Thank you for your continued support. I appreciate it.

Standard disclaimer.

Long chapter.

When the going gets tough, the tough eat chocolate.

With the hospital on temporary lockdown, Sam leaned back and waited.

From where he sat, he could see out the cafeteria and across the reception area, to the front door of the hospital. And in less than four minutes, firefighters and other emergency personnel came pouring in.

'A drill,' he thought, since no one was being evacuated.

Then, ten minutes later, the hospital employees reappeared, though Mercedes didn't.

"You want something to eat?" the cook called out to Sam.

He nodded, realizing he was starving. So he stood and walked over to the cook's station and eyed all the various ingredients.

A few more people came in behind him, including two women in scrubs, who took one look at him and began whispering between themselves.

"Quesadilla?" the cook asked. "Or maybe a grilled turkey and cheese? A burger? I have a hell of a Cobb salad today, but that's not going to fill up a big guy like you."

"Burger," Sam decided. If the plane crash hadn't killed him, or the second-story jump, then a little cholesterol couldn't touch him.

The women behind him were still murmuring.

"...in the Vets' Hall," one of them whispered, "Where anyone could have seen them."

"How do you know that?" the other whispered back.

"Susan told Cassie who told Geraldine. It's really unlike her. I mean, you'd expect it from one of the other Jones' but not her…"

The cook slid Sam an apologetic glance, as she flipped his burger.

"Cheese?"

He nodded.

And the whispers continued.

"…thought she'd be more careful with her image, what with the HSC at stake and all. She's still short of a lot of money and needs everyone's support."

"Do you think they did it in one of the closets here?"

Sam had never given a shit about image, and he didn't think Mercedes did either, but this was really pissing him off. So he turned to face the two nosy old bats, his arms crossed over his broad chest.

Both women gasped, as Sam faced them and immediately busied themselves with their trays.

He stared at them long and hard, but neither of them spoke.

So he did.

"Mind your own business."

Both kept their heads down, properly chastised and didn't make eye contact.

Sam turned back to the cook, who handed him his plate. Then, she gestured to the card he still held in his hand, the one Mercedes had left him.

"Just swipe it," she said, indicating the machine alongside the register. "Mercedes' card will get you anything you want on her account. Should I add a drink? Chips?"

Mercedes had given him her employee pass. She was still trying to take care of him. But he wasn't used to that.

Shaking his head, he pulled out cash.

"But..."

He gave the cook a look, that had her quickly making his change.

Extremely aware of the two women behind him, boring holes in his back with their beady eyes, he took his burger and headed back to his table.

The two women proceeded to buy their food and walked passed him, giving him several long side glances, which he completely ignored.

But what the hell did he think he was doing anyway, messing around in Mercedes' life?

He was leaving soon, but Lucky Harbor was her home, her world.

He ate, feeling confused and uncertain, two entirely foreign emotions for him.

He'd actually believed, that he was the one giving here, that he was the experienced one, imparting a little wildness and the dubious honor of his worldly ways.

How fucking magnanimous of him.

Especially, since the truth was, that Mercedes had done all the giving, completely schooling him in warmth, compassion, and strength.

And in the process, with nothing more than her soft voice and a backbone of steel, she'd wrapped him around her pinkie.

Hell, he really was such an asshole.

He cleared his plate and headed out, slowing at the front entrance.

There was a box there, similar to a mailbox, where people could drop donations for the Health Services Clinic.

He'd given money for the Vets' program, which wouldn't help, if Mercedes couldn't get the support for the HSC to remain open.

He stared at the box and knew exactly what he was going to do, to give back to the woman who'd given him so much.

On Mercedes' drive home, she stopped in at Eat Me.

Quinn had sent a text, saying there was an emergency, so she hurried in, finding her and Santana, waiting for her with a box.

A shoe box.

"Bad girl shoes," Santana said, pushing the box towards her. "Happy birthday."

"My birthday was last month."

"Merry early Christmas."

"Oh no!" Mercedes started. "These meetings are always about me. It's one of you guys' turns."

"Nope," Quinn said. "We can only concentrate on one of us at a time."

"Then, let it be Santana," Mercedes said.

"Yeah," Sue said, from where she was watching TV, at the other end of the counter. "She's screwed up. She's got that big, sexy, forest ranger sniffing around her, and all she does, is give him dirty looks."

"Hey," Santana said. "That is none of your business."

Sue cackled.

"Not talking about it," Santana said firmly, and nudged the shoe box towards Mercedes again.

Because they both looked so excited, Mercedes relented and opened the box, to find a beautiful pair of black, strappy, four-inch heels, that were dainty and flirty and pretty much screamed sex.

"Oh..." she breathed and kicked off the athletic shoes she'd worked in all day, replacing them with the heels.

Two counter stools over, Mr. Wollenski put a hand to his chest and said,

"Wow!"

"Heart pains?" Mercedes asked in concern, rushing over there in her scrubs and bad girl heels.

"No," he said. "Not heart pains."

"Where does it hurt?"

He was staring at her heels.

"Considerably lower."

Santana snorted and Mercedes went back to her stool.

Quinn was grinning.

"See? Use them wisely. They have the power."

"Power?" Mercedes asked.

"Bad girl power," Santana said. "Go forth and be bad!"

The next day, Sam brought Ray dinner. He was living in a halfway house outside of town, in a place that Mercedes had arranged for him to stay in, through the HSC.

It was infinitely better, and safer, than living on the streets.

After they ate, Ray asked Sam for a ride, directing him to the HSC.

"What's up here tonight?" Sam asked.

"A meeting."

The sign on the front door explained what kind of meeting: NA...NARCOTICS ANONYMOUS

Someone had attached a sticky note that said,

EMPHASIS ON THE A, PEOPLE!

Sam didn't know whether to be amused, that only in Lucky Harbor, would the extra note be necessary, or appalled, that the town was trusted with the anonymous at all.

But part of the process was trusting.

And he'd always sucked at that.

He turned to Ray, who'd gone still, seemingly frozen on the top step.

"I'm too old for this shit," Ray muttered.

"How old are you?" Sam asked.

"Two hundred and fifty."

"Then you're in luck," Sam said. "They don't cut you off, until you're at least, three hundred."

A ghost of a smile touched Ray's mouth.

"I'm forty-three."

'Only ten years older than me,' Sam thought.

Ray's body was trembling. In the detoxing phase, which wasn't good.

And Sam would've paid big bucks to be anywhere else right now, but he figured, if anyone was interested in him as a crutch, they had to be pretty bad off.

"How long has it been since your last hit?" Sam asked Ray.

He swiped a shaking hand over his mouth.

"I ran out of Oxycontin four days ago. Doctor says I don't need it anymore. Fucking doctors."

Sam slipped his hand into his pocket and fingered the ever-present empty bottle.

'Two months, two weeks, and counting.'

He thought about saying, that he'd wait outside, but that was the coward's way out, so he went in.

Sam survived the meeting, and so did Ray.

An hour later, they walked out side by side, both quiet.

He didn't know about Ray, but he was more than a little shaken, by the stories he'd heard, and at the utter destruction of lives, that those people in there had been trying to reboot and repair.

He knew he had to be grateful, because, he hadn't fucked up his life. At least not completely.

He was halfway back to Ray's place, when he spoke.

"So, are you and Mercedes a thing?"

Sam had been asked this many times in the past few weeks. By the clerk at the grocery store, by the guy who'd taken his money at the gas pump...actually, by everyone who'd crossed his path.

And now that he thought about it...by the very same people, who...until Mercedes...had been content, to just stare at him.

Mercedes.

Mercedes was the heart and soul of this town, or at least, she represented what its heart and soul would look like, in human form.

And while, maybe he'd treated her, like someone he could easily walk away from, he knew different.

She was different.

Still, there was no denying the fact that, while she was grounded here, in this place, in this life, he was chomping at the bit, to get back to his.

"No," Sam finally said. "We're not a thing."

Ray scratched his scruffy jaw.

"She know that?"

It'd been Mercedes' idea, that this be just a one-time affair, though, she'd accepted his latest visit, as just an addendum to the original deal.

And she'd let him off the hook for being an ass.

And then, asked him to leave without a good-bye.

"Yeah. She knows that."

The question was, did he?

"Because, she's a real nice lady," Ray said. "When I was living on a bench at the park, she'd bring me food at night. She ever tell you that?"

Sam shook his head, his chest a little tight, at the thought of Mercedes, after a long day in the ER, seeking Ray out, to make sure he was fed.

"Yeah, she can't cook worth shit," Ray told him with a small smile. "But I ate whatever she brought anyway. Didn't want to hurt her feelings."

Sam heard himself choke out a laugh.

"If I was…" Ray started. He lifted a hand to indicate himself and trailed off. "...you know, different," he finally said. "I'd try for her. She's something special. Way too special for the likes of me, you know?"

Sam's chest tightened even more. Yeah. He knew. He knew exactly.

"She'd be pissed off to hear you say that."

"She's pretty when she's pissed off," Ray said wistfully. "One time, she came to the park and some kids were trying to bean me with rocks. She chased them, yelling at them at the top of her lungs. I was in a bad way then, and still I think I looked better than she did. Her hair was all over the place, and she was in her scrubs. She looked like a patient from the place I'd stayed at, after I got back from my third tour."

'A mental facility.'

Sam pictured Mercedes, furious and chasing the kids off. He could see it...her scrubs wrinkled after a long day of work, those ridiculous fuzzy boots, and her hair looking, like it had rioted around her face.

God! She was so fucking beautiful.

"You've seen the stuff on Facebook, right?" Ray asked.

And Sam slid him a look.

"How are you getting on Facebook?"

"There's a community computer at the house." Ray shrugged. "Facebook's the homepage. And there's a pic up of you two. You two seem pretty cozy for not being a thing."

'Yeah. Cozy.'

Except, what he'd had with Mercedes, had been just about the opposite of cozy. It'd been hot. And bewildering, even staggering.

And what the hell pic was up on Facebook?

Sam dropped Ray off, then went home and worked on the Jimmy for Mark, until late.

Afterwards, he showered, then eyed his blinking phone.

Scanning the missed calls, he found himself getting a little rush, at the thought, that Mercedes had called him.

The last time she'd been stuck. Maybe this time, she just wanted to hear his voice. Because, he sure as hell could use the sound of her voice, right about now.

But the message wasn't from Mercedes. It was from Dr. Scott. He was expected at the radiology department at seven, for scans, and then, at a doctor's appointment at eight.

He tried to read the tone of the doctor's voice, to ascertain, whether the news was going to be good or bad, but Dr. Scott was as good as Sam, at not giving anything away.

The next morning, Sam was led to the doctor's office and told to wait.

He'd perfected the art of hurrying up and waiting in the military, so when Dr. Scott strode in, carrying a thick file, that Sam knew contained his medical history, he didn't react.

Scott was in full doctor mode today.

Dark blue scrubs, a white doctor coat, a stethoscope around his neck, and his hospital ID clipped to his hip pocket.

His hair was rumpled, and his eyes tired, as he dropped Sam's file on his desk, sprawled out into his chair, and put his feet up.

"Whew!"

"Long day already?" Sam asked.

"Is it still day?" Scott scrubbed his hands over his face. "Heard from Francine today. Or yesterday. Persistent, isn't she?"

"Among other things. What did you tell her?"

"That your prognosis was none of her goddamned business and to stop calling me."

This got a genuine smile out of Sam.

"And she thanked you politely and went quietly into the night."

"Yeah," Scott said, heavy on the irony. "Or, told me what she was going to do with my balls, if she had to come out here, to get news on you herself."

"Sounds about right." Sam looked at his closed file. "Verdict?"

"Scans show marked improvement. With another month of continued P.T., you could be back in the same lean, mean, fighting shape you were. For now, I'd say, you were probably up to where us normal humans are."

Another month off would fucking kill him, he thought.

"So I'm good to go then."

Dr. Scott gave him a look.

"Depends on your idea of go. You're not up to leaping out second-story windows."

"Yeah, but that hardly ever happens."

The doctor put his feet down and leaned forward, studying Sam for a long, serious moment.

"You're really going back."

"I was always going back."

"But you want to go back now."

"Hell, yeah," Sam said. "I wanted to go back the day I got here. Especially, in the past few weeks, since I've been swimming and running again."

"So why didn't you? Go back?"

"I want to work," Sam said, gesturing to the file. " I need clearance."

"Yes, and that's going to come soon, but my point is, that you haven't been exactly handcuffed to Lucky Harbor. You could have left."

A flash of Mercedes' face came to Sam. She was looking up at him, while lying snuggled against him in her bed, wearing only a soft, sated smile and a slant of moonlight across her face.

It was no mystery what had kept him here.

"Merce know, that you're just about out of here?" Dr. Scott asked quietly.

"This has nothing to do with her," Sam said flatly. "Sign the papers."

"You'd have to be on light duty."

"Fine. I'll push fucking papers around on a desk if I have to. Just clear me."

Scott shook his head, looking baffled.

"You'd leave here for a desk job? Man, you're not a desk-job kind of guy and we both know it."

He'd deal.

He needed to get close to the action, to get back to his world. He needed the adrenaline. He was wasting away here in Lucky Harbor.

"You know," Dr. Scott said, with that infuriatingly calm voice, leaning on the desk, his elbows on the release papers. "Maybe we should get back to the real reason you're still here."

"Sign the papers, Scott."

Scott stared at him.

And Sam stared back, holding the other man's gaze evenly and steadily.

With a shake of his head, the doctor signed the papers.

Sam spent two days, not making any plans to get back to his life.

First, he told himself he needed to finish up the Jimmy.

Then, he told himself he had to finish up the Charger for Lucille's neighbor, and the other two cars he'd taken on as well.

And people kept calling him with new car issues.

He couldn't just ignore them. Plus, he needed to finish the Shelby, just for himself.

But the truth was, she was running like a dream.

After that, he ran out of excuses and decided he'd give himself a day off from thinking about it.

Which turned into yet another day…

Then, he woke up to a message from Dr. Scott, to stop by his office at ten.

So he got up and swam. Then he ran, hard.

Next, he played WWE with Mark at the gym for an hour, until they fell apart gasping, sweating, and equally worked over.

After that, he dragged himself to the shower and drove to the doctor's office.

Dr. Scott was in dress clothes today...a white doctor's coat over his clothing, and the ever-present stethoscope acting as a tie.

He looked up from the mountain of paperwork on his desk and scowled at Sam.

"You call 'The Queen' yet, about being cleared?" he asked.

"No."

Dr. Scott gave him a long look, then stood and shut his office door.

Back in his chair, he steepled his fingers, studying Sam like a bug on a slide.

"Is there a problem?"

"No. I've just got a little pain is all." He straightened his leg and winced.

"No doubt," Scott said dryly. "I was at the gym this morning and you never even noticed me. You were too busy wiping the floor with Mark...who, by the way...is the best street fighter I've ever met. And you kicked his ass. How much pain can you be in?"

"I pulled something."

Dr. Scott's smile faded.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Scott was quiet for a moment.

"Then maybe, you should give it another week," he finally said.

Sam nodded his agreement and left, through the back way, which meant, he stood in the bright sunshine in the hospital parking lot, staring at Mercedes' POS car.

He briefly wondered what the hell was wrong with him, but since that was probably way too big a problem to solve, in this decade, he went home.

Sam fiddled on the Shelby, until he realized it'd gotten dark. He was just getting out of his second shower of the day, when he heard a knock at his door.

He'd been off the job for more than six months, and still, the instinct to grab his gun before answering, was second nature.

But this was Lucky Harbor. The only real danger, was being killed by kindness.

And nosy-ass gossip.

Shaking his head, he grabbed his Levi's up off the floor and pulled them on, then opened the door to…Mercedes.

She gave him a small, sweet smile. Clearly she hadn't yet heard through the cafeteria grapevine, that he was single-handedly ruining her life.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey yourself."

Her gaze ran over his bare torso and something went hot in her eyes, as she took in the fact that, he was only wearing jeans, which he hadn't yet buttoned all the way up.

He did that now, while she watched, and the temperature around them shot up even more.

Then, she stepped over the threshold, and since he hadn't moved, she bumped into him.

He thought it was an accidental touch, but then, her hands came up and brushed over his chest and abs.

'No accident.'

Nor was the fact that she was wearing a halter top, low-riding jeans and a pair of really hot heels, that brought her up four point five inches and perfectly aligned their bodies.

Her pulse was beating like a drum, at the little dip in the base of her throat. Lifting a hand, he ran a finger over the beat, watching her pulse leap even more.

Her hand came up to join with his.

"In the name of full disclosure," she murmured, "You should know that I talked to Ray this afternoon."

Sam lifted his gaze.

"He landed in the ER," she said.

"What happened? Is he all right?"

"Someone on the highway caught sight of him wandering around and brought him in. He had a bottle of Jack and some dope he'd scored off some kids."

"Shit!"

"Yeah." She kept her hand on his, squeezing his fingers reassuringly. "He's fine. He's currently sleeping it off, but before that…he was talking."

"Was he?"

"You took him to NA."

That was a statement of fact, so he let it sit between them.

"You…went into the meeting," Mercedes said. "And you stayed."

Another statement of fact.

"Was he…unsteady?" she asked. "Did he need the assistance?"

Ah, and now he got it. She was on a fishing expedition.

"He wasn't that bad off. No."

She nodded, and Sam waited for her expression to change, but it didn't. There was no leaping to conclusions, no trial and jury, no pity, nothing.

Hell, he didn't know why that surprised him. She never did the expected.

She was the warmest, most compassionate, understanding woman he'd ever met.

"Did you need something there?" she asked.

And she was also one of the most curious.

"Why don't you just ask me what you really want to know, Mercedes?"

"Okay." She drew a deep breath. "Are you an addict, too?"

Unable to resist, he again stroked his thumb, over the spot at the base of her neck, before slipping his hand into his pocket, to finger the ever-present Vicodin bottle.

It was a light weight. And empty.

And both those things reassured him.

He'd fucked up plenty, but at least not with that.

"Damn close," he said.

"Oh," she breathed, and nodded. "I see."

No, she didn't. But that was his fault.

"After the plane crash, I wasn't exactly the best of patients. I was on heavy meds. A wreck, basically."

"You'd just lost your team," she said softly.

Something warm unfurled in him at that. She was defending him. To himself.

"When I went back to work, I gave up the meds." Sam paused, remembering. "It sucked. Christ, it sucked bad. I liked the oblivion, too damn much."

Mercedes' eyes were on his, absorbing his words, taking it all in without judgment. So he gave her the rest.

"Six months ago, I got hurt again. In the ER, they got me all nice and drugged up before I could refuse the meds."

Something flickered in her eyes, and he knew she was remembering, how he'd refused drugs the night of the storm.

"Then I was released," he said. "With a 'take as needed' prescription. I found myself doing exactly that and living for the clock, for the minute I could take more. That's when I stopped refilling."

"You went cold turkey?"

"I never understood that saying, cold turkey," Sam said with a grim smile. "It's more like hot hell, but yeah."

He blew out a breath.

"And I still crave it."

Mercedes went quiet for a moment.

"I think, the craving part is normal. We all have our cravings. I gave up chocolate once. And the cravings sucked."

Sam choked out a laugh. God, he liked her. A whole hell of a lot.

What was he supposed to do with that?

"I don't think it's exactly the same."

"True. I mean, I can't be arrested for hoarding chocolate cake," she said. "But it ruins my life. Costs money. And it makes my scrubs tight. You know how bad that is, when your drawstring pants are too tight? Pretty damn bad, Sam."

He was smiling now.

He rocked back on his heels and studied her.

"You're looking pretty damn good from where I'm standing."

"Because, I only let myself have it once a week. Or whenever Santana calls. She's a very bad influence."

"Still crave, huh?" he asked with genuine sympathy.

"I'd give up my next breath for a piece of cake right now," she said with deep feeling. Then she sighed, as if with fond memories.

"I think it helps to keep busy...distracted. I know that much."

"I've been distracted plenty," Sam said, and Mercedes felt her face heat.

He loved that she could initiate sex in a storage room, above about five hundred of her closest friends and family and still be embarrassed.

"Were you working on a car?" Mercedes asked. "I heard you're the new go-to mechanic guy."

"I was working before I showered," Sam said.

"Show me."

"The shower? Sure. I might have used all the hot water though."

She gave him a little laugh and a shove, that took him back a step.

He could have stood his ground, but he liked the way she was letting her hands linger on his chest.

He took one of those hands and guided her through to the kitchen and out the back door to the garage.

Mercedes looked around, taking in the cars and the slew of tools, scattered across the work table.

"What were you doing?" she asked and Sam answered,

"Brake line work on my Shelby."

"Show me," she said again.

"You want to learn, how to put in new stainless steel brake lines?" he asked, heavy on the disbelief. "Mercedes, those shoes aren't meant for working on a car."

"What are they meant for?"

"Messing with a man's head."

She smiled.

"Are they working?"

"More than you can possibly imagine. Listen, this car shit...it's messy."

"So?" she asked, sounding amused, and he had to admit, she had a point.

She saw blood and guts and probably worse, every single day. So a little dirt wasn't going to bother her.

Shaking his head at himself, he popped the hood. Then grabbed a forgotten sweatshirt off the bench and handed it to her.

"I'm not cold," Mercedes stated.

Sam's gaze slid to her breasts. Her nipples were poking at the material of her halter top. If she wasn't cold, then she was turned on.

It would seem hard to believe, since he hadn't touched her, but every time they got within five feet of each other, he got a jolt to the dick, so who was he to say?

"It's to keep your clothes from getting dirty."

He pulled the sweatshirt over her head, unable to stop himself, from touching as much of her as possible, as he tugged it down her torso, only slightly mollified, to hear her breathing hitch.

'Yep, we're definitely on the same page.'

The sweatshirt came to her thighs. She pushed back the hood and said,

"It smells like you."

And Sam felt that odd pain in his chest again...an ache, that actually had nothing to do with wanting to get her naked.

"And now it's going to smell like you," he said.

"Is that okay?"

It was so far beyond okay he didn't have words. internally, he smiled and then nodded.

Sam kicked over the mechanic creeper, then his backup, and gestured for Mercedes to get onto it.

When they were both flat on their backs, she grinned at him.

"Now what?"

"Under the car," he simply said.

She slid herself beneath the car, and he joined her. And side by side, they looked up at the bottom of the chassis.

"What's first?" she asked.

Sam looked at her sweet profile.

'What was first?' he thought.

Then reminded himself, that he'd been cleared to leave Lucky Harbor.

He handed her a roll of brake line.

"You bend it to fit the contours of the frame as you go." He pointed out the route, and she began to work the brake line.

"It's peaceful," she said. "Under here."

He slid her a sideways look, and she laughed at him. No one ever laughed at him, he realized. Well, except for Mark, and he didn't look cute while doing it either.

"I'm serious," Mercedes said, still smiling. "You don't think so?"

It was dirty, grimy, stuffy…and yeah. Peaceful.

"I'm just surprised you think so."

"You don't think I can enjoy getting dirty once in awhile?" She bit her lower lip and laughed, just as he did. "Okay, you know what I mean."

"Yeah. Here..."

She wasn't able to put enough muscle into bending the line, so he put his hands over hers and guided her.

"Unravel another foot or so."

"Okay." She frowned, eyeing the space. "How long is that?"

"About nine inches. I need twelve." Sam paused. "Twelve inches would be great."

He felt her gaze, and he did his best to look innocent, but she didn't buy it.

"What the hell would you do with twelve inches?" she wanted to know.

He waggled a brow.

"Plenty."

Mercedes shook her head.

"Like you aren't lethal enough with what you have," she said, making him laugh.

They worked the brake line in companionable silence for a few moments, but Mercedes didn't do silence all that well.

"What do you think about, when you're under here?" she asked. "Besides your…inches?"

Sam smiled, but the truth was, he usually tried like hell not to think at all.

"Sometimes, I think about my dad."

"He was a Navy mechanic, too, right? He taught you all this stuff?"

Sam's dad had been a mechanic in the Navy, but not him. Yet, correcting the misconception now, by telling her that he'd once been a SEAL medic, wasn't something he wanted to get into.

It was far easier to deny that part of himself, rather than revisit it.

"My dad didn't want me to learn mechanics, actually. He wanted more for me. I think he hoped, that if he kept me away from anything mechanical, I'd become a lawyer or something like that."

"And…?"

"And when I was fourteen, he bought a Pontiac GTO." He smiled at the memory. "A '67. God, she was sweet."

"She?" Mercedes teased, turning her face to his. She was so close he reached out and stroked a rogue strand of hair from her temple, tucking it behind her ear.

"Yeah, she," he said. "Cars are always a she. Do you want to hear this story or not?"

"Very much." She nudged her shoulder to his. "Every single detail."

"I took apart the engine."

"Oh my God!" she said, on a shocked laugh. "Was he mad?"

"It was a classic, and it was in mint condition. Mad doesn't even begin to cover what he was."

She stared at him, with wide eyes.

"Why did you do it?"

He shrugged.

"I couldn't help myself. I liked to take things apart and then put them back together again. Only I couldn't. I had no idea what I was doing."

Sam could still remember the look on his father's face...utter and complete shock, at the empty engine compartment, horror that his baby had been breached and violated, and then sheer fury.

"I can still feel the sweat, trickling down the back of my spine," Sam said, shaking his head. "I hadn't meant to take it so far. But I just kept undoing and undoing…"

"What happened?"

"I was pretty sure he'd kick my ass."

She gasped.

"He beat you?"

"Nah, he never laid a hand on me." Sam felt a smile curve his mouth. "But he didn't have to. He was one scary son of a bitch. He'd talk in this low, authoritative voice, that dared you to defy him. No one ever did...that I know of."

"Not you?"

"Hell no!"

Mercedes was grinning wide, and he shook his head at her.

"What's so funny?"

"You," she said. "You're so big and bad. It's hard to imagine you scared of anything."

She touched his jaw, cupping it in her palm and lightly running her thumb over his skin.

He hadn't shaved that morning, and he could hear the rasp of his stubble, against the pad of her thumb.

And as she touched him, he watched the flecks in her eyes heat like gold.

"I like being under a car with you," Mercedes said.

Working on cars was Sam's escape.

Beneath a hood or a chassis was familiar ground, no matter what part of the world he was in, or where he lay his head at night.

It was his constant. A buffer from the shit.

And Mercedes was a single-woman destruction crew, outmaneuvering him, letting herself, right into his safety zone, and then into his damn heart, while she was at it.

Because, no matter what bullshit he fed himself, he liked being here with her, too.

"You ever going to tell me what you are scared of?" she asked.

Sam let out a short laugh.

"Plenty," he assured her.

Her eyes softened, and she slid her hand into the hair at the back of his neck, fisting lightly, bringing him a full-body shiver, of pure pleasure.

"Such as?" she asked.

'You,' he nearly said.

And it would be God's truth.

"Tell me."

"I'm afraid of not living," he said. He rolled out from beneath the Shelby, then crouched beside Mercedes' creeper, putting his hands on her ankles, to yank her out, too.

Sitting up, she pushed her hair back and met his gaze.

"Don't worry, Sam. I know."

"You know what?"

"That this isn't your real life, that you're just killing time with me, until..."

He put his finger over her lips.

"Mer..."

"No, it's okay," she said around his finger, wrapping her hand around his wrist. "You're not the small-town type. I know that."

And yet here he was. Free to go, but still here.

"Are we done working on the car?" Mercedes asked.

"Yeah." Her legs looked so freaking good, in those jeans and fuck-me heels. "We're done working on the car."

"So, I can teach you something about my work now?" she asked.

He took in her small but sexy smile and felt himself go hard.

"What did you have in mind?"

"Ever play doctor?"

Stay safe!