A Restored Man (5 page)

"I stuttered again," Ty said absently as he stared out the large office window at the rising sun. He loved to people watch and the mobs of pedestrians in the nearby sidewalk racing to their morning downtown Miami commute provided enough entertainment to distract him from the conversation.

"When?" Dr. Samantha Knox asked.

He looked over to the psychologist he had been seeing for the past eight months. "I'm sorry?"

"When did you stutter?" Dr. Knox asked with her notebook sitting idly on the side table.

She always seemed to listen to him rather than focus on jotting down notes. Maybe that stupid recorder she kept on during their sessions was the reason. Even still, he felt comfortable with her, far more than the other two psychologists he'd cycled through before her to deal with his survivor's guilt and the endless list of other issues he had been working through since the accident. "When I met the new hire for the shop," he said, shoving his hands in his pockets.

She cocked her head to the side. "What did you feel when you met him?"

"I'm not sure," he said, returning his focus to the window. There was something about this new guy.
Cole
. Ty remembered following the sound of unfamiliar footsteps in his shop. Then he saw Cole down on his knees as if worshipping the Yenko. He remembered almost mirroring that exact same action when he first saw the car. He couldn't believe the owner had called a salvage yard to junk her. The elderly woman didn't have a clue the rare gem she had decaying away in her abandoned shed. Her husband had wanted to restore it himself—a project he had been unable to complete before he died the previous year. She refused to take any money for it, but he insisted, giving her several thousand dollars for letting him take it off her hands. Aidan didn't understand Ty's passion for cars. How the love for the automotive industry skipped Aidan entirely always baffled Ty and their father. His shop—his dad's shop before him—was Ty's passion, his place of solace, and what kept him sane during his recovery.

"I think we need to explore that a bit more. We're trying to pinpoint what triggers your stutter. There's no medical basis for it, so it—"

"It's all in my head. I know," he said, stating the obvious.

"Ty, you've been through a significant amount of trauma, so remnant issues to work through, both physical and mental, can be expected."

Ty sighed. "I know. I just hadn't stuttered in a while, I thought…I don't know…that it went away or stopped."

He heard Dr. Knox flipping through her notes. "Two months since your last stutter."

"Yeah, it sorta took me by surprise."

"Were you angry or upset?" she continued to probe.

"No. Not when I had stuttered."

"But you were?" she asked, picking up on his careful use of words.

"After. At myself. I was embarrassed." He didn't mind admitting that. The good doctor knew he hated the stutter that had suddenly appeared during his recovery. He had managed to survive the car accident that took his parents' life and spared his…barely. Although the doctors were skeptical of his survival, he somehow came out of a six-month coma without any medical head trauma visible in an MRI or CAT scan. His follow-up doctors' visits for his other issues were finally down to once a month and his physical therapy down to checkups once every three weeks to make sure he stayed on track with his at-home regimen. The prognosis of a relatively normal life was positive, his recovery paralleled a miracle.

His stutter, the curse no one could figure out. It was mild, rare, and always seemed to come up when he needed to be most focused.

"If we could figure out the trigger, you can prepare for it and learn to overcome it."

"And if I had the right numbers, I'd win the lottery," he said, looking over his shoulder.

She laughed and shook her head. "There's nothing wrong with you, Ty."

There it was again. That phrase. He hung his head and inhaled deeply. There
was
something wrong with him…a lot of things. He was no longer the man he once was and no amount of therapy would ever change that. Now, he just needed to accept the
new
Ty and deal with it. He was a survivor, a fighter. He was lucky.

But sometimes, he had a hard time believing it.

* * * * *

Cole stood by the door inside the shop and waited, thankful to be out of the Miami morning heat and humidity. He felt like a moron standing by the entrance, watching the workers arrive, but he knew better than to start exploring the shop without permission. No need pushing things so soon, he was lucky his new boss hadn't fired him last night before he even began. Maybe his early arrival would score points in his favor. He was certainly punctual, had to be if your talents focused on sticking to a well-organized plan.

He saw a young woman, probably mid-twenties, briskly walking toward him with a clipboard in hand. "Hi there, you must be Cole. I'm Stacie," she said, finally arriving by his side at the entrance.

He extended his hand in greeting and smiled. He could do charming. "Hey there. Yeah, that's me."

She pointed to his face. "That looks like it hurt."

"It's fine. Gives me character."

Stacie smiled broadly. She stood about an inch or two over five feet and wore a blue business pantsuit. Her long dark hair hung loosely to the middle of her back and boldly offset her pale skin, blue eyes, and bright red lipstick. "Great. Follow me, we'll walk and talk," she said, turning and guiding Cole through the bays. "I work with Mr. Calloway. He asked me to give you a quick tour then work on the uniform and other details until he arrived."

"Okay," he said, figuring one word answers were a hell of a lot safer than embellishments.

He followed the little spitfire as she guided him through the bays, barely able to keep up with her zipping through each space. 'Lightning fast' tour would have been more appropriate. He wanted to stop, look, ask questions, but he thought it best to just keep up for the moment.

The first bay, as he had suspected the night before, was for mechanical work. According to Stacie, all work was scheduled beforehand and completed by ASE Certified techs with specialized workshop training for the luxury lines and high-end imports. Cole noticed the employees draped blankets over the work area—everything careful, everything clean.

Just the way he liked to work.

"This is Mr. Calloway's office." Stacie signaled to the space between the first two bays.

Cole couldn't see much into the office with the blinds drawn. The room was larger than the traditional shop offices, which seemed odd, but he didn't want to be too nosey. At least not so soon. "Where is Mr. Calloway?" he asked, emphasizing the name.

Stacie turned to face him. Cole abruptly stopped to avoid running into her small frame, not realizing how closely he was following.

"Sorry," he said and took a step back.

The smile, permanently etched on her face, didn't falter with the near crash. "He should be in shortly," she said and turned again to resume her speed tour. The second bay was also for traditional service but segmented for exotics and special collections. That morning, they had two mechanics in the shop, one working on the Lamborghini, the other on the Bugatti he had seen the night before.

Lucky bastards
.

Cole tried to keep pace with Stacie going into the next bay. The restoration bay was relatively empty with the Yenko still off to the side.

"Why isn't anyone in here working on her," he said, pointing to the rusted metal.

"Mr. Calloway leads all restoration projects so he works on them when he can. This is the first restoration he's worked on in a while," she said, continuing her tour.

The next bay was the customization area. Along the walls, Cole saw stacks of boxes of car parts, audio equipment, and more. He looked up and smiled when he spotted the Ferrari 458 on a lift getting a custom body kit installed by two workers. Cole didn't understand why some people paid so much for a car then chose to change its appearance, but he had to admit, the 458's wide body looked damn good with the extra curves they were adding. He pointed to the row of plaques and awards hung across the bays. "Did he win all these awards?"

Stacie stopped and followed his line of sight. Her smile softened to something resembling admiration. "Yes. Each is an award for one of his customization or restoration projects at various shows around the world."

Cole cocked his head. "You said the Yenko was the first restoration in a while?"

Stacie nodded. "C'mon," she said, coaxing him to continue the tour.

In the next bay, Cole counted two sanding rooms with extractor fans and three paint booths at the back end. There was one worker in the painting booth and a station setup that looked like a custom fender had been shaped and waited to be prepped for sanding.

"Does he usually get this much work?" Cole asked in awe, still staring at his surroundings.

"He's always busy and we subcontract out some of the space to workers for special projects," Stacie answered, pushing open the door to exit the bay.

They had managed to work their way to the end of the aisle of warehouse bays and were now standing outside. "That's the door where I came in from earlier, right?" Cole asked, trying to get his bearings.

"Yes, you came in through there," she said, pointing to the door that appeared far off on his left. "Let's jump over to the other side."

"He owns this too?" Cole asked, trying to keep up with the tour guide from hell.

"Yes," she said, unlocking the door. "Hold on a sec, let me get the lights." Cole stood still in the darkness and heard the click-clack of her shoes as she took a few steps then stopped. Cole blinked rapidly when all the lights flickered on at once and illuminated the huge open space.

"Oh my God," he said on a whisper. He tried to grip the doorframe when his knees weakened.
This
was obviously the showroom. A row of—Cole quickly counted—fourteen cars were lined up, all parked at forty-five degree angles, sorted by color. Yeah, seemed
this
Calloway had a dash of OCD mixed in. Each graceful in their own right, whether luxury classics or sinfully fast elegance. He could easily label this a multi-million dollar alley. "Are these his?"

Stacie giggled. Cole looked over to her and snorted a laugh. With her petite frame, it was actually cute as hell. "No. He has clients who often ask him to store their cars while they go away on a trip. So he stores them here along with completed projects. It helps to showcase some of the shop work for potential clients and models we work with. Come, follow me over here."

Cole followed Stacie to a separate area off to the far end of the showroom space.

"This is our detailing area," she said, zipping past a large bay as if it were a small bedroom. "Here, Mr. Calloway wanted to make sure I showed you this." She unlocked another door and flipped the lights on. There, locked away safely on its own, was
his
car. Well, it would be his in four months if he was able to fulfill the agreement Hunter had left for him.

"It's nicer than I remember," he whispered, ghosting his fingers along the edge of the fender.

"Mr. Calloway detailed it before storing it away. He thought she needed to be beautiful for you," she said, a tone of reverence evident to anyone in earshot.

This
would make being good so worth it. His own version of a sleeper. To the average person, it would look like a traditional black on black Cadillac coupe available to everyone and their grandmother. The custom, matte black accent stripes and chrome five-spoke rims hinted at something different. But it was the tiny CTS-V badge that identified the undercover powerhouse street-legal car with the supercharged V8 engine. "Beautiful for me?" Cole asked absently, a slight tightness in his chest surfaced.

"Yes, he said you were working on a difficult project and this was your compensation for finishing. He said it was your motivator so he wanted to make sure she was spectacular should you need to spend some time with her while meditating."

Cole's gaze snapped to Stacie. "Um, meditating? Difficult project?"

Stacie smiled wider. "That's what Mr. Calloway calls it. When deadlines and projects get a little overwhelming, he meditates. He sneaks into the showroom and just sits on the floor and stares at the cars." She neared him, her entire body language went from bubbly and happy to firm and menacing. "And if you tell anyone I said that, you will have to deal with me. Got it?" she said, pointing a finger at him.

Cole nodded and held back a laugh. The little spitfire had a temper and it looked like she wasn't afraid to use it. "What else did he say about the
difficult project
?"

Stacie eased back into her prior happy nature. "Not much, but that's expected. We only disclose the bare minimums here since most clients prefer their privacy."

Cole nodded. If Stacie didn't know he was an ex-con, chances were, the others wouldn't know either. He inhaled a shaky breath as his throat tightened. He was starting with a clean slate.

It was completely on him if he screwed this up.