by Gun Brooke
Table of Contents
Synopsis
By the Author
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Epilogue
About the Author
Books Available From Bold Strokes Books
Synopsis
A year ago, NASCAR star Evangeline Marshall barely escaped death in a tragic crash. Evie is plagued by nightmares and fears racing again, but she doesn’t want to give up her dream. Blythe Pierce, renowned photographer, struggles with her own demons, having worked in one warzone after another.
Blythe witnessed Evie Marshall’s crash through her camera and is impressed by Evie’s courage. She persuades Evie to allow her to document her recovery and return to racing. Blythe finds Evie irresistibly attractive and fears she can’t hide it. Evie in turn is mesmerized by the loving but enigmatic Blythe.
But as Blythe’s past catches up with her and Evie’s fears grow as her first race nears, can they find the strength to triumph over their pasts and find love together?
Speed Demons
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Speed Demons
© 2012 By Gun Brooke. All Rights Reserved.
ISBN 13: 978-1-60282-719-6
This Electronic Book is published by
Bold Strokes Books, Inc.
P.O. Box 249
Valley Falls, New York 12185
First Edition: August 2012
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book, or parts thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission.
Credits
Editor: Shelley Thrasher
Production Design: Stacia Seaman
Cover Design By Sheri ([email protected])
Cover Art By Gun Brooke
By the Author
Course of Action
Coffee Sonata
Sheridan’s Fate
September Canvas
Fierce Overture
Speed Demons
The Supreme Constellations Series:
Protector of the Realm
Rebel’s Quest
Warrior’s Valor
Pirate’s Fortune
Acknowledgments
This novel was the hardest one to write, to date. The topics hit close to home, my mother passed away, and I was a bit unfortunate myself, healthwise. You can imagine that I harbor even more gratitude toward the people who helped make this story better.
My first readers—Sam (South Africa), Maggie (Sweden), Georgi (Scotland), and Jan (Australia)—you helped me not make a fool of myself before I sent my manuscript in. Your thoughts, pointers, and—a few times—complete puzzlement made me go back into the story and bring the characters out better. Thank you! You are true pearls.
Radclyffe, aka Len Barot, thank you for reassuring me that you keep having faith in me. I adore our BSB family, and with Rad as our captain, we sail toward even better times.
Dr. Shelley Thrasher, my editor, my guide, and my very good friend. I owe you so many thanks, and it’s amazing to think we’ve worked on ten (ten!!!) novels together, and some short stories too. I can’t imagine going through the process without you. You know me and my style—and my weaknesses as a writer—so well, our work is fast and seamless.
Sheri—we work well together when it comes to the covers, don’t we? I love working with you and hope to do it a lot in the future.
Lori, Cindy, Sandy, Toni, and the rest of the people at BSB who help create the final product, thank you for all the hours you put in. There would be no books published without you.
There is a special group of women (mostly) online, who, like me, are obsessed with The Devil Wears Prada fan fiction. You all know who you are. Thank you for the spirit-lifting distractions!
Lastly, my family in Sweden, my extended family in Rhode Island, and my book circle friends, I’m glad that you support me and believe in me. It would sure be an uphill battle if you didn’t. I’m especially grateful to Elon, who this year (our thirty-first) has had to deal with everything I couldn’t. I also want to mention my children, Malin and Henrik, who bring joy to my life by their mere existence.
For Elina—my granddaughter who came into this world as I was working on this novel. Welcome, our beloved little girl.
For Lilian, my mother, who passed away as I was in the editing phase. I miss you endlessly and you never failed to state how proud of me you were. I love you and I hope to one day be as strong and resilient as you.
Prologue
The sound of roaring engines drowned out everything else. Blythe Pierce had her left eye pressed to the viewfinder of her Hasselblad, not about to miss any spectacular images of Evangeline Marshall entering the Daytona International Speedway pit. Her crew was prepared to change her tires, and Blythe was ready to capture the image of Evangeline through the net covering the opening in the side of the car. She hoped she could manipulate the photo digitally to make out Evangeline’s features through the helmet visor.
“Five seconds,” Ben Mason, the team leader, yelled over the communication system. “Go!”
The red Dodge Viper rushed toward them and stopped perfectly within the markings.
“Damn it, Benny. The engine’s still getting too hot.” Evangeline’s growl was unmistakable through the headset. “Tear the fucking plate off.”
Mason didn’t hesitate. “Pete, do as she says. We’ve got to cool it down, or it won’t last through the last few laps.”
A seventh pit crewmember jumped the wall and tugged at some plating in the front.
Blythe moved lithely among Evangeline’s team, careful not to be in the way or to trip over the crew’s equipment. She kept snapping pictures, shooting through the net over the window and always focusing on the woman in the car.
The crewmember in charge of the jack let the car down and Evangeline took off. Soon she was speeding around the track, making faster laps than before. Blythe climbed the makeshift platform she had built to stand on because she was so short. She followed the Viper through her lens until it was out of sight, then patiently waited for it to reappear.
Suddenly the voice over the speakers grew excited. The audience’s roar nearly drowned out his words. “Paul Gardner is in trouble and now also Leo Schwartz, in the blue Honda…”
A loud noise cut the speaker off. Instead Blythe heard Evangeline’s voice over the headset.
“There’s smoke up ahead and I can’t see shit. What’s going on, Benny?”
“Several cars crashed at the next corner. Go low. Go low.”
�
�I can hardly hear you.” The headset crackled, breaking up Evangeline’s words.
“Go low, Evie!”
Blythe kept looking through the viewfinder, her hands steady. Smoke billowed around the corner before the pit, and if Evangeline went low like Benny said, she would clear the pileup.
“Damn it, Evie, two more cars are involved, don’t go through.” Benny tore at his headset and began to run. “She’s not going to make it!”
Staring through the viewfinder, pressing the shutter release over and over, Blythe thought her heart would stop dead in her chest.
The red Dodge Viper, Evangeline’s beloved car, shot through the smoke, and she went low exactly as her team manager advised. Two other cars had just turned over and slid down the eighteen-degree bank. Evangeline’s car T-boned the second car, spun around in a mad dance, and slammed sideways into the first. From behind, a black Chevy repeated the maneuver with Evangeline’s Viper.
Mechanically, Blythe kept pressing the shutter release and clinging to her camera with ice-cold hands, even as the first flames erupted.
Chapter One
Blythe pulled into a space by the park on Main Street in the center of Branford, a small town east of New Haven. She was way too early, as usual, and remained in her seat, watching people stroll by. The warm Indian-summer evening clearly had coaxed the Branford population outdoors to enjoy the nice weather. Checking her watch again, Blythe grimaced, then flipped down the small mirror behind the sun visor. Her blond hair lay in curls around her triangular face, and her freckles had multiplied during her latest assignment in Afghanistan.
She deliberately steered away from those memories. Even editing her latest photo book was almost too painful, and she’d rather not dwell on the upsetting images from Afghanistan just before she met Evangeline Marshall again. It had been more than eighteen months since she’d photographed Evangeline’s crash. Two rookie drivers had died that day, and Evangeline and two other drivers were seriously injured. In fact, nobody had thought any of them would make it, let alone race again, but here Evangeline was, about to prove everyone wrong.
Blythe had never used any of the pictures she’d shot that day at the Daytona International Speedway. She had printed them, only to tuck them into her safe together with two backup disks. Countless magazines and news networks, not to mention the tabloids, had offered her a lot of money. Blythe couldn’t care less about any monetary temptations; she valued her dignity more than that. A cynical inner voice added that it was easy for her to stand on such high moral ground, she who was financially independent. However, that hadn’t always been the case. Blythe also remembered vividly when she arrived in New York more than twenty-four years ago with less than fifty dollars.
“And even that wasn’t really mine.” Blythe snorted when she thought of how she’d stolen it from her father’s wallet. She’d paid him back in less than a year, but she’d never returned to her parents’ home in Myrtle Beach.
Blythe picked up the thick manila envelope holding more than one hundred photos she’d taken the day of Evangeline’s crash. She had spent the last two days scrutinizing them and was surprised at their quality, despite the horrific subject. This was the norm when it came to many of her photos. Bosnia, the Balkans, the Twin Towers, Iraq, Afghanistan—the theme was human courage versus human suffering. Some of her colleagues claimed to be there to document, to stay objective, to be non-political. But Blythe believed that everything you did in life, action or non-action, was political. She was assigned to document, to use her talent and her eyes to show other people what she saw. How could her opinion not color what she deemed important enough to capture?
After checking her watch, she tucked the manila envelope into her worn leather messenger-style bag, which held her ever-present Canon. Then she glanced at her reflection in the car window. Dressed in dark jeans, a crisp white cotton shirt, and a brown blazer, she looked younger than forty-two, at least at a distance. Her petite frame, and the freckles she’d despised as a teenager, didn’t exactly make her look more mature. Pearl Wang, Blythe’s mentor and friend ever since she’d arrived in New York, maintained that people only underestimated Blythe once. “Everyone with their head screwed on right will realize what this woman’s made of the second she raises her camera,” Pearl often said.
Blythe hoisted her bag and began to walk to Pasta Cosi, the Italian restaurant on the corner farther up the street, opposite the park. Pearl would also have recognized the way Blythe’s nerves were affecting her right now. When she wasn’t involved in photography, in doing her job, she had to deal with her lifelong struggle with nearly debilitating shyness. She had to force herself to approach people, to socialize and carry on conversations with people she hardly knew, even complete strangers. Few people, except Pearl and a couple of her closest friends, knew the toll it took on her. For a long time, she had hoped her shyness would become easier with age, but the last few years it seemed to have gotten worse.
Blythe willed her fingers to relax around the shoulder strap of her bag. Her heart hammered and goose bumps erupted along her arms. She knew how to appear unaffected, but it had taken her years to perfect the appearance of being comfortable when she wasn’t. Now she used one of her techniques, a mantra of sorts in which she told herself that Evangeline wasn’t a stranger. They had met several times before the crash. Tall, Evangeline Marshall had long dark hair and deeply set green eyes in a chiseled, oval face. Nobody had seen any new close-ups of her since the crash, and Blythe wondered, not for the first time, if the injuries had left scars.
She entered the restaurant, which looked about half full.
“Welcome,” a young woman just inside the door said, and reached for some menus.
“I’m meeting someone. Reservation’s under Marshall.”
The woman checked her chart. “Ms. Marshall is waiting for you. Follow me, please.” She guided Blythe over to the far corner. “I hope you will enjoy your meal.”
Evangeline looked up from a paperback she’d been reading. “Hello, Blythe.”
Blythe had never felt more tongue-tied, but forced herself to greet Evangeline politely. She hung her bag across the tall backrest of the chair and sat down across from Evangeline. “Nice to see you again, Evangeline.” It was. She shuddered at a sudden flashback of the smoking pileup of cars and the broken body of the vibrant woman in front of her.
Evangeline placed her book on the chair next to her. “Call me Evie. Please. It’s been a while.”
“Yes. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice.”
“My manager said you have something important to show me.” As direct as always, Evie obviously hadn’t developed an affinity for small talk during her recovery.
“Yes.” Blythe didn’t allow the annoying tremors in her stomach to rush her. “I understand this is one of your favorite restaurants in Branford.”
“It is.” Impatience oozed from Evie, but she motioned toward the menu next to Blythe’s plate. “I recommend the puttanesca.”
“Thank you. I’ll take your word for it.” Glad she didn’t have to peruse the menu, she turned to the approaching waiter.
“I’ve already placed my order,” Evie said, when Blythe gestured for her to go first.
She ordered the dish Evie suggested, then sipped her water, stalling a few seconds longer. “You want to eat first or…?”
“No, let’s get to the point.” Evie also drank some water.
Understanding that Evie wanted to make sure she wasn’t wasting her time, Blythe dug into her briefcase for the manila envelope. “I just want you to know that some of these aren’t easy to look at. For anyone. For you, it might be even worse.”
“What is this?” Evie weighed the envelope in her hand, her dark eyes burrowing into Blythe’s.
“Photos that I took. That day.” Not sure why she found it impossible to say “the day of your accident,” she watched Evie pale a couple of shades.
“You—you took photos?”
Blythe couldn’
t judge if Evie was shocked or outraged. Trying not to recoil, she nodded solemnly. “I did. That’s why I was there, after all. I was lined up to photograph you coming through the curve and was already shooting when everything happened. I just kept my finger on the shutter release. It all went so fast.”
Evie’s eyes turned flat as she opened the envelope slowly, as if it contained a bomb. Blythe assumed the experience had been like being in a high-powered blast. She knew every single one of those pictures by heart, and even if Evie remained expressionless, the crisp images of her car plowing through the crashing cars hidden in the smoke reflected in her eyes. More than a year after the accident, Blythe still shuddered to think of the horrific events she’d witnessed.
Evie browsed through the first photos, and as she turned each one over, her eyes narrowed and her hands faintly shook. Without finishing the full series of pictures, she suddenly shoved them back into the envelope.
“Are you trying to sell me these, this long afterward?” Looking dangerous, she pushed the envelope back. “I’m not interested.”
“No. No, you misunderstand.” Hadn’t Evie’s agent explained properly? Blythe pressed her palms against the table. “I don’t want money for the photos. They’re not for sale.”
“Then, frankly, I don’t get why I’m wasting my time here.” Acid dripped from Evie’s words.
“Because I want to give them to you, and I have a proposal.” Blythe normally didn’t handle customers herself. She had employees to take care of the administrative tasks, so all she had to do was show up and do the actual work. But she refused to leave this task up to an assistant, no matter how far out of her comfort zone she had to step.
“Go on.” Evie looked more relaxed and calm.
“I know it’s been hard for you. On top of that, it’s so unfair that the bloggers out there are spreading false rumors and raising questions that the NASCAR officials and your rep have already answered. My pictures should set the record straight once and for all. We could include them as one of the chapters in a photography book. That way, you’d get to tell your story and I could finish what I started.” Blythe took a deep breath and gulped down some more water.
