He'll show up eventually, she told herself and got to work, throwing herself in the pile of paperwork. She only had three days left of work, she estimated. However, she knew from experience that there were always last minute problems. Her timeline could easily extend until the end of the week. Perhaps a part of her wanted it to.
A half hour went by quickly and there was still no sign of Caleb. It wasn't a problem until she hit on some abbreviations she didn't recognize on a few invoices so she didn't know how to properly organize them in the computer program.
Pushing up from her seat, Maddie went downstairs to the garage and walked over to Brian. "Do you know where Caleb is?"
"Yeah, sweetie, he's around the back in the second garage workin' on a restoration," the older man said, tilting his head towards the lot.
The second garage?
But sure enough, there was a second garage. Around the corner and past the employee break area where Caleb had first kissed her was a smaller workshop, half the size of the main building. Inside was Caleb, as well as a hunk of metal that used to be a car, sans tires, held up by four metal blocks with wheels on them.
The hood was popped off completely, the flat, rusted piece of metal leaning against a wall in the corner. Caleb was leaning over the front of the car, cranking some mechanism with a chain that was slowly lifting what she thought was the engine out of the body.
He spotted her when she stepped a hesitant foot inside. She remembered that she was supposed to be mad at him, but it didn't stop her from peering inside the car curiously. It looked beyond repair. Rusted doors, rusted interior. The leather seats were ripped, white fluffy filling spilling out. The steering wheel was completely missing, not to mention the dark stains covering the floor. The body of the car appeared to have once been a vibrant blue, but had greyed significantly over time and was now mottled with orange patches.
"So, this is what you do," Maddie commented softly, straightening from her bent position.
Caleb nodded, not pausing his work. Maddie watched as his forearms flexed each time he gave the chain another pull. Slowly but surely, the engine continued to rise from the car, attached to some kind of crank and lever system.
"I don't know much about cars," she admitted.
"This is a 1963 Ford Falcon Ranchero," Caleb supplied easily, which surprised Maddie. "Just got her in this morning."
Something pinged in her mind. She remembered a telephone conversation she'd overheard last week. "But I thought you weren't doing restorations until after the New Year."
Caleb glanced at her. "I decided I needed a project."
The way he stared made Maddie realize it was because of her. She flushed, shifting on her feet, and swallowed thickly.
Get yourself together, she commanded.
She cleared her throat. "You like doing this stuff?"
"Yes, I like doing this stuff."
Maddie couldn't help the smile that spread over her lips at his grumpy tone. It was almost cute. "It's impressive work. How many have you restored?"
Caleb went silent. The only noise in the garage was the chain clinking, but Maddie waited patiently. In fact, his silence hardly bothered her anymore. She knew from experience that he'd either answer her or not, but she was done feeling awkward or uncomfortable if he chose to do the latter.
"Alone, I've done eight. With my uncle, maybe three times that."
So, this had been their hobby. Well, perhaps 'hobby' wasn't the right word, considering it was half of their-or rather Caleb's-business, judging by the sign out front: Montgomery Restoration & Repair.
"This is a client's car?"
He nodded. "He found it in a field."
"But where do you get all the parts?" she asked, furrowing her brow. "They're old cars."
"Some companies still sell reproductions of the real thing. Otherwise, we upgrade," he said, stepping away from the chain. "Either way, they don't come cheap."
"Doing this is good money then?" she asked, and then she flushed again. "Sorry, that's nosey. My brother always says I'm too nosey." And then she felt uncomfortable because she realized that Caleb still didn't realize who she was and didn't realize that her brother had been a friend of his in high school. She also wondered if he'd recognized Kyra last night. She'd been a flirt in high school, after all, and had certainly tried her hand when it came to Caleb. But last night, he hadn't even blinked an eye when they'd both emerged from the restroom.
Caleb unhooked a part of the chain from the suspended engine. "Restorations bring in more than the garage some months, depending on the work load. Haven't you come across them in the books?"
"Maybe," Maddie said, shrugging. "Like I said, I don't know much about cars. I noticed significantly larger payments every now and then." She glanced down at the paper in her hand and stepped over a toolbox to approach him. "Speaking of which, I'm not sure what to group this under."