4. Regan
Regan
Good old Martha.
“A case of ‘cobbler’s shoes’” my old grandpa would’ve said. Meaning that builders always live in half-finished houses, chefs heat up microwave meal for themselves, and car mechanics drive around in junkers with a list as long as your arm of things to fix.
This one’s not my fault though. Replacing gearboxes is definitely Abe’s job, not mine.
Ordering the part and paying the account at the end of the month now, that is me.
As-is talking to the customers, understanding what they need and negotiating the fee.
That’s because Abe don’t talk. Not unless he has to.
Oh, he can talk. Ain’t nothing wrong with him or nothing.
He just mostly chooses not to—specially with strangers.
I don’t think he dislikes strangers. I just think he feels… awkward. Doesn’t know what to talk about. Worried he’ll do or say the wrong thing and offend someone accidentally. Of course, him being so huge and intimidating-looking don’t help any neither.
Anyway, back to the job in hand. Some woman and her father on vacation, apparently.
Steam coming out the radiator. Probably nothing, but we’ll take a look.
It don’t do to go racing round these mountain roads in a vehicle that’s prone to overheating.
Some of these climbs can take it out of an engine—especially an older one, or a smaller vehicle with an engine more suited to city hops at best, or shopping trips and picking the kids up from school.
I smile to myself. People… they do the dumbest things, and then—generally speaking—they either blame it on someone else or on their equipment… or both, of course.
Anyway, thanks to Martha’s call, we’ve got another client and another few dollars to put into the account. Not that we need the work. We’re doing fine already. It’s taken us three years since we first opened up to get to break-even. Now the locals know us and trust us.
Mostly, anyways.
I pull into the forecourt at Martha’s One Stop Gas ‘n’ Diner and park up next to a beat-up old silver Toyota Corolla I’ve not seen before, and which I suspect is gonna turn out to be “the patient.”
Glancing up through the diner window, I see an older man and a younger woman. The sunlight’s playing on the window glass, so I can’t see detail, but I think I can make out the outline of a shapely, female upper torso. A very shapely upper torso.
Hmm… maybe this job is about to get a lot more interesting. I break into a jaunty whistle—the boys have banished me from whistling back at the yard, so I take every chance I can when I’m out and about—as I head for the diner.
Time to get this show on the road.
In the end, they’re exiting out the diner as I’m heading in, so we meet on the steps.
“Hi, I’m Regan.” I give her my best grin.
The one I reserve for Highway Patrol cops and attractive young ladies.
Two things I hate—speeding tickets, and date rejections.
I’m wearing my favorite Terre D’Hermes cologne.
I get it special through mail order because no one stocks it in town.
But it’s worth every cent. Never fails to knock ‘em dead. This will be a cinch.
“Martha said you needed some help with your vehicle, so here I am.” The woman smiles, and when she does her face lights up like an angel.
Until then she’d looked a little tired, stressed and—if I’m honest—more than a little distrustful.
Like she thought I was someone to watch carefully, or something.
I nod towards the diner. “Did you try the pancakes?”
She smiles again. “Sure did.”
“Good, aren’t they?”
“Every bit as good as promised.”
“Glad you liked ‘em. Well, Miss… err?”
“Oh, err… Smith. Louise Smith.”
“Well, Miss Smith,” I just loved how her pearl white teeth gleam as she smiles. And that Mediterranean olive skin is smooth and soft as butter. As for her hair… it’s so dark it’s nearly black, but yet with a distinct sheen that makes it gleam and shimmer in the morning sunlight.
And her figure? Oh, my goodness—those legs reach on forever, and as for her breasts… a man could die happy in those arms, let’s just leave it at that.
I’d sure like to be that lucky man.
“Got the keys?” She nods. “Well then lead on. Let’s go take a look.”
I listen to her story about driving all night, and how she’d started to notice the steam coming from her radiator earlier this morning.
I pop the hood and using a rag to protect my hand, I carefully unscrew the radiator cap, which flies off with a loud popping noise, landing on the ground three or four feet away.
I retrieve the cap whilst the remaining steam evacuates out of the system.
“Well, Miss Smith?—”
“Louise.”
“Well, Louise, as you can see, she’s still too hot to go anywhere.
Best thing we can do is tow her round to the yard where she can cool down in her own time.
Then tomorrow morning we’ll check her over and if everything seems okay, well we’ll refill the rad, add new coolant, and you can be on your way. How does that sound?”
“Yes, okay, fine I guess.” She says it’s fine but looks a little concerned.
“Problem?”
“Well, no… err… but we’ll need somewhere to stay. Is there a cheap motel or anything around these parts? We’re on vacation, but we’re on a bit of a budget.”
“Hmm.” I think for a moment. The big hotel on up the highway’s expensive. Anyways, it’s too far without you having no transportation. Martha used to put up guests, but she don’t no more. Says it’s too much like hard work.
“Tell you what… it’s only one night, so why don’t you and you father put up with us? We’ve got a spare cabin with a couple of bedrooms. Why not sleep there? Let’s say fifty bucks for the two of you, seeing as you’re a customer anyway.”
“Oh, I couldn’t possibly—” she begins to respond, but I cut her off mid flow.
“Sure you can. It’s no problem—good to have the place aired in fact. Besides, Louise, I don’t think you got a lot of choice.” I give her my widest grin—the one that says I’m entirely harmless. “Come on… let’s get your car hooked up.”
A short while later, we’re in the cab of the tow truck, and heading for the yard, Louise’s Corolla safely hooked up behind us.
I turn to the old man.
“So, Sir, you’re vacationing with your daughter, Louise. You’re a lucky man. It’s not every father who manages to keep up such a close relationship with his daughters.”
“No, I guess you’re right there, son. But Maria and me, well we’ve lived together ever since her mammy died giving birth to her, so I guess you could say we’re unusually close.”
He leans back in his seat, seemingly entirely unaware he’s just called his daughter Maria, instead of Louise. I wonder if ‘Smith’ is also made-up, and decide it almost certainly is.
Now, why would a young woman be up in the mountains with—presumably—her actual father and operating under an assumed name?
They obviously aren’t criminals of any kind.
At least, if they are criminals they’re absolutely useless at it.
A child of three could see right through their cover story in moments.
Even Martha had said they’d told her they were from Chicago, yet had strong Brooklyn accents that led her to believe different.
So… a mystery. I smile. Good, I like mysteries. Especially long-legged beautiful ones.
Plus, although I don’t miss it, it has been three years since the three of us left the special forces. Great as it is to live around here—and it truly is—it’s my opinion that we could use a little more excitement from time to time.
It’s about a thirty-minute drive from Martha’s to our place.
We chat about this and that, and I deliberately keep the conversation away from anything awkward or potentially controversial.
I don’t want her to bolt. Not when I’ve only just met her.
Besides, if they are on the run then they might need help, and it would be our duty to assist them.
Always assuming they’ve not done something bad, of course.
But honestly, I can’t imagine what these two could possibly have done that I’d consider to be bad.
Illegal…? Yeah, maybe. But actually bad? No. Not likely.
We pull up in the yard, and Abe comes out of the workshop to help me unhitch the Corolla and push it to one side, beneath the shade of a large red maple, where it can cool down without getting in the way.
I introduce him, but just as I expected, he just grunts and heads straight back into the workshop to carry on doing whatever he was up to.
“Come on into the office and meet the boss,” I say, and the three of us walk across the yard to the big building.
We built it ourselves. It’s the first thing we did when we came here.
That and the workshop. All local timber, well-seasoned and tough as nails.
The front of the building serves as a Reception area with a counter, a desk and chairs, and a seating area and vending machine for waiting customers.
A doorway leads into an office where we store the paperwork and all the IT stuff businesses need to survive these days.
Going through the door by the side of the reception counter takes you into the private side of the building.
This is where we each have our bedrooms, as well as the living accommodation—a big kitchen, two bathrooms, a dining room that we never use and are always talking about converting into something useful, like a pool table room or something, and a living room with a huge fireplace that keeps us warm and cozy in the winter, and large French-style windows that open onto the backyard to keep us cool in the summer.
Outside we constructed a timber-built barn as our workshop, and we also have a space in that which is dedicated as a weights gym, since all three of us are into health and fitness.
Beyond that we have maybe ninety acres of mountainside, mostly forest, with a stream running through it from west to east. After three years it’s all still very much a work in progress, but I think all three of us acknowledge how lucky we were to come across this place on the market just when we were hunting for the perfect location for our new business and the opportunity to build ourselves new lives outside of the military.
Of course, if it wasn’t for Grant’s inheritance we could never have afforded it, and that makes him the senior partner.
But he’d been Abe’s and my platoon commander before anyway, so we’re used to him being the boss.
Besides, you couldn’t ask for a better strategist than Grant.
We need someone like him in charge or we’d never have got halfway to where we’ve gotten so far.
“Hey, Grant, we got guests,” I shout as we enter the building, instantly feeling the coolness of the AC since the day is now warming up outside.
The office door opens and out comes Grant, buzz haircut, and dressed in army-style fatigues as usual.
It’s true what they say. You can take the boy outa the army, but you can’t take the army outa the boy.
Well… not Grant, leastways. He ain’t never gonna change.
He practically is the army. It’s a shame really.
What happened. Shame for all three of us.
But perhaps Grant the most. Or Abe. Tough to know, really.