Hot Laps

by Shey Stahl

  “Goddamn, this boy could fuck,” was what was on my mind.

  “You’re beautiful,” he panted about the time he bent me over my desk.

  I said nothing as moaning and holding on was the only thing I could do. Every touch scorched my skin as though he was on fire or maybe I was.

  Either way, it was hot, both physically and … whatever.

  Now when Casten said, “Let me show you exactly how I plan to apologize,” I knew what this involved but this wasn’t what I had imagined.

  “Oh god, Casten!” I screamed with very little volume control. My hands reached back and grabbed his that were firmly grasping my hips.

  “Jesus, Hayden,” he moaned. “I can’t hold on if you do that.”

  “Neither can I …” was my last coherent string of words before I fell apart on my desk. My chest slumped against my keyboard, each nipple pressing a key I’m sure based on their stiffness.

  Casten bent forward lying on my back, his body jerked as he let out a soft grunt of pure pleasure.

  “I’ll take that apology every day.” I told him once we were upright again.

  His eyes cast down, his long thick lashes were shadowed. Then, with a lazy smirk, he lifted his head. “I was hoping you understood the meaning rather than the gesture.”

  “And that would be?” I slipped my shirt over my shoulders and then pulled my jeans up.

  He stepped closer, sincerity swept over me just by his gaze. “That I really like you.”

  There’s the “really like” phrase again.

  Me, well, I avoided anything feeling related, and said, “Shall we go to Texas?”

  He smiled. “Sure,” and nodded toward the door. “I just need to lock up the shop and then we need to get some clothes.”

  “So we’re flying or driving because I don’t have money for a plane ticket. Or gas … so I’m actually pretty useless.”

  His shirt was still off and my pants were still unbuttoned when we heard, “Oh, there you are, honey. Listen, your dad said you were coming to Texas this weekend.” It was his mother. His fucking mother. She was walking and talking and not looking. “I’ll be there sometime Sunday morning but I have to fly to Washington first and then back to Texas.”

  Shit on a fucking shingle.

  And then she looked up and saw the scene before her.

  “Oh … wow. I’m so sorry!” she screeched.

  “Hey, Mama,” Casten said, with absolutely no panic to his tone, yanking his shirt back on quickly.

  So that’s his mom. Huh, awkward.

  His mom giggled stepping toward us. “You must be Hayden?”

  A quick cherry red flush spread rapidly over every part of my skin. “Yep, that’s me.”

  “It’s nice to meet you.” Was her next reply and then reached for my hand. “Casten told me how much fun you two have been having together.”

  Casten laughed running his hands through his hair. “Thanks, Mama.”

  She slapped at his chest. “Oh, you stop.” Her pretty green eyes met mine. “It’s nice he has someone other than Cole.”

  I wasn’t sure how to respond. I’d never met the parents of anyone I messed around with and now I’d just had sex with her son, and she’s here, being kind to me. This was a lot of firsts for me in one day.

  “I won’t keep you two …” her eyes fell upon me once again. “It was nice meeting you. Drive carefully, baby,” she said, kissing Casten’s forehead.

  Casten started laughing as soon as she was out the door. “Well, that was interesting.”

  “Not exactly how I envisioned meeting your mom,” I told him leaning against my desk after putting my boots on.

  “Well,” he gave me that adorable wink he had. “My mom’s a champ.”

  “I’ll say.”

  Casten shrugged his jacket back on. “Road trip?”

  “That’s a really long drive …”

  “It’s only sixteen hours.” He shrugged. “No problem.”

  “Why don’t you fly?”

  “I don’t like to fly.” And he left it at that.

  Just as we were about to leave, he glanced at my desk, memories I’m sure engulfed him as they were me, as well. “I’ll never look at your desk the same way.” He shoved the stapler in the pocket of his jacket. “I’ll be keeping this, by the way. I’m jealous of it now.” He hinted knowing where it was lodged just moments ago.

  We were out the door and standing at his truck when he looked at me strangely. Having just agreed to leave my car here and take his to Texas, I thought maybe he was second-guessing the trip for a minute.

  But it wasn’t that.

  He was kissing me, again, with a little more passion than he had inside the office.

  With his head bent forward, a smile tugged at his lips. “What is this?” he asked with a shyness I didn’t know Casten Riley could have.

  “Fucking?” I replied quickly. My mouth had gotten me in enough shit lately.

  He stepped forward; his hands grasped my waist pushing me against the truck roughly, head meeting glass as the cool night air wrapped around us. “Nah, I think it’s more than that. You just don’t wanna say it.”

  “What?”

  “You’re only fucking me, aren’t you?”

  I was screwed…he broke through me. Right then he broke me down to nothing and I cried.

  I cried against his shoulder. Actually cried real tears. “I don’t know what’s happening to me. I used to be … so cool. Now I’m building fuck forts for a guy who whispers dirty engine terms to me. Who does that shit?”

  He laughed, threw his goddamn head back and let out an adorable fucking laugh. “Let’s go on a road trip.”

  We stopped off at my apartment and shoved some clothes in a plastic garbage bag. Then we headed to Casten’s house to pack some clothes. First, we made use of the fuck fort. We had to. Casten had told me on the way there was no way he was going to make it sixteen hours without thinking about the fort if we didn’t give it a proper goodbye.

  Inside those sheet walls and fluffy pillows, it was hot, sweaty and sticky.

  It didn’t stop us though. No way.

  With him laid out before me, his head propped against pillows, I licked him from base to tip before taking him in my mouth slowly, watching his reaction to my every movement.

  He didn’t disappoint. It was evident, if not in his eyes, but the flex and tremble of his stomach muscles, that he was enjoying it.

  Swirling and bobbing, he sat up slightly on his elbows, his right hand sweeping my hair aside for a better view.

  “Jesus, don’t tease me.” Casten tossed his head back, his breathing increased just about the time he placed his bare feet flat on the fuck fort floor and arched his back diving into my increased motions.

  Tease him?

  “How am I teasing you?”

  He smiled, his excited teased eyes met mine. “You just are. I want you too much. It’s all I can think about.”

  Well the feeling was definitely mutual but throughout all this, I kept thinking about my girly breakdown in the parking lot earlier.

  When did I turn into such a pussy?

  I never cried. I never did multiple fuck fort nights. Hell, I’d never built a fuck fort before. And, the most important never? I had never been in love. Unless, of course, you took into account Sampson, the dead goldfish.

  Casten startled me when he pulled away and flipped me over. One hand found my ass and then other the back of my neck. He laid me down in a sea of fuck fort pillows.

  “So fucking amazing.” He peered down at me as though I was his favorite brand of beer.

  “So are you, stud. Now are you gonna fuck me or stare at me?” I wiggled my hips to get my point across.

  Once again, he had my body bending in directions that were not safe from my stand point.

  Ten minutes into it, I had to stop him when I felt my knees giving me black eyes.

  “Okay, I’m all for this awesome sex but … I have concerns when my knees tou
ch my cheeks.”

  He laughed, threw that adorable fucking head back and laughed.

  Spreading my legs, he leaned forward pressing his chest against mine, slower movements took over. “Well then, pretty girl, how about I show you a more gentle side?”

  “Just don’t make me cry again.”

  “I can’t promise you that.”

  His lips, fire and ice, met mine softly. “You’re so pretty,” he whispered pushing forward, tenderly. “I love these chocolate kiss eyes of yours.” Kissing my eyelid, his lips then pressed to my forehead as he shook above me.

  The forehead kiss. The fucking forehead kiss!

  Gentle was good, right?

  Yeah, good. Sweet as a forehead kiss.

  And then the tears came and I pushed the engine builder away.

  “Oh, goddamn it,” I wailed reaching for a pillow to scream into. “What is wrong with me?”

  This time Casten didn’t laugh, he just stared at me pulling a fuck fort blanket up around us before he laid me against his chest. That just brought new tears because the adorable engine builder who I built fuck forts for and only humped, was being sweet to the girl who got drunk every night, fucked an entire hockey team (aside from the goalie) and couldn’t actually remember how many people she slept with.

  This is what I liked to refer to as: Rock. Ass. Bottom.

  “Shhh …” he soothed bringing another wave of emotions that I was less than proud of.

  Moments passed, more tears flowed and I think I frightened him because he began to sit up.

  No words were spoken for close ten minutes, believe me, I counted the agonizing minutes.

  “Are you scared?” he whispered around three in the morning when I still hadn’t calmed down. I was no longer in control of myself. “Do you not want to go to Texas with me?”

  “Yes. You scare me,” I finally admitted.

  He did scare me. Some thought I drank to relieve the pain or something equally as troubling. I didn’t though. I drank because that was me. Until now. For the first time I let myself fall into something other than drinking and I wasn’t familiar with it. I had nothing to go on aside from my twelve hour relationship with Sampson.

  Now look at me. Crying uncontrollably in the arms of an engine builder on the floor in his bedroom in a fuck fort that I built.

  If that doesn’t scream, “Girl with issues, run!” I don’t know what does.

  “Don’t be scared. I won’t hurt you,” he said more to the pillow next to me than to me.

  I looked up at him through my emotional shit show. “It’s not me I’m worried about.”

  Realization finally hit him and silenced him.

  “You won’t hurt me.” He let out a laugh gesturing around. “You built a fuck fort for me.”

  “Maybe we should … you know … make some rules.”

  If AA had steps, I think my first relationship needed rules.

  “Sure,” he nodded in agreement, “like what?”

  “Well,” I sat up wrapping a sheet around myself. “I’m only … well, uh … are you?”

  “Am I what?” a knowing smile tugged at the corners of his beautiful lips.

  His hands moved from my legs to rest behind his head in a very arrogant way. I half expected the fucker to whisper some kind of dirty engine term.

  “You’re gonna make me say it, aren’t you?”

  “I’d like you, too,” he winked, letting out a gentle laugh.

  Stupid butthole.

  We stared at each other for a few moments before he broke me completely.

  “My god! I’m only fucking around with you and I’d like to keep it that way.” I spoke the words like a beaten dog would if he could speak, soft and timid. I might have even flinched.

  Casten chuckled. “Was that so hard, pretty girl?”

  I laughed right along with him, but it was more of a cry. “Yes.”

  “It was nice to hear.” He looked me directly in the eye, implying with utmost seriousness.

  “I better be the only one on your dick, too!”

  “Yes ma’am!” he agreed with a salute.

  Conversations ended after that because we had a road trip to get to.

  Inverted – Sending the quickest cars to the back of the field.

  In terms I never thought a guy like me would use, I had a girlfriend.

  As of right now. We didn’t come out and say it but, in reality, that’s what it was.

  And that was that. We didn’t have some long drawn out discussion or anything.

  Strangest fucking week ever.

  It took one week to give in and two to fall for her. Two weeks. Well, if you want to get technical about it, not even two weeks yet.

  When I finally told her that I was feeling something for her, I felt like a huge weight had been lifted. All week I was constantly fighting it, wondering what it would mean and now it was out there.

  As we loaded a few bags behind the seat of the truck, I watched Hayden, a soft pink to her cheeks. She smiled a lot and I liked to think it had something to do with me and our conversation.

  We were dating.

  I’ve never dated. I’ve had girls I’ve regularly messed around with, but never dated just them. Now I wasn’t even thinking about other girls. None. Not even Zoey, who usually kept my interest longer than most.

  Tommy called just as we got on the road. Neither one of us was tired so we decided to get a head start and just crash in a hotel.

  “What?” I asked Tommy when he danced around his hello.

  “You’re in your truck?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay,” and then he hung up.

  Knowing Tommy, I didn’t think much of it.

  It was an hour later and we were sitting in our truck heading down Interstate 77 talking about nothing in particular. She was telling me about how her and Adam got to living together and then asked why I was so lucky to still be living at home.

  “I’m not sure.” Leaning toward her, I swung one arm over the back of the seat. “I’m kind of a mama’s boy. I like living there and well,” I smiled, “you’ve been in my bed. It’s comfortable.”

  “It definitely is.” She watched out the window as a truck passed by us. “Are you going to move out eventually?”

  “Yeah, eventually. It’s not like I want to live at home the rest of my life.”

  “That’s good. I hated living at home.”

  “Why?” It suddenly dawned on me I didn’t know a whole lot about Hayden as far as her childhood. Something made her the way she was.

  “My sister was perfect and my parents got to be real assholes. They thought I should’ve been more like the hailed Haley.” Hayden rolled her eyes. “I know she fucked around and got into trouble, but in their eyes she was perfect. It was annoying.”

  “So your parents favored her?”

  It explained a lot. I understood the favorite. For a while I felt like Axel was the favorite in our family but it’s hard to feel that way when you have parents like ours. They never let any of us feel like we weren’t loved.

  Even when my dad was pissed at me. He got pissed because he loved me. That I understood. If he didn’t care enough to yell, that’s when I knew I’d overstepped the line.

  Hayden seemed at that line with her parents.

  “And they kicked you out?”

  Hayden took a big slurp from her water bottle and then replaced the cap and let the bottle slide down to the floorboard. For once we weren’t drinking. Almost seemed entertaining.

  “Up until two weeks ago, I’d never had a job.” She sighed, her eyes on her hands. “When I graduated I think they thought I’d follow in Haley’s footsteps and head to college. I got decent grades,” she shrugged. “But I didn’t want to go. I was eighteen and had very little direction. I was so completely different from Haley that I think it shocked them a little. They left me alone for a while, but after I didn’t come home for three days and then showed up drunk and belligerent toward my mom, they told me
I needed to move out.” Hayden shrugged again. “So I did.”

  “Why were you upset with your mom?”

  “Every time I’d come home she felt the need to tell me about everything Haley was doing. That day she insisted on telling me that she got A’s in all her classes and now was in a sorority … just shit that didn’t pertain to me. She went to college in California, clear across the United States, to get away from our parents but yet they insisted she was perfect.”

  I nodded, sensing the conversation was upsetting her, and decided to change it. She surprised me when she folded her legs and turned to look at me.

  “What’s that tattoo on your shoulder for?”

  “This one?” I lifted my sleeve to the princess fairy I had on my right shoulder. When I was fourteen Nathan thought it’d be funny to tattoo my shoulder. Worst idea ever. It was like this horrible stick figure fairy, too.

  Hayden laughed. “No. The other shoulder.”

  She was talking about the one I had done for Ryder last year.

  “It’s for my dad’s friend,” I stopped myself. “My friend, Ryder Christensen.”

  “The guy who was killed at Perris?”

  I nodded. “Yeah, he was like my mentor in racing. My dad taught me a lot but he was so busy with Cup all the time so that left Ryder. He was always heavy into USAC and that’s all I raced.”

  “But your brother, he doesn’t race USAC, right?”

  “He used to but then when he was seventeen he started racing in the Outlaws. When my grandpa Jimi retired he took over his ride.”

  “And that number on your chest, that’s Jimi’s number?”

  She was way more perceptive than I gave her credit for. “Yes, that’s his number.”

  “Are you going to race again?”

  “Yeah, I was thinking about it. That car in the corner of the shop is mine. Just gotta get it going.”

  I stared out the window, trying to make heads or tails of my thoughts about that Chili Bowl race when she scooted closer to me and into my side.

  For a while, I thought I’d never race again but the thought of never getting in a car again was sad to me. I knew I needed to step away for a while, and now the time had come where I wanted that part of me back. In fact, part of me understood that I might have quit for the very same reason why I told myself I wanted to go back. It wasn’t the same anymore.