You Drive Me Crazy novel · Chapter 5 of 24
Chapter 5: Her Rules
"Nobody doesn't leave tire marks," Cade said.
He stepped past me into the shop and stopped in the middle of the floor.
He took in the two bays, the warped shelves, and the crack up the east wall.
He took in the sign my father had painted.
"This is it?"
"This is it."
"You've had this place seven years."
"My father had it thirty."
"It's good."
"It's a hole."
"It's a good hole," Cade said quietly. "Every tool is hung where you'd reach for it."
I took the sweatshirt from him because I could not stand to be looked at while he saw all of it.
"Why are you really here?"
"Eli's sweatshirt."
"You could have mailed it."
"I'm bad at mail."
I almost smiled, and killed it.
Cade looked at the paper still crumpled in my fist.
"Is that from her?"
"Go home, Mr. Renfro."
"Mara."
"It's not your business."
"If it's hers, it's mine."
"It's mine," I said. "It's my shop and my loan, and I will settle it with my own hands."
"How much?"
"I said it was mine."
"How much do you owe?"
"Fifty-eight thousand dollars to a company that doesn't exist, which is her."
He closed his eyes briefly.
"I'll pay it today."
"No."
"Mara, it's money. I have too much of it. It does nothing but sit."
"Then keep it sitting."
"You'd rather lose the shop?"
"I'd rather not be bought," I said. "Not by you, and not by her. I was left once by a man who figured I would stay quiet, and I am not doing that twice."
It was not true, and it was not fair, and I watched it land.
He took it without flinching.
"Then I'll go with you," he said.
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