Chapter Three

“Taco Friday is your best idea yet.” Asa filled a plate and moved on down the line of ingredients.

Duke shrugged. “I have them from time to time.”

“They generally involve food or liquor. You’re Shaggy and Scooby rolled into one.”

Duke laughed. “Right on. More evidence of how lucky you are to have me around.”

Asa snorted. But Duke was right. From pretty much the time they’d met in the army, Duke had been his friend. Had his back, in both the metaphysical sense and the physical one. Duke had saved Asa from getting killed more than once.

The lunchroom at Twisted Steel currently held all eleven employees, so it was loud and raucous. Which might also have something to do with the fact that it was Beer and Taco Friday.

It had been a hell of a long last few weeks. They’d pushed one total rebuild out as well as two other smaller jobs. Asa had slept on the couch in his office at least once a week rather than face a drive home after three a.m.

But the work had all been delivered to very happy clients, he was soon to be full of tacos and beer, and all was right with the world.

He and Duke had bought the building the shop sat in five years before, and Asa felt like it was only now truly operating to its full potential. They’d had three employees back then and only used about a quarter of the space. Now they had a showroom, eleven full-time employees, and a host of people they contracted work out to.

There he was, a successful business owner. A homeowner. Asa Barrons, the kid who’d grown up in trailers and shitty public housing apartments in Houston, now had multiple cars, money in the bank, and a life free of chaos and pain.

They had built something together, he and his friend – a business both men could be proud of. It was the ticket out he and Duke had barely known to have dreamed about.

“I’m going to sleep the hell out of a lot of hours,” Asa said, taking several long pulls from his beer once he’d collapsed into a chair and set his food down.

Duke settled in across from him. “No lie. I’ve gotta be back here at ten, though. No way would I miss such a fantastic opportunity.”

“What?”

“I told you about this last week. The pinup calendar shoot? They’re using the showroom and some of the bays,” Duke explained. “Don’t worry; I made sure Casey went over everything they have access to. They won’t get near any work in progress. Plus I’ll be here. Looking at hot women.”

“I probably wasn’t listening.”

“See what happens when you don’t?”

Hot women draped over his machines. Now that was indeed a way to spend a Saturday. He’d planned to come in to catch up on paperwork that next afternoon anyway.

Asa tended to keep in his head, especially when he was in the middle of a project. It’s all he thought of, the need to put his hands on something, to stamp it with his vision, to watch it yield under his will.

“Thanks for the save. Guess I’ll be here at ten instead of noon like I planned.”

“I was thinking of heading out to the track on Sunday. You up for it?”

Duke and Asa had recently started a racing team they co-owned with a group of their friends. It brought Asa to the track a lot, and that’s when he’d discovered how incredible it was to drive the track himself.

“Hell yes.”

Duke tipped his chin. “Fastback?”

On a motorcycle trip down the coast to Los Angeles the summer before, Asa and Duke had found the beat-up shell of a 1968 Fastback and had to have it. They’d spent their spare time since restoring it.

Duke was magic with machines. The best mechanic Asa knew. He’d built the engine they’d wanted as Asa had coaxed all the badass back into the frame.

The result was a growling, hellaciously fast beast.

“Indeed. Depending on the conditions I might take the bike out too.”

“Your mom is going to kill me if you eat pavement, you know that, right?”

Fast and hard was his favorite. Nothing else felt quite like driving very, very fast. He didn’t have the talent to actually make a living racing. His talents lay elsewhere in the car universe. But he had access to a track and lots of fast machines, and he used that every chance he got.

“My mom uses a cane, you big whiner. You can outrun her. Then again, she doesn’t need to catch you. I bet she could throw it and knock you out from ten feet away.” Two years before, his mother had to have her foot amputated after complications from diabetes.

“I’m telling her you said that.”

“To Pat, that’s a love poem.” Asa grinned, thinking of how awesome his mom was.

“Speaking of that, the arbor you built over her back patio is really nice.”

Asa had gone into the army because it was that or end up in jail. He’d had more anger and potential for violence inside him than he could process. Years spent on the verge of trouble or running from it had left him feeling out of control and exhausted.

So he’d enlisted and then spent several years using the opportunity to make himself into a better man. A better son. To keep himself from landing in trouble in the army, he’d sent home most of his pay. It had been enough to get his mom and two sisters into a safer neighborhood.

He’d kept sending his mom what he could, even once he’d returned to the U.S. and left the military. Eventually, after the surgery, he’d convinced her and his youngest sister to move out to Seattle. It meant everything to him that he could provide for her at long last after she’d fought so hard most of her life just to survive.

“She needed some shade back there. Those big windows made her kitchen and living room way too warm.” He didn’t like her to be uncomfortable. “Anyway, what were you doing over there? You spoil her worse than I do.”

“I had a bunch of green peppers. I know she likes them. No big deal. She bragged on you so long I made her stop because I was getting a complex. Then she made me a grilled cheese sandwich and tomato soup to cheer me up. Your mom is rad.”

Asa snorted a laugh. “Just don’t tell her about the motorcycles at the track. She’d make my life hell if she found out I was racing.”

Twisted Steel was magnificent.

PJ turned in a slow circle as she stood in the middle of their showroom. Just to her left, a 1970 Chevelle. Candy-apple red.

Big windows fronted the space, but they managed to still give it a sort of intentionally gritty feel inside with black leather couches placed in a way to look at the cars and bikes on display like art.

She loved it so very much. Bold and clever. It took itself very seriously when it came to the product but also had a little bit of tongue-in-cheek self-deprecation. Delicious design choices all over the place, including a custom Harley Softail in black matte that gave her a little shiver.

She’d thought it impossible for Asa to be any hotter, until she saw this place.

“If you’re done getting all wet over cars can we get your makeup done?” Audra called out.

“Do you see this?” PJ pointed at the Softail’s back tire. “It’s so fat and delicious. I might actually be maybe a little wet, yes. But I’m just telling you that because we’re so close.”

PJ plopped down in front of a makeshift makeup station mirror.

“Go look at your outfits with Stella so she can get you styled for each.” Audra had taken on the task of organizing the shoot. She pointed at a rolling rack of clothes that had PJ’s name on it.

“I see a theme here.” Stella, who was acting as their makeup person for the day, took in each outfit.

Tom bounded into their space, amped up on coffee. “What? She’s like a ridiculously sexed-up girl next door. Guys love that. We all know it. So work it and sell my decks!”