Wrenches, Regrets, & Reality Checks: Wrench Wars, #3

By L. A. Witt

When Reggie's garage became part of a popular reality show, business went through the roof. And he supposes having his shop in the black is a fair trade for jumping through the network's hoops.

 

As the show's lowest-ranking producer, Wes is tasked with proposing a new spin-off show to Reggie. The sexy mechanic makes him sweat on a normal day, but this time, Wes is holding cards he can't show. With execs breathing down his neck, he's expected to pitch a show Reggie will never agree to do, even if his rejection puts his existing show on the line.

 

The network is counting on Reggie refusing to sign. But they're not counting on their messenger falling for the man they're trying to fire.

 

This  19,000 word story was previously published.

• Language: English
• Publisher: GallagherWitt
• Release date: Nov 27, 2022
• ISBN: 9781642300659

L. A. Witt

L.A. Witt is the author of Back Piece. She is a M/M romance writer who has finally been released from the purgatorial corn maze of Omaha, Nebraska, and now spends her time on the southwestern coast of Spain. In between wondering how she didn’t lose her mind in Omaha, she explores the country with her husband, several clairvoyant hamsters, and an ever-growing herd of rabid plot bunnies.

Book preview

Chapter 1

How the guys in this garage functioned with the swarm of cameras and crew hovering around, Wes would never know. Then again, after four and a half seasons of Wrench Wars, he supposed they were used to it.

Wes didn’t like being in front of a camera—thank God he was just a producer—so he hung back and watched from the sidelines. Fortunately for him, there was a section of the shop that was off-limits to the cameras. It was separated from that portion of the garage by a wall, and the windows had long since been tinted to prevent the cameras from catching anything on this side. Wes watched through the darkened glass, waiting for Reggie, the shop’s owner, to take a break.

You’re gonna be waiting a while. Kasey, one of the mechanics who never went over to the other side—to the red zone, as they call called it—stopped beside Wes and gestured at the window with a wrench. They’ve got a good six, eight hours of work left on that thing.

Wes glanced at his watch, then at Kasey. It’s almost five o’clock.

Yeah. Kasey nodded toward the window. And they’ve got a good six or eight hours of work left on that thing. He chuckled. You might want to come by tomorrow.

Wes pursed his lips. They still take breaks, though, don’t they?

Kasey responded with a snort of derision and shook his head. Without a word, he walked away.

Wes faced the window again. He didn’t have to ask about Kasey’s reaction. The shop’s collective contempt toward the network, especially the producers, was well-known. And given the tight deadlines the men worked under in order to maintain the realistic tension and suspense on the show, he shouldn’t have been surprised that state-mandated breaks weren’t exactly enforced.

Thanks to the tinted glass and the task he was currently focused on, Reggie couldn’t know that Wes was watching him. Even if he felt like he was being watched, he’d probably blame it on the camera that was just inches away from his head.

Wes, however, was acutely aware of Reggie’s presence. In spite of the glass and the wall, he felt him as if the man were standing right there in his face instead of arguing with Ray or whatever his name was about something relating to a muscle car’s undercarriage. His presence hummed on the ends of Wes’s nerves just like it always did. They’d only met a handful of times—when the network had pitched the show, during a few visits to assure the network things were going swimmingly, a couple of meetings via Skype—and Wes was still as off balance as he’d been the first time, when the tattooed, stubbled mechanic had caught him completely off guard.

He’d expected a grizzled old dude like the ones who ran the other shops that had auditioned for the show, but Reggie had been the polar opposite. He wasn’t more than a year or two older than Wes himself but had that weathered edge of a man who’d spent his life doing manual labor. That edge that fucked with Wes’s ability to form a coherent thought.

He wasn’t stupid, either. Not that those who went to work without neckties were stupid, but Wes had to admit his outlook on the blue-collar sector had needed an adjustment or three after stepping into this world. Particularly after meeting Reggie. The mechanics at the other shop were intelligent, but Reggie had a way about him that kept Wes from thinking straight. Like he looked right into him and knew every last thing about him without Wes so much as opening his mouth and revealing a detail.

Wes wasn’t the only one who’d had to change the way he looked at the men in this shop. The network had been convinced Reggie and his boys would be ignorant and trusting, the kind of people who were easy to manipulate into letting the producers pull strings and run the show to their specifications in the name of ratings. They should’ve learned after it blew up in their faces during the first season that these guys wouldn’t put up with blackmail, manipulation, or coercion.

Reggie was no man’s puppet. Neither were his boys.

But the network knew that now, which was why Wes was here. No one else wanted to broach the subject of the spin-off with Reggie because they all knew damn well what the answer would be. Sending in the one man who really struggled to push Reggie was pretty much a guarantee of this playing out the way the higher-ups hoped it would.

Wes was used to being a pawn in the network’s games. This time, they were asking too much. Way too much.

But with his job and future employability on the line, he had no choice except to do as he was told and move on the chessboard.

Gaze still fixed on Reggie, Wes swallowed. This wasn’t going to be an easy conversation. Between the show and the attraction….

He shook his head and looked away. He faced down some of the toughest execs at the network without even blinking, but a conversation with this guy made him break out in a sweat even when he wasn’t pitching a bullshit catch-22 deal.

It didn’t help that the man was gorgeous. Exactly Wes’s type, too. Which was why Wes religiously watched Wrench Wars himself, and he never watched any of the network’s other shows.

His addiction had nothing to do with the cars. The shop’s creations were impressive—these boys were brilliant with both mechanical and body work—but it was the tattooed mechanic who kept Wes glued to the TV every Wednesday night at eight, no matter how insane his busy schedule was.

Reggie was slim but solid, soft-spoken but always