Chapter 4 Cracks in the Wall #2
By the time he reached the equipment shed, two ranch hands stopped talking the moment he walked past.
Another gave him a curious look before returning to his work.
None of them said anything directly.
They didn't have to.
Small towns had their own language.
Silence often spoke louder than words.
Around noon, Jax drove into Red Hollow to pick up fencing supplies from the hardware store.
The town looked exactly as it always had.
Pickup trucks lined the main street.
Country music drifted from the diner across the road.
Children rode bicycles along cracked sidewalks while older men gathered beneath the awning outside the feed store discussing weather forecasts that rarely proved accurate.
Everything appeared ordinary.
Until he stepped inside the hardware store.
"Morning, Jax."
Mr. Benson greeted him with his usual friendly smile.
"Morning."
"You need more fence posts?"
"And wire."
Mr. Benson nodded while leading him toward the storage room.
"I heard Navarro fixed your truck."
"He did."
"Good mechanic."
"He is."
"And apparently he works fast."
Jax glanced at him.
"Fast enough."
Mr. Benson smiled knowingly.
"That's not all people are saying."
Jax sighed quietly.
"What are they saying?"
"Oh..."
The older man waved a dismissive hand.
"You know how folks are."
"They don't."
"They see two young men talking more than once and suddenly everyone thinks they've solved some great mystery."
"There isn't a mystery."
"I know that."
"But gossip doesn't need facts."
Jax loaded the supplies into his cart.
"I appreciate the warning."
Mr. Benson lowered his voice.
"For what it's worth, your father used to say this town talked too much."
"He wasn't wrong."
"He also said the talking usually moved on to somebody else after a while."
"I hope so."
"As long as nobody gives them something new."
Jax nodded politely before finishing his shopping.
Outside, he loaded everything into the truck and started the engine.
Instead of heading directly back to the ranch, he found himself turning toward Navarro Auto Repair.
The decision surprised him.
He didn't need another repair.
He didn't need another excuse.
Still...
He wanted to check on something.
Or perhaps someone.
He wasn't entirely sure which.
The familiar garage doors stood open.
Inside, Eli was lying beneath an old pickup with only his boots visible from underneath the vehicle.
Country music drifted softly from an old radio sitting on a shelf nearby.
Jax leaned against the doorway.
"You always hide under trucks?"
Eli's voice echoed from beneath the pickup.
"Only when customers interrupt lunch."
"I can come back."
"Nah."
A few seconds later Eli rolled out from underneath, wiping grease from his hands with a rag.
"What brings you here?"
"My truck isn't broken."
"I'm relieved."
"I was buying supplies."
"And somehow got lost."
Jax smiled.
"Something like that."
Eli studied him for a moment.
"You look like something's bothering you."
Jax hesitated.
"People are talking."
Eli's smile faded slightly.
"They've been talking since the cattle drive."
"You've heard."
"I own a garage."
He laughed quietly.
"Everybody tells mechanics everything."
"What are they saying?"
"Depends who's asking."
"I'm asking."
Eli tossed the rag onto the workbench.
"Mostly that you've been spending a surprising amount of time around here."
"That's all?"
"There are more creative versions."
"I don't want to hear those."
"No, you probably don't."
Jax rubbed the back of his neck.
"I didn't think helping fix ranch equipment would become town entertainment."
"It doesn't take much in Red Hollow."
"I guess not."
Eli leaned against the workbench.
"For what it's worth..."
"What?"
"I don't care what they say."
Jax looked at him.
"You don't?"
"I know why you've been here."
"So do I."
"That's enough for me."
The simple certainty in Eli's voice eased something inside him.
Neither tried explaining further.
Neither needed to.
The bell above the office door jingled.
An elderly couple entered carrying the keys to a faded blue sedan.
Eli glanced toward them before looking back at Jax.
"I've got customers."
"I should get going."
He turned toward the door before Eli spoke again.
"Jax."
He stopped.
"If the gossip starts making things difficult..."
Jax looked over his shoulder.
"...you don't have to keep finding excuses to stop by."
The words landed harder than Eli probably intended.
Jax realized, perhaps for the first time, that Eli wasn't worried about himself.
He was worried about Jax.
"I wasn't looking for excuses."
"No?"
"No."
A small smile returned to Eli's face.
"I'm glad."
Jax nodded once before climbing back into his truck.
The drive home felt longer than usual.
His thoughts refused to settle.
He replayed every conversation they'd shared over the past week.
The roadside breakdown.
The late-night repair beneath the stars.
The cattle drive.
The storm.
The quiet honesty that seemed to appear whenever they were alone.
He had known Eli for less than two weeks.
Yet somehow the mechanic had become the one person he could speak to without pretending everything was under control.
That realization followed him all the way back to the ranch.
Late that evening, Jax sat alone on the front porch, watching the sun disappear behind the western hills while the cattle settled into the pastures below.
The wind carried the scent of dry grass across the fields.
Normally, moments like this helped clear his mind.
Tonight they only made him think.
He had spent years worrying about the ranch.
The bank.
The board.
His family's expectations.
Now another concern quietly joined the list.
The gossip would eventually fade.
Someone else would become the center of Red Hollow's attention.
Rumors always did.
What unsettled him wasn't the whispers drifting through town.
It was the growing certainty that every conversation with Eli left him wanting another.
That every goodbye felt a little too soon.
That every unexpected smile from the mechanic lingered in his thoughts long after the moment had passed.
Jax had been convinced the rumors were the greatest threat.
Sitting alone beneath the fading evening sky, he finally understood the truth.
The biggest danger wasn't what the town believed.
It was how much Eli Navarro had already begun to matter to him.
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