t crazy about the “cute” adjective, his breath caught again on her smile. “I have absolutely no desire to go 180 miles an hour. My family knew early on I’d never be a driver.”
Then he rethought the burst of honesty. Did it make him sound timid? Nerdy?
The clerk slid the smoothies across the counter, and Larry signed the credit card slip.
“I’d try it once,” said Crystal, capturing the plastic straw between her white teeth. “Just to see what it felt like.”
Larry’s gaze caught on her red lips as they wrapped around the straw and took a pull on the thick drink.
Then she grinned. “Of course, there’s every chance I’d scream my head off.”
She stirred the straw through the drink as she turned away. He watched her long legs, the sway of her hips, and the smooth skin of her bare shoulders. She was gorgeous enough to be on a Paris runway. And for the first time since his wife died three years ago, Larry felt a rush of sexual desire.
He tore his gaze from her body, scooped the other smoothie from the countertop, and followed her.
Crystal chose a corner table between a potted fig and a glass wall that overlooked the park. The ceiling was lower here than in the pool area, dampening the echoes of the growing swim crowd.
Larry rushed forward to help with her chair, and she turned to give him a bemused smiled. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.” He took the chair opposite, setting his drink on the table.
“So, you bucked the family business,” she began, dabbing her straw up and down.
“I did,” he agreed, struggling to keep his gaze from straying below her neck.
“Were they disappointed?”
“That I became a professor instead of a mechanic?”
She tipped her head sideways. “It sounds strange when you say it that way.”
“Only to people who don’t understand the value of a good mechanic.”
“And you do?”
“I became a professor, because I’d make a lousy mechanic.”
“And I became a parts driver, because I made a lousy model.”
“You were a model?” It didn’t surprise him.
“For a couple of months. I hated it.”
He raised his eyebrows, waiting for her to continue.
“The sum total of your being is reduced to the size of your waist and the length of your legs.”
He couldn’t help it, his gaze dipped down. Luckily, she didn’t notice.
She wiggled forward in her chair. “I felt like some kind of a mechanical Barbie doll. Face this way. Walk that way. Frown, pout, stare. And all those people.” She shuddered. “Ogling you. They pretend it’s about the clothes, but half of them are checking out your body.”
“Why did you try it in the first place?”
“I was in college, and the money was good.”
“What was your major?” he asked, feeling himself relax in a way he rarely did around women.
“Creative writing, plus some history and anthropology.”
“But you became a parts driver?”
“Unlike you, I didn’t buck the family business.”
He nodded, remembering the logo on the side of her van. “Softco Machine Works.”
“Mom and Dad are good for a paycheck.”
“Do you write at all?” He knew it was tough to make a living as a writer.
She nodded, sliding her fingertip through the condensation on her glass. Larry had to remind himself to take a drink of his own melting concoction.
“Short stories mostly, based on the lives of the women who settled the South. That’s why I like driving for Softco. It’s part-time, and the hours are flexible. If I’m working on a story, I can come in late or take off early.”
“That sounds fascinating,” he told her honestly.
“Mostly it’s traffic lights and getting cut off by sports cars.”
“You know what I meant.”
“It’s fascinating,” she agreed. “Particularly the interviews. And I’m working on a cookbook
and anthology that my publisher thinks might pay off.”
“Tell me about it.” Larry took a long pull on the pineapple-mango smoothie, wondering how he could possibly segue from a cookbook to a date.
CHAPTER TWO
O N S UNDAY MORNING , C RYSTAL had to settle for bran cereal instead of cold, leftover pepperoni pizza. On the bright side, she now had a dozen cans of dog food, a shiny black dog dish and a leather leash dangling from one of the hooks beside her kitchen door. On the down side, she might have to ask her mother for an advance this week.
Rufus was curled up, asleep on the woven mat in front of the fireplace. It would have been a picture-perfect scene, if the fireplace had worked, if it wasn’t ninety degrees outside and if Rufus hadn’t snored like a longshoreman. The dog had remained aloof for the past two days. He was polite, but clearly confused, and he still had an air of watchfulness and waiting about him.
The phone rang, and he jumped to his feet.
“It won’t be for you, boy,” she said, then added, “Sorry.”
Still, he watched her closely while she crossed the faded, yellow linoleum to retrieve the cordless phone from the top of the washing machine. The readout showed it was her mother from downstairs in the office.
She clicked the talk button. “Hey, Mom.”
The computerized lathes and milling machines rumbled in the background. “Are you up?” called Stella Hayes.
“I’ve been up for an hour,” said Crystal. It was way too hot to sleep late.
“Good. Norman’s been up since four this morning machining a backup axle for Dean Grosso, just in case, and we need a delivery driver.”
Crystal experienced a moment’s hesitation.
The Dean Grosso garage might bring her into contact with Larry again. Not that that was a bad thing. It was simply a…strange thing.
There was something about the man that made her restless and edgy, not to mention uncharacteristically expansive. When she thought back over their conversation, she couldn’t believe how much she’d rattled on about her Colonial cookbook and anthology project.
She also couldn’t believe a man who was helping the world explore the asteroid belt had been interested in her writing project. Looking back, she worried that he’d simply been humoring her.
When she’d asked, he’d admitted he was consulting on an ion propulsion engine for NASA. Although most of the technicalities escaped her, Larry explained how a blue beam of light that could barely push a piece of paper on earth could eventually propel a spaceship to thousands of miles an hour. The man was a bona fide rocket scientist.
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