Smiling, he nodded. “Well, then hopefully you’ll sleep better tonight.”

  My stomach fluttered. Tonight. Because we were doing this. Like… today. Now. “I mean it, though—nothing fancy.”

  “Nothing fancy. Got it.”

  “Oh my God.” I stared at Scott in the rearview of the Camry. “Do you hear that?”

  “Hear what?” Quinn, the salesman, asked from the passenger seat.

  “It sounds fine to me,” Scott said from behind me.

  “Exactly.” I sighed happily. “Nothing’s rattling. Or clanging. Or…”

  Scott chuckled. “Nothing like the sound of a healthy car, am I right?”

  “So much. It even smells new.”

  “Yeah, that shit comes in a bottle.”

  I eyed the salesman. “Does it?”

  Quinn shrugged. “Well, I mean, we use some cleaners, and—”

  “You can literally buy ‘new car smell’ in a bottle,” Scott said dryly.

  I steered the car out of the dealership’s parking lot. “Well, given the weird smells in my current car, I’ll take bottled ‘new car smell’. Hell, I’ll bathe in that shit.”

  Scott barked a laugh. “Please don’t.”

  “What? Why not?” I snickered. “You could totally threaten to spray it all over any of your teammates who don’t shower after a game.”

  “Hmm. That might actually work, now that you mention it.”

  I chuckled and kept driving the car. I took it around the block, then onto the freeway. On the way back, I pulled into a nearby parking lot and went in and out of a parking space, checking out the backup camera and the turning radius.

  It drove like a dream. Smooth. Quiet. No suspicious clatter of a piece falling off. No telltale smell of burning electronics. Was it weird for the dashboard to be so dark? Oh, right. All those lights were supposed to be off unless something was wrong.

  When I returned to the car lot, I shut off the engine. “Man. This thing is awesome.”

  Quinn lit up in the passenger seat. “Do you want to try test driving any others? Or is this the one you like?”

  “I’m, uh… I’m not sure yet.” I turned to him. “Do you mind if we”—I gestured at Scott—“chat for a few?”

  “No problem! Take all the time you need.”

  We all climbed out of the car, and Quinn went inside to give us some space to confer privately.

  “So.” Scott raised his eyebrows. “What do you think?”

  “It’s nice. Really nice.” I paused. “And you know what’s wild?”

  “Hmm?”

  “My neck and shoulder don’t hurt as much while I’m driving.”

  “Really? Are the seats that terrible in your car?”

  “They are, yeah, but it’s also the fact that with this one, I’m just… relaxed. I’m not bracing for something to go wrong.” I exhaled, cautiously rolling my shoulders. “Goddamn, I hadn’t even realized how much it was stressing me out, just driving that stupid failwagon.”

  “Wow.” Scott tapped the car with his finger. “We’re definitely getting you one today, then. Whether it’s this one, or you find another.”

  I stared at him. “Seriously?”

  “Yes.”

  “But… I mean…” I swallowed. “Look, I meant what I said. You don’t have to buy—”

  “You need a better car,” he said, voice gentle. “Especially if the one you have is making your pain worse. Honestly, I’m happy to do it.”

  “You’re amazing. Thank you.” I pushed out a long breath as I watched my finger trailing along the weather stripping, which was firmly in place instead of falling off. “I don’t think you realize what a difference it’ll make for the three of us.” I turned to Scott. “Having a car that actually runs and isn’t going to crap out on us if someone brakes too hard.”

  “Jesus,” he breathed. “Well, at least you can get rid of the one you’re driving. In fact, we should probably bring it in. You won’t get much of a trade-in for it, but they’ll at least take it off your hands.”

  “Oh. Good idea.” I chewed the inside of my cheek. “Will they hold this one while we go get my car? Or wait!” I pulled out my phone. “I think Rachel is off today. Maybe she or Leo can bring it.”

  “Actually…”

  I turned to him, thumb hovering over the Send button. “Hmm?”

  “Maybe we should go get yours,” he said softly. “And your ex and her husband should bring theirs.”

  “Bring theirs? What for?”

  Scott’s smile made the whole parking lot tilt, and I’ll be damned if he didn’t blush as he shyly said, “We’re already here and getting the ball rolling. Why keep the two of them riding around in pieces of shit when they’d be a lot safer and less stressed in…” He made a sweeping gesture around the parking lot.

  The dealership parking lot.

  The dealership parking lot full of other cars for sale.

  As the piece snapped into place in my head, and I sputtered, “You want to buy them cars too?”

  “Safe. Reliable.” He shrugged. “Why not?”

  I stared at him.

  “I mean it,” he said softly, showing his palms. “No strings. No bullshit.”

  “I…”

  Oh hell. Why not? I could already feel my own stress lifting away just at the prospect of driving away with this car instead of my regular trash heap. Why keep my ex and her husband in piece-of-shit cars if someone was willing and able to help? Why keep our daughter riding around in those deathtraps?

  “Um. Are you sure?”

  Scott nodded.

  “Okay. Uh. Okay.” I looked down at phone. “Let me give Rachel a call.”

  “I like the blue one!” Ginny declared, pointing at the Toyota that Leo had just finished test driving.

  “Ha!” Leo pumped his fist. “I win!”

  Rachel rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. After all, she’d already picked out a red Honda that we all agreed was the perfect car for her, so it wasn’t like she could complain. She and Leo had debated between a couple of Toyotas for him, and she’d preferred the first one, but he’d preferred the second. With Ginny’s vote in his favor, Rachel wasn’t going to argue.

  Leo sobered, and he turned to Scott. “Are you really sure about this?”

  Scott was nodding before he’d even finished asking the question. “I’ve been there. The car I drove in college had pieces falling off for the last two years of its life and one door handle was held together by duct tape. I know how stressful it is.”

  “Still,” Leo said. “You’d never even met us before yesterday.”

  “It’s all right.” Scott glanced at me, a knee-shaking smile on his face. “I’ve met him, and he’s spoken highly of both of you.” He gestured at Ginny. “And you need something safe for her, right?”

  Leo glanced at my daughter. “Yeah, we do. Well, I really appreciate it. This is… Man.” He shook his head and laughed, extending his hand. “I’m speechless.”

  Scott just smiled and shook Leo’s hand.

  Since we had all settled on cars, Quinn took us into the dealership to finalize everything. There were some toys set up near the sales desks, and Ginny watched longingly as a couple of little boys played with them. Since it was all within full view of Quinn’s desk, we let her go play while we all dealt with the paperwork. While Quinn went through everything and tried to upsell every possible thing imaginable, Rachel, Leo, and I all glanced over on occasion to make sure she was all right.

  After failing to convince Scott that financing was necessary—dude, you are barking up the wrong tree—Quinn brought out some brochures. “Now, since these are Certified Pre-Owned, they’re eligible for extended warranties.”

  Rachel and I both opened our mouths to speak, and I suspected she was about to decline just like I was.

  Scott beat us to it, though. “Full coverage for all three.” He tapped the platinum warranty.

  Rachel’s eyes widened.

  I nudged Scott. “Are you sure? We can go without the warranties.”

  Scott shook his head. “This way you’re covered for a while if something breaks down.” He tapped the brochure again. “Plus it’s got roadside assistance. Even if you’ve got AAA, it never hurts to have a backup that isn’t going to show up and charge you three hundred bucks.”

  “He’s got a point,” Rachel admitted. Beside her, Leo nodded.

  I hated the idea of Scott shelling out more money, but I didn’t have any strong arguments against warranties or the car. So I nodded. “Okay. Yeah. Let’s go with the warranties.”

  The salesman looked like he’d won the lottery, which I guess I couldn’t blame him for; he probably worked on commission and was struggling as much as anyone else in this region. Rachel and Leo looked relieved as hell, though, like years’ worth of stress was falling off their shoulders as Quinn pulled up the paperwork for the warranties.

  Now that I thought about it, I was that relieved too. I’d still need to call the insurance company, and I’d have to run by the DMV to get the car registered, but those didn’t need to happen right this second. For now, though, I just let the relief wash over me.

  Our dying cars were gone. Scott and I had gone to my apartment to pick up my car, and then Leo and Rachel had joined us in a bizarre caravan of three beaters puttering along behind a Ferrari. Now those beaters were history. We all had new cars. Well, not new new—they all had between thirty and fifty thousand miles, and there were some hints of wear and tear that even the dealership’s expert detailing hadn’t been able to mask.

  But they all ran. They even had extended warranties and roadside assistance. They most likely weren’t going to shit the bed and leave one of us—not to mention our daughter—stranded on the side of the road or with no way to get to where we needed to be.

  They were also paid for. Free and clear. All we needed to do now was take them home and make some calls to sort out insurance. Even with the paperwork and logistics left to handle, it was done. And the relief was just… holy fuck.

  I turned to Scott. “Thank you. You really didn’t have to do this, but… thank you.”

  His smile made me warm all over. “You’re welcome.”

  And my God, my heart melted a little. If he’d been out of the closet and we’d been openly dating, I’d have hugged him right then and there, but I wanted to stay mindful of his boundaries. When we were alone, I’d definitely hug the hell out of him.

  Actually, I’d do more than hug him, and I didn’t care at all if he paid me for it. In fact, I kind of wished he wouldn’t this time. Did he have any idea how much I wished he wasn’t a client anymore? Not because he bought me things, but because he cared. The kind of man who said, “Hey, you don’t have enough—let me fix that” without even blinking, even to the ex-wife and kid of the man he was paying for sex—was exactly the kind of man I’d have dated in a heartbeat.

  It wasn’t that he wanted to give us all fancy cars. It was that he saw that we needed cars to get to our jobs and ferry Ginny around, but what we were driving were unreliable pieces of shit, and he replaced them.

  I didn’t care if he had money or if he ever spent a dime on me, but the fact that he thought nothing of making sure the people around him had what they needed, on top of the fact that he was just so sweet and gentle and caring…

  I mean, why wouldn’t I want a partner like that?

  “I still can’t believe how different things are now.” Rachel released a long sigh. “My God. Just being able to pay bills, and knowing we have cars that aren’t on Death’s door.”

  Sitting at the other side of the kitchen table where we were putting together the budget for the next month, I said, “No kidding. I don’t even know how to process it.”

  “I don’t care about processing it.” She tapped a few keys on her ancient laptop. “I’m just grateful as hell for it.”

  “You and me both.” On my own computer, I pulled up the website for the power company. Usually I grumbled a bit as I paid the various utilities. With as much as we were coughing up for rent, you would think the complex would spring for things like gas, water, and electricity, but no. I supposed we should’ve been grateful they covered trash services and had actual reserved parking; the place I’d lived before moving in with Leo and Rachel had been a parking lot free-for-all. Half of my neighbors had a bunch of roommates, and someone always seemed to be having a party or something, so I was lucky when I could park on the same side as my unit.

  Ah, well. The joys of apartment living. At least the utility bills stung a little less when we actually had the means to pay all of them. I did not miss the days of “we need to pay the electricity before it gets shut off, so let’s drop the gas this month and hope they don’t notice.”

  Rachel frowned at her computer. “Hey, Leo?”

  “Yeah, babe?” he called from the couch where he was putting together a puzzle with Ginny on the coffee table.

  “The portal isn’t letting me pay the rent.” She turned the frown toward him. “It worked for you last month, didn’t it?”

  “Yeah, it worked fine. It’s not kicking back the payment, is it?”

  “No, it’s…” Rachel jabbed a key, huffed, and shook her head. “It’s not even letting me get to the part where I set up the payment.”

  Leo said something to Ginny, then got up and came over to us. With a hand on the back of Rachel’s chair, he peered at the screen. “Huh. That’s weird. The office is still open, so I’ll go down and take care of it since Larry never answers his phone.”

  “Thanks.”

  He kissed her cheek, grabbed his keys and wallet, and headed out.

  “Ugh,” she muttered. “I am so sick of this piece-of-garbage portal system.”

  I laughed dryly. “Right? I mean, the building is flimsy. Why not the software too?”

  She made an irritated noise, and we continued working out the budget.

  It was so bizarre. With all the money Scott had paid me this summer, we were almost to the point we could get gas or groceries without checking the budget first. We might’ve been past that point, actually, and into the territory where one of us could pull twenty bucks out of an ATM, not mention it to the others, and not even make a dent in anything. We were all just so used to being down to our last few dollars and one ATM fee away from disaster that we kept budgeting as if nothing had changed. There was just a lot less swearing involved and a much bigger balance in the checking account when we were done. Weird.

  It was just as well we weren’t getting too relaxed about money. With Scott’s off season ending soon, there was no telling when I’d be pulling my weight again.

  On the other hand, we didn’t have to worry about car payments, and we had warranties out the ass in case anything befell one of our new cars. This was a degree of security I still couldn’t quite get my head around.

  Thank you, Scott.

  About twenty minutes after Leo had gone down to the office, he came back, and he looked a little dazed.

  “Did you get it fixed?” Rachel asked.

  “Uh.” Leo crossed the living room, pausing to glance at Ginny (probably out of habit—we all checked on her constantly) before he dropped into one of the chairs at the table. And wow, he really did seem dazed.

  Rachel eyed him. “You okay?”

  “Yeah. Yeah. Um.” Leo put his wallet and keys on the table and turned to me. “Did Scott tell you he was paying our rent?”

  “Paying—what?” I sputtered.

  “The rent’s paid.” Leo wiped a hand over his face. “For a year.”

  I stared at Leo, completely speechless.

  Rachel sounded like she’d choked. “A year? Are you—are you sure?”

  He nodded, unfolded a piece of paper, and pushed it across the table. My ex and I both craned our necks.

  It was a receipt. The next twelve months were listed in a column, and beside each one, it read in capital letters—PAID. At the bottom was a mostly redacted card number.

  And below that:

  Deacon, Scott M.

  “Holy…” I almost forgot that my daughter was in the room, but I caught myself. Lifting my gaze, I glanced back and forth between Rachel and her husband. They looked as stunned as I felt.

  Rachel sat back, eyes still fixed on the receipt.

  Leo pressed an elbow into the table and rubbed his neck. He seemed drained. Like he was about to collapse.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  His eyes flicked up. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m… I just can’t believe…” He blew out a breath and tapped his fingers on the edge of the receipt. “Did you know about this?”

  “No!” I shook my head. “I didn’t have a clue.”

  “That’s so much money,” Rachel breathed. “Wow. I mean, it’s probably nothing for a pro athlete, but still.”

  “Yeah, I doubt it’s very much for him, but…” I stared at the receipt. “That’s…”

  “I feel weird even accepting it. After the cars, especially.” Rachel turned to me. “I mean, please tell him thank you for us, but this is… It’s just so…” She exhaled. “It really is so much money.”

  I nodded slowly. “Yeah. I get it.”

  The three of us sat in overwhelmed silence for a long moment, as if we needed a minute to collect ourselves.

  Leo shifted in his chair. “I feel weird about it too. But at the same time, I mean…” He laughed, shaking his head. “We don’t have to worry about rent? For a year? Whoa.”

  I finally managed to laugh too. “Right? It’s crazy.” I looked at Rachel. “You might even be able to scale back your hours so you can finish school.”

  Lips parted, she blinked a couple of times. “I… Oh, wow. You’re right.” Face lighting up, she looked at Leo. “Do you think we can swing that?”

  “Are you kidding?” He reached across the table and squeezed her arm. “You only had like two terms left anyway, didn’t you? We can totally do that.”

  Rachel was suddenly giddy, all the stress from the last few years seeming to vanish from her features and off her shoulders. It was contagious, too—Leo and I were both smiling, and we all laughed with the sheer relief of legitimate financial security.