Daybreak by Kate Hawthorne

Author:Kate Hawthorne [Hawthorne, Kate]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance, Gay / Lesbian / LGBT
Amazon: B08ZNK1R3H
Goodreads: 56278586
Publisher: Heart Eyes Press
Published: 2021-05-09T22:00:00+00:00

14

Liam

Sleeping on a couch was going to be the death of me, but it was Sunday and the water pump was supposed to arrive any day now. He’d muttered a curse under his breath about me having a faulty new car instead of something old and reliable, and that’s how I’d found myself in the garage, fingers trailing over the angled edges of the Mustang’s fastback roof.

Gus circled around my feet, threading his way around my ankles as I made a lap around the car. I didn’t know much about classic cars or muscle cars or whatever, but I had a suspicion this one would have been really something in its prime. Now, though, the body was littered with bits of rust, the seats were in the car but not bolted down and the hood sat half open, engine parts barely visible.

“Why doesn’t he fix it?” I asked Gus, taking the stairs back into the laundry room and latching the door behind me.

Gus barked, giving me an answer I didn’t understand, but also felt in my bones. The car clearly belonged to his husband, or ex-husband, or whatever the guy was. I know Jasper didn’t talk about it, didn’t talk about him, but there were signs of a past life scattered all around the house. There were no pictures; in some corners it wasn’t much more than a feeling, but it was definitely there. I didn’t know how he lived with the memories.

I scooped coffee into the filter and poured water into the pot, then sat at the table and played on my phone while I waited for the coffee to brew. I started to wonder what his husband looked like, what they looked like together, and a surge of jealousy lit up in my chest.

“Definitely not,” I muttered under my breath, stabbing Manny’s name on my contact list. It rang four times before he answered, voice quiet and groggy.

“Are you dead?” he croaked.

“Clearly not.”

“Why are you calling me so early?”

“It’s eight,” I said, glancing at the clock on the wall that had a bright orange rooster at the twelve.

“Wherever you are maybe,” Manny groaned.

“I’m in Vermont,” I said.

Manny cleared his throat and sighed. “Still?”

“The part hasn’t come in for the car yet.”

“Right.”

“It hasn’t!”

“And you’re shacking up with the mechanic?” he asked.

“I’m sleeping on his couch,” I answered, cheeks heating.

“Tell me the rest.”

“There is no rest,” I lied.

“Tell me the rest,” Manny said again.

The carafe on the coffee pot was half full, so I poured myself a mug. I put my phone on speaker, but turned the volume low, and sat back down at the table, cradling the quickly warming ceramic between both of my palms. It had only been a handful of days, but I’d gotten used to the simple comforts of Jasper’s house.

Everything felt like it had history to it, from the giant table in the dining room, to every blanket in the stack he’d given me to keep myself warm the first night, to the row of cars in his garage, mine included.

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