Chapter Eleven
Zane
The shop hums around me.
Not loud. Not quiet. Just steady as if it’s got a heartbeat of its own.
Sparks spit from the torch. Steel groans under the grinder. And that smell… the burnt oil and hot metal, gets into your clothes, your skin, your fucking bones.
Rainer trusts me with jobs that matter now, no longer sweeping floors or stacking parts.
Now, it’s real work.
Engines torn down to their guts. Welds that burn hot enough to blister. Tasks that leave my muscles screaming and my shoulders aching in the best possible way.
This is the kind of pain that proves I still exist.
That I’m still here, and that maybe I’m worth something after all.
Rainer’s decent in a way that doesn’t need to be loud. He doesn’t hover or question every move I make. Just tosses me a job and waits to see if I can handle the pressure.
And I do.
Because here, I’m not the wreck everyone looks at with guilt in their eyes. I’ve got a purpose. I count.
The days fall into a rhythm.
Start early. Work hard. Go home with every muscle screaming for rest.
My hands stay busy enough to keep the noise out. While my body is tired enough to sleep through the dark.
And for once, that’s enough.
So, I keep my hands busy. Wrench in one, torch in the other. Sweat dripping down my spine.
But still… Skylar is still here with me. In every bolt I twist. Every grind of steel. She’s even in the goddamn fucking air.
I tried to fuck her out of my system last night, with a girl whose name vanished with the night. She smiled too easily, dropped to her knees like she’d done the whole routine a hundred times. I told myself the release would help. That closing my eyes would make Skylar vanish.
But the second her lips wrapped around my cock, everything in me screamed this wouldn’t work.
It wasn’t right.
It didn’t feel at all like the way Skylar touched me.
All I wanted was Skylar. On her knees. Mouth slick. Eyes burning. That wild fucking fire in her stare before I snuffed it out.
I came hard, in the chick’s mouth, she swallowed everything I gave her, but there was no victory in it. Just a hollow kind of ache that settled deep and stayed.
She laughed, wiped her mouth, and asked if I wanted to grab a drink.
I walked away and didn’t even glance over my shoulder.
No one gets close to what Skylar carved into me.
And I fucking hate that. Almost as much as I need the fire she lit in me.
Rainer gave me permission to make the apartment mine. Said the apprenticeship was official now, which is good because the money I had saved is already gone.
I’ve tried to build something real. Little by little, it’s started to feel that way.
There’s a blanket on the bed now. Thick enough to bury myself in when the nights turn mean. Weights stacked in the corner that I lift until my arms shake and my abs burn. Until the pain silences everything else.
But nothing drowns her out.
Not completely.
I lie there some nights and tell myself I’m safe, that I made it out. And for a minute, I believe it.
But then the dark crawls in and all I can think about is her.
I don’t get why the fuck she’s still in my head. She doesn’t belong in my world. It’s been four goddamn weeks—gone, out of her orbit, out of her life—and I still can’t fucking shake the pull.
That alone pisses me off more than anything.
The sun cuts hard through the windows, a blinding strip of light slicing across the concrete. My hands are slick with grease, shirt clinging to my back, soaked from the heat.
I kill the torch, peel the goggles off, and squint into the glare.
That’s when I see her.
A blur of movement.
Sneakers on cracked asphalt. Eyes too familiar.
Cassie. Skylar’s friend.
The one who always watched too much. Who knows shit she shouldn’t.
No one moves the way she does.
Chin high, like the world can go fuck itself for staring.
She’s small, sure, smaller than most of the kids at school, but carries that kind of fire that grabs you by the throat.
That kind of spark you don’t mean to notice but can’t ignore.
She walks ready to fight. If you knock her down, she’ll bleed on your shoes and come back swinging.
She’s not soft.
Not beautiful in the way Skylar is.
There’s nothing delicate about her, but she’s fucking tough and all edges.
She storms straight across the floor, sneakers squeaking against the concrete. Eyes locked on me.
I catch it in the corner of my eye. Pretend I don’t. My hands stay busy with the torch, twisting the valve that doesn’t need adjusting.
I don’t give her the satisfaction.
Not yet.
Her shadow slides over the floor, until it’s brushing my boots. She doesn’t say shit, just stands in it, letting the silence cut.
Then comes the cough.
Short. Sharp. Designed to get my attention.
I let the silence drag a little longer than I need to before I turn.
Cassie waits, arms crossed, chin lifted.
The girl’s got more backbone than half the assholes I’ve met. I’ll give her that.
“What the fuck do you want?” My voice is flat. Dry. Scraped of anything that might give her the wrong idea like I give a shit.
Her eyes narrow, arms still crossed.
“Well, that’s just fucking rude.”
I turn back to the bench, grab the rag, wipe grease from my palms.
“I’m working. Spit it out or leave.”
Cassie takes a step closer. “It’s Skylar.”
I freeze.
Only for a second. Barely long enough to count. I keep my expression bored, detached.
“What about her?”
“She’s not okay,” Cassie snaps. “Four days until she leaves Dolores, and she’s got nowhere to go.”
I keep my eyes on the bench, toss the rag aside, and reach for the socket set.
“Not my fucking problem.”
“You’re such a heartless asshole.”
“Keep your voice down.” My tone is steel, final.
But she holds her ground. “I know what you did. And yeah, that was some next-level asshole shit, even by your standards.”
Fuck.
I wonder what she told her. If the memory still burns. Whether the hurt still hits.
I turn slow, my stare cutting into hers. “You done?”
Cassie doesn’t flinch. Her chin tips higher. “Not even close.”
That’s it.
I drop the socket set with a sharp clang and close the distance.
My hand clamps around her arm. Not enough to bruise. Just enough to jolt her.
She stumbles when I yank her toward the door.
“We’re not doing this in here,” I mutter, dragging her across the floor.
Cassie twists hard. “Oh, fuck you. You think hauling me outside makes you some kind of big man?”
I shove the door open with my shoulder, sunlight crashing down on us as it slams shut behind. I drop her arm but plant myself between her and the door.
No fucking way she’s going back in there.
Cassie spins, her eyes blazing. “I came to you because I don’t know what the fuck to do.”
Her voice cracks. Tears bite at her lashes, and for a second, I catch everything.
The way she cares.
The way Skylar means something real to her.
She softens but only for a breath. “I’m scared she’s gonna end up sleeping on the street.”
Then she catches the way I’m looking at her.
Her jaw sets. Her spine straightens. “Not that you’d fucking care anyway, asshole.”
I smirk. I can’t help myself.
She’s grit and steel and every kind of stubborn. Walked into a place she didn’t want to be to fight for someone else.
Skylar’s lucky she’s got someone like that in her corner.
Cassie jabs her finger into my chest. “She’s fucking drowning in all the worry, Zane. And you’re standing here, not giving a shit. I figured you’d understand, me showing up here, being one of us.”
I get what she means. An unwanted foster kid, surviving on our own. But I don’t let her off easy.
I fold my arms over my chest, lean back on my heels, and let the silence stretch until it hurts.
“So are you gonna say why you came here…” I ask, voice low. “Or keep circling around it like a coward?”
Her jaw clenches.
Good, let her fucking squirm, because stepping back into Skylar’s world… that’ll wreck fucking everything.
It will rip me open.
Bleed me out.
If I can avoid it, I will.
But fuck me, Cassie is making that difficult.
Her mouth twists. She looks away for half a second, chewing the inside of her cheek like it might keep the words in. Then she shoves her hands into the pockets of her jacket.
“I don’t want to be here,” she says through gritted teeth.
I don’t respond. Just wait.
She drags in a breath. “I fucking hate this, okay? Hate you. Hate that I’m standing here asking you for something.”
Still, I say nothing.
Her head snaps up, eyes burning. “But I need your help.”
“Give me your phone,” I say, extending my hand.
She doesn’t move, only lifts a brow. “What for? You wanna scroll through all the dick pics and rate them out of ten?”
I grunt. “Yeah. Figured I’d kill time while you finish running your mouth.” I flick my fingers. “Do you want my help or not, for fuck sake?”
She huffs, digs her phone out of her back pocket, and slaps it into my palm.
I punch in my number, fast, then hand the phone back.
“There. Don’t call unless she’s in real shit and you’re desperate. And don’t fucking give that number to anyone.”
She stares at the screen, before lifting her eyes to mine. Her glare could flay skin.
“You really are an asshole,” she mutters, snatching the phone as if it’s tainted and then storms off.
I stand frozen, hands clenched, wondering what the fuck I’ve done, letting Skylar back into my world.
I shove off the wall and head back into the workshop, grabbing the first thing I see on the bench. Steel in my palm. Work. That’s the answer. It always has been. Keep my head down, my hands moving. Bury the past so deep it forgets how to crawl out.
I tell myself I gave Cassie my number for Skylar. In case the shit gets too real. Not because I care or that I want to get involved.
I tell myself I’ll keep my distance. That I can. That I fucking will.
But by the time the sun sinks and the shop’s gone quiet, I already know I’m lying.
And still… Cassie’s voice plays on repeat. “She’s drowning.”
And I haven’t got a fucking clue what to do with that, let alone how to be the guy who saves her.