by Hodgson, Jim
Buck nodded. To Faith, he didn’t seem fazed by this news. Obviously he just wanted to ride. He was a competitor. She could respect that.
“Do we have bikes?” Buck asked. The racks were empty.
“We do, they’re just out on a training ride at the moment,” LeMond said, and then, upon hearing noise outside the door, added, “Ah! Here they are.”
An outside door do this room opened, and riders on green, white, and red bikes entered. They were sweaty and breathing hard, but smiling. Buck looked envious to Faith. He’d been off the bike for a few days now. He must be crazy to get back in the saddle and ride by now. She knew what it was like to have to go a few days without training. It could be hell.
Introductions went around. In addition to Jose, there was Hidalgo, Antonio, Hector, and the twins Alfredo and Alfonso. Buck shook all their hands, smiling and talking shop as much as was possible through the language barrier. They all racked their bikes up and headed for the showers. Buck was still smiling.
“They don’t look bad do they?” LeMond asked.
“They don’t,” Buck agreed. “But I haven’t seen them ride yet.”
“Just wait. You think you’ve seen heart, but these kids will blow your mind.”
“We’ll see,” Buck said. “Now what?”
“Now I believe the kitchen has a dinner for us,” LeMond said, rubbing his hands together.
The “kitchen” turned out to be Alfredo and Alfonso’s mother, Miriam. She’d prepared a feast fit for a wedding. A big one, by Faith’s reckoning. There was steak, chicken, corn, black beans, and enough freshly made guacamole to fill a giant novelty sombrero. Faith couldn’t bring herself to eat corn tortillas, since the corn was probably genetically modified. Only god knew what horrible effects that might have on her body. Instead, she enjoyed a delicious burrito, with a piece of lettuce instead of a tortilla. Even though there was a language barrier, everyone at the table was laughing and pointing like they’d known each other for years.
After they ate, the Miami team members cleared the dishes, and Jose appeared from the kitchen with a tray covered in shot glasses and a bottle.
“Oh no,” Buck said. “Not tequila. I can’t drink that.”
“Aw loosen up, Buck,” LeMond said, standing. “It’s tradition. They’re trying to welcome you and Faith.”
“Where are you going?” Faith asked.
“I have to head back to New Lyon before it gets too late. Tie up a few things. I’ll be back tomorrow and we’ll get started. You guys have fun.”
The Miami team distributed glasses around the table, not bothering to ask Faith or Buck if they wanted to drink any. Faith considered it. She didn’t want to be rude. “Jose, what kind of tequila is that?”
“Tequila?” he asked. “This is not just tequila. This is añejo!”
“Añejo!” the twins echoed together, laughing and slapping each other on the back.
“What’s añejo?” Faith asked.
Jose looked thoughtful for a moment then set the tray down. “A bike race is a bike race. This is tequila. But the Tour is the Tour, yes?”
“Yes,” Buck said. His tone rose a bit to indicate he was following Jose’s logic.
Jose gestured with one hand heavenward. “The Tour?” he said, and then gestured to the bottle. “Añejo.”
The twins looked at each other. Everyone knew it was coming, so a few of the other rides joined them. “Añejo!” they cried. Everyone laughed.
Faith didn’t know much about the Tour de France except that the French were all wild about it like it was the CrossFit Games, the Olympics, and Christmas Day all put together. But she liked to think she knew a good time when she was having one, and she was having one. The pressures of the past few weeks were behind her, in New Lyon. Here there were only smiles, happy faces, and a sun setting through these gorgeous trees.
“I’ll have some,” she said, surprising herself.
Jose beamed. “Yes!” he said, pouring a shot. He slid it across the table to her, and she took it carefully. He’d filled it to the brim.
Everyone was looking at Buck now. “Aw, what the hell,” he said, a grin wedging itself sideways onto his face. “Pour me one too.”
The Miami riders all cheered like they’d just won a race, and everyone drank their shots down together. Faith drank hers in one gulp in case the taste was terrible. She didn’t want to embarrass herself by spewing it everywhere if it was revolting. She didn’t have a lot of experience with tequila, but she’d heard it could be harsh. She expected to screw her face into a scowl and endure the aftertaste, but . . . it was so good! Sure, it had a kick, but she could feel the warmth spreading in her chest. The lingering taste in her mouth was like butter mixed with electricity and some kind of other crazy ingredients she couldn’t even imagine.
She looked at Buck. He was smiling too. He held his shot glass out and looked at it as though it’d just said something unexpectedly poignant.
“Hoo,” he breathed. “That was good.”
“Uno mas?” Jose asked, his smile rakish.
“Uno maaaasss,” Hector said in a low voice, pounding the table with his fists excitedly.
“Sorry?” Faith asked.
“Another?” Jose said.
Faith was uncertain. She’d allowed herself one, but two was another matter. And by the way her chest was warming, that stuff was high-powered. You wouldn’t want to use it to try to put out a fire. In fact, she’d be careful not to breathe near any open flame for the next couple of hours.
“Hell yeah!” Buck said. Murmurs of approval echoed around the table.
Well. Faith refused to be the not-fun-Nancy/only-girl of the bunch, so she nodded.
The second shot went down even better than the first. Faith was ready to savor the warmth and the taste this time, and to feel the glow spread. But good sense prevailed, and she said no to a third. If she had a third, she’d pretty much be drunk, and that was unprofessional. She didn’t want to be a stick-in-the-spokes, but she was also here in a professional context. It would be bad form.
Buck laughed about something one of the riders had done. They were making each other laugh with their animated Spanish, but most of it came through thanks to wild gesticulations and the odd English word. Buck’s laugh sounded like a saxophone, or a bassoon. It was so sonorous and musical. Faith smiled just listening to it, and those eyes of his that ought to be banned for being too green flashed. Under the table, his legs moved as he laughed, and his knee came to rest against her leg. She didn’t move hers.
She was smiling for no reason whatsoever. Who smiles for no reason at all? Happy people, she guessed. Buffoons, maybe. Idiots? She didn’t care.
She waited for a lull, choosing her moment, and then said clearly as she held her glass aloft, “Uno mas!”
The Miami riders all screamed with surprise, laughter, and approval, and Jose filled her glass once again. She drank it down in a smooth motion and yelled along. Buck’s bassoon laugh sounded again, tolling across the table and out into the night.
After the laughter died down, everyone sat around smiling, feeling full and happy. Sundown had given way to night, and a chain of yawns crept around the table.
Jose showed them where they’d be sleeping, in the same building where the kitchen and dining area was. It was situated at right angles to the building that housed the gym and bike room. The rooms were small, dormitory style, but seemed clean and comfortable enough. They were paired around bathrooms so that each room shared those facilities with another. Buck and Faith would be sharing a bathroom.
That was weird, Faith thought, but if she had to share a bathroom with someone, she was glad it was someone who could fully understand English. She just hoped Buck was clean. Of course, she had no reason to think he wasn’t. He certainly smelled good. But li
ke any adult, she appreciated clean facilities. She knew, though, that men were occasionally not so attuned to matters of cleanliness. Her brother had probably never cleaned a bathroom in his life, and it was a small wonder that he’d never been killed by a wasting disease picked up the toilets in his pigsty of an apartment.
Jose completed the tour of the dormitory area by showing them a veranda at the end of the hallway of rooms. It didn’t have much of what you’d call a view, since it looked out into the trees, but the effect was like being in a tree house for grownups. Jose then retreated into his own room and began settling himself for sleep. The other riders were closing doors and running water.
Faith was definitely feeling sleepy as she went back into her room. She brushed her teeth, washed her face, and then stood next to her bed, looking at it. As soon as she lay down in that bed, she’d be asleep. No doubt about it. Why not go back out on the veranda again? The moon might be up by now. She bet it would be beautiful.
Buck’s side of the bathroom was closed and the light was out. He must have just lain down in his clothes and gone to sleep. She couldn’t blame him. What with his injuries, whatever lingering soreness he might have, and the tequila, he was probably exhausted. She poked her head into the hallway, and the doors were all closed. Light streamed out around the edges of a few doors, but they appeared to be closed for the night. She walked quietly down the hall, feeling silly for being quiet since it was just as much her dormitory as the riders. But she stayed quiet just the same.
On the veranda she found Buck, not asleep after all, but peering out over the veranda’s railing, toward the road. Cars could just be heard on the highway over the various night sounds of bugs and a light breeze sighing in leaves. The moving air was nice and warm on her face. He heard her behind him, turned, and smiled.
“Hey,” he said. “I was just thinking the moon might be up by now. Look.”
She craned her neck but couldn’t quite see around the eaves of the dormitory building. She stepped to the railing and stood on her tiptoes. She could just see the moon, crescent shaped in the sky. It looked positively enormous in the clear night sky. The breeze came again, and with it Buck’s smell. It was as intoxicating as the tequila, if not more. He was smiling, studying the moon. The moonlight played on his face, his features wondering.
Faith didn’t put stock in any sort of mystical mumbo jumbo. She didn’t go in for fortune telling or astrology or anything like that, maybe because her life revolved around achievable results that came from hard work. Wishing never got anyone more fit. But in this moment, she realized she was telling the future. Buck was going to turn to face her, and they were going to kiss. The thought came to her as clear as his laugh tolled across a room. As clear as if she’d seen a coming storm. Their faces were drawn together, barely moving but unable to stop, like planets joining in some distant universe. She never even had a thought of stopping it, until she wasn’t just telling the future. She was kissing him. They were kissing each other. She squeezed him, feeling the muscles in his back and drinking in his smell. Oh god, she was kissing him!
He pulled back.
“Oh,” she said, not knowing any word to use at this moment. She stepped back too, now, hand to her mouth. The hand brought with it a waft of the heady Buck cologne smell. “I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, I ah . . .” He looked sheepish. “I want you to know I . . . well, I don’t do this kind of thing. I don’t know what came over me.”
“Me either. It’s just been so crazy. But I can’t do, you know . . .” She trailed off. Do what? “This,” she finished.
“No. Yeah. You’re right. We gotta keep things professional.”
“It’s not just that,” she said, looking at the boards that made up the veranda’s decking. Her insides were doing flips, and she had no way to tell what they were trying to tell her. Jump on him? Sniff him some more? Go to bed? Jump off the veranda and make a break for it? “I’m, you know . . .”
“You’re what?”
“Engaged.” Her voice had a pleading tone, and her arms made a fussy motion that she’d not intended them to make, like a little girl throwing a tantrum. She definitely needed to go to bed. Or jump off the veranda and run for it. Something.
“Hey, look,” he said. “I’m sorry. I had a couple of tequilas, and it’s so beautiful out here, and you’re so, you know . . .”
“What?”
Buck looked at her. Something in his face seemed to change. Not imperceptibly, obviously, because she was able to perceive it, but something small shifted and she felt he might have made up—or changed—his mind. A smile appeared. His eyes were as green as ever. He looked rueful, apologetic, but with a dash of puckishness as well. That dash made her insides give up the flips in favor of just rebounding around her in a mad seizure. He wasn’t sorry.
Maybe his insides might be doing the same thing hers were?
“Let’s just call it a nice night and leave it at that,” she said.
Buck nodded. “A nice night,” he agreed.
She went back into the hallway, heading for her room. The lights had been turned out. It was the same hallway she’d walked down just a few minutes before, but she was a completely different person. Like she’d been over a waterfall in a barrel and lived to tell the tale.
She turned back. Buck was there, on the veranda, watching her go and smiling. The moonlight played on his face still, the shadow of the building casting a sharp line diagonally on his body as though to accentuate his features. He looked calm and pleased, like a man who’d eaten a gorgeous dinner, drunk some high quality tequila, and then been kissed on a moonlit veranda.
Chapter 12
Buck woke up feeling like an asshole. No. Not just an asshole. President and Founder of the Asshole Club for Inappropriate Assholes. He rose, stood, and looked out the window. It was a clear day, an irritating contrast to his mood. At least it would be decent weather for a ride. He kicked his legs. They were still stiff and reluctant to move from the last vestiges of the road rash he’d picked up in the crit back in New Lyon, but they’d probably be okay. They’d have to be okay. He needed a ride in the worst way.
Downstairs in the dining area, Faith was eating a grapefruit. Clanking noises came from the kitchen, so she wasn’t the only one awake. But maybe he could have a quick word with her.
“Hey,” he said.
She looked up. Smiled. A hint of a frown. Smiled again. “Hey,” she said.
Then Miriam saw him and called good morning from the other room. “Buenos dias,” she said, but the “dias” was missing the “s” sound, so it sounded more like “Bueno diaaaa.” She had breakfast ready to eat, the smell of bacon making its way into Buck’s nose. He felt better. Faith couldn’t be too mad at him if she smiled at him like that. Sure, there was a suggestion of hesitation there, but she hadn’t chucked her grapefruit at his head or jabbed him with the pointy grapefruit spoon. Things would be okay.
Except, would they be okay? Now he knew how her hair smelled. He knew how those gorgeous lips felt on his, how it felt to have her arms around him. Not just a woman’s arms, but an athlete’s arms. She was so strong, but so intoxicatingly feminine. Not at all like the women he was used to. Nothing like the cycling facility girls, who spent all their time talking about television or looking at their phones. She had consequence. Gravity. And when she’d hugged him last night, he’d felt her body pressing against him, the pressure of a breast touching his side and—
And she was looking at him oddly. He was staring.
“Bicycles!” he said, his voice a horrifying croak. He cleared his throat. “B—uh, bicycles,” he tried again. Not much better, but at least he wasn’t staring anymore. He smiled sheepishly. She smiled back again. Don’t be freaked out, he thought at her, telepathically. I’m not a weirdo.
“Yes, bicycles!” a voice replied. It was Jose. He wa
lked in, already in his Miami riding kit. His face displayed surprise at Buck still in his sweatpants and tee shirt. “You need to kit up. We ride.”
Buck clenched his fists and shook them happily. We ride! Finally, something he was sure he could do without making an ass of himself. “Yes,” he agreed. “We ride!”
Buck headed back to his room and got dressed to ride then hurried back downstairs. In the bike room, the rest of the riders were also awake and dressed. Buck pulled his bike off the rack and inspected it. No problems. He pumped the tires up to pressure and threw a leg over the bike. It felt good. Back where he should be: on the bike.
Miami riders kept things loose. They chatted among themselves during the ride, keeping the pace relaxed. Even so, Buck eyed their technique. It needed work. But it wasn’t terrible by any means. And anyway, he certainly needed work too. He wasn’t up to full power. It felt great to ride, though, especially given the flat terrain. There wasn’t a hill taller than twenty-five meters anywhere to be seen.
“Hey, Jose,” Buck said, riding up alongside. “How do you guys train for climbing?”
Jose smiled evilly. “You will see.”
There must be a hill around here somewhere, but Buck was glad they were keeping it light today. He just wanted to spin his legs out, remind them what it was like to pedal a bicycle.
After a couple of hours, they returned to the facility, winding their way around the entrance on the dirt track. Thankfully, the dirt was packed enough that their tires didn’t sink in.
In the courtyard area between the two buildings, Buck dismounted, feeling immensely satisfied. He spotted LeMond’s car parked nearby and smiled. This was going to work out nicely, he thought. It’d been so good to ride. Now he had his trainer and friend on-site. Tomorrow they would start training for real.
