Page 20 of Midnight Racers

Charlotte lifted her menu to study it, her lips twitching.

“She hugged you, too,” I muttered. “And at least my arms weren’t stuck out like a snowman in distress.”

I did a double take when she started to humLet It Go. One of the guys in my crew had a daughter who watched that film on repeat and he had to bring her to work one day when her Mum had a hospital appointment. I was sick of that snowman by the third time she played the video, and volunteered to go clean up a scene before there was one in my office.

“What can I get you both?” Wendy appeared with a steaming pot of coffee, two mugs, accompanied by sugar and cream.

“I’ll have my normal, thanks.”

“Can I have the pancake stack with bacon?” Charlotte asked. “Bacon extra crispy.”

Wendy smiled at her benevolently. “Coming right up!”

“This is not what I expected,” Charlotte said. “Dale insists on fancy restaurants as his body is a temple and he needs proper nutrition before a race.”

I laughed at her huge eyes as she took in the full ambiance of the place. “Yeah, well, if my body is a temple, then its old and crumbling, probably haunted.” Considering the number of souls I had sent to the devil, there most likely were a few ghosts hanging around.

Charlotte’s nose wrinkled when she giggled. “I know the feeling some days. It’s hard to be an adult and go to work at a reasonable hour.”

“There are no fixed hours in either of my jobs, and I prefer people to feel good when working on the cars. My Grandpa always said that a car feels your emotions and amplifies them. If I’m having a shitty day, then my work suffers.”

She stared at me for several seconds and I began to feel stripped bare under her assessment. “You’re not what I expected.”

“Right back at you,” I said with a grin. “You were supposed to be a man. I got quite the surprise when my burglar turned out to be our new chief engineer.”

Her eyebrow arched as she sat back. “I know that Jordan phoned you and sent you a sample of my work. It was your assumption that I was a man.”

I held my hands up to fend off her attack. “Touché.” I rested back in my chair. “So, apart from cars, what do you like doing?”

This was a part of me that I couldn’t control. I tended to know everything about the people I worked with. As an assassin, I had spent most of my time working alone, and trust had been hard earned. Now, I preferred to know what weaknesses could be exploited in my team since we were only as strong as our weakest link.

“I’m boring, unfortunately,” Charlotte replied. “I would love to be able to say I go paragliding or abseiling on my days off, but I tend to be at home with my cat and a good book.”

“Murder mystery?”

“Paranormal romance.”

I laughed at her apologetic expression. “I hear monster erotica is all the rage right now. Maybe you are a vampire after all.”

She rolled her eyes. “If a centuries-old vampire is still working instead of sitting on their hoard they’ve accumulated over the years, someone should stake them.”

“Technically, it’s dragons who sit on their hoards,” I replied and then almost bit my lips off when her mouth fell open at my revelation. “It’s not just women who can read about aliens with two dicks or werewolves who knot.” I bounced my eyebrows and she covered her mouth with her hand to hide her smile.

“You’re so weird,” she muttered. “And the opposite of Jordan.”

“Is that a good or a bad thing?” I queried.

“Honestly? It balances the business. He’s all smouldering and intense, ready to rip your head off. And you know about werewolf porn and what monsters get up to in the dead of night.”

“Hey! I can be intense and smouldering too!” I gave my best impression of Jordan.

“Nah, you’ve shown your geeky side. You just look constipated.”

I wasn’t sure whether to be shocked or complimented. Jordan had a natural ability to take assholery to a new level. He wandered around looking down his nose at everyone or ignoring them because that was the camouflage he donned from an early age.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” I said and earned a smile in return.

“I would,” Charlotte replied. “All the best people are geeks.”

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