“The first one wasn’t too bad.”
“It had a bed built over the staircase. The base was cardboard.”
Noah sighed. “I’m not sure we can afford to be too picky. We have one more to see.”
“My hopes are not high.”
Wade halted by the bonnet. “When do you need to move?”
“The sooner the better. Half our old household is in Elliot’s living room.”
Wade’s brow crunched with a frown.
“Look,” he took out his keys and tossed them to Noah. “How about you drive while I make some calls. Grace lives here, her stepdad works as a letting agent at Middleton Real-estate. He might have some ideas.”
He hoofed to the passenger side and Noah gripped the cool keys, gazing at gleaming paintwork and chrome.
A car like this looked . . . special.
Noah slid behind the wheel and caressed the leather. “You let just anyone drive your baby?”
Wade glanced up from his phone. His eyes roamed Noah, considering.
Noah lifted a brow.
“You’re not just anyone.” He cleared his throat. “I mean, you’re calm under pressure. You think before you act.”
“I threw a nine-hundred-dollar vase at you.”
“You’re right. Get out from behind the wheel immediately.” He laughed. “You held your ground to an intruder. You can always drive any of my babies.”
Noah eyed the elongated stick-shift. “You’ve got . . . more than one?”
“Not usually at once. I hunt old-timers in need of repair, buy them at a bargain, fix them up and sell them.”
Noah spotted the landlord staring at them from the porch and the ghost of Wade’s tug on his hips had him starting the car.
“She’s almost ready to sell.” He patted the sheepskin. “As soon as I sort out this seat.”
“So this is, what? A side-hustle?”
“I’ve been doing it alongside a day job for the past four years. Not sure if that will turn into five years or not.”
Noah frowned. “Waiting on an offer from that interview?”
“Yeah.”
“How do you feel about it?”
The sparkle in Wade’s dark eyes as he looked wistfully around the interior had Noah’s stomach twisting. “I don’t want to fix run-arounds and SUVs for someone else. What I really want is to start a restoration business, my own thing. It’s just, the cost . . . but if I take up Franny’s offer to live with her . . .”
Noah forced back his feelings and focused on merging onto the main road. A phone shrilled in regular beats, punctuating the silence. “Hey, Grace.”
Noah caught a flash of blond hair and a dolled-up face on the screen.
“Wade! It’s like you can’t get enough of me.”
“Who could?”
My brother’s kind. Too kind for his own good.
“Is Luc with you? Give him my love!”
Noah felt Wade’s eyes sliding to him for an instant. He gripped the wheel.
“No, I’m not—”
“Sorry,” Grace chirped. “Bad reception, turn off video?”
Wade switched and Noah became privy to a one-sided conversation.
He swallowed the unreasonable sting climbing up his throat. He really had no idea about Wade and his life. And no right to be speculating about his relationships. Perhaps he’d truly meant for them to be friends. Friends was nothing to scoff at. He’d be lucky to have that. He concentrated on tuning out everything but the car and the road.
Wade released a heavy sigh. “Yeah, of course. Thanks, Grace.”
Wade tossed his phone on the dashboard. “Nothing in the price range you’re looking for.”
Noah had caught that much. “Don’t worry about it.” He indicated right. “We’re here.”
They pulled up outside a run-down townhouse with a couple of boarded up windows.
Wade grunted. “I reckon we keep driving.”
Noah chuckled and fiddled open their seatbelts. “Maybe I can negotiate? Replace the windows myself?”
A letting agent met them at the front door and offered a tour. Wade looked unconvinced but at least didn’t feel the need to drag him to safety.
Noah talked with the agent about a rent-free month in exchange for making repairs, and the agent made some calls outside while he and Wade took another look.
Wade leaned against the entry to the bathroom, arms crossed. “It has plastic sheeting on the floor.”
“A bit of lino, no problem.”
“It’s a long bus ride to town. Longer to your sanctuary.”
Noah leaned against the opposite side of the doorframe, ankle hooked over his foot. Wade had looked up his sanctuary? “Just under an hour.”
Wade grimaced.
“What are you thinking?”
“Why such an important job as yours isn’t paid more.”
“That’s not so much the issue.”
Wade looked at him.
“I secured my dad’s debt and I’m liable.”
Wordlessly, Wade stared at him. Disbelief was written into the lines at his brow. “You have to pay—”
“It was the right call, Wade. I stand by giving him his last wishes.”
Wade pushed off the doorframe, immediately cutting the distance between them in half. A warm palm clasped his shoulder, each fingertip blazing into Noah’s back. “You’re a damn decent guy.”
Noah’s mouth dried. He opened it to acknowledge him. Smoothly return the compliment.
