Hoodwinked Read Free

hard enough with the heel of her shoe to unclog it.
    She was considering that when she noticed the big dark mechanic standing a little distance away, studying her with what could only be described as a calculating stare.
    She glanced toward him, but before she could even speak, he moved closer. “Isn’t this a little obvious?” he asked with faint amusement. “First you spill coffee all over me. Now your car stalls right next to my pickup.”
    His pickup? She felt as if fate were out to get her. It really had been a horror of a day. And now here was this big, dishy mechanic under the impressionthat she was putting on an act to get his attention. It was her own fault, she supposed. To someone who didn’t know her, her behavior might have seemed come-onish. And she had stared at him in the canteen.
    â€œIt’s all right,” she said quickly. “I know what to do.”
    â€œWhy don’t you just crank it?” he asked, eyeing her curiously. He folded his arms across his broad chest. “For future reference, I don’t like come-ons. I don’t have much trouble attracting women, and I sure as hell don’t want you lying in wait for me every day. Clear enough?”
    That was insulting, uncalled-for and surprisingly painful. Tears stung her eyes, but she blinked them away hurriedly. She got to her feet, staring at him numbly. She wasn’t quite her old, feisty self. Losing both her parents at once had been a terrible blow, and she still wasn’t quite recovered. Too, she’d always been sheltered. She simply didn’t expect cruelty from people. It was shocking to find that, and mocking contempt, in a total stranger.
    â€œI suppose you’re justified in what you’re thinking,” she said quietly, “but you’re quite wrong. I’m not trying to come on to you. This morning was really an accident. And I have a bad battery connection that I meant to see about earlier, but I had some distractions. All I have to do is beat on it with a shoe, and I can crank it. So please don’t let me detain you.”
    She turned back to the engine, her hands trembling with mingled hurt and confusion, took off her shoe and slammed it against the battery terminal with a sharp, angry blow. She stood up and almost collided with the mechanic.
    â€œThere does seem to be a little corrosion there,” he said slowly, obviously surprised.
    She didn’t answer him. She didn’t even look at him. She closed the hatch, got in behind the wheel and tried the key. This time it cranked.
    She didn’t look back as she drove off, fighting tears all the way. Horrible, arrogant, conceited man, she thought furiously, and wished she could call him what she was thinking he was.
    Maureen had an active mental life. In her mind, she could be and do anything. But in real life, she was only a shadow of the person inside her. The inner Maureen could engage in verbal battles and give people the devil. But the outer Maureen, the one who seemed always to blend into the background, was a different proposition. She fumed and muttered, but she was too softhearted to argue with people. She walked away from fights. She always had.
    Back at the small duplex in which she lived, she kicked off her shoes and flopped down on her worn sofa. She couldn’t remember a time in her life when she’d been as weary. Everyone had bad days, she reminded herself. But hers seemed to go from bad to worse.
    That ill-mannered mechanic’s sarcasm had been the last straw. So he was dishy. That gave him no excuse to accuse her of chasing him, for heaven’s sake. Who did he think he was? Nobody who really knew her would ever think her capable of such a thing. She smiled ruefully when she remembered that there wasn’t anybody who really knew her. Only her parents, and she’d lost them. She had nobody anymore. She didn’t make close friends easily because she was basically shy and