“F—heck.” The dollar signs invading my brain made my whole face clench. Fast math said that even split, that was going to cut into my reserves in a big way. But no way was I letting Alden cover the whole thing. And calling Professor Tuttle like little kids who needed bailing out just wasn’t happening either.
“That’s fine.” Alden shot me a look, but there was concern in his eyes too. I remembered what he’d said about his emergency credit card not having an unlimited balance. When Mary stepped away to start prepping the car for a tow, he lowered his voice. “Hopefully, it’s not too bad. I’ll put it on my card.”
“I don’t want your moms saving the day,” I argued. I was much less inclined to accept their help after what Alden had told me.
“Me either.” He sighed. “I’ll put it on my personal card—”
“You’ll put half on it. I’ll do other half.” I was prepared to be stubborn about this. Alden didn’t reply right away, his mouth moving as if he was trying to decide how to get around my decree.
But then Mary came back over, and he gave me a long stare. “Okay.”
“Y’all have a kid in the back seat?”
“Uh, no.” I scratched behind my ear. “Goat.”
Mary blinked. “Eh. Can’t say as I haven’t heard that one before, but no animals in my truck. It tame?”
“It’s a toy.” Alden was blushing. It was cute, him getting all embarrassed over the stuffed animal.
“It’s kind of our mascot.” I grinned over at him, trying to make the best of a crappy situation. The tentative grin he gave me in return definitely counted as something good, the way it made my skin heat.
“I see. Well, climb on up in the truck, boys, and let’s get you back to the shop.”
The truck was an older one, with just a single large bench seat. It was going to be a tight squeeze in the cab with the three of us. I took the middle because I figured Alden’s anxiety might do better closer to the door and not having to bump against a stranger. At least we’d been pressed together the day before on the Speedway tour.
“Thanks,” he whispered as he climbed in after me. Our feet jostled for space and Alden was practically diagonal, half up the door to avoid contact with me.
“That’s not going to work.” I laughed and yanked him down into my lap. And hey, now I had a lap full of Alden, warm and smelling far better than he had any right to—solid, his back against my chest. My pulse revved in a way it hadn’t in months. I’d squeezed into cars before or at concerts with friends, people ending up in my lap or squashed against me, no biggie. But this felt different than if it had been Jasper or some other friend. Way different.
“Oh good. You figured out how to fit.” Mary swung herself up into the driver’s side of the truck. Alden tensed against me, but if she cared how we’d arranged ourselves, she wasn’t showing it. “Town’s not that far.”
Not that far ended up meaning about fifteen minutes north up the bumpy rural highway, and each pothole and curve in the road made Alden shift in my lap, forcing me to strike up small talk with Mary as a way to distract my brain away from how good—and wrong—it felt.
Luckily, Mary was happy to tell us about Marshall, a small college town surrounded by what felt like endless farms. The way I figured it, they probably had more cows than people in the population.
“Spit and you’ll miss it,” she said, laughing. “But even if we’re not right on the interstate, tourists like us. You boys can wander around while I get you up and running again. Bunch of bed-and-breakfasts. Some restaurants. College kids like to eat and sure like their coffee. People also come for the fishing. Hatchery’s not too far off—”
“I don’t fish,” Alden said stiffly.
“Too messy for you?”
“Yes.” He shuddered and the ripple of his back muscles made electricity zoom up my abs.
“That’s fine. More fishing for me.” Mary laughed again. Despite wishing we were anywhere else, I liked her. “We’ve even got a Walmart now. And there’s a quilt show every September.”
“It’s June.”
“Relax.” Hoping Mary wouldn’t notice, I used my right hand to pat Alden’s leg. “We’ll find something to do.”
“There’s always the Jim the Wonder Dog Museum.”
“That…uh…sure.” I tried to sound more upbeat than Alden, but growing up in the middle of Kansas, I’d had my share of strange small-town museums and attractions.
“Of course, kids also like the arcade just off North. But y’all are probably too old for games—”
“Oh, you’d be surprised.” I grinned as she pulled into an old yellow gas station with a bay of repair garages behind it. It had modern pumps but an aging canopy over them and a decrepit hound dog standing guard by the repair shop.