Exactly the laugh Jake remembered from the first weekend.
They drove outside the city.
No security.
No assistants.
No schedule.
Just road.
Eventually Claire pulled into an overlook above the valley.
Sun lowering.
Engine idling.
She shut it off.
Silence.
Jake leaned against the seat.
Claire looked toward him.
“You trust me with your grandfather's car.”
“Don't make it weird.”
“It's already weird.”
Jake smiled.
Claire became serious.
“I've been thinking.”
“Dangerous.”
“Jake.”
“What?”
“Move in with me.”
He stared.
Claire immediately added:
“Not because your apartment is small.”
“It is.”
“Not because I can give Lily anything.”
“You can.”
“I’m asking because I hate leaving.”
Jake looked toward the windshield.
Claire waited.
He did not answer quickly.
That was one thing she had learned about him.
Silence meant thinking.
Not rejection.
Finally:
“Your house is twenty-seven minutes farther from Lily’s school.”
Claire blinked.
“That is your first concern?”
“Yes.”
“I can arrange—”
“No drivers.”
“Of course.”
“Garage commute?”
“Twenty minutes.”
“Traffic?”
“Thirty-five.”
Claire smiled slowly.
“You're calculating.”
“I fix systems.”
She laughed.
Jake looked toward her.
“Maybe.”
Claire’s face softened.
“Maybe?”
“Same answer you gave me on the fellowship.”
“You're cruel.”
“Yes.”
Three months later, Jake and Lily moved.
Not into Claire’s mansion.
Claire sold it.
That shocked everyone.
She had never liked it.
Too large.
Too much glass.
They bought a house halfway between the garage and Weston Global headquarters.
Three-car garage.
Jake negotiated that part.
Lily got a workshop corner.
Claire got an office.
Jake got angry when journalists described him as “the mechanic who married up.”
They were not married.
Yet.
Claire thought it was hilarious.
“Technically they don't know how much your Mustang is worth.”
“Not helping.”
Public interest eventually faded.
Another billionaire scandal replaced them.
Life became strangely ordinary.
Morning coffee.
School.
Traffic.
Meetings.
Oil changes.
Arguments over dishes.
Claire occasionally took calls with heads of state while Jake searched the kitchen for missing sockets.
Lily told both to stop being embarrassing.
Two years after the Mercedes arrived, Claire entered the garage on a Friday afternoon.
Jake was underneath a truck.
Same as before.
Her shoes appeared beside the creeper.
Jake rolled out.
“Car broken?”
“No.”
“Company broken?”
“Always.”
“Then?”
Claire held two coffees.
“And conversation.”
Jake smiled.
She sat on the old bench.
Same bench.
Paint more worn now.