“Huh?”

He pulls into the streets and reaches around and tugs me close to him, over the sideboard, and I realize that he’s holding me to his chest, and that his hand has slid down my back and his fingers are dangerously close to my bum. My heart starts to pound and I can’t seem to think straight because his eyes are so so close, so so blue, and so so hypnotizing even as he stares angrily ahead.

“I … I don’t succumb to my every whim, if that’s what you’re asking,” I defend myself.

He just stares at me, then at the road, driving with one hand, the other on me.

“Right now I could be thinking of doing things I want to do, I feel compelled to do, but because I know I’m going to regret them, I don’t do them.”

“What things,” he wants to know, pointedly surveying my mouth.

“Well … I, uh.”

He’s breathing hard still, his nostrils flaring as he visually dissects my features. And I’m partly straddling and partway lying on his chest, his lap beneath me—his erection so prominent it hurts to look at because my whole body is jealous of my eyes.

I pry free of his embrace, meeting his expression.

“I want to make love to you and I want you to make love to me,” I admit, sitting back in my seat, and he just looks at me hotly.

I cover my mouth. “Oh my god. I’m … I think I’m buzzed.”

He smiles, laughing, but his eyes are still so hot. “I’m taking you up on that,” he rasps, a low promise as he reaches out, looking at me fiercely and stroking his thumb along my jaw. “I need to go out for a run, chill myself out, because you just set me on fire, girl. But I’m definitely taking you up on that when you’re sober, and you look at me the way you’re looking at me now.”

I close my eyes and shudder, nodding. We say nothing else until we arrive at the hotel; he walks me to my room, and then, when I open my door, he walks in with me.

He starts to undress me, kissing the back of my neck as he unzips my dress from behind, and I’m shocked to feel how expertly he does it, pull off my dress, unhook my bra, leave me in just my panties as he scoops me up and sets me down on the bed.

He seems agitated and a little hyper as he removes my shoes, kissing every part of me that’s near; my thigh, the inside of my ankle, he pulls off my strappy heels and strokes his hand up my leg, the inside of my knee, growling softly, squeezing my thigh in one big, callused hand as he then leans forward and kisses my pussy over my panties.

“I want you so bad,” he says, licking the wet spot there, before he exchanges his tongue with his thumb and looks up at me. “I’m never going to get enough of you,” he promises me, leaning over and kissing my lips—and they taste of me, of my pussy—before he pulls the sheet to my chest.

His forehead is against mine, his eyes holding my gaze hostage.

“When I get my hands on you, you’ll be made love to like you’ve never been made love to before.” He grabs my face, squeezes it and pecks my lips in the fiercest way he’s ever done. “I’m going to fuck all those moans out of you until the whole hotel and city hears you.”

With that the guy is gone, leaving me the horniest I’ve ever been in my whole damn life, ready to scream from the unfairness of it. I don’t hear him go into his room; and the whole night I wonder where he went.

I toss and turn. Naked or almost naked in my bed (I never sleep like this!) with nothing but a pair of panties that are wet from my own arousal and his delicious kiss.

I can’t seem to sleep at all. I’m worried about my dad, my brothers’ relationship with Racer, I’m worried about Racer and his attitude and his recklessness—and his panty-twisting, soul-searing kisses and the way he looks at me. I don’t know why this is happening to me right now. When we uprooted, I never once thought about complaining, about what I would miss. My friends back home, going to a normal college instead of an online one while doing it in some hotel room. I never once thought about me, because my dad and my brothers’ dreams became my own. Because David was gone, Mom didn’t love me, and as far as I was concerned, I didn’t have anything left that I couldn’t afford to lose. Then comes this guy, the one guy who has the talent and guts enough to help us achieve what we’ve been working so hard for. And I’m feeling selfish, because I want him for myself as much as I want to win this championship. I’m tempted to throw all caution to the wind, and let myself fall for him even when I am afraid I am not getting much of a choice.

Lana

We’re in Russia, having breakfast at the hotel, when the Clark drivers come in. Clark does a double take when they see us. “What? She your girlfriend?”

“She will be.” Racer smiles cockily and winks at me, and I frown at him and stiffen my spine as I keep eating my omelet.

“Lainie … seriously, you can do much better.”

Racer kicks his chair back and stands, looking at him. “Take a hike, Clark.”

A self-absorbed smile appears on his face and he shoots me a smile. “You’ll come around. Nobody wants to date a loser. Especially when she can have a champ.”

One second everything is fine, the next Clark is getting shoved back—HARD. “I said, take a hike.” Clark stumbles for balance as Racer gives him a look that could peel off the skin from his bones.

Racer sits back down, looking at me as Clark exits the shop with his brother without buying a single thing. “Let’s get dessert,” Racer says as he calls the waiter, calm and confident, as if nothing happened.

I blink, still stunned by what happened. “I don’t like guys that are violent,” I whisper, flushing because no man has ever fought for me before. “Too much testosterone if you ask me.”

“I’m not violent.” He grins, but his eyes look a little dark and angry. A little lusty, too, as he watches me finish my omelet. “If I were, I’d have cracked that motherfucker’s skull,” he gruffs out.

We do well in practice, but during qualifying, Clark gets in the way, and we don’t seem to be able to catch up with his fastest lap.

“Tate said she didn’t have enough torque,” Drake is filling me in. “Doesn’t seem comfortable in the car. He seems off these past few days.”

I watch Kelsey get too close to the car in front. Suddenly Kelsey’s nose grazes the car in front, and she flips. He’s in the air.

In

The

Fucking

AIR.

I’m on my feet, screaming “NO!!” and covering my mouth as the car flips three times before he lands with a crash against the wall. Debris is landing everywhere; and the car parts are scattered all across the track. The nose. Two wheels. Broken parts from the tail. I can only see the cockpit, and the cloud of dark steam coming off the engine against the wall.

My whole body collapses and I feel my dad catch me.

“Lainie baby,” my dad says worriedly.

I start to hyperventilate, and they bring me a little bag to breathe in. “Is he okay?!” I’m begging my brothers to know as I breathe into the bag and frantically try to see some movement from inside the cockpit.

One hand comes out to flip his visor back—and I almost faint from the relief washing over my ice-cold bones.

“He’s signaling from the car, I think he’s okay,” Clayton assures me.

It takes forever for the car to be brought back, in shambles.

And Racer has to walk the way home from the track. He storms into pits like a devil on a vengeance spree. He sends me a heated look when his helmet comes off, his hair standing this way and that, his eyes blue like laser beams. He grits his jaw and heads over to our tent and slam his helmet down. “What the fuck,” Clayton tells him.

“I wasn’t concentrating.” He drags his hand along the back of his neck and makes a fist at his side.

“You—”

“I wasn’t concentrating.”

“This is our best car,” Clayton says.

“Was,” Drake says.

Racer storms away, more furious than my three brothers combined.

There’s dead silence as we ride back to the hotel in my family’s rented van.