“What did you just say?”
Desi shrugs. “Which part?” she asks. “Where did I lose you?”
“Love,” I tell her.
“Yeah,” she says, “I hate to be the one to tell you, but he’s been trying to figure out the best way to tell you for a while now.”
“He actually said that word, though?”
Desi nods. “Repeatedly,” she says. “Did you really think he was only into you because you’ve hopped on the racing bandwagon?”
“It still all comes back to the same question, though,” I tell her. “How can I believe you?”
“There’s nothing I can say that’ll make you,” she says. “I guess what it comes down to is whether or not you believe him. Maybe he hasn’t said the words, but can you honestly tell me that you’re surprised to hear it? The last time he was in here, he was talking about how he’s been looking to sell that old beater of his. Do you have any idea how long and hard I tried to get him to give that stupid thing up? I don’t even know why he still hangs onto it.”
My phone buzzes in my pocket.
“Wait, he said he’s going to get rid of the car?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she says. “I was just as surprised as you. He loves that thing for some ridiculous reason.”
I take my phone out of my pocket and check the message. It’s from Eli. It reads, “Hey, I’m at the club. I really think the three of us should talk. I want you to know you can trust me.”
“Looks like he’s here,” I tell Desi.
I’m walking out of the back room before she can say anything.
When I get back to the club proper, it doesn’t take long to spot Eli. He’s leaned over the counter at the bar, talking to the bartender.
I walk up behind Eli and tap him on the shoulder. He turns around.
“Kate,” he says. “I know this doesn’t look good, but if you want me to stop talking to-”
He stops as I throw my arms around him. I give him a quick peck on the lips, asking, “Is it true that you’re looking into selling the Galaxie?”
Wow, that’s a weird question out of context.
He gives me a crooked smile. “Already found a buyer.”
I give him another squeeze and another kiss.
“Kate, I don’t want to be with anyone else,” he says. “I don’t care about anyone else. I just want to be with you.”
“I am still pretty pissed about one thing,” I tell him as I rest my head against his shoulder.
“What’s that?” he asks.
“You didn’t introduce us,” I tell him, “Desi and me. I think the two of us would really get along.”
Chapter Twenty
The Oval
Eli
“So, tell me more about this track,” Kate says from the passenger’s seat of the flatbed.
“Well,” I say as I make the turn into the parking lot of the track, “it’s old. The asphalt’s not too degraded, but there are some rough patches.”
Jerry, the guy who owns the place, keeps it closed to the public for the most part, but every once in a while, I manage to talk him into letting me run around the thing for an hour or two. After all the stress and tension of the last few weeks, Kate and I could both use a break like this.
“But this is totally legal?” she asks. “We’re not going to have to negotiate police road blocks while we’re driving around or anything like that, right?”
“Yeah,” I tell her, “Jerry owns the place. He’ll make us sign a liability release form before he’ll let us onto the track, but it’s perfectly legal.”
“That’ll be a pleasant change.”
I pull up next to Jerry’s trailer—he calls it his office—and we get out of the flatbed.
Jerry comes out, carrying a clipboard, saying, “You both know the rules, right?”
“Yeah,” I answer as Kate nods. “Don’t screw up your track and if we get into a crash and die, we can’t come back from the grave to sue you.”
“Good enough,” he says. “Now if I can just get you both to sign here…”
He holds out the clipboard. Kate signs first, then I do.
“Great,” he says and we follow him over to the gate to the track, which he opens. “Have fun.”
Before heading back to unload the Chevelle, Kate and I take a few steps onto the grounds to get a better look at the track. There aren’t any potholes, exactly, but the pavement is pockmarked at the very least.
“How bad is it going to be?” she asks.
“You’ll need to go a bit slower than you otherwise would,” I answer, “but as long as you stay toward the inside of the track, you should be all right.”
“All right,” she says, “but you’re doing the first ten laps.”
We get back to the flatbed and unload the Chevelle as the sun reaches its peak in the sky. Getting behind the wheel, I fire up the car, and once Kate’s in and has her harness all cinched up, I slowly pull through the gate and onto the track beyond.
“Do you have a preference on direction?” I ask.
“Not really,” she answers, and without waiting for another second to pass, I hit the gas.
I take a right, the back end of the Chevelle drifting out behind me, and Kate’s howling with cheers and laughter as I slow for the first turn.
Ovals have never been my thing, but it is nice to not have to worry about the fuzz stopping the show. Besides, Kate’s clearly enjoying herself.
Before I’m even done with my first lap, she’s shouting over the sound of the engine, “I’m ready if you are!”
I smile.
I love this woman. One of these days—probably after the recent strain on our relationship has had a chance to fade a bit—I should probably mention that to her.
Coming to a stop, I put the Chevelle in neutral and undo my harness. Kate and I get out and switch places. I’m barely strapped in when she takes off.
We get up to about a hundred before she comes to the first long turn, and she slows down a bit too much.
“You can usually keep it around one-twenty around these bends,” I tell her. “But just keep doing what you’re doing and feel it out before you-”
Her foot comes down hard on the gas and we’re back in the triple digits well before the end of the turn.
“I want to try nitrous,” she declares as we reach the next straight.
“Your best bet is the dentist’s office,” I tease.
She glances over at me and then back at the track ahead. “You know, you’re a very handsome and charming man, but we really need to work on the jokes,” she says. “It’s undoing all the hard work your car is doing for you.”
“Give it at least a few more laps,” I tell her. “Hold off until you’re used to the surface.”
“What’s it going to be like when I hit it?”
“It’s going to be like you’ve got a rocket engine in the trunk for the first couple of seconds,” I tell her. “Those are going to be very important seconds, because that’s when things with nitrous usually go wrong.”
Kate follows my advice and runs a few more times around the ragged oval, finding the right speed, getting used to the longer, more gradual curves.
Finally, when she starts her tenth lap, I tell her, “All right, when we get to this next straight, get the car stabilized along its trajectory and, if you’re ready, go ahead and hit the nitrous.”
Kate bites the inside of her cheek and nods. She takes the curve a bit more conservatively than she has been, and once we’re back on a straight, she moves her thumb to settle over the button. Her hand is shaking.
I say, “If you’re not ready, you don’t have to-”
Then my head is being forced backward against the headrest of my seat, and I’m watching the needle of the speedometer make its rapid climb as the nitrous propels us.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Kate is shouting, though her lips are pulled back in a huge grin.
She’s a bit hard on the brake coming into the next turn, but she handl
es it.
We’re both laughing as she starts to slow the car even further.
I look over at the gorgeous woman in the seat next to me, and even with all the misunderstandings and the silly mistakes we’ve made with each other, I wouldn’t rather be anywhere else with anyone else.
“Is that Jerry?” Kate asks.
I turn my head to look back out the windshield. There’s a car sitting at the entrance of the track with its lights on.
“I don’t know,” I tell her. “I don’t think Jerry drives anymore, though.”
“Could I talk you into letting me race them over a couple of laps before I hand this thing back to you?” she asks.
Before I get a chance to answer, the car—an SRT Viper—peels out and starts charging toward us.
“Kate, get off the track,” I tell her.
“What?” she asks. “Why? I can take this clown.”
She maintains her speed, allowing the Viper to catch up, and it’s revving its engine as it pulls up alongside us.
“I’m racing him,” Kate says and the car jerks a little as she downshifts and hits the gas.
The Viper falls back at first, but as we come into the next turn, it catches up easily enough.
“I don’t know who that is,” I tell her. “I do know they’re not supposed to be here, though.”
“Aw, come on,” she says. “Live a little.”
In the next moment, though, the Viper’s on our inside, and they’re edging us toward the outside wall.
Kate tries to speed up, but the Viper keeps pace. She tries to slow down to let the Viper pass, but it holds tight. Finally, when there are no more than a couple of feet between us and the outside wall, she slams on the brakes.
The Viper cruises past, but Kate loses control as the back end comes out and she’s jerking the wheel wildly, just trying to stay away from the wall as we go into a full spin.
We finally come to a stop on the dirt interior of the track, facing the opposite direction and we’re both breathing heavily.
“Are you all right?” I ask.
“I think so,” she says. “They were trying to run us off the track! They were trying to make me crash!”
Somewhere behind us comes the sound of tires losing a lot of rubber, and I look over to see the Viper turning around.
“Kate, get out of here,” I tell her. “We need to get out of here now.”
She spins the Chevelle around, staying on the dirt as we try to make our escape. The other driver has no interest in sticking around, though, and the Viper cruises past us on the track and out through the gate.
* * *
I offer to call into work. I even offer to take Kate to the shop with me, but she insists that she’s fine.
Still, I don’t feel all that great leaving her alone in her apartment when I don’t know who was driving that other car or why they tried to run us into a wall.
Kate doesn’t want to deal with her mom, so her parents’ house is out. I think Mick is off, but that’s still a bit weird for all three of us. The only real option is to drop Kate off with her friend Paz.
Things have been pretty tense between the two of them since Paz sent me up to that room to be ambushed by Kate’s mom. After what happened at the track, though, both Kate and I are feeling a lot more forgiving right now.
On the way there, I’m telling Kate that I’m going to find out who went after us and why, but she tells me just to drop it. Pulling up to the curb in the flatbed, Kate and I kiss before she gets out of the car.
She’s putting on a brave face, but she’s clearly shaken. I know I am.
I tell her I’ll call her when I get off work and she forces a smile, saying, “I look forward to it.” Then she turns around and heads off toward her friend’s apartment.
While Kate was in the passenger’s seat, I did my best to act calm. The last thing I want to do is upset her more. As I’m driving to the shop, though, my blood starts simmering in my veins.
There are two possibilities: either someone was actually trying to make us crash or someone was playing a stupid prank. It doesn’t really matter which it is, the fact remains we very easily could have wrecked if Kate hadn’t slammed on the brakes when she did.
I drop off the Chevelle in the junkyard. When I get to the shop, I’m gritting my teeth and clenching my fists. As livid as I am, though, I notice the piece of paper on the windshield of the Galaxie immediately.
My buyer’s coming by later this week to pick up the old car, but there are a few minor (and a few major) repairs I want to make before I hand it off to him. Right now, though, that’s about the furthest thing from my mind.
I take the note from under one of the windshield wipers. It reads, “You’re gonna need more than practice to beat me.”
One of the problems with running a bare-bones auto shop is that, for a good part of the day, there’s nothing to do but sit in the office. Right now, I am the shop’s best customer.
The note’s unsigned, but I know it’s from Jax. He’s trying to get into my head before the final race in two weeks, but that idiot just bit off more than he can chew.
The only problem is I don’t know where to start looking for him. Up until the guy actually walked into this shop, I thought he was just some overblown legend based off of someone who used to race.
It’s not like he has an ad in the phonebook.
I pull out my cell and find Mick’s number. Although it’s a long shot, if anyone knows where I could find Jax, it would be Mick.
“Hey, what’s up, man?” Mick answers.
“Where are you?” I ask.
“I’m at the shop,” he says.
“So am I,” I tell him. “Are you in the office?”
“Yeah,” he says.
I hang up the phone and walk into the office, finding Mick lounging in the waiting area, flipping through channels.
“Did you see this?” I ask and show the note to Mick.
“No,” he says. “What’s that all about?”
“Jax tried to run Kate and me into a concrete wall today,” I tell him. “I need to know where to find him.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” he says, getting up from his seat. “Jax is not a good guy, Rans. Even if you did find him, he’s got a strapped crew that goes everywhere with him. Just take it as a bad prank and let it go.”
“I don’t care if it was a bad prank,” I tell Mick. “The guy or one of his people tried to run us into a wall. Kate was in the car, Mick.”
“How’s it going to change anything if you find him, though? I mean, what are you really going to do to someone like that?”
“I just want to talk to him,” I answer.
He shakes his head. “I’ve seen way too many action movies not to know that means you want to beat the piss out of him,” Mick says. “No sale.”
“You do know where I could find him, though?”
“I doubt it,” he says.
“What does that mean?”
Mick rubs the back of his neck. “Look, I don’t even know if it’s true or not, but I heard that Jax owns a restaurant here in town and he does a lot of his business from a private room in the back.”
“What’s the name of the restaurant?” I ask.
Mick shrugs. “I honestly couldn’t tell you.”
“Okay,” I say, “so you heard a rumor that Jax owns a restaurant in town, but you don’t know which one it is, and in order to find out whether I’m in the right one or not, I’m going to have to check-”
“No, no,” Mick says. “I’ve heard the name, I just can’t pronounce it. It’s some French word or French words. There can’t be too many places like that around here, can there?”
“You’re joking,” I scoff.
“That’s what I heard. How am I supposed to know if it’s true? I’ve never really had the urge to try to track Jax down for anything.”
I put my hand to my forehead. “No, I think I know the place,” I tell him. I let out a chuckle. “You don’t happen to kn
ow if he’s a Twisted Sister fan or not, do you?”
The Chevelle’s a liability on public roads and Maye’s flatbed would never get me out of there in time if things go sour. It takes a minute, but I eventually convince Mick to let me take his car.
The closer I get to Soeur Torsadée, the more ridiculous this all seems. Sure, you never know what kind of music a person’s going to like, but starting up a full-blown theme restaurant doesn’t seem like a move someone like Jax would make.
Still, when I get to the restaurant, I don’t drive past it; I park.
I get out of the car and into the restaurant and the hostess—whose name I’m almost certain is not Nikki—asks if it’s just me.
“I need to talk to Jax,” I interrupt.
The hostess’s eyes go wide, but she says, “I’m sorry, is Jax a customer?”
She gives a quick glance toward the back of the restaurant, and I don’t wait for any more confirmation. I just start walking.
There’s a hallway at the back of the restaurant and I walk down it, finding a large metal door near the end.
I’m not even in the room before there’s the cold metal of a gun resting against my temple.
“You opened the wrong door,” the bodyguard speaks.
My hands are up and my mouth is dry. I did not think this through.
“It appears our old friend Ransom has decided to grace us with his presence,” that cold voice comes from further in the room. “Ty, lower your piece.”
The gun lowers, and I finally take a breath.
Shifting Gears: The Complete Series (Sports Bad Boy Romance) Page 22
