Page 8 of Jackrabbit

“But boss—”

“Boy, I know you didn’t just ‘but boss’ me.”

Oh. Why was that kinda—

Colt swallowed.

“Nope, sure didn’t,” Xavier hurried to answer. He shoved his phone in his back pocket. “Dunno what you heard. I said, ‘sure, boss’. Must have mumbled. You know how it is.”

“Mhmm.” Beau clicked the mouse twice.

Xavier left into the shop. He bounded up to a kid in a backwards hat and shook him by the shoulders, and the kid turned. His eyes went wide when they landed on Colt, and he waved, grinning. Colt turned back to the clock behind Beau’s shoulder. He’d have been thrilled literally just yesterday to see a couple of guys excited to see him because of his video. Not today.

Ten minutes and thirty-two seconds later, the phone rang.

And rang.

Colt looked away from the clock and found Beau watching him. Slowly, he raised one dark eyebrow. “Well, boy? Answer it.”

It was on its fifth ring before he managed to scramble over and pull it off the receiver. He fumbled it, nearly letting it slip from his fingers before bringing it to his ear. The desk dug what was sure to be a spectacular bruise into his hip because of course.

“Merc’s Motorworks,” Colt greeted. “Um—how can I help you?”

”Yeah, hi,”the woman on the other end breathed as a kid screamed in the background.”I need an oil change.”

“An oil change,” Colt repeated. Like an idiot.

In the thirty seconds it took for Beau to take pity on him, sweat prickled at his upper lip. Without looking up, Beau turned a second computer screen toward Colt. There was a schedule on it. Easy to read with simple blocking, thank fuck.

“Yeah, uh—” He cleared his throat and snatched the mouse Beau set in front of him. “We have an appointment this afternoon. At two. Um. P.M.”

Fuck his actual life.

”Two? Yeah, okay. Two works.”

The line was quiet long enough that Colt started drumming his fingers on the desk. “So, yeah, we’ll…see you at two?”

”Don’t you need, like, my name?” the woman asked. Something crashed to the floor on her end, and she sighed.”Tommy Price, you pick that up right this second.”

“Name! Yes. Right.” Ears burning, Colt clicked the appointment slot and leaned further across the desk to grab the keyboard. Beau smirked, and Colt ignored it. “And phone number.”

Beau raised both eyebrows.

“Uh. Please. Ma’am.”

Snorting, Beau turned back to what he was doing on his computer as Colt took down the woman’s name. When he finally hung up, he let out a short, relieved breath. God, he couldn’t have looked more incompetent if he’d tried.

“You got a job?” Beau asked. He reached under the desk and pulled out another clipboard.

“No.” Colt rubbed the back of his neck and then pushed his fingers up through the shorter hairs at the base of his skull. “Mostly race to make rent.”

“Mhmm.” Beau clicked his pen and started writing. “How’s that working for you with that fancy ankle bracelet you got on there?”

“I’m supposed to look for work within my perimeter,” Colt mumbled, pushing the toes of his sneakers against the floor. “There’s a Seven-Eleven across from my apartments.”

The scratching of Beau’s pen was drowned out by the sound of the garage doors opening in the next room, and light flooded the lobby. Colt pressed his lips together, the need to fill the silence worming against his skin.

Eventually, Beau set down the clip board and dropped the pen into the pocket of his jeans. “You gonna keep showing up here?”