The kind with toolboxes in the bed and mud on the side panels. The driver's side door opened. He was tall. That was the first thing she registered. Then the rest of him, broad shoulders, work boots, a gray t-shirt with a faded logo across the chest.
He moved with the easy, unhurried confidences of a man who knew what he was doing and didn't need to prove it. Dark skin, short beard touched with a little gray at the jaw, eyes that caught the early light and did something she wasn't expecting. They went straight to her, not to the car first, not to assess the situation, not to run through some diagnostic protocol. He looked at her first. Morning, he said.
His voice was unhurried, deep. The kind of voice that had probably talked a lot of frightened people down from a lot of ledges without ever meaning to. "You all right? " Victoria opened her mouth. What came out was not the ospon she'd rehearsed in her head during the 20 minutes she'd been sitting on her bumper. She'd had a whole thing worked out.
Confused expression. Something about the engine making a sound and then just stopping. Maybe a nervous laugh. What came out instead was I honestly don't know. He blinked.
She blinked. I mean, she started the car. The car stopped. I was driving and then it just she gestured vaguely at the open hood. I don't really know what I'm looking at.
He studied her for a moment. Something in his expression shifted. Not suspicion. Exactly. More like he was recalibrating.
The way smart people do when the data they're getting doesn't quite line up with what they expected. "Okay," he said. "Let me take a look. " He walked to the front of the car and stood over the engine. His hands went to work immediately, methodical, practiced. He checked the obvious things first without narrating them.
She watched him and felt absurdly like she was in trouble for something she hadn't done yet. "When it stop? " he asked without looking up. About 20 minutes ago. It throw any lights? Check engine temperature warning?
Anything? No. He looked up at her then. Brief assessing. You come far Atlanta, she said.
He nodded slowly, looked back at the engine, moved to the battery connections, checked the coolant reservoir, did something to what she thought might be the alternator. She genuinely did not know. When's the last time you had this serviced? 2 months ago. Another look, this one slightly longer.