Red Truck Rendezvous Page 7

  For as long as she could remember, Portia had loved old things. They had character, soul even. Seeing Sweetie, sanded down to a dull orange, her frame up on blocks and tires missing, she was sure that the truck would never be the same. All of her father’s doubts and worries about having Pablo restore the truck had come washing back in, and she had fled.

  Grabbing a quick shower, and dressing in skinny jeans and a white shirt, the young woman tied a red kerchief around her hair and stiffened her spine. She would go and get the truck. For better or worse, Pablo had done the work she had asked for, and now it was time to pay the piper. If she couldn’t live with the result, she could always sell the 1942 Ford and start over, even though the thought made her heart drop to her shoes as guilt tugged at her middle. She hadn’t been fair to Pablo.

  Flicking the empty ice-cream containers into the trash, she tidied her little house on wheels and determined to face the music. She would get Sweetie put back together, pay Pablo, and move on.

  Even as she thought it, the idea of walking out of the young mechanics life saddened her, and Portia wondered why. She recognized her attraction for Pablo, and it had been fun giving him such a hard time at the garage, but during that time, something else had been growing. An admiration, a friendship that she had all but betrayed with her behavior a few days ago.

  Checking her appearance in her mirror, Portia grabbed her keys, determined to make amends, and started for the door. She had just laid her hands on the door latch when the distinctive hoot-hoot of an old car horn filled the air.

  ***

  Pablo jumped out of the truck, determined to stay confident. The old pickup looked amazing in a blazing new coat of red paint that glistened in the afternoon sun. The black wheel wells were a nice contrast to the rest of the truck, highlighting the sloping fenders and making the truck look beefier than it was.

  As a crowd began to gather around the classic auto, Pablo saw Portia step out of her camper and stop, staring at the truck with wonder in her eyes.

  “Ms. Princeton,” he started. “I thought you might like to see the finished product.” The echo of her words a few days earlier still rang in his wounded heart.

  “She looks amazing!” Portia looked between the mechanic and his handy work. Where she had feared the personality and soul of her classic truck had been lost, Sweetie looked like she had been given a new lease on life. Instead of looking like a cold, impersonal, mechanical device, that same flare and personality that had drawn Portia to the truck in the first place seemed to overflow.

  Pablo dangled the keys from thumb and forefinger, offering her a drive. “Shall we take it for a spin?”

  Portia raced for the truck, barely able to contain her excitement as Pablo opened the door, letting her slide onto the black calfskin bench seat.

  Pablo jumped into the passenger seat, his ears and eyes tuned to any trouble. He didn’t need Portia to find anything to complain about. He had finished the work, and he knew that once she was satisfied, he could collect his fee and go back to the way things had been.

  “I can’t believe this,” Portia sighed, easing the truck through the gaping crowd. “I never imagined you’d make her look so good.”

  Pablo’s heart sank. Portia still couldn’t believe that he had been able to pull this off, and in record time to boot.

  “I am a fully licensed and qualified mechanic, you know.” His words were harsh as they rolled out onto the main road. “This is not my first rebuild. I told you I could do it, and I did.”

  Portia heard the bite in Pablo’s voice and knew how much she had hurt him with her outburst from a few days ago. She should never have let her father cause her to doubt the man she had entrusted her truck to. She should have believed in the man who had become as close to a friend as she had.

  Shifting gears, she pressed the gas pedal harder, reveling in the hearty purr of the truck's engine. She had been up and down this road so many times over the past few weeks as she explored the northern reaches of Michigan, Mackinac Island, and the UP that every turning was familiar.

  Seeing the turn, she wanted Portia twisted the wheel, skidding the truck onto a long winding dirt road.

  Chapter 18

  Pablo gripped the door handle hard as Portia turned into the dirt lane. Why she had decided to bring the pristine truck down the dusty road he didn’t know, but it was her truck, and who was he to complain.

  “Pablo,” Portia said, slowing as they came to a quiet area under a large tree. “I’m sorry, I should never have doubted you.”

  Pablo felt something deep in his chest unfurl, and he started to relax. Portia had actually apologized. “I thought…” Pablo started. “I thought that we had gotten past that kind of thing. When you bought that other truck, we had started working together, not against each other. I thought you had recognized that I knew what I was doing.”

  Portia put the truck in park and turned the engine off, twisting on the seat as she met Pablo’s gaze. “I really am sorry,” she pulled her lower lip between her teeth. Apologizing didn’t come easy, and the mechanic wasn’t making it any easier.

  “You did an amazing job.” Portia looked up, seeing a softening to Pablo’s dark eyes.

  “I don’t understand,” Pablo finally said. “You wanted me to fix this truck to make it new again, but when I stripped it down, you freaked out. Why?”

  Portia twisted her hands in her lap, looking across the bench seat at the handsome mechanic who had been slowly stealing her heart. Perhaps one of the reasons she had reacted so badly to the way her truck had looked was that she was actually afraid of her feelings for someone like Pablo. They were nothing alike. She had been raised with a silver spoon in her mouth, and he had worked for everything he had.

  “I was scared,” she finally spoke.

  “That I couldn’t fix your truck?”

  Portia shook her head slowly. “Of you. Of how I was starting to feel about you. No matter how hard I made your life, you just kept pushing forward. You told me what you would do, and you did it. You never once backed down, and I didn’t know how to deal with that.”

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Pablo studied Portia’s pretty face. She was a beautiful woman, a bit of a motorhead, and a fantastic driver. For the past five weeks, she had been making him crazy in a multitude of ways. She irritated him with her constant questions, her habit of looking over his shoulder, and the way he was attracted to her.

  “Portia,” he hesitated a moment making sure she was listening. “I never promise anything I can’t deliver.”

  Portia nodded. It was precisely what he had done with her truck, but what about her heart. How could she have possibly started to fall in love with the man sitting across from her when they were from two very different worlds?

  Pablo lifted his hand, brushing a strand of hair from Portia’s cheek. “I was starting to kind of like you,” his half-smile froze her heart, and Portia felt her stomach turn over.

  “I thought you trusted me.”

  Portia dropped her gaze, guilt filling her. Teasing Pablo had started as a bit of fun, but the more she grew to know him, the more she liked him. The day he had kissed her, he had turned her world upside down, and she didn’t know what to do about it. Soon she would be hooking up her trailer and heading home. What would happen then?

  “I do,” Portia’s words were a whisper. “I don’t trust myself. My father kept telling me to come home, to have a real garage take care of my truck. I’m sorry I doubted you. He has always made big decisions for me. I doubted myself.”

  Pablo placed a forefinger under Portia’s chin, lifting her gaze to his. “I didn’t expect to like you,” he grinned. “As a matter of fact, when I first met you, I was sure I was going to hate you, but I don’t. Portia, you’re special. You and your truck and your little camper. You are so full of life, but I’m just a mechanic. I work long hours, I struggle to make ends meet, but I love what I do. I don’t think there is any room in my life for someone like you.”

>   Portia felt the tears spring to her eyes. Pablo didn’t want her in his life. She had started to fall for him, and though he had proven that she could trust him with her precious truck, she couldn’t trust him with her heart.

  A glint of sunlight sparkled off of the little ornament hanging from the mirror of the truck, and Portia turned her attention to it, giving her something else to focus on. The little truck was so much like Sweetie, it could have been her miniature, and she reached out touching it.

  “Where did this come from?” she asked, trying to keep from crying.

  “You remember that little box in my office the day you and Sweetie arrived? Pablo asked. “This was in it.” The mechanic studied the truck, his old suspicions rising again as something turned over in his heart. Was it so crazy that he and a girl like Portia Princeton could be together? Hadn’t stranger things happened?

  “It’s perfect,” Portia smiled, as a strange warmth spread through her fingers. “If I didn’t know better, I’d swear it was my truck. Where did it come from?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t look. It probably came from some car accessory place.” Pablo felt the lie deep inside, but he couldn’t admit to his fanciful notions concerning these ornaments and who sent them.

  “Portia, turned the tiny truck in her hand, squinting to read the engraving on the bottom of it. “There’s something written here.”

  When love races toward you, don’t run away.

  “What do you think that means?”

  Pablo felt a shiver race up his spine. Portia had all but run him over the day she had rolled into his garage. She was bright, beautiful, and right there in front of him. If he turned her away now, would he ever have another chance at finding out where this could go?

  Portia turned, her aqua eyes meeting his as her heart melted, at the confused look on Pablo’s face. His words said one thing, but the look in his eyes said something different.

  “That’s us.”

  “I guess it is,” Pablo agreed. Throwing caution to the wind, he leaned in, kissing Portia soundly, as light danced into the truck.

  That kiss, that perfect kiss under the light of the little ornament, changed everything, and Pablo felt himself surrender. Portia had captured his heart, and he wanted nothing more than to show her just how much she could trust him.

  Portia pulled back, smiling shyly at the handsome mechanic. Sweetie was once more roadworthy, yet she knew she couldn’t leave. She wanted to get to know Pablo all over again.

  ***

  “I was starting to worry,” Mr. Claus said as they watched the truck roll back to the Inn from their chairs on the tiny porch of the Christmas Cottage.

  “It is no easy task getting two stubborn young people together,” Mrs. Claus replied, watching as Pablo helped Portia from the truck. “I hope you’ve learned your lesson about meddling in my business,” she added, reaching over and taking her husband’s hand.

  “From now on, I promise to leave the matchmaking to you,” Chris chuckled. “It’s too stressful for an old man like me.”

  Mrs. Claus leaned over, placing a sweet kiss on her husband’s cheek. So much had changed over the years, so many new and wonderful adventures. “It has been hard having to wait, hasn’t it?” she mused. “Now we know that they each have someone to love, maybe it will make the waiting easier.”

  Chapter 19

  The courtship was a whirlwind, much of it spent in the depths of Pablo’s garage as he and Portia learned to work together.

  The young rich girl learned to find joy in working with her hands as together, she and Pablo worked to rebuild and repair cars.

  “If I didn’t know better,” Pablo commented as they leaned over the hood of an acid green fastback Mustang, “I’d think you were born to this life.”

  Portia leaned in, kissing the man she knew she loved. “I never knew that getting greasy could be so much fun. I have always loved cars, racing, and how things worked, but to actually fix something and see it run, is thrilling.”

  When Pablo finally knew he was ready to propose, it had taken all of his courage to contact Portia’s father, seeking his permission. He knew that Portia talked with her father regularly, but wasn’t sure if the man would approve of his little girl falling for a greasy monkey like him, but he loved her and was willing to risk it all. The big surprise had come, when Mr. Princeton had turned up at the Old Inn, in-person to meet the man who had stolen his daughter’s heart.

  “It’s about time she met a man who knows what work is,” Mr. Princeton had said. “I built my business from the ground up, and have often worried that Portia would end up with one of those useless types who are only interested in money.”

  Pablo hadn’t known what to say, but he pulled Portia tight and nodded. “I just want to make her happy, sir,” the young mechanic said. “I promise to do my best.”

  Portia hugged her father, as joy filled her heart. “He does make me happy,” she enthused. “He even lets me work on the cars with him, and I love it.”

  Mr. Princeton laughed, offering Pablo his hand. “I think that’s all I need to know,” he agreed. “You have my blessing.”

  ***

  Autumn had reached the upper reaches of Michigan when the wedding bells pealed. Pablo couldn’t imagine being happier than he was the day Portia said ‘I do’, on the shores of Lake Michigan with the wind whipping her veil like a sail.

  Everything had changed the day Portia had rolled her worn-out rig into Pablo’s garage. He hadn’t been prepared for her love to roll into his heart.

  The ceremony was simple, but the magic that bound two young hearts wasn’t as Pablo and Portia became one. Surrounded by family and friends, they said their vows promising to make the rest of life’s drive together, no matter how many bumps there might be in the road.

  As the preacher declared them husband and wife, the soft hoot-hoot of the old truck horn pronounced them wed and grabbing Portia’s hand, Pablo raced up the beach helping his beautiful bride into the old truck, then jumping behind the wheel.

  The old engine roared to life, and with a quick wave, he sped up the driveway and into a new life. Behind them, well-wishers cheered and waved, laughing as the string of tin cans attached to the bumper and the large painted rear window announced JUST MARRIED in bold white print.

  “Happy?” Portia asked, looking at Pablo behind the wheel of her old red truck.

  “I couldn’t be happier,” Pablo smiled.

  “Me too,” Portia’s grin widened, and she reached for her new husband’s hand. “I’m sure glad I bought Sweetie and not that old yellow panel truck I was looking at last year. If not for Sweetie, we never would have met.”

  The End.

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