Page 62 of Mine to Love
An engine was second nature.
It was home.
Spending time with billionaires who dealt with spreadsheets, stock quotes, and did million-dollar deals on a daily basis, well, that gave him fucking heartburn.
He popped two Tums and stared at the bottle of bourbon on his counter.
Nope. That wasn’t the way to deal with this situation.
Trust your gut. Your instincts. Once you have the information, you process it better than anyone I’ve met. You can debate anyone in open court if you had to. Stop the internal dialogue that plagued your childhood and dump what Trixi’s father did and you will have all that you desire.
Those were his dad’s words.
Good enough.
His mother’s words.
Whatever she meant by that.
Flunked sophomore English twice. With the same teacher. Bombed the SATs. Won’t get into college. He’d be lucky to be a garbage collector.
Those had been his guidance counselor’s words to his mother and that had been the day she agreed to let him go to trade school. No one tells her that one of her kids wasn’t going to amount to much.
But she had to go and tell him to work harder. To prove that idiot wrong.
Not the right pep talk at the time.
However, thinking about it now, she was right. And he’d done it. He proved them all wrong and he’d done something he could be proud of. All those assholes who put him down now came to him when their vehicles didn’t work. Or they got into a fender bender. He was the best money could buy and they all knew it.
He wasn’t good enough, yet he was the best in his chosen field.
But that’s when his mind went down that twisty road of not being good enough for any woman. For a family.
He tapped his chest. His heart was telling him something else completely. Two people right now were relying on him not to fuck up.
Ding-dong.
Shit.
He strolled to the front of the house and pulled open the door. The man who stood before him was a little over six feet and looked almost exactly like Gabriel. It was uncanny.
“You must be Miles,” Harvey Blue said. He held a dark backpack in his hand.
Miles stretched out his arm, taking Harvey’s hand in a firm shake.
“Where’s Liberty?” Harvey asked.
“Next door making sure Gabriel is asleep.” Miles waved Harvey inside. “Can I get you a drink?”
“If you have some scotch, I’ll take that on the rocks. Otherwise, a beer would do the trick.”
“Follow me.” Miles made his way to the kitchen and found a bottle of scotch. He poured three fingers and then went for the bourbon. He might as well join the man.
Harvey set his bag on the counter and eased onto one of the stools at the island. “My daughter has an infinity for good bourbon.” He laughed. “When she was seventeen, she and her boyfriend at the time stole a bottle from my liquor cabinet and proceeded to get shit-faced. She puked her guts out and had the worst hangover. I made her suffer all day by playing loud music and forcing her to do chores around the house. I thought maybe it would teach her a lesson, but not my Liberty. That child had a rebellious streak a mile long.”
“And she still likes bourbon.” Miles raised his drink. “But in the short time I’ve known her, I can’t say I’ve ever seen her hammered.”
“Whenever she had to take care of her brother, she was a good kid. I know this is going to sound strange coming from me as I figure you know the whole sordid tale.” Harvey took a slow draw from his drink. “But I tried not to make her Gabriel’s caretaker when she was a kid. My ex-wife didn’t want Gabriel leaving the house, so I hired professionals to come in to help. People who worked with kids on the spectrum. We weren’t equipped to deal with it and Liberty was just a child herself. But Robin would always fire the help and make Liberty handle Gabriel. Fucking broke my heart.”
