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by Stacy Borel

  “Sounds interesting.” She wasn’t in the least bit interested. Annabelle was too busy trying to prevent herself from a total freak out moment in front of me.

  I needed to get her in the car. She needed to get a feel for it and see there wasn’t anything to be afraid of. Besides, I hadn’t planned on letting her go much over one hundred miles per hour. She had no experience behind something with this much power before. I pulled her around the car to her side and told her she needed to climb in through the window. Annabelle was less than impressed.

  “You’re little, you can do it. Imagine being my size squeezing in there.”

  She giggled. “Okay you got me there.” She slipped in easily. When she was in her seat, I poked my head in and strapped her into her harness. Her blue eyes were watching me intently, moving with every motion of my hands. I was careful not to linger when I got to the buckles around her chest. I didn’t want her to think I was copping a feel, although I wanted nothing more than to see how she fit in my hands. Instead, I pulled away when I was done and got in on my side and buckled up.

  “Okay, you ready for your lesson?” I asked.

  “Doesn’t look like I have much of a choice. I’m kind of trapped in here.” Her side glance, and the idea of her being at my whim was more of an aphrodisiac than it should have been.

  Giving her some peace of mind I told her, “You want out at any time, just let me know. If I’m going faster than you’re comfortable with, let me know. If you need anything just let me know, and I’ll stop.”

  She brought her bright round eyes to mine. It was a moment, connecting and building a sense of trust in a matter of a couple second. She nodded giving her approval.

  “So for starters, I’m going to pull up to the start line. When you’re in this seat, you’re in control of everything. The car will not move unless you are in gear and you are the one pushing on the gas. It’s just like any other vehicle other than there is an engine in it that has 900 horsepower. It’s powerful Annabelle. I want you to understand that.” She was listening to my every word with rapt attention. “This vehicle can get up to 200 MPH. We are in a roll cage and are quite safe, but you have to know how to handle this thing around the corners. You shift it just like any other car. Have you driven a standard before?”

  She slowly shook her head.

  I grinned. “No, no big deal. Alright, you ready? I’ll take the first lap slow. After that I’m going to open her up.”

  Pushing the gas I felt the familiar purr of the engine. I’d driven this car more times that I could count. I knew it well. Creeping up in speed, I was still on the straightaway. The bleachers were breezing by, but I had tunnel vision. Shifting, I kicked it up a notch. I was creeping up to 90 MPH just as I was hitting the first corner. Annabelle’s hand came up and she was about touch my forearm, when I downshifted and slowed before turning the wheel. She dropped her hand into her lap. I wanted to look at her and tell her it was okay, I was going to keep her safe, but I had to keep my eyes on the track. These cars were unpredictable. I would have spoken to her, but the engine was too loud.

  We took both corners at about the same speed. The second one, she kept her arm down and gave me the trust I was silently asking for. I’d only hoped she was enjoying herself just a little bit. As I hit the end of my first lap, I was ready to open it up. I wanted to feel the adrenaline pumping in my veins. I knew it was probably not the wisest choice to give it what I normally did, because I knew she was already on edge. If I wanted Annabelle to feel comfortable, I’d need to take it easy. When I started the second lap, I pushed on the throttle harder than the first time. I let the speedometer creep up to 100 MPH. Even at this speed, you can feel the force of the G’s pushing you back into your seat. Instead of bringing it down to a comfortable speed for her when I got to the curve, I only downshifted once, and kept up the momentum. Surprisingly, she didn’t freak. Maybe she was okay with this after all. I continued on the track and at the end of the lap, I came to a complete stop in the pit. The crew immediately began fueling the car back up, and checking tire pressure. I looked over at Annabelle, and she was staring at me with such wonder in her eyes. Never had a woman looked at me like this.

  “You doing okay?” I asked.

  She didn’t answer right away. It was like she was trying to find her words. “I’ve never gone that fast before.”

  “It’s a different feeling isn’t it?”

  “It is.”

  “Would you like to drive? I can teach you.” I wanted her to so bad. I wanted to see her let loose and mesh with the car. It would have been the biggest turn on. But I could see her answer already.

  “No, I’m okay. I don’t know how to drive a stick and I’m sure they don’t want to replace the transmission on this thing if you try to teach me. I’d rather just sit and feel if that’s okay?” She hesitated, expecting me to push her into changing her mind. I wasn’t.

  “That’s fine.” I smiled to offer reassurance. When she smiled back, the feeling that shot through me was incredible. I wanted to make her happy. I’d never given two shits about other women I dated, it was always about making them make me happy. But that smile she gave me, my God, it could light up a room.

  We ended up going around the track about ten more times before calling it quits. I pushed the car and her comfort level to about 140 MPH before Annabelle, did in fact reach over and touch me. She’d had enough and I’d maxed out her level of comfort. I was fine with that. After we’d taken off the suits and we were walking back out to my car, I grabbed her hand. Rubbing my thumb back and forth over the smooth skin on her wrist, she was as soft as I’d imagined. Getting her settled in, we drove the whole way to her house in silence. The only thing I asked was if she wanted something to eat. She said she wasn’t hungry, and I knew what she meant. It was almost as if both of us were trying to take in the evening we’d just had. As soon as we arrived at her house, I helped her out and walked her to her door.

  “I hope you had a good time,” I said uneasily.

  “Mhmm, I did.” She glanced down shyly.

  “I’d like to take you out again, if that’s okay.”

  She pondered it for a moment and then said, “I’d like that.”

  There was no stopping the smile that spread across my face. “Alright then. I’ll be in touch. I need to think about where I want to take you next.”

  Her eyes got big. “No more dare devil stuff.” She laughed. “Not sure my poor heart can take it.”

  “Did you get hurt today?”

  She was confused. “Well . . . no, but . . .”

  I cut her off. “Did you have fun?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay, I’ll let you know when I’ve got the next date set up. And Annabelle . . . it will be fun.”

  She sighed, knowing she wasn’t going to win. “I’ll wait for the call then.”

  Leaning forward, I tenderly kissed her cheek. The scent of cotton candy was lingering on her skin. I heard her small gasp and I wanted to kiss her on the mouth, but some things were better waited on. Next date, I was going to take what I wanted.

  “Goodnight, Annabelle. Thank you for a good evening.”

  “Goodnight, Turner.” She twisted in her cute little tennis shoes and went into the house.

  She’s different. I’ll give her that much. I was very intrigued by her. I was going to need to think of something that I could do with her, something that we could actually sit and have conversation. Unfortunately, the race car was too loud for either of us to hear the other person. This was going to take some thought on my part. I wanted to break her out of her shell and see what she was made of, but I could tell it was going to be a process. Annabelle was my new project, and I was looking forward to seeing who she really was.

  I WAS STANDING OUT IN FRONT of the PAWS animal shelter waiting for Camden and Keegan to show up. They were thinking about adopting a dog. Keegan had called and asked if I wanted to join them and maybe get lunch afterwards. I reluctantly agreed. My date
with Turner was almost two weeks ago and I had kind of kept to myself since. I had a feeling she wanted to pry and find out what happened. Why couldn’t she just ask Turner? I’m sure he’d tell Camden if he asked. Keegan had called the day after, but I was still processing the fact that I had actually enjoyed myself.

  Speaking of, they pulled up a couple minutes after I’d parked. Getting out of their car, Keegan looked like she was still glowing from her wedding day.

  “Morning,” she said.

  “Morning back.” I smiled at her.

  Camden stepped beside me and nodded. Such a conversationalist.

  “Alright, let’s do this.” She rubbed her hands together. “And, for the love of God, I am going into the cat room whether you like it or not.” She fixed him with a pointed stare.

  He flung his hands in the air. “Fine, we’ll go into the cat room. But don’t get pissy with me when I walk out sneezing or my eyes are itchy.”

  She leaned in and kissed him sweetly. “You’ll be fine. But thank you.”

  “Welcome,” he grumbled.

  As we walked in she whispered to me, “He says he’s super allergic to cats, but I have yet to see a reaction from him when we’ve been somewhere with a cat.”

  “Sneaky. Clearly not a cat lover.” I giggled.

  As we walked in, we were greeted by the workers who asked us to fill out some information forms. Apparently they don’t let just anyone in here. And who knows, maybe I’ll come back for a friend for Chaz. When we were done with that, we were led into a side room where barking dogs galore were behind closed doors and waiting anxiously for any human to stop and say hi. The first couple of dogs were older, and lazily sat in their rooms with disinterest. Another room held a beagle mix whose tail was nonstop wagging. She was very cute. Camden and Keegan put her down as a maybe. Little dogs and large ones were scattered throughout and still, they hadn’t come across one that seemed like “the one.” As they approached the final room and feeling discouraged, they came across a black lab with a white patch on his chest. He was a six month old baby, who had been born at the shelter. Letting the volunteers know, they pulled the pup from the room and let Camden and Keegan go into a separate room to get to know him.

  While the playful little guy chewed and nipped at Camden’s hands, Keegan turned her attention toward me.

  “You haven’t told me much about your date with Turner. Spill the beans. You going on another one? Was he a gentleman? And race car driving . . . that shocked the crap out of me. I had no clue you were even into racing.”

  I held my hand up to her. “Okay, for starters, slow down. One question at a time. He was a gentleman.”

  Camden snickered in the background. “Well, that’s kind of shocking. You all thought I was a brut, Turner is worse than I ever was.”

  Keegan nudged him. “Hush. She’s talking. Anyway, you were saying?”

  I glanced back and forth between them. Their relationship and sweetness made me envious.

  “Yeah, so I’m not in to racecars. In fact, I had no idea he was even taking me to the track. Had I known I would have told him he could take his idea of a good date and shove it up his ass.”

  Keegan’s eyes got wide. “Then what made you agree to do it if you didn’t want too?”

  “Honestly, I don’t know. He pulled into the parking lot and he gave me a look that made me feel like I could . . . I don’t know, trust him? So I went with it.”

  “Wow. I’m honestly kind of shocked.”

  “Did you enjoy it?” Camden asked inquisitively.

  The puppy was vigorously running around the room, tossing toys in the air and making them squeak.

  I thought about how to best answer him. “Yes, I enjoyed it. At first, I was terrified. I’d never been inside a car that could go that fast. Turner ended up going around once, showing me that he had complete control of the vehicle. I know he wanted to push it to the limits, but I wasn’t having it.”

  I closed my eyes and remembered how the wind whipped around me and everything breezed by so fast I couldn’t make out shapes. What I remembered most though, was the way Turner looked at me, letting me know he had me. I knew when his blue eyes met mine, he was going to keep me safe. He didn’t even have to say anything to me, I just knew.

  Camden chuckled. “Turner always was the one to push the boundaries.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When we were kids he was always the first one on the roller coasters, or jumping off the roof of the house onto something. I thought Mom and Dad were going to give him up for adoption or give him away on a street corner.”

  I tilted my head to the side, more curious than before. “So he’s a bit of an adrenaline junky?”

  “Yeah, you could say that.”

  A worker popped her head in. “How’s it going?”

  “He’s amazing!” Keegan clamored.

  “He’s a sweet boy. Would you guys like to see any other dogs?”

  Keegan and Camden looked at each other. “There was a female we saw, but it seems like Cam really likes this little guy,” Keegan told her.

  The worker beamed. “Well, if you’d like, I can start processing his paperwork while you speak to one of our adoption agents and they can give you all of his info if you are still interested.”

  “That would be great, thanks,” Camden agreed. He was holding the puppy on a leash, and I could tell this was the little fella they were going to go home with today.

  When the worker closed the door, Keegan turned back toward me. “Okay, so now what? Are you two going to go out on another date?”

  “I agreed to a second date. I just don’t know where he’s taking me.”

  “How exciting,” she shrilled.

  “Calm down, Keegan. It’s just a damn date. Not like they are walking down the aisle,” Camden scolded.

  She slapped his arm. “Shut up.”

  I shook my head. “Definitely no weddings for me. This girl has vowed to live the life of singlehood.”

  “Why?” Camden asked, completely contradicting what he just said to Keegan a moment ago.

  I stared at him. “Because I’m not interested. You become so invested in someone, giving your full self over to another person, and then what? What happens when they die? What would you do? How do you go on? I’m sorry, but I’d rather not go there.”

  Keegan looked sad. “Didn’t know you felt that way.”

  “It’s called self-preservation. I don’t knock anyone who gets married and has a family and all that, but it’s just not for me. I decided this a long time ago.”

  Technically, it wasn’t that long ago. Around the time of my parents death I made a vow to myself that that if I didn’t give my emotions to another, I’d spare them the grief and agony if something ever happened to me and vice versa. I didn’t care that most people didn’t get it. In fact, it’s why I rarely ever spoke about it. Everyone who has met me since my parent’s accident just thinks I’m some indifferent cold hearted bitch or a lesbian. When the reality is, I’m neither.

  “Oh, can we change the subject for a minute?” I asked. Refusing to actually keep talking about my date and love life.

  “Sure, what’s up?” Keegan replied.

  We were being led out of the puppy play room and Camden was greeted by one of the adoption agents. They were currently going over the puppy’s records, while Keegan and I sat back and chatted.

  “You sure did miss some action the other night.”

  “Oh yeah? What happened?”

  “We got a mother in that was a severe addict. Any drug you could think of, it was in her system. She was so awful—belligerent, yelling, and the worst part, she didn’t care about her son she’d just given birth too. I’m hoping in all the years I’m a nurse, that’s the worst that I see.”

  Keegan’s eyes were wide. “I heard about that one. Didn’t know you were the delivering nurse. When was this?”

  “My shift right after the wedding.”

  “How’s the baby?
”

  I paused. “Actually, I don’t know. I had planned on stopping in to check on him yesterday, but was beat after I clocked out. I think I’ll head into the NICU tomorrow before I go in. He was such a little guy. Hoping he’s a fighter.”

  She rubbed my arm. “No doubt. And it’s probably a good thing I wasn’t on that day. Lord knows I would have throttled that woman.”

  “Oh, it took everything in me to not grab her by her face and say, ‘wake the hell up, your baby needs you.’ Of course I didn’t and went and blew off some steam in the stair well. Speaking of, someone really needs to put a dart board in there. Sure would help when I’m catching a breather.”

  She giggled. “Definitely.”

  “Hey, baby, I need you to come over here and sign some papers,” Camden called for her.

  Awe, puppy time for the happy couple. I took a step back and let her go be with her husband. Heading to the cat room, I sat down as the little purring furballs surrounded me. Sighing I thought to myself. Ah yes, destined to forever be a cat lady. I didn’t know if that made me happy, or sad. Either way, it’s how it was going to be.

  Sitting in my office on the fourth floor of the hospital, I was staring out my wall of windows instead of doing the paperwork that I was desperately behind on. This was ludicrous. It had been almost two weeks since I’d taken Annabelle out on our first date, and I had yet to plan our next one. Things in the operating room had been hectic, and I barely had any time to myself, let alone trying to schedule something. I felt terrible. Even worse, I had a fucking hell of a time concentrating on anything that didn’t have to do with her.

  The one time I’d managed to pick up the phone, her line had just started ringing when I had been called out to an emergency surgery. I’ve been frustrated. So frustrated, that one day not too long ago, I found myself down on her floor, outside the nursery window, peeping in on her like some creeper. I’d watched as she tenderly gave a newborn its first bath. There were other nurses in the room, and a couple had taken notice of me, but thankfully none of them tipped her off that I was around. I watched her for a couple minutes and decided it was best to leave. I’d considered poking my head in to see how she was doing since we hadn’t spoken, but it didn’t seem like the time or the place to do it. Women got all weird being around babies, and I swear it was like you could hear their ovaries exploding when they saw, heard, or smelled a newborn. I didn’t want any part of that. Instead, I went back to my office, called her cell phone, and left her a message apologizing for being MIA for so long. I’d consider myself lucky if she actually called me back.