I fire up the engine and pull out of pits, ready for qualifying.

Her taste is still in my mouth.

The taste of her soft tears, and her loving eyes.

My veins are chock-full of fucking meds, and I should feel slower.

I don’t.

I feel more powerful than I ever have.

Because I let her see me—and she responded like I always prayed she would.

She fucking gets me.

And I’ve fucking got her.

“Okay girl,” I say once I’m in the clear for qualifying. “Let’s show the world who we are.”

Lana

“FUCKING SHIT, HE QUALIFIED FIRST!!”

“Un-fucking-believable—fresh out of the hospital, and he qualified first!”

I’m about to burst from the excitement, and while my brothers are yelling at each other in disbelief, Racer leaps out of the car.

Racer.

My Racer.

All mine, I think greedily. I want everything that he is, all for me.

There’s euphoria bubbling up inside me as he reaches out for me and gives me a huge kiss and carries me, kissing me as I kiss him back.

When he sets me down, my brothers leap on him. My brothers’ eyes are glistening, and their smiles are miles and miles wide as they lift him up from the ground.

My dad’s eyes are misty.

Anybody who saw us would think we just won the championship.

They don’t know that we had a moment there where we thought we’d lost him, our #1 driver, and that this is another kind of victory not in any books but ours.

The ride up the elevator to his floor feels like an eternity. It’s just Racer and I riding upstairs. My dad and my brothers stayed with the rest of the team, making sure Kelsey remains in top-notch condition for the race and downloading the race data to review. I’ve never, ever, been the kind of girl to be obsessed with a guy. Guys had always been a second thing in my life, after David. Definitely not something I couldn’t stop thinking about.

But this guy?

I never knew that one guy could melt me with a look or send me flying with a smile.

His body warmth seeping through my clothes. He’s holding me by the waist and pinning me to his side as we ride upstairs.

I shift a little to get closer, and he tightens his hold on me, murmuring in my ear, “Are you happy with qualifying?”

I lift my eyes to his with a grin. “You tell me.”

He smiles because he knows.

I shake my head in something beyond happiness, beyond any word. “I knew you could do it, but you were up against more than anyone out there,” I say.

His eyes gleam mischievously as he looks into mine, sliding a hand down my side as if savoring this happiness of mine. “You’re good medicine,” he says with a husky smirk, pressing his mouth to the top of my head.

I groan as my whole body tightens for him.

He shifts me closer, and I hear the music playing in the elevator. The song, Maps by Maroon 5, before the elevator tings.

He presses his fingers to the small of my back when we reach his floor, and I step out, following him into his room.

“You were incredible,” I breathe.

He smiles enough that his dimple shows, his eyes twinkling.

“I swear you were driving with everything you had. It’s like you pulled out all your stored energy from the past few days,” I continue.

Racer’s eyes gleam devilishly as he opens his door and leads me inside.

“You didn’t know if you could do this with your meds, and look what you did!” I say as he shuts the door behind us, leaning up and wrapping my arms around his hard shoulders. “You beat this, Racer Tate, and we can beat it again. As many times as we need to.”

He chuckles softly, and he looks so boyish and so handsome as he eases back and looks into my face. “Felt good to be back in that car. Felt good to drive.” He strokes his index finger along the freckles on the bridge of my nose, and my lungs begin to struggle for air. “Feels good for your brothers to know about us. And me.” He runs his thumb down my throat and lower, to the start of my T-shirt. “And still nothing feels as good as you, Lana.”

Racer’s eyes smolder as my breath catches. He corners me against the wall, tugging my T-shirt from the waistband of my jeans.

My heart feels as if it can’t fit in my chest—because discovering that you love a man this complex, this exciting, this demanding, this consuming … well, it takes a bit from a girl. Not that I don’t like what it takes; or how my heart thrums in my chest, my blood boils with his nearness, even my silly little nipples and how they stand shamelessly up to salute him when he’s near.

I’m in his room, trembling and anxious to feel him. Racer watches me, those eyes eating me alive as he tugs the fabric of my top downward to reveal my bra. He then tugs my bra down, and pops out a nipple.

“You’re so pretty. You know that right.”

He keeps eye contact with me as he opens his mouth, and his tongue comes out to roll a little circle around my nipple.

I catch my breath, dying inside as I drown in those blue eyes and tremble under that hot tongue caressing my nipple.

I part swallow, part groan, “Don’t torture me …” I beg.

He smothers my nipple with his mouth, shutting his eyes as if he can’t help it anymore, sliding his hand between my thighs. He cups me as he suckles me, groaning as he touches me over my panties.

“Give me all of this girl,” he says, a soft commanding growl as he caresses me over my panties with his index finger.

I rock and roll my hips up to his fingers, realizing I’m out of control but ohmygod, ohmygod, I’ve never wanted anyone’s touch so much, anyone’s kiss so much, anyone so much.

His body vibrates as if he’s holding himself back from doing other equally wicked and pleasurable things to me. I don’t want him to hold back. I move against his hands and run my fingers along his arms, pressing my lips to his jaw. “Racer,” I groan, a plea.

He groans back and eases his finger into my panties, licking into my ear. “God, baby, you want to come right here for me, don’t you? You want to break apart for me, baby,” he purrs.

I nod.

A possessive streak of lightning passes across his blue eyes.

“Tell me you’re mine,” he says, urging me down on the bed as he starts to flick open my buttons.

I’m trembling.

“Racer …” I say.

“Say you’re mine, Lana.” His blue eyes look down at me and quietly demand for me to say it; eyes that are raw and true and so perceptive I know that he knows that it’s true.

I swallow.

“Not anyone else’s. Not David’s anymore. Tell me you’re all mine,” he repeats, clenching his jaw in need and arousal. “You told me some stuff in the hospital, and I want you to tell me now that I’m okay, Lana.”

He shifts, his eyes glimmering as he rubs the pad of his thumb over my lower lip in a caress that I feel down to my toes. He leans down and scents my neck, then pecks my lips, softly, like he does, before licking the seam and easing back to drink in my features once more. His voice rough, husky, male.

“Tell me who you want here. Who keeps you awake at night. Who you think of every second of the day.”

He leans his forehead to mine, his eyes gripping my own, his voice deep and textured as he cups my face as a tear slips.

“It’s me, baby,” he croons tenderly, nuzzles my nose, and brushes the tear from my cheek as he presses a kiss there and then captures my gaze again, “Are you going to tell me my name?”

I tilt my head for his mouth, trying to stop shivering. “Racer, kiss me—”

He presses his thumb to my lips, silencing me. “Tell me,” he says, looking down at me. “Tell me now,” he says.

He slips his hand into the back of my neck and presses his lips to mine—firm but tender, giving me a minute before they stop feeling tender and begin to feel relentless.

“For me, it’s you,” he whispers in my ear. “The one keeping me awake at night. The one in my every thought.” He slips his hand between my legs, sliding it under my skirt as he captures my mouth and kisses the living daylights out of me. The pain out of me. The fear of whatever is happening between us out of me. Until there is only one giant, tingling feeling—and it’s all over my body. A fire shaking through me, under my skin, IN my skin, in my veins, my tummy, the tips of my breast, the warm spot between my legs that suddenly feels so swollen it’s uncomfortable.