A NASCAR Holiday 2: Miracle SeasonSeason of DreamsTaking ControlThe Natural

by Pamela Britton

  Danny needed solitude right now, every bit as badly as he needed it in the lead-up to a NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series race. On race days, his team knew better than to talk to him in the half hour before he went out on the track.

  “Smile. Shake hands. Congratulate.” He reiterated aloud the routine he’d planned for tonight. Tried to convince himself it was no different from any of the other routines he employed as a race driver: Fasten harness. Insert earpieces. Put on helmet.

  The great thing about routines was that you could do them without thinking. If Danny could greet Trent Matheson, winner of the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series, without thinking, It should have been me, he’d probably emerge from tonight’s party a better human being.

  But he’d still be the guy who’d lost the championship to Matheson in the last seconds of the last race at Homestead.

  The rain pelted down harder, in perfect sync with Danny’s mood, and he set the heater to full blast to prevent the windshield icing over. Even in good weather, visibility wasn’t great on the winding country road that connected his house near Kannapolis with I-85 to Charlotte. He eased off the accelerator in deference to the road conditions—it wasn’t as if he was in any hurry to get to the party.

  The sooner I get there, the sooner I can move on. The road straightened, and Danny sped up. He would do the right thing tonight, with a smile on his face and a gracious attitude. He would listen, with forbearance, if not acceptance, to the observations and advice that everyone from the waiters to rival drivers and team owners would feel compelled to offer him. Then he’d move on to the next season of NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series racing. Next season, he would win.

  Another vehicle, the first he’d seen since he left home, rounded a bend up ahead, coming toward Danny with its lights on full beam. Danny squinted, momentarily blinded, then the other guy dipped his lights.

  That’s when Danny saw the dog—so huge it could have been a small horse—darting out from the foliage at the side of the road, into the path of his truck.

  Danny stomped on his brakes, estimating he had maybe fifty yards to stop. Any NASCAR driver knew that wasn’t technically possible from this speed, in these conditions. The dog apparently lacked the ability to perform that calculation. Either that or it was confused by the car lights coming from both directions, because it paused in the middle of the road.

  “Move it!” Danny yelled, knowing the animal couldn’t hear him. He gripped the wheel tighter to counter the truck’s shuddering as the antilock brakes kicked in.

  Not fast enough.

  Just as Danny came to a halt, there was a thud of dog-meets-truck.

  As Danny cut the engine, the oncoming car sped past him on the other side of the road. All he could hear was the fading rumble of its engine, the tattoo of the rain, the swish of the wipers. No barking, howling, or any other sound that might emanate from a still-alive, justifiably enraged dog.

  “Damn.” He got out of the truck, ignoring the icy pellets that drove into his face.

  The animal lay against the front bumper, its tongue hanging out, panting. Alive.

  “Hey, buster.” Danny knelt down, put his hand in the region of the dog’s nose. The animal didn’t seem interested in sniffing it. Its eyes held Danny’s. Danny leaned in closer, and in the light of his headlamps saw blood caking the animal’s fur. “We’d better get you some help.”

  There were no houses nearby, so he couldn’t think where the animal had come from. Nor where he’d find the owners to confess he’d run over their pet. He’d better get the dog into his truck, find a vet.

  Picking up a creature that must have weighed a good hundred pounds wasn’t easy, no matter that Danny regularly bench-pressed more than twice that in the gym. The animal put up a heck of a lot more resistance than a barbell. Its legs flailed and it flung its head around, tongue lolling, jaws uncomfortably close to Danny’s face.

  “Quit fighting,” he grunted as he staggered around the truck.

  After he’d hefted the dog onto the truck bed, Danny climbed back into the cab. He ran his hands over his face to clear away rain and grime and dog spit. When he pulled off his tie, the overhead light revealed dirt and blood on the shirt of his tuxedo. Thankfully he’d stowed his jacket on the passenger seat for the journey; he’d keep it buttoned at the party.

  A call from his cell phone retrieved the number of an after-hours vet clinic on the edge of Charlotte, whose answering machine assured him the clinic was open until midnight, even though “our staff cannot take your call right now.”

  Danny read the time on his phone. Seven o’clock. He could drop the dog at the clinic and still get to the party in time to offer warm congratulations to his number one rival.

  MADISON BEALE FUMED as she typed the notes on her last patient, a cat suffering a distended stomach from gorging itself on a rat almost half its size. The owner had delayed bringing it to the clinic because she didn’t want to miss her favorite TV show. When Madison had said pointedly that if the show had been a double episode the cat would have died, the woman had been shocked, but not repentant.

  The sudden slam of the clinic’s outside door sent Madison’s hand skittering across the keyboard.

  “Anybody there?” The masculine voice that called from the waiting area sounded strained.

  When she hurried out, she saw why. The man was tall, but the dog struggling in his arms, while undeniably a mongrel, looked to have more than a passing acquaintance with a Saint Bernard somewhere up the family tree. “Keep still, dammit,” the man snapped at the animal.

  Madison bristled. “That’s no way to talk to your pet.”

  “It’s not a pet, it’s a road hazard. Where can I put him?”

  She shifted a display of flea treatments before the writhing animal overturned it. “Just lay him on the floor.”

  The guy let out a grunt of relief as he lowered the dog gently to the floor. Madison crouched down, too, her face just inches from the stranger’s, giving her a close-up of strong cheekbones, well-molded lips and a square jaw. She sat back on her heels.

  “You found him on the road?” With calm, firm strokes, she soothed the dog.

  “I, uh, ran him over.” When she looked up, startled, he added, “He ran out in front of my truck. I’d pretty much stopped when I hit him, but I think he got cut by the winch on my front grille.”

  She scratched the dog under its chin. “Okay, gorgeous,” she crooned, “let’s take a look.” She darted a quick glance at the man. “Gorgeous is the dog, obviously.”

  “Obviously,” he said drily.

  Examining the dog, Madison found a deep laceration to his thorax, but no broken limbs, no sloughed skin, no indication of blunt trauma. “He’ll be fine, but this cut on his chest will need stitching.”

  The guy didn’t reply, and Madison looked up to find him frowning at her.

  “You’re a vet, right?” he said. “Not a student, or something?”

  “Of course I’m a vet.” She knew she looked younger than her twenty-seven years.

  “You have a stocking on your head,” he said abruptly.

  Instinctively, she put a hand to her hair. She’d forgotten she was wearing the red wool Christmas stocking, complete with pipe-smoking snowman, that the grateful owner of an epileptic German shepherd had knitted for her. “It’s a variation on the Santa hat—I wear it at Christmas to cheer people up. Most folk who come here after hours have an emergency on their hands. I like to help them relax.”

  “Did it occur to you they might find a white coat more reassuring?” He eyed her green chenille scoop-neck sweater and slim black pants as if they were a clown costume.

  “What’s most reassuring is when I treat their pets’ problems,” she retorted. “My name is Madison Beale, and I’ve been a vet here four years—you’ll see my diploma on the wall.” She jerked her head toward the counter, behind which hung all the staff’s qualifications. “I’ve treated plenty of injuries like this, and I promise you this one isn’t too bad, Mr….”

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nbsp; It was the perfect opportunity for Mr. Slow-Brakes to introduce himself, but he didn’t.

  “Fine, you’re a vet,” he said, as if he’d just made it so by personal decree. “That means you can stitch him up, right?”

  Madison felt through the thick brown fur of the dog’s neck—at odds with his short-haired jowly face—for a collar. Nothing. “Do you know where he lives?”

  He ran his hands through his dark hair, flattened by the rain. “I was in the middle of nowhere.”

  The movement showed the flex of muscle beneath the white shirt plastered to his chest, courtesy of said rain. His shoulders were broad, and where his collar was unbuttoned, Madison glimpsed a strong throat.

  When she met his dark eyes it occurred to her he looked familiar. “If we can’t find the owner, will you pay for the treatment?”

  She’d treat the dog regardless, but her boss objected—loudly and often, despite the clinic’s robust financial health—to the amount of free care Madison dispensed. This guy was wearing dress clothes and, if she wasn’t mistaken, that chunky steel watch on his wrist was a Rolex.

  He glanced at the Rolex, and, guiltily, she jerked her gaze back to his face.

  “Sure.” He pulled out his wallet, put a credit card on the counter. “I have to go, but I’ll give you my details—”

  “You’re leaving?” Madison said, confused.

  “Yeah.” He looked around. “Is there somewhere I can wash up?”

  “But—what about the dog?”

  Displaying considerable ability to read the moment, the dog whimpered and his head slumped forward.

  “You said he’d be fine.” A business card joined the credit card on the counter. “Call me tomorrow if you like, tell me how it went. Right now, I’m late for a party.”

  “You’re going to a party?” Madison’s voice rose. He might as well have said he had to get home to a TV show. “You ran over a dog. You can’t walk away from your responsibility.”

  Danny observed with some alarm the flashing of Madison Beale’s tawny brown eyes, the clenching of her fists on her hips. She looked like a fairy that had toppled off the Christmas tree in the corner, with her petite figure and that ridiculous stocking on her head. She’d been all tender concern while she examined the dog. Now she looked at Danny as if he’d lined the animal up for target practice.

  “I checked that you’re qualified to treat him and I said I’d pay. That’s as responsible as I get.” He didn’t have time to argue, so he fixed her with the hard stare that he used to intimidate his rivals before they went out on the track.

  “That’s not good enough—” She stopped, and he saw recognition dawn. “You’re…Danny Cruise,” she said hesitantly, and he noted with satisfaction that her hands unclenched. “You’re The Natural.”

  As always, the nickname grated. Danny had been tagged with it the first time he climbed into a race car and never managed to shake it off. Yeah, he’d won a lot of races, and yeah, he was more at home behind the wheel of a stock car than anywhere else. But nothing about those “effortless” wins, as the press called them, had been natural. He’d earned every inch of pavement through hard work, grit and one hundred and ten percent focus. He never got into a car certain of victory. But people didn’t like to hear that, so he said neutrally, “That’s me.”

  “I didn’t recognize you without your uniform.” Her eyes narrowed, as if she still wasn’t certain he was Danny Cruise. “Seems strange that a NASCAR driver couldn’t brake in time to avoid a dog.”

  “Have you seen the roads tonight?” he demanded.

  She pursed her lips. “I guess you don’t have much experience driving in the rain—you’re probably no better than the average Joe in bad weather.”

  He snorted. “Even blindfolded with both hands tied behind my back, I’m a lot better than the average Joe.”

  She huffed as if she suspected that was exactly how tonight’s accident had happened.

  “Look, I feel bad about the dog,” he said, though in fact he was more worried about NASCAR’s new chassis specifications. “But I’m on my way to Trent Matheson’s victory celebration.”

  Trent Matheson was a homegrown star, and now that he’d won the series, he was Charlotte’s undisputed hero. Madison softened visibly.

  “I’ll bet Trent could have stopped in time,” she said.

  Danny bit down on a rude comment. “If I couldn’t stop, no one could.”

  “Be that as it may—” she was all snooty disbelief “—you can’t go now. I need help moving this fellow. And he may need calming while I stitch him up.” She eyeballed Danny, presumably trying to look tough. Someone should tell her that with that chestnut hair peeping out from under her stocking, with her eyes wide and her chin tilted, she could make a killing selling Girl Scout cookies. “You might have hundreds of people wanting to see you tonight, but right now, this dog has no one.”

  Which meant Danny and the dog had more in common than she would probably believe.

  CHAPTER TWO

  MADISON HAD RESIGNED herself to ruining a colleague’s evening off. It took a few seconds to realize that her powers of persuasion were greater than she’d dreamed. She’d called Danny Cruise, NASCAR star, on his bad attitude, and now he was unbuttoning his shirt-cuffs, rolling up his sleeves to reveal strong forearms sprinkled with dark hair.

  “Uh, right,” she said, not as crisply as she’d have liked. “How about you carry him into the treatment room down the end of the hallway?”

  When the dog was safely on the stainless steel treatment table, she administered an intravenous sedative. The animal panicked as the liquid went in, but Danny did a good job of holding him still. That, coupled with the same diamond-hard glare he’d directed at Madison earlier, seemed to have at least as much effect on the animal as the drug.

  “We need to wait five minutes for the sedative to take effect,” she told Danny as she threaded her needle.

  With most clients, she’d make casual conversation while they waited. But Danny’s “Uh-huh” wasn’t encouraging and the dog wasn’t a beloved pet whose diet and exercise regime they could discuss. Madison trained her gaze on the clock above the door, watched the second hand’s staccato journey around the dial.

  Funny how twenty seconds of silence could feel like an hour.

  She glanced at Danny. He was looking right at her, yet she could tell he didn’t see her. His dark brows were drawn together, his lips clamped as if he might say something he regretted. She’d always thought his mouth was his best feature, whenever she saw him in close-ups on TV. It was the sort of mouth a woman might—She jerked her gaze back up to the clock. Thirty-four seconds.

  “I’m sorry to make you late for Trent’s party,” she told him in a desperate bid for conversation.

  He cocked a skeptical eyebrow and didn’t reply.

  “Trent’s my favorite driver,” she said. “That race at Homestead was incredible.” She winced, added apologetically, “Not for you, I guess.”

  Danny shrugged. “You can’t win ’em all.” It came out casual, relaxed, just as he intended.

  “And the way Trent proposed to his girlfriend right after the race…” Madison sighed, a faraway look on her face.

  “That was smart,” Danny agreed. It had been a PR masterstroke. Not only did Trent’s win score huge coverage in the newspapers, his marriage proposal made the cover of several women’s magazines. Small wonder Trent’s sponsor was footing the bill for tonight’s extravaganza, a combined victory and engagement party.

  “I’d call it romantic,” Madison said sharply.

  “That, too,” Danny said.

  “This is the second year in a row you were runner-up in the Cup, isn’t it?”

  Great, his favorite subject. “Yep.” He’d been second last year, third before that. This year, he should have won.

  “It’s an incredible record.”

  “Thanks,” he said automatically. Then he added warmly, “It’s great, the whole team was thrilled.”
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  Madison’s sudden chortle took him by surprise.

  “What’s so funny?” he demanded.

  Madison’s eyes met his, brimming with amusement, and Danny felt an unexpected tug of attraction.

  “The whole team was thrilled,” she mimicked him. “You so don’t mean that.”

  “I do, too,” he said, outraged. He’d practiced that mix of pride and delight out loud, over and over. If a woman he’d never met before could see right through him, what chance did he have of sounding gracious in defeat when he got to the party?

  “Maybe the team was thrilled,” she said, “but you weren’t. I’ve seen you on TV.”

  “Oh, well, in that case…” he said sarcastically. People who’d seen him on TV had told him he was vitamin A deficient, that he was ambidextrous, that he was the metaphysical twin of a Tibetan monk. Why shouldn’t a vet with a stocking on her head be able to read his mind over the airwaves?

  “Before the race, during the invocation and the national anthem, you have this look on your face,” she said. “A kind of set, fixed gaze, and your mouth goes into a thin line.” She colored slightly as she looked at his mouth. “It’s like you’re not really there, your mind has gone on ahead.”

  Okay, so she was right about that. Everyone got lucky sometimes. Intent on disconcerting her, Danny looked right back at her mouth, and discovered her lips to be full and well shaped. He ended up resorting to a childish, “So what?”

  “Winning matters to you….”

  “It matters to every driver out there,” he shot back. Her “insight” was nothing more than a bad case of stating the obvious.

  She tutted. “You didn’t let me finish. Winning matters to you more than anything.” She smirked. “No way were you happy with second place.”

  “You don’t know me,” he said flatly.

  “During my training I worked with racehorses.”