Grant (Thoroughly Educated #2) Read online

  Lara Norman

  Grant

  Thoroughly Educated, Book Two

  First published by LPN Publishing 2019

  Copyright © 2019 by Lara Norman

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  First edition

  This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy

  Find out more at reedsy.com

  To Denise, Kim, Melissa, and Nan, without whom I would be lost.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Thanks for reading!

  About the Author

  Also by Lara Norman

  Chapter 1

  Grant threw the wrench he was using across the floor of the shop. He was having a hard time coming to terms with the ‘boyfriend’ his sister had brought home for him to meet. The man was older than Grant himself, eleven years older than Reagan, and had been her professor all last year. Grant and Reagan had a rule about doing what made them happy as long as it didn’t hurt anybody, and as far as Grant could tell, she’d followed that rule.

  It didn’t mean he had to like it.

  He could still picture it, the way she knocked on his door a half hour earlier than he’d expected her.

  “Grant.”

  She said it in that way she had that made him feel like the only person in the world. They’d relied on each other for so many years that he was feeling depressed over her moving on with her life. Despite being happy for her, he was lonely with her at college.

  “You’re early. Why didn’t you tell me you were here so I could get your bags?” He pulled her in for a hug and ushered her inside the apartment.

  “Because I have to tell you something.” She heaved a sigh, and Grant frowned.

  “What is it?”

  Reagan sat on the couch and he plopped down next to her. “I brought someone home, and they’re going to stay in the hotel down the street. I promise I’ll stay here with you since I’ve only got three days.”

  “It can’t be Luna. You said she went home for the summer.” Her first friends at college, Luna and Davis, had vowed to work something out so that Reagan could stay in Maryland and work over the summer. Grant frowned.

  “No, it’s my boyfriend.”

  He felt it, the protective side of him wanting to explode, but he kept it in check. “I didn’t know you had a boyfriend.”

  “I moved in with him last weekend so that I wouldn’t have to live with Davis.”

  He rubbed one hand over his temple and breathed deeply. “Okay.”

  “There’s more.”

  His head snapped up and his eyes widened. “What is it?”

  “He’s older than me. And . . . and he used to be my professor.”

  Grant threw another wrench and listened to it skitter across the concrete floor. He’d wanted to throw a fit when Reagan told him her news, but he had managed to keep it locked down.

  “Does he make you happy, Ray?” he’d asked.

  “More than anything,” she’d replied.

  “And you’re going to bring him over to meet me, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  He was silent for a few minutes as he tried to process the fact that his baby girl had grown up. “Okay.”

  Grant himself had just turned twenty-five, so it was a shock to have Reagan come to the door with someone clearly older than him.

  “Grant, this is Hudson. Hudson, this is my brother, Grant.”

  “Hi, Grant, I’ve heard so much about you.” The man was about Grant’s height, with red hair and a full beard. He was standing next to Reagan, thankfully not touching her. He held his hand out, but Grant stood there in the doorway, too frozen to move.

  “Grant,” Reagan prodded. He moved backward, allowing them to come inside.

  “Your apartment is great,” Hudson said politely.

  Reagan smiled up at him like he’d quoted Shakespeare, but Grant could only stare at him. He was trying to work out what to say, but his brain refused to catch up. His baby sister was dating someone older than he was. Living with him, for fuck’s sake.

  “Um, we can sit on the couch, right, Grant?”

  Grant blinked at Reagan and nodded. Is this what a stroke feels like?

  They sat on the couch, Grant on one end and Hudson on the other. Reagan sat between them and both men tried not to claim her as their territory. It was several minutes of uncomfortable silence as nobody knew what to say.

  “Anybody hungry? We could go grab dinner,” Reagan suggested.

  Grant cleared his throat. “Sure.”

  Reagan sighed in relief that he’d finally spoken. “Bernie’s?”

  “Sounds great.”

  The three of them stood, and it got awkward again. Grant wasn’t going to be chauffeured by his sister’s boyfriend, but he’d recently traded his four-door truck for a Harley.

  “I’ll drive,” Reagan spoke up.

  The tension was ridiculous. Grant had to lock up, so he let the two of them go ahead of him. When Hudson put his hand on Reagan’s back as she headed down the stairs, Grant growled. Hudson apparently heard him because he dropped his hand and stayed a few paces behind her.

  The drive was silent, and they were all grateful it was short. Grant went to one of the few four-top tables in the restaurant and staked his claim on one side. He knew his sister would sit opposite him, and he’d be forced to watch Hudson sit next to her.

  He was right. At least the old man kept his hands to himself.

  “We have to order at the counter once you know what you want,” Reagan said to Hudson. He looked over the laminated menu and then stood up. Reagan went with him since she knew what Grant liked. It was only a minute later that Hudson was back at the table without her.

  “You’re a mechanic?” he said as he sat down.

  “You’re her professor?” Grant bit out.

  “Uh, was. We couldn’t date while she was in my class.”

  “I bet.”

  Grant glared at Hudson until the other man looked down at the chipped Formica table. Reagan returned with their sandwiches and set them on the table.

  “Okay, I know this is weird, but can we relax a little?” Reagan finally said, completely exasperated with both men.

  “Sure thing, Ray.”

  Reagan frowned at Grant’s sarcastic response. “I’m serious.”

  He very slowly set his sandwich down in the red basket it came in and leaned toward his sister. “I’m doing the best I can, but, fuck me running, baby girl, he’s older than both of us and he was in a position of authority over you. What do you want from me, a parade in his honor?”

  “No, of course not, but
some civility wouldn’t be too much to ask!”

  Reagan sat back against the plastic booth and glared at Grant. Hudson looked like he would rather be anywhere but there.

  Grant looked like someone had pissed in his cornflakes. “This is as civil as I can get right this minute, but keep pushing and you’ll hear exactly what I think!”

  In the shop several days later, Grant sat back on his heels as he tried not to think about that first meeting. He’d spent the next three days with Reagan, trying his damnedest to be nice and not asking what the fuck she’d been thinking. He truly wanted her to be happy, so he struggled to let her be and not judge her decision. It wasn’t easy. Hudson appeared to be polite and even well brought up, but Grant couldn’t get past the fact that he’d been her professor.

  He heard the sound of an engine and looked out of the bay to the driveway of the shop. There was a fairly new car idling there, and a long leg ending in a stiletto emerged first, followed by its companion. They were nice legs, Grant had to admit. When he followed the legs up, he was met with a short skirt and a blouse that fit nicely over a good-sized rack. Long brown hair was curled over the woman’s shoulders and halfway down her back. She had on huge sunglasses that covered too much of her face for him to decide how hot she was. But her body was one to fantasize over.

  She stopped just outside the doors and Grant stood to greet her. “What can I help you with?”

  “I need an oil change, please.”

  “Sure thing.” He snagged the clipboard off the nail on the wall and handed it to her. “Just pick your poison.”

  She looked down at the form in front of her. “I haven’t got a clue. Whatever you think is best.”

  “Got it. You can go inside there, and pay at the counter.” He lifted his chin in the direction of the office.

  She turned around and he couldn’t help watching her ass as she walked off. She knew how to move in those heels, that was for sure. Grant went about getting the paper mat for the floorboard and slid in the seat of her running car. He’d been working there for years and could probably perform an oil change with his eyes closed.

  He tried to focus on his job, but he kept looking through the windows at the woman in the office. She’d taken off her sunglasses, but he couldn’t tell the color of her eyes from that distance. He was intrigued by her, he couldn’t deny it, he just didn’t know why. She was dressed well, expensive looking shoes and a tight skirt that looked like it cost some money. His first hunch was that she was a rich snob, but he wasn’t sure what gave him that impression. When he was finished about fifteen minutes later, he walked into the waiting area to let her know.

  “Your car is ready, Miss.”

  “Thanks.” She dropped her sunglasses back over her face before walking through the bay to get in her car. Grant liked her vivid red lips and what he thought were dark brown eyes before she disappeared.

  He put her out of his mind the same way he would any customer. It wasn’t hard, considering how busy they were. After hours was a different story. He went home and showered, then stood in front of the fridge and tried to decide what to do about dinner. He didn’t cook for himself when Reagan wasn’t around, but there were some leftovers. He stuck the container in the microwave and his mind’s eye brought up a picture of the brunette from earlier in the day. She was hot, he couldn’t deny that. Her hair was the feature that he kept going back to; okay, and that ass. It was showcased perfectly in that tight red skirt. There was just something about her that rubbed him the wrong way, and he couldn’t put his finger on it.

  Grant sat on the couch in the living room to eat as he flipped on the TV and tried not to notice how pathetic he was. He worked, he went home, he slept. Got up and did it all again the next day. He was boring. His life was boring. Fuck, even his little sister had a love life, and there he was on a Friday night eating leftover takeout on the couch. He’d never been into one night stands, and it was a line he wasn’t interested in crossing just because he was alone, now. Of course, he wasn’t going to meet anyone if he stayed in all the time, either.

  Grant worked on Saturday, but he had Sunday off. He cleaned the apartment, called Reagan, balanced his budget, and snorted at how middle-aged he acted. He watched a little pre-season football and called it a night. He had to be up early Monday morning for work. The one thing that never quite meshed with a potential girlfriend was his schedule. Being at work at seven, eating at five, going to bed at nine. None of it was enticing to a woman. None that he’d met, at any rate.

  Work on Monday was the same old, same old. He was starting to worry that he was turning into an octogenarian at the ripe age of twenty-five. His friend Brent constantly called him an old man, and Grant saw it more with every passing day.

  Tuesday brought the brunette back to the shop, and that was interesting. She parked the car in a spot and walked into the bay, despite the signs clearly stating to head into the office instead.

  “Excuse me.”

  Grant looked up from the engine he was tooling around with and raised his eyebrows at her. She was wearing skintight jeans and an off the shoulder black shirt that left little to the imagination. She had a healthy amount of cleavage on display.

  “Can I help you?”

  “Something’s knocking around under the hood.” She looked down at his steel-toed boots and then traveled up his body with her heated gaze.

  He almost blushed. “Drop the keys with Josh behind the desk in there.” He nodded in the direction of the office. “I’ll get to it when I’m done here.”

  She stood for another minute, staring at him before she walked off.

  Grant had never flushed a transmission as quickly before.

  He felt her watching him as he stepped into the office to retrieve the paperwork and the keys. He went out to her car and brought it into the bay, leaving it running so he could listen for any unusual sounds. He didn’t hear anything, so he turned it off. He checked the filters to ensure he’d secured them properly, both oil and air, and then went over a standard inspection of the engine.

  He stepped back into the office forty-five minutes later. He glanced at the paperwork for her name. “Miss Banks.”

  She dropped a magazine on the empty seat beside her, picked up a large black purse and walked over. “Yes.”

  “I couldn’t find anything. There’s no charge for the work.”

  He held out the keys, but she didn’t move. “What do you mean?”

  He frowned. “About which?”

  She propped a hand on her hip, and he caught sight of red fingernails. Figured; he’d pegged her correctly. He expected the haughty tirade to come. “I distinctly hear a knocking sound when the engine is running.”

  Grant scratched the back of his neck and shot a glare at Josh, who was trying not to snicker. “Look, I had it running for damn near forty-five minutes. I checked over the work I did the other day as well as giving you a standard engine check. There’s nothing wrong with the car.”

  Miss Banks dropped her sunglasses from the top of her head to her face and snatched the keys from Grant’s hand. He didn’t even feel bad about watching her ass as she retreated.

  Josh laughed once she was out of the office and the door closed behind her. “Gotta love it.”

  Grant glared at him again and stalked back to the bay. There was nothing he could do about her. He didn’t expect to see her again since she was clearly dissatisfied with his service.

  He was stuck opening alone on Wednesday, which would usually suck. Instead, it was raining and he had no customers. He sat in the office with his chair aligned so he could see the parking lot and listened with half an ear to the early morning news playing on the small television in the corner. He was flipping through a Car and Driver magazine when he heard an engine idling. He looked up, shocked to find Miss Banks had pulled her car into the bay without permission and was climbing out of the car.

  He stood abruptly, and the chair spun behind him as he pushed his way out the door. Rain was coming
down in heavy sheets, pelting the roof and the pavement beyond the one open bay door. He’d left the rest closed that morning. It was only seven thirty, and he couldn’t believe she’d returned.

  “You really can’t just come in here like that. There are safety regulations.” He glanced down at her spiked heels. “And they sure as hell don’t include footwear like that.”

  Her eyes were on fire as she slammed the driver’s door. He was right about one thing; her hair was fantastic as it curled and swayed around her shoulders. “Look, mister, I tried to be nice yesterday, but I’m serious. There’s something wrong and I need you to fix it.”

  She walked over to where Grant stood just outside the office. “Look, Miss—”

  “It’s Alexandra.”

  He put his palms up. “Excuse me, Alexandra. I already told you, there’s nothing wrong with your car.”