Page 107 of Stuck with my Mechanic Daddies

Like she’d known I was coming. Like I would come eventually.

She gestured for me to sit, then took the armchair across from me, folding her hands in her lap. “Tell me what you need.”

“I need to knoweverything.”

Beatrice watched me carefully, her sharp blue eyes measuring the weight of my words.

Then, without a word, she picked up the teapot and poured two cups.

“Everything,” she repeated, a wry smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. “That's a lot to ask, Miss Bennett.”

I wrapped my hands around the warm ceramic of the cup she offered me.

“Aurora,” I corrected softly. “If we’re doing this, if you're going to tell me who my uncle really was, I think we can drop the formalities.”

She studied me again, then gave a small nod. “Aurora, then.”

For a moment, she just sat there, staring at her tea like she was pulling pieces of the past from the amber liquid. Then, finally, she exhaled.

“George was always stubborn,” she said, voice quieter than I’d ever heard it. “Even as a young man, he had this idea in his head that he could fix everything, that he could shoulder burdens alone. He never wanted anyone to worry, least of all me.”

There was something in the way she said it that made me pause. It wasn’t just loyalty or admiration. It was something deeper, something old and unspoken.

I stayed quiet, letting her talk.

“He used to drive me absolutely mad,” she continued, shaking her head. “I managed the bookstore, and he was constantly coming in and messing with my systems. He’d restack shelves incorrectly, leave notes for customers that had nothing to do with their orders, and—God help me—he’d give away books for free if he thought someone needed them.”

I raised an eyebrow. “For free?”

Beatrice huffed. “Don’t look so surprised. He had a soft heart. If he saw a kid hanging around the store too long, he’d find some excuse to send them home with a book. If someone was struggling, he’d ‘accidentally’ misplace an invoice for their purchases.

“I scolded him for it constantly, told him a store couldn’t run on generosity alone.” She exhaled. “But he never listened. He’d just smile at me, that ridiculous, boyish grin of his, and say, ‘What's the point of a bookstore if it doesn’t take care of people?’”

My chest tightened. I’d never thought of my uncle that way.

I’d only ever seen the man who barely spoke to me, who kept me at arm’s length my entire life.

But in this version of him—the one Beatrice knew—he wasn’t just some eccentric shop owner drowning in debt.

He was a man who loved books, who loved this town, who cared enough about people to put them above himself.

Beatrice’s fingers traced the rim of her teacup absently. “One time, there was this woman—single mother, two kids. She was barely getting by. George let her take books whenever she wanted, said it was an investment in the kids’ future. I told him he was going to run us out of business.” She let out a soft laugh. “And you know what he said?”

I shook my head.

“He said, ‘Bea, I’d rather go broke doing something good than be rich with nothing worth remembering.’”

Beatrice went quiet for a long moment, her gaze distant.

The way she breathed her own nickname—Bea—I knew then.

She hadn't just loved him as a friend. She hadlovedhim.

I swallowed hard. “Why didn’t you two ever, you know?”

She blinked, looking at me like she was surprised I’d asked. Then she smiled, small and sad.

“Some loves aren’t meant for the world to see,” she said simply.

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