The garage was back to business as usual.

The Pagani job was in the past, but the payday from it had given Dax the breathing room to refocus the shop on their usual clientele. For the last three months, the crew had been busy with a mix of high-end rebuilds, deep-tune street cars, and some custom jobs. The hype from the Laguna Seca event had even brought in a few new customers looking for performance upgrades.

But something had shifted.

· Jinx was still Jinx, flirting with girls at meets, talking too much, and somehow never losing an argument against Rev;

· Rev was back to his usual work, focused on tuning, but always keeping tabs on who was racing who in the underground scene;

· Carmen was still their go-to for bodywork, working on side projects between helping the crew;

· Dax had finally started modifying the 930 Turbo, though he was still debating on whether to go full track build or keep it street-friendly;

· Erin was dividing her time between customer work and slowly bringing the Silvia to its final form.

Through all of it, there was an undercurrent of tension in the shop, because Ghost wasn't gone. He had been popping up unexpectedly every few weeks, never staying long, never giving a clear answer about why he was still in LA. And Dax wasn't letting it go. So, when Ghost rolled up unannounced again, late one evening, just as the crew was closing up, Erin could already feel the storm brewing. Dax was done playing along.

The garage had finally gone quiet for the night. Jinx and Rev had locked up and headed out, Carmen had left earlier, and it was just Erin and Dax finishing up inside.

Dax was leaning over the workbench, flipping through paperwork, looking like he was pretending to be more interested in invoices than he actually was.

Erin, meanwhile, was half-distracted, wiping down her hands at the small garage sink, watching him out of the corner of her eye. She knew he was holding something in. And she knew exactly what it was.

The problem was, he wasn't talking about it.

Ghost had been around too much lately. Not constantly, but just enough to make his presence unavoidable. And every time he showed up, Erin could feel the way Dax stiffened, watched, measured everything yet he never said a damn thing. Not once, which was worse than him snapping.

She tossed the blue roll into the trashcan and leaned against the bench next to him. "Alright, Carter. Spill."

Dax didn't look up. "Spill what?"

She huffed. "Don't play dumb. You're too good at it."

Now, he looked up, smirking slightly. "You saying I should act smarter?"

She crossed her arms. "I'm saying you should stop pretending you don't care when we both know you do."

Dax exhaled slowly, rubbing the back of his neck before finally tossing the papers down. "It's not that I don't care, Ace. It's that I don't see the point in interfering."

That made her pause. "So you're just gonna let this whole thing play out?"

"Yep."

She frowned. "Even if you don't trust him?"

Dax shrugged. "I don't. But I also don't have to."

"What does that even mean?"

He sighed, resting his hands on the bench, finally really looking at her. "It means you're gonna do whatever you wanna do, Ace. Whether I tell you to stay away from him or not. And I'm not about to start acting like I'm in control of your choices."

That... was not the answer she was expecting. She had braced for a fight, or at least some sort of lecture.

Dax not stopping her meant he was waiting for her to realize something herself. It meant he thought she was making a mistake, but he wasn't going to stop her from making it.

She swallowed. "So that's it? You're just gonna sit back and watch?"

Dax's smirk was gone now. His voice was calm. Even. "That's exactly what I'm gonna do."

She held his gaze, searching for something more. Some sign that he wasn't just letting this go. But there was nothing. No outburst. No warning. Just Dax waiting. Letting her figure it out the hard way. And for the first time since Ghost had shown back up in her life, Erin felt a flicker of something she hadn't expected.

Doubt.

Because if Dax was waiting for something to go wrong... Maybe she should be, too.