It's a 2009, she added for reasons she wasn't entirely sure of. I can see that, he said. There was something in his voice, not unkind. Ry maybe, like he was trying not to smile and mostly succeeding. Battery connections are clean.
Coolant's good. She's got oil. He stood up straight and looked at her directly. You sure it just stopped. Or did it?
Maybe. He paused, choosing his words. Need to stop for a while. Victoria felt heat climb her neck. I'm sorry.
He looked at her the way a person looks at something when they're deciding how honest to be about what they're seeing. Then he looked back at the engine. Then he looked at her again. Nothing, he said. I've got some tools in the truck.
Let me run a diagnostic. He turned back to his truck and she watched him go and she thought he knows. He absolutely did not know. He couldn't know. But something about the way he'd looked at her unhurried, unimpressed, entirely without the difference she was used to had made her feel for one unnerving second like she was standing in front of someone who could see through walls.
She crossed her arms over her chest and watched the sunrise and told herself to get it together. His name, she learned, was Marcus Carter. He told her that while he was under the hood, not as introduction, but as answer she'd asked, trying to fill the silence, and he'd answered without ceremony, the way people answer questions that don't require performance. Marcus Carter, he said, I run a shop about 4 miles east. Carter's Auto, Victoria, she said, and caught herself before the last name.
Wells. The alias came out smooth as water. She'd practiced that much at least. Victoria Wells, he repeated. You visiting somebody out here.
Or just driving. Just driving, she said. I needed. She stopped. Started again.
I needed to get out of the city for a few days. He didn't push it. He didn't feel the silence with the reflexive small talk she was used to from people who were nervous around her. He just went back to the engine. That silence didn't feel empty.
She noticed. It felt like he'd made room for her to say as much or as little as she wanted and had no particular investment in which she chose. She wasn't used to that. You find anything? She asked after a moment.