In my periphery I see Haddie watching me to see my reaction to the comment on the TV. I don’t want to talk about it so I concentrate on the images on the screen. I’m able to make out the back of Becks’s head, Smitty’s face tight with concentration as he adjusts something on the wing, and then I find Colton in the back, shooting the shit with another racer. The sight of him calms me instantly and has me reaching for my cell in anticipation of his promised pre-race phone call. His voice is exactly what I need to hear right now.

“Fuck them,” Haddie says, holding her middle fingers up to the television, making me laugh. I can tell that was her intention with the comment when I look her way.

“You could have gone, you know. I would have been fine by myself,” I say, knowing full well I’d rather have her here with me to help calm my nerves since I can’t be at the race.

“What? And leave your pregnant ass behind? Nope. Not gonna happen.” She smiles as she lifts her wine glass to her lips. “Besides, someone had to stay here and guard the wine cabinet.”

“Guard it or deplete it?” I ask with a raise of my eyebrows that gets a laugh from her followed by a guilty shrug.

“What good is it if it’s not consumed?”

“True,” I muse, shifting on the couch when a sharp pain hits my lower back. As much as I try to hide the wince, it doesn’t go unnoticed by Haddie. I grit my teeth and ride it out as my stomach rolls again and fight the wave of nausea that temporarily holds my body hostage.

“You okay?” Haddie asks. She shifts to get up and move over to me, but I stop her with a wave of my hand as I take a deep breath and plaster a fraudulent smile on my lips.

“Yeah. The baby’s not too thrilled about something I ate, I think,” I lie, talking myself into it when I know it’s most likely the stress over everything: the tape, Zander, the race. Too many things at once.

“Uh-huh,” she says in that way that tells me she’s not buying my story. “It doesn’t have anything to do with the phone call about Zander or the—”

The ring of my cell cuts her off and I scramble to answer it, fumbling my phone even though it’s in my hand. I just really need to hear Colton’s voice to quiet everything in my head.

“Colton?” I sound desperate but I don’t care.

“Hey sweetheart. I’m just about to get strapped in but I wanted to call real quick and tell you I love you,” he says, voice gruff, the sound of chaos all around him in the background.

“I love you too,” I murmur into the phone followed by an audible sigh.

“You okay?” he asks. It sounds as though he is searching to understand the caution in my response.

The tears sting the backs of my eyes as I nod my head before I realize he can’t see me. I swallow over the lump in my throat. “Yes. It’s race day. You know how nervous I get.” And technically I’m not lying to him. I do get nervous, but it’s the other things about Zander I desperately need to share that I can’t before he gets on the track.

Things I can't have mulling around in his head when he's supposed to be concentrating on the race.

“I’m going to be fine, Ry. In fact, I’m going to win and then rush home to get my victory kiss from you and claim my checkered flag.”

My mind flashes to my cache of checkered-flag panties—my unofficial yet Colton-approved race day uniform. The underwear I have worn every race day since that first one in St. Petersburg so very long ago.

Just like the ones I’m wearing right now.

“Smooth one, Ace.” I laugh, feeling a tad better even though his words do nothing to abate my unease when I see him on television going two hundred plus miles an hour, wedged between a concrete barrier and another mass of metal.

“You like that?” He chuckles. “You wearing them?”

“You better win and rush home so you can find out for yourself.”

“Hot damn.”

“Be safe,” I reiterate as I hear Becks call his name in the background.

“Always.” I know that cocky grin is on his face, and his certainty allows me to breathe a little easier.

“Okay.”

“Hey Ryles?” he says just as I’m about to pull the phone away from my ear.

“Yeah?”

“I race you.” And I can hear his laugh as he hangs up the phone, but the feeling those words evoke stay long after the line goes dead. I sit there with my phone clutched to my chest and send a little prayer into the universe to let him come back whole and safe to me.

“You okay?” Haddie asks softly.

“I’ll tell him about Zander when he gets home,” I say as if I need to justify my actions.

“Radio check, One. Two. Three.” The radio comes to life as Colton’s spotter calls out and immediately distracts us from our conversation.

“Radio check, A, B, C,” Colton says, and for the first time in what feels like hours, a smile lights up my face.

But the low ache deep in my belly stays constant. The ball of tension sitting in my chest only increases as the familiar call is made on the television, “Gentlemen, start your engines.”


FUCK, IT’S HOT.