A/N: Enjoy :D

Chapter 5

Jamie frowned as he munched his way through the BLT sandwich he had bought from a local baker's. Either his brother had finally had a breakdown or his nephew was much more persuasive than he let on. He was willing to bet it was the latter. It was too bad that Andy was so obsessed with maths and cars. He'd make an amazing lawyer. Or a politician. How had Andy persuaded Troy to hire a woman?

Now, Jamie knew his brother. Troy had nothing against women and neither did Jamie. Sarah, his wife, prevented him from expressing any sexist thoughts. But, Jamie remembered the time when Troy had built the business up from scratch. He'd been angry, distraught, helpless...but the one thing he'd promised Jamie is that the garage would stay a woman-free zone. Friends and family were allowed but no women employees at all.

So why had it changed?

He watched his brother curiously as he expertly altered the gearbox (the Landrover refused to drive in third gear without stalling). Ever since Jamie had arrived for work, Troy had been wittering on about Gabriella. Gabriella this, Gabriella that. Jamie probably wouldn't have minded as much, considering Troy was paying a woman some attention. But what was really annoying Jamie was that Troy knew nothing about her. He wasn't suggesting that his brother shouldn't have employed this Gabriella woman. As long as she was a good mechanic, Jamie wished her good luck. But, because Troy knew nothing about her, he kept repeating himself over and over again.

Jamie couldn't tell if Troy's fascination was a bad sign or if he was simply denying the fact that he needed someone exactly like her.

Jamie sighed as he finished his sandwich and rubbed the crumbs off his hands. "Okay," he began with his mouthful. He swallowed and tossed his rubbish into a nearby bin. "Troy, shut up. I don't care what Gabriella's like. I'm sure I'll meet her later. I don't care if she constantly has a bandana around her left wrist. I honestly don't care. As long as she can fix cars, I don't care."

Troy frowned as he rubbed his hands on a rag. "What's wrong with you?"

Jamie shrugged. "I don't know. Ever since I got here, you've only talked about her. But the problem is, you keep repeating yourself. Change the record already." He sighed. "I've got nothing against women, you know that Sarah wouldn't let me live until tomorrow if I did, but you said to me that this was a woman-free zone. Why did you hire her?"

"I don't know," Troy muttered as he slammed the bonnet of the Landrover shut.

"Are you having a breakdown?" Jamie asked worriedly.

Troy leaned against the closed bonnet. "I don't know."

Jamie frowned. "But, she's a good mechanic, right?"

Troy pushed himself off of the car and nodded. "Yeah. Changed the oil pan and fan of a car yesterday and she's been altering some of the electronics on a Hyundai today."

"Isn't that the main thing?" Jamie asked.

Troy sighed. "I just don't want any drama, that's all. I had my fair share of drama twenty years ago."

Jamie shrugged. "That isn't women. That's just life."

"She won't tell me anything. At all. It's worrying," he exclaimed.

Jamie shook his head. "She's not going to tell you everything. From what you've told me, she doesn't sound like a convicted axe murderer."

Troy shrugged. "You never know." He kicked at the spanner that he'd dropped on the floor and hadn't picked up yet. "I don't know. I'm just so used to everybody being open with each other when they work here."

Jamie folded his arms. "Can I ask you a serious question? And answer me honestly. Are you reluctant towards her because you're afraid of her?"

Troy laughed. "Jamie, don't be stupid. Of course not."

Of course not, he says. Lies. Troy had never been a terribly good actor. And it showed. He was lying through his teeth. Of course Troy was scared of Gabriella. Well, not specifically her. Just women in general. Especially women who seemed different. Women who didn't quite fit with Troy's past experience terrified him. Women were a foreign species, any man would tell you that. But, the difference between the average man and Troy was that the average man, such as Jamie, acknowledged that women were complicated and braved the gossiping, mood swings and arguments. Troy just blocked women out completely. He didn't give them a chance.

Jamie found it quite sad, really, because while Troy had every right to believe that women weren't worth the hassle, he was being illogical. The denial that Troy had of how much he needed a woman in his life had lasted over twenty years. And it was time for that denial to end. Troy had to give Gabriella a chance. Even if he wasn't willing to contemplate her as girlfriend material, at least as a friend. The business had always held employees who were friends and were willing to work together like a well oiled machine. But, who knows? Maybe this time would be different and Troy would discover how a woman's beauty would cancel out her complications.

Jamie snapped out of his thoughts to see Troy stood in front of him, looking exasperated. "What? What did I miss? Were you talking to me?"

Troy sighed, slamming a folder into Jamie's chest. "Look around. I'm not talking to the ghost of Auntie Mable. You're losing it, little brother," he muttered. He patted Jamie's shoulder as he walked past.

Frowning, Jamie flicked through the folder. "But, Troy, these are the accounts. Andy usually does these."

Troy shrugged helplessly. "Well Andy is in a lecture at the minute, learning about trees or flowers or..."

"Logarithms?" Jamie supplied helpfully.

"Logarithms," Troy muttered absently. "Those, too. And since you passed your maths GCSE the first time around and I didn't, you can do them."

Jamie frowned as Troy disappeared into the back office. "Chicken," he called as he sat down at the table and began methodically working through the expenses and the profits of the business. Undoubtedly, Troy would give the accounts to Andy to double check, anyway. But, for the next few minutes, Jamie was lost in the logical and sense-making world of numbers.

"Hey, I said I was sorry, didn't I? What more do you want?" a voice exclaimed, humour lacing its voice.

Turning in the vague direction, Jamie saw a woman, Gabriella no doubt, heading his way. She was on the shorter side, nowhere near six feet. But she looked the pure image of hard work. Her dungaree shorts and white t-shirt already showed progress of her work day with oil, coffee and a stain on her shoulder that was either ketchup or blood. He terribly hoped it was the former. Her dark hair, eyes and darkly tanned skin gave her a beautiful exotic look. Her toned legs were scratched and scarred and were obviously not exempt from the tell tale signs of her job.

She let out a ring of laughter as she offered a friendly smile to him and set her denim bag on the table. "I promise you that I'll spend my lunch hour tomorrow filling you in. But, be warned, there really isn't much to tell you...I don't know, I haven't asked. I've been a bit busy being really pissed off by him...No, his left hand his completely empty." By this time, all humour had vanished from her voice and was instantly replaced by frustration. "Shar, listen to me, I'm not interested. Look, I've got to go. I've got a man staring at me and laughing. I've got to go. Bye Shar." Sighing, she hung her phone up and threw it into her bag.

"Don't mind me." Jamie smiled and turned back to the accounts.

"Alright. Obviously a mechanic and you have the blue eyes I've seen constantly these past few days. You're a Bolton. Troy's brother? Jamie?" she asked.

He smiled and extended his hand. "Got it in one. No need to ask who you are. The famous Gabriella."

Gabriella nodded and pulled out a chair to sit down on. "Yep. Gabriella, that's me."

He nodded. "Well, I'm glad you're here. Andy tells me you like maths."

She shrugged. "My two one on my degree says that I do."

He slid the folder towards her. "Could you double check the accounts? It's usually Andy's job but he's at uni and so my brother loaded it on me."

She laughed. "Sure." She started perusing over the numbers, her eyes flitting back and forth. "Troy's the oldest, right?"

"Yep. My beloved older brother. How'd you know? Because of Troy's grey hair?" he joked.

Gabriella shrugged as she closed the folder and slid it away. "Not really. I can spot an older brother a mile away."

He quirked an eyebrow. "You have a brother?"

She nodded slowly. "Yeah. Five years older, a whole lot stupider. I'm kidding. He's not that bad. A bastard at times. And an ass. But he has good intentions."

"Brothers, eh?" Jamie laughed.

"Sisters are just the same." She smiled at the thought of her sister. "Addie's three years younger than me."

"Ah. Middle sibling," Jamie realised.

Gabriella was about to reply but a voice interrupted them. "Well, I go into the office for a minute, come back out and see you two gossiping."

"For your information," Jamie protested, "I was getting to know my newest workmate."

"Get to work," Troy muttered.

"And on that note," Gabriella began as she stood up, "I have a Hyundai calling my name."

She picked up her tool box from beneath the table and headed out into the car park.

"What do you think?" Troy asked as Gabriella opened the bonnet of the car she'd been working on that morning.

Jamie stood up and shrugged. "She's nice. And hot."

Troy groaned. "Don't go there."

"I'm just saying," he exclaimed.

Troy sighed as he watched Gabriella bend over to inspect the engine. What did it matter if she was hot or otherwise? He was her boss and she was his employee. Nothing less, nothing more. And it would stay that way.

"...and then you carry the one and, voila. X equals three," Andy explained calmly.

Steph rolled her eyes and turned back to her textbook. "That's fascinating and confusing and it doesn't make any sense to me. But, if you don't mind, I'm reading about the anatomy of the starfish."

Andy quirked an eyebrow. "Fascinating."

"It is actually. I'm going to write my dissertation on it. And if I ever get around to doing my Masters, I want to write a thesis on starfish," she explained.

"Steph, the amount you talk about starfish, I could write a thesis on them," he exclaimed.

Steph sighed and turned back to her textbook. They were sat opposite each other at the dining room table of her house. A mountain of textbooks, notebooks and papers separated them. Andy had just attempted, and failed, to explain some kind of mathematical equation to her. But, he got nowhere. She was much better when learning about the ocean. He was too optimistic sometimes. Ever since they left sixth form, she had sworn never to study maths again. The only reason she had sat maths at A Level was because it looked impressive on university applications. But, Andy remained ever hopeful that she would one day return to his world.

Fat chance. She was more than happy scuba diving to study fish in her own seaside town. A lot of people wondered why she hadn't moved away to go to university like the majority of her friends had. Given the chance, they had left Scarborough's confining and sheltering walls and went into the big, wide world. Not her, though. Why? She wasn't sure. Andy had a valid reason. His family was complicated and he'd stayed home to keep an eye on his father. But she didn't have complications in her family. In fact, her parents had urged her to move away. But she didn't.

She saw Andy's fingers, the fingers that were like magic wands when he was fixing a car, stabbing hurriedly at the keys on his calculator. Poor calculator. If he prodded any harder, the thing would shatter. It wasn't that he was angry or anything. It was just that when he was studying, the easygoing, happy-go-lucky guy that she'd known all of her life transformed into a frantic genius. She could visibly see the cogs turning in his head as he scribbled his methodical workings out into his notebook.

What if he was the reason? What if the thought of leaving Scarborough, and inevitably Andy, too, scared the crap out of her? She didn't know why. Maybe because he was her rock; the person she went to when things weren't going quite the way she planned. But, whatever the reason, she was incapable of leaving until he did. And then she would go where he did.

Wow. Pathetic much?

She tried her best not to sound desperate when she contemplated things like this, but she couldn't help it. Still, no matter how much she thought about this stuff, she could never bring herself to admit that it was because they were more than friends. That's all they were: friends. And that's all she wanted them to be...right?

"Hey," she protested when a paper airplane hit her smack, bang between her eyes.

Andy was laughing loudly, holding his stomach. "Steph, you were on planet Zorg. I've been talking to you for ages but you couldn't hear me."

She sighed, realising that the hour of reading she had planned for herself had been a bit ambitious considering Andy was around. "Sorry," she muttered. "What were you saying?"

He shook his head. "Nothing. It doesn't matter. What's wrong?"

She shrugged. "Nothing's wrong."

He seemed to contemplate probing further before he let it go. "What do you think of Gabriella?"

"She seems nice," she murmured. "I think Uncle Troy made the right decision in hiring her. She seems great from what I've seen of her."

"I think that, too," Andy murmured. "Do you think..."

"What do I think?" Steph asked curiously.

"Do you think she and my dad have a chance?" he asked.

She chewed her lip as she contemplated her answer. She knew that his optimism extended towards his dad, always hoping that Troy would find the happiness he deserved. "I think," she began slowly, "that people only have a chance if they want one. You know me. I don't believe in fate. If they want it, they'll make it happen. Do you understand what I'm trying to say?"

Andy nodded slowly. "I just know that she's good for him."

Steph smiled. "I know you want what's best for Uncle Troy. I do, too. But, you're not going to force them together. Do you know why?"

Being the oblivious guy that he was, Andy's only response was a shrug.

She sighed. "You can't force them together because Uncle Troy is a stubborn mule and the more you push him into it, the less it's going to happen." She stood up, heading into the adjoined kitchen to get a drink. "Besides," she called out over the sound of the running tap, "even if they don't know they want each other, if the want is there, somewhere, it'll happen. Trust me. Sometimes you think you don't want something, but deep down, in the pit of your stomach, you know that you do." She looked through the open doorway to look at Andy, feeling tears well in her eyes. "And nothing can change that."