Ali was just leaving school when she heard the sound of a car behind her. She knew the sound of that car anywhere and looked round to see the well known red twin turbo Supra driving up behind her. It pulled in just in front of her and the passenger side door opened to let her in. She said bye to her friend and got into the car.

"Hey," she said to the guy in the driver's seat. He leant over and kissed her.

"Hey, how was your day?"

"Good thanks but I'm so tired. Can't wait to go home and get to bed." She needed her sleep after the party they had last night. She didn't understand how her boyfriend didn't get tired - even with last nights late party and him being at work all day today he still seemed to be in a good mood.

"Well there might be a problem there," he said keeping his eyes on the road ahead.

"Why," she asked him curiously.

"There's a bit of a rush at the garage today and three cars need to be done by 7 for the races tonight. All the guys are in but there is no way we are going to get them finished. We need an extra pair of hands and your hands would be the best?" He said looking at her with those big puppy dog eyes that she just couldn't say no to. She didn't mind helping out at the garage anyway; it had been like her second home for the past 5 years.

"Don't worry I promise I'll make it up to you." he said trying to convince her, not that she needed it but she wasn't going to complain.

"Ok let me just go home first to get changed and then I'll go round with you." He looked pleased as he sped off up the road to the house.

They arrived at the house about 10 minutes later. She got out of the car and went into the house, ran up the stairs to her room and opened her wardrobe to find something to wear. She grabbed her jeans and a green sleeveless t shirt and quickly got changed out of her uniform and into the clothes. She put her hair up and fixed her make up quickly then ran downstairs again. Before leaving the house she went into the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge then left locking the door behind her. Her boyfriend, Taylor, was still patiently waiting in the car. She got in and they left for the garage.

They arrived at the garage and she could see Adam and Jason at the front working on the engine of a black Honda Civic type r sports. She couldn't see the rest of the team around anywhere as they drove into the garage. Taylor parked his Supra beside the rest of the team's cars.

They got out of the car and walked towards the garage.

"Hey guys," she said to Adam and Jason as she walked past them into the garage.

"Hey," they both said in unison. She walked into the garage and could see Craig working on a red Mazda mx-5 in the corner and Chris was busy with a blue Nissan 350z. She said hey to they guys and walked into the office were she had seen Taylor sneak off to.

"So what am I working on then?"

"We got a Mitsubishi Eclipse in this afternoon that needs to be checked over for the races tonight. Do you want to take that?"

"Do I have an option?"

"Well it's either that or change the gear box on the Honda CRV out back?"

"Ok then I'll take the eclipse. Just a standard check yeh?

"Yeh that'll do," he said without even looking up at her.

"Oh that'll do? Fine I'll get right to it shall I?" she said sarcastically and walked out of the room.

"Hey Ali while your on your feet fancy getting me a drink from the fridge? Please?"

"Sure. Why not! What do you want?" She couldn't help but be nice to the team; they had been there for her for the past 5 years and would do anything for her.

"Just give me a can of coke please."

She got him the coke and then went over to the Eclipse and started work on it. It was almost 5pm now and all the cars needed to be finished by 7 at the latest in time for the races tonight so everyone was working harder than usual and the garage seemed to be very quiet.

Time passed quickly and it wasn't long before Taylor came in from helping the cars outside to tell them that they had 20 minutes to get finished. Ali was fine coz she was just finishing up the check anyway but she had noticed that Johnny has been struggling trying to change the exhaust on the Nissan for the past 30 minutes or so and when she had finished on the Mitsubishi she went over to see would she could do.

"Hey Chris you want a hand to get that finished?"

"Have you finished the Eclipse yet?"

"Yeh otherwise I wouldn't have offered would I?"

"Ok sorry. Yeh I could do with a hand. I just need a bit more time to get this finished but there is other stuff on the inside that needs to be done. You want to sort that out?"

"Yeh sure what needs done?"

"Well there's something up with the CD/MP3 player. And the 5 inch monitor on the back of the passenger's seat isn't working. Would you see what you can do with them?"

"Sure."

She got into the car and checked out what she had to fix. The CD/MP3 was easy enough - there was just a problem with the data files on it which she sorted out quickly. She moved onto the monitor and spent about 10 minutes trying to work out what the problem was before Taylor came back into the garage saying that it was almost seven and the cars needed to be finished and cleared out of the garage in the next 5 minutes.

Chris had just finished the exhaust and was putting all the stuff away. She then noticed that one of the wires running into the monitor had been broken and would need replaced. She got out of the car to go and get what she needed to fix it. The job shouldn't take more than 5 minutes.

She noticed Mark walking into the garage.

"Hey guys, hey Ali. How's it going?" Mark was one of their regulars at the garage and knew everyone well. He would obviously be racing tonight and was here to collect the Honda Civic that Adam and Jason were working on. He chatted with Taylor for a couple of minutes before the two of them went into the office to sort out the money then he left.

She was just about to get out of the car when she heard Taylor talking to someone. It was the guy whose car she was working on and she got of the car to meet him. He walked over to her.

"Hey I'm Brian," he said holding out his hand for her to shake. She thought he was quite attractive and noticed his piercing blue eyes. She also noticed that he had an American accent.

"Hi I'm Ali," she said offering her hand to him.

"Thanks for working on my car today." She could see Taylor becoming annoyed very quickly. He was a very jealous boyfriend and couldn't stand any guys flirting with her.

"Oh it's not me you should be thanking its Chris he did most of the work, I just fixed a few things on the inside."

"Well thanks anyway. Taylor how much do I owe you for this then?"

"Come into the office and I'll sort it out." They both walked into the office and the door was closed. Ali thought nothing off it and carried on tidying up with the guys. About 10 minutes later the office door opened and Brian left. Taylor came onto the garage floor.

"Thanks for working so hard today guys now let's get home." He walked over to Ali who was on the floor talking to Craig. He pulled her up to her feet and kissed her.

"Thanks for helping me out hunni couldn't have done it without you. Now you wana get home and get sorted for the races tonight?"

"Yeh let's go. I need to go to bed for a bit before we go though because I'm really tired."

"Sounds good to me!" he said back to her with that playful look in his eyes.

"I mean to sleep," she said laughing, only to see the smile leave his face.

Taylor locked up and the whole team left the garage one by one in their cars.