After a few more lefts, Tucker pulled the car up in a parking lot, letting the engine idle. “Okay. Your turn.” He unbuckled, grabbed his hat and her coat, and said “Scoot over” as he opened his car door and exited. Cold air invaded the warm bubble for the beat or two it took for him to shut the door.

Della watched him absently, utterly distracted by the way he moved, the breadth of his frame, the confident, easy strides he took as he rounded the vehicle to her side. She was staring at him through her window as he pulled up outside her door. He quirked an eyebrow. “Changed your mind?”

His voice was muffled, but she heard him well enough. She shook her head absently, distracted by the way the window framed his shoulders.

“I’m freezing my ass off out here.”

His warm breath misted into the air, galvanizing Della into action. “Shit, sorry.” She fumbled with her seatbelt, finally releasing it and sliding across—just like she’d fantasized about—until she was sitting behind the wheel of the idling truck.

Tucker opened the door. “Seatbelt,” he said as he climbed in. Della reached for it as Tucker shut the door. “I’m going to sit in the middle for a bit.”

He announced it with a degree of trepidation in his voice, like he was about to cross the Rio Grande, not three feet of bench seat. Della swallowed. “Okay…sure.”

“Just until you get a hang of the gear changes. You should take some lessons in Denver with a stick shift, but the foot/hand coordination is the same with a column shift, and that’s always the tricky bit when you’re first learning to drive.”

“Okay.” Her voice sounded weird, and it took Della two attempts to get the seatbelt clicked into place as Tucker slid across.

All the way. Until he was sitting right beside her.

Sure, there were a good couple of inches between them—he wasn’t touching her at all—but heat from his body blasted like a furnace, and her pulse skyrocketed regardless.

“Right. You ready for this?”

Della nodded. “Bring it.”

She listened carefully as he talked her through the gear positions, getting her to engage the clutch as he demonstrated them, then getting her to cycle through the gears over and over—from one to two to three to four and then reverse—until he was satisfied she knew them by heart.

Next he explained the combo of clutch/accelerator action to move the car forward. He got her to repeat it back to him a couple of times until he was confident she had the theory right.

“Okay.” He blew out a breath and rubbed his hands together. “Want to try?”