A Perfectly Imperfect Match (Matchmaking Mamas) by Marie Ferrarella Read Free Book Online Page A

more time and turned her key. Still nothing. She was also afraid that she was going to wind up flooding the engine.
    Frustrated, she sank back in her seat. “Not if I don’t mind spending the night in the parking lot,” she responded.
    Moving to the front of her vehicle, Jared looked down at her headlights and said, “Turn on your lights.”
    She had no idea how that was going to help anything, but at this point she was willing to try anything. Shrugging, she did as he instructed.
    “Now what?” she asked.
    There wasn’t so much as a glimmer in either headlight.
    The phrase “dead as a doornail” came to mind as he frowned at the vehicle.
    “Now nothing, I’m afraid,” he told her. “Looks like your battery’s dead.”
    Undaunted, she said hopefully, “Maybe we can jump it.” She slid out from behind the wheel. “I’ve got jumper cables in my trunk.”
    Jared looked at her in surprise. He thought of that as being rather responsible for someone her age. He doubted if his sister even knew what jumper cables were. Experience taught you things like that.
    “I take it this has happened before,” he assumed.
    She inclined her head and made a vague gesture he couldn’t begin to interpret. “Once or twice. Or five,” she muttered under her breath.
    He still heard it. “All right, I’ll go bring my car around and see what I can do.”
    * * *
    But apparently, at least on the outset, he could do nothing—although it certainly wasn’t for lack of trying.
    Jared aligned his vehicle so that the two cars were literally nose to nose in the lot. Elizabeth took it from there. He was amazed at how expertly, not to mention quickly, she managed to hook up her car’s battery to his.
    “Start yours first,” she urged as she got in behind the steering wheel in her car.
    When the other engine hummed to life, Elizabeth pressed down on the gas pedal and turned the key, mentally crossing her fingers. She might as well not have bothered.
    Her engine remained dormant.
    There wasn’t so much as a feeble whimper coming from that region. Every spark of life in the battery had been utterly siphoned off.
    Jared came around to her side of the two tethered vehicles and looked down at her battery. Usually, when a mechanic swapped out a battery, he would scratch out the month and year on the new one to indicate just when it had been pressed into service. He saw nothing but spots of corrosion on top of this battery.
    “How old is it?” he asked, tapping the top of the battery where the dates should have been.
    “Old” was all she said. Then, because he was apparently waiting for more, she added, “I’m not really sure.”
    Jared tried another approach, hoping to jog her memory. “Have you put a new battery in since you bought the car?”
    He saw a guilty look pass over her face in response to his question. A second later, she shook her head.
    That answered that, he thought.
    “Well,” he began with a slight, drawn-out drawl, “the good news is I think we’ve located your problem.”
    Since he’d enunciated it like that, she braced herself before asking, “And the bad?”
    “I’d say you definitely need a new battery, and most auto parts places are probably closed for the night by now.”
    Fruitlessly trying to bring the battery around had taken them a while, and it was now after six.
    Jared took out his smartphone and pressed a button to bring it back to life. The moment he did, his thumbs began to fly over the keyboard.
    “Are you texting someone?” Actually, what she wanted to ask was who was he texting at a time like this.
    It seemed to her a rather strange time to touch base with a friend. But then, on the other hand, why not? It was her car that had the problem, not his. He was perfectly free to do whatever he wanted, take off wherever he wanted.
    “Just finding out if The Auto Mall is still open,” he explained, referring to a popular auto parts chain. Still looking, he pulled up the chain’s nearest location.