6. Riley
Riley
The rental car rattled over the gravel as Riley turned into the lot at Copper Shank Bootmakers.
Humidity pressed through the open windows before she killed the engine.
By the time she stepped out, the back of her neck was damp and the air smelled of salt, machine oil, and leather baking in the Georgia heat.
No rink chill. No arena air. No cameras waiting behind a rope.
Just an old building with wide delivery doors and the steady thump of machinery inside. Good. This was better.
She dropped the keys into her purse and crossed the lot.
Inside, sunlight spilled through tall windows onto the concrete. Workbenches crowded one side of the shop. Stacks of leather waited near cutting tables. A press came down with another blunt thud, followed by the scrape of something dragged across the floor.
A man in a leather apron stood behind the front counter with a clipboard tucked against his hip. Gray threaded his beard. He glanced up, took in her clean clothes and purse, then went back to the page.
“You looking for somebody?”
“If you’re Mac, I already found him.”
Mac studied her for a moment.
Riley stopped across from him at the workbench. “I’m looking for a job. Word is you need a shop mechanic, and I’m not leaving without it.”
Mac lowered the clipboard. “Word travels.”
“So does rent.”
He looked her over again. Not insulting. Measuring.
“My backlog is loggers, linemen, fishermen. Men who expect their boots back when I say they’ll be ready.” He tapped the clipboard against the bench. “I don’t have time to train somebody who gets nervous around old equipment.”
“I don’t get nervous around equipment.”
“You ever spent a full shift around machines this old?”
“Old doesn’t bother me. Neglected does.”
The corner of Mac’s mouth twitched. He pointed toward the shop floor.
“Those machines don’t care how confident you sound. Some of the stock we move weighs more than you do.”
Riley glanced down the line at the functional presses pounding away, then leveled her gaze back on him.
“I’ve hauled gear bags, skate steel, motors, grinding wheels, and whatever else kept a rink running when nobody had money for a service call.”
Mac’s eyes narrowed. “A rink.”
“I sharpened commercial hockey skates for years. Tore down burnt motors when the machines seized. Rewired switches. Replaced bearings. Fit carbon boots until my hands cramped.”
“Skates aren’t work boots.”
“Motors don’t care what ends up on somebody’s feet. A failed machine is still a failed machine.”
The press in the next bay dropped again. The impact traveled through the floor.
For the first time since she left the arena, the noise didn’t ask anything from her. It didn’t want a smile, a credential, or Graham’s last name. It meant somebody was building something designed to survive real work.
Mac hooked his pen beneath the clip. “You got references?”
“Not ones I plan to use.”
“That answer tends to mean trouble.”
“It means I know how to work.”
He studied the stalled machine for a moment, then met her gaze. “You planning to tell me your name?”
“Riley.”
“Last name?”
She held his gaze. “Riley is enough for the shop floor.”
Mac stared at her for another moment, then slid the clipboard under his arm.
“Big claims don’t clear my backlog. Back bench is through there.” He motioned toward the rear of the shop. “We’re going to find out whether your hands can back up your mouth. Come on, then. Watch where you step. We haven’t cleared that bay since the machine went down.”
Riley followed him between worktables and stacked hides, keeping her purse close to her side.
The heat worsened toward the back, trapped beneath the roof with the smell of oil and hot dust. A hulking sole press waited beside the wall, its casing powdered with grime and one access panel hanging crooked.
“Don’t clear anything yet,” she said. “I want to know how it failed.”
Mac glanced over his shoulder. “You always this bossy before you’re hired?”
“Usually after.”
He stopped beside the press and tapped the casing with two fingers. “Tuesday was the last time this thing held pressure. Two mechanics have already crawled around inside it, cursed my family tree, and quit.”
Riley set her purse on the corner of a worktable. She pulled her hair back, twisted it into a knot, then crouched beside the machine.
Mac folded his arms. “Morning shift needs this line. You get that press running before they clock in, you’ve got the job.”
“Power isolated?”
“At the wall.”
“Keep it there until I tell you otherwise.”
“That confidence going to fix it?”
“No. Tools will.”
The latch on the motor cover resisted her first pull. Rust flaked beneath her thumb. Riley adjusted her grip, worked the mechanism, then leaned her weight back until the metal gave with a squeal.
Dust streaked her fingers as she opened the cover.
The smell changed at once.
Burnt insulation.
Riley leaned closer without touching the wiring. One section near the motor housing had scorched, and the casing around it carried a smear of soot. A failed wire alone didn’t explain that kind of strain. Something had forced the motor to keep working after the mechanism stopped moving.
There you are.
Mac stepped nearer. “You planning to tear the motor out already?”
“I’m planning to figure out why the other two did.”
She traced the route of the wiring, then looked toward the lower assembly. “When it died, did the press stop all at once or start dragging first?”
“Started dragging. Then it locked up solid.”
“And somebody kept cycling it?”
Mac rubbed the back of his neck. “Foreman tried it three or four times before he killed the breaker.”
“That’ll do it.”
Riley stood and wiped her dusty fingertips on her jeans. “Unlock your utility closet.”
Mac cocked his head. “You found the problem that fast?”
“I found one of them. This wiring burned because the motor kept fighting resistance.” She nodded toward the lower block. “My guess is a jammed seal or something binding in the assembly. Motor cooked itself trying to force past it.”
Mac looked from her to the open housing.
“Need anything else?”
“Wire, solvent, replacement connectors, whatever seals you keep for this model, and every wrench that fits the block.”
“You know the model?”
“I can read a plate.”
Mac almost smiled at that.
He pulled a ring of keys from his apron. “Take whatever you need from the closet tonight. Prove that press works before the morning shift clocks in, and you’re on payroll.”
Riley looked at the open machine, the scorched wiring, the grime packed along the lower housing. For once, the problem in front of her had bolts, wires, and a cause she could hunt down.
She held out her hand for the keys.
“Deal. Leave the toolboxes open. I’ll have the block cleared before sunrise.”
The stubborn bolt had turned perhaps twice since Riley put the wrench on it. Grease slicked her knuckles, and every pull dragged another smear of black grime across her fingers. She reset her grip and leaned into the handle again while Mac sorted parts on the neighboring bench.
“That one giving you trouble?” he asked.
“Threads are packed with filth.” Riley eased the wrench back into position. “Hand me the smaller breaker bar.”
Mac passed it over. “Thought you said weight wouldn’t bother you.”
“Weight isn’t the problem. Somebody overtightened this thing like they were trying to weld it shut.”
A harsh scrape echoed from the delivery lane before Mac could answer. A young driver came around the corner guiding a pallet jack loaded with bundled cowhides, the raw leather smell spreading ahead of him. He slowed when he noticed Riley crouched beside the open press.
“Need me to move that out of her way before somebody gets flattened?”
Riley kept the breaker bar against the bolt. “Keep your pallet in the delivery lane. I’m not using your side of the floor.”
The driver looked past her toward Mac. “You’re seriously giving the new girl the big press?”
Mac set down the part in his hand. “You seriously stopping a delivery to give me hiring advice?”
“I’m giving you injury advice.” The driver nodded toward the exposed block. “That cast iron’s got fifty pounds on her. That wrench slips while she’s muscling it, she’s going to snap a wrist.”
Riley shifted the breaker bar and pulled again. The bolt gave enough to turn.
There it was.
She worked it another rotation before answering. “My wrists will be fine.”
The driver laughed under his breath. “Sure they will.”
Mac stepped around the bench. “She diagnosed that dead motor in under ten minutes while you’ve spent the last five standing there watching her work.”
The driver’s grin faded.
Mac pointed toward the loading area. “She calls the shots on this repair. Keep your mouth shut and finish unloading the truck.”
“Whatever.” The driver hauled the pallet jack forward again. “We’ll see who’s crying when she gets stuck.”
Riley looked back at the bolt. “If I get stuck, I’ll ask the machine for advice before I ask you.”
The jack clattered away across the concrete.
Mac eyed her sideways. “You always make friends this fast?”
“I’m saving the charming version for payroll.”
“That ought to terrify me.”
He returned to the bench, leaving Riley with the open motor and the next bolt waiting beneath a crust of soot.
For several minutes, the work took over again. Wrench. Turn. Reset. The rhythm was better than conversation. Better than explanations. Nobody here needed to know what she’d left behind or whose name used to open doors for her.
Then the smell changed.
Burnt insulation mixed with the fresh cowhides stacked near the delivery lane. Riley stopped with the wrench halfway through another pull.
Her stomach turned.
Not here. Give me a minute.
She lowered the tool onto the floor before she could drop it, then flattened her hand against the side of the press. The steel was cooler than the air around it. She bent forward and rested her forehead against the casing, keeping her eyes on the concrete until the worst of the nausea passed.
Mac called something from the other bench, but she lifted one hand without turning around.