Chapter Twelve
Breanna was bouncing up and down beside Isaac’s yellow import when Jordan coasted through the intersection and past the exit ramp. He killed the engine as he pulled to a stop just past her.
Jordan’s grin was contagious, almost too contagious.
The Mustang came to a stop behind us and Jordan’s grin only grew wider when he checked his rearview. “He’s pissed.”
Jordan popped open his door and stepped out. I slid out behind him, wriggling past the steering wheel in time to see the look of pure shock and terror that slid across Mr. Popped Collar’s face. He might be arrogant, but he knew when he’d met his match.
He didn’t cower, which was surprising.
Jordan had the kid by nearly a foot and almost a hundred pounds of muscle. He towered over Popped Collar and crossed his arms across his chest. “How old are you?”
“Old enough.” The kid tried to snarl with his chest still puffed out, but it only made Jordan laugh.
The curly haired girl who held the money jogged up and handed it to me. “You got straight hustled, dude.” She laughed at him before turning toward Jordan with a jerk of her chin. “Hey, Slater.”
“Cara,” he said her name with an ease that told me they knew each other well. I was missing something. When I looked from one to the other, Jordan answered the question in my eyes. “She’s Rascal’s niece.”
“Oh yeah! I remember you.” The last time I’d seen her she’d barely been off training wheels. It made sense that I’d be drawn to her. Rascal had raised his niece most of her life. I’d seen her dozens of times, before she’d hit puberty.
“Well, Jimmy.” Cara was beaming, pride and laughter practically rolling off her in waves. “You finally got your shot at one of the Street Kings and got your ass drug by Jordan Slater in his daily driver.”
Jimmy wilted in defeat. His face morphed through all the stages of shock.
Jordan leaned against the truck, grinning beneath the bill of his hat, quite comfortable with his small-town celebrity.
“Seriously?” The incredulous tone of Jimmy’s voice had me turning away to hide the smirk on my face.
Cara pointed at me and then Breanna. “Aiden Casey’s little sisters, bro. You should have known better.”
“I just got hustled by Jordan Slater.” He spoke reverently, with his eyes wide. “That’s cool. When can I take a shot at the Malibu?”
Jordan laughed. The sound was vibrant, alive, and filled with good humor. “Bro, you got a lot to do before you take a shot at me like that. If you can’t hang with the truck, you ain’t worth the car’s time. Put some work in, get some grudge races under your belt, then come see me when that thing will run from a dig. But, don’t come light.” He rubbed his fingers together, a universal sign to show him the money.
He saluted as he held the truck door open for me. I slid in, for the moment feeling every part Jordan’s girl.
Isaac leaned in the window as the door clanged shut behind Jordan. “Imma take Breanna to get her truck and we’re headed over to their shop.”
“Loitering where you won’t get popped by the cops?” I teased.
“What can I say, your dad doesn’t seem to mind punk ass street racers in his parking lot.” Isaac’s teeth flashed in a feral smile.
“It pays the bills.”
Jordan fired up the truck as Isaac sauntered off. “Where we going?”
I felt free and happy, like I hadn’t in a very long time. The sensation would be short lived, I couldn’t be that easy when I was with Jordan, not with the tension that gripped us both. “I guess the shop.” Racers in town had been picking up races from our parking lot since my parents opened the place. Being at the shop meant I wouldn’t be alone with him.
“Did you talk to Devin?” His voice was so quiet, I barely heard it over the roar of the Chevy’s engine.
I heaved a sigh. I didn’t want to answer that question, nor did I want to have that discussion with Devin. “No, not yet. To be honest I haven’t had a chance to talk too much of anyone. With SKS coming up we’ve been slammed.” Having a talk with Devin meant confronting the past with Jordan. It meant I would have to contemplate what our future held.
He grunted and didn’t talk for a long moment, not until we turned and headed toward town. “I was the first person you thought of tonight?”
“Yeah.” I didn’t try to lie, there wasn’t much point to it.
“Not Hunter?”
There was a quiet to his question, a complete lack of confidence that amazed me. I turned to check for any obvious chinks in his armor. He merely cocked a brow beneath the brim of his hat. Nothing but his voice to give away what was going on behind his stoic facade.
I conceded with a shake of my hair. “He would have been my second call. But nah, this Jimmy kid is too cocky. He needed to be smacked off his pedestal. I knew you could do it, no questions asked.” I chewed on my bottom lip. “Plus, I really didn’t want to go for a ride with him. I guess I had more faith that you would save me from such a fate.”
He cut a sidelong glance in my direction and his lips twisted in a crooked smile, it was the sort of look that made women need to fan themselves. Myself included. “Does this make me your hero?”
Normally I would have turned away. This time I didn’t, I couldn’t. That’s exactly why it had to be Jordan tonight. I’d seen Jimmy leaning against his car and thought about Caleb. I knew they weren’t the same person, but I’d needed Jordan as that buffer between me and my memories. I’d needed to remind myself of who I’d been, who we were.
I’d needed him to be my hero.
“You did it again.” His voice rumbled low and soft.
“What?” I blinked, twice, to bring myself back to the moment.
“Went somewhere else.” He covered my hand with his.
Out the window our sleepy town flew by. I squeezed the warm, calloused hand that held me anchored to myself. He was my hero, in more ways than one.
“One of us really needs to talk to him.” He rubbed his thumb across my knuckles in a small act of possession that wasn’t lost on me or my libido.
“I know. I will. It should be me.” I pursed my lips, valiantly trying to slow the beating of my heart.
“He’s meeting us at the shop with Vic.” The finality of his words sank down on me, stealing my breath.
My heart dropped into my stomach. “Oh.” That’s all I could say, oh. Devin’s presence meant he’d know I was with Jordan. There’d be no avoiding the talk. “Did you set this up on purpose?”
“No, I was on my way there when I got your message. I told him I got caught up with something. I’m sure by now he knows what it was.”
I shouldn’t have been so quick to jump to conclusions, Jordan wouldn’t have put me on the spot like that. If he could, he’d take the brunt of everything from any of us. By the hard set of his jaw, it was obvious he wished he could take the responsibility from me and the pain from Devin.
I had an epiphany in that moment, the first of several I would have before this was all over. I was more afraid of hurting Jordan, than I was of hurting Devin. I couldn’t do it. I would never put him in front of that particular bullet. “You can drop me off at one of the stores right here and I’ll have Breanna pick me up.”
The look he gave me told me exactly how much he didn’t agree with that idea.
“I don’t want to cause problems with the two of you.” I didn’t. Hurting Jordan was the one thing I couldn’t willingly do.
“Nah.” He squeezed my hand, as if to reassure the panic that was rising in my chest. “Riding from a race with me ain’t a thing. Now, if he caught you in my bed it might cause problems.”
The thought of it sent my heart pumping and not out of fear. The panic was replaced with a deep-rooted desire. I wanted to squirm in my seat. Instead, I focused on the parts of Arkadia that flashed past the window. Anything to keep from thinking about being in his bed.
My cheeks warmed and my chest flushed. I had to pull my hand free. Just touching him had me thinking about being in his bed, beneath him, with his hands and his lips on me.
“Yeah—” He coughed to keep his voice from cracking. “Me, too.”
I hadn’t said a word, he read me that well.
The parking lot of the shop was full, but this time there weren’t any North Side townies with too much money and too much time. There wouldn’t be, unless you counted Devin when he got there. He’d been a North Side townie, until his dad had bought a big piece of land and a house in the country.
Thinking about Devin, kept the lurid thoughts of Jordan temporarily at bay, helped me regain my composure. He had always been the quiet, pretty boy. The one that was an easy target to these big country boys and their bullying. At least until he’d befriended my brother and Jordan. Jordan had protected him, as had all of us, and Devin had flourished.
“Want to know why I called you? Not Devin?”
He encouraged me to continue with another raised brow. “There are guys who love to race and love their race cars, like you and Aiden. Any chance you get, you can both be found racing or working to get ready for a race. Then there are guys like Vic, who just love cars and anything to do with them—if it has a motor and four wheels—he wants to check it out. I can relate to that. I grew up with men like that all around me.”
My words came in a rush now, tumbling over each other in a race to see which thought would come first. “But, then you have guys like Devin, who only want to be race car drivers. He doesn’t love it like you and Aiden. He wants to be known as a guy who does it. He wants the attention gained from street racing. He always has, it’s why he’s always followed you guys around. As much as I love the guy, it’s who he is.”
“I think you’re being hard on him, so you don’t feel guilty.” He said it softly, as if he was cradling me from an unseen blow.
“No, that’s not it. It’s hard for me to explain, Jordan. But there is a love that you and Aiden and even Hunter have for racing. It’s in your blood. You need to know who is the fastest at any given moment, whether you get beat or not. That’s why you were the first one I thought of. That kid, he reminded me of someone. I needed you to fix that for me, I needed you to put it right, because you couldn’t not win. It’s a way of life for you.”
“I bet five hundred bucks that the two things you think about more than anything else in the world are sex and racing. Knowing I’d spend time alone with that creep would have been enough to make you want to beat him. But, that wasn’t all. You live racing, you breathe racing, everything is racing. Even Vic is in love with racing. For Devin, it’s just something to do…something to be. He wanted to be a part of what his friends were a part of, so he is. He wants to be known, to be the guy people talk about on Sunday morning, so he’s trying to put together a car fast enough to beat you at SKS. He wants to be the big fish in the little pond. If nobody cared, he wouldn’t do it. But you? Aiden? You’d still sink every dime you had into your car to see if you could outrun the next guy.”
He couldn’t say much to that, there wasn’t any arguing my point. Because I was right. But then, he surprised me. “Ever think it’s you he’s trying to impress?”
I snorted derisively. Devin might think himself in love with me, but I couldn’t believe he’d built an entire race car just to impress me.
Jordan reached over to turn my face to his. “Look at the guys you’ve always gone for and tell me that’s not what Devin is trying to be.”
I jerked away and opened the door. “And that’s exactly what pisses me off. He doesn’t love me, the only reason he wants me is because you do.” I stormed off, swallowed up by the steadily growing crowd of people in the shop parking lot.
By the time Devin found me, my temper had simmered from its boiling point. Jordan had been wrong. I wasn’t looking for things to make me angry with Devin, to make it easier to tell Devin I wasn’t interested. I could see his faults and still love him, as I saw Jordan’s and my brother’s and still loved them. What I’d told Jordan were a list of reasons I couldn’t love Devin the way he wanted me to. There were things I’d know, things that would fester inside of me, especially if Jordan was right and Devin did them for me.
At the end of every day I would know I loved Jordan Slater because he was true to himself. If I learned anything at all from my time away and all the things that had happened, it was that you couldn’t alter yourself for anyone.
“Hey there, Raelynn.” Devin propped up against the tailgate of Breanna’s truck where I was perched.
“Hi, Devin.” I had to look past him so that the anger didn’t show on my face.
From the corner of my eye, I saw that his smile never faltered. I was struck again with how attractive he was. If that’s all it was about to me, I could go there in a heartbeat. Like every other woman in the county. “I heard you and Jordan won a race tonight.”
“He won a race. I merely hustled my way into a couple of hundred bucks.” I intended to split my winnings among Breanna, Jordan, and myself.
“That’s cool. What are you doing tomorrow night?” And there it was, he didn’t even hesitate. I took a deep breath as soon as he finished his question.
“Can we talk?” My voice stayed even, but my stomach twisted into a knot. Better late than never. The fewer things I had hanging over me the better. I had to make it quick, like ripping off a Band-Aid.
“Sure.” He brightened, misreading me completely. Jordan would have never misread me. He’d see the ripping tide that waged war with the thundering storm inside of me.
From across the parking lot I could feel Jordan’s eyes on us. He knew what was going down.
I used my keys to unlock the front of the shop, the bells on the door singing their echoing clang into the empty room as I coded off the silent alarm. I didn’t turn on the lights. I told myself the parking lot lights gave enough light to see. But at this point, I didn’t want people to be able to look in and see what was going on. I wouldn’t do that to Devin.
And maybe I didn’t want to see him, to see the mark my rejection was going to leave.
He gave me that dazzling smile. My stomach wound itself into even more knots. The smile on my face was forced and most likely came out a grimace. I missed when it was easy, when I could look at Devin and not wonder what he was thinking and if he was misinterpreting something I said or did. I wished for the days when I could hug him and not worry about giving him the wrong idea.
“I miss when none of this mattered.” I gestured between the two of us.
“What do you mean?” The smile slid slowly from his face. I’d reached the point of no return. Over his shoulder, in the parking lot, Jordan watched us.
“Devin…” I lifted my hand and let it fall hopeless and dejected to my side. “I know what it feels like to think I wanted something that I really didn’t.” I didn’t mince my words. I couldn’t. I remembered all too clearly what sort of pain rejection could bring. The poor decisions that pain could force someone into.
“You never know until you try.” His defiance rang clear.
“That’s just it, I do know. I know that whatever you think you feel for me, I don’t feel the same way for you.” A Band-Aid ripped clean.
He turned away from me, fingering through the pages of a parts catalog on the counter. The silence stretched out so long, I began to chew my bottom lip. I thought I’d been shattered by Jordan. I had no idea how much my heart could break when I heard the pain and realization in Devin’s voice. “Because of Jordan.”
“No.” Broken, I didn’t know what to say. So, I lied. “That was a long time ago. He did this to me, remember? That’s why I know this isn’t going to work.”
“You can’t know it won’t work if you never give me a chance.” He laughed without humor.
I worried the hem of my shirt with my fingers. “I love you too much to force feelings that aren’t there. I won’t make you like Aiden, I won’t leave you with someone who doesn’t want to be there and resents you for it. It wouldn’t be fair to either of us.” I wasn’t angry anymore, I was genuinely sad and a little afraid. Sad that I was hurting Devin, afraid of how Jordan would take it.
“You’re telling me, this has nothing to do with Jordan? Not even a little bit?”
“My feelings for you have absolutely nothing to do with him.” Liar, liar.
I’d been wrong. As tears rolled down my face, Devin finally really saw me. He saw that I was lying. I saw the rejection, the despair Jordan had left me with years ago, reflected at me in Devin’s eyes.
Saying nothing else, he stalked out of the office. I started shaking when the bells clanged on the door as he left. Alone in the dark I shook with sobs. I tried desperately to find one thread of the anger I’d found earlier. Anger would make this so much easier. Jordan was right about that too, I’d been looking for a reason to be mad. To keep this from being so hard.
I’d failed.
I was still standing in that same spot, in the middle of the dark sales floor, when one of the bunny’s cars went peeling out of the parking lot, Devin behind the wheel. If he was leaving with her to make me jealous, he was off the mark.
A few seconds later, the bells on the door jangled as it swung slowly open. I didn’t have to look to know who it was, only one person knew what Devin and I had been talking about.
“You okay?” The timbre of Jordan’s deep voice was softer than usual, almost a whisper.
For a brief moment, I couldn’t help but wonder if it was the same voice he used in bed. I know I was using him then, using my attraction to him to not think about what I was really feeling.
I snorted at the mixture of emotions running through me.
“It’s hard.” The truth from my lips, too little too late. “I lied to him.”
“Yeah, it is.” He stayed right inside the doorway, not crossing to me. Damn him, I wanted him to come to me. To hold me. To make this better. “Even harder when you’re lying.”
“Was it? Were you?” I laughed and swatted at an errant tear with the back of my hand. “I don’t remember you crying in the dark.”
“I waited until you left.” He smirked, his joke chipping away at my despair.
“You didn’t cry.” I blinked back the remaining tears.
“No, but I felt like it. Watching you walk away was the hardest thing I have ever done next to burying my grandfather, it took—”
I stopped him with a raised hand. “Don’t. I’m positive that was harder on me. Which is why this sucks, because I know what he’s feeling.”
“Wanting something you can’t have sucks for everyone involved.” His voice stripped me raw.
“He knows that I can’t love him, because I—” The words died on my tongue, I couldn’t finish that last part, no matter how true it was. Fear stopped me.
“Yeah, I figured that.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and contemplated the floor. As if he knew that I’d stopped short of saying I loved him. “He’s been crashing at my house the past few weeks. Made a point to tell me he wouldn’t be coming home tonight before he left.”
“It’s not just you.” Epiphany number two. Even if Jordan had never existed, I didn’t love Devin like that. I didn’t want him.
“You sure about that?” He rocked back on his heels, keeping his face half hidden in the shadows.
I turned away from him and wrapped my arms around myself, I seemed to be doing that a lot lately. I sought comfort from the only place I could gain it safely—within myself. “If I didn’t—no, even if I’d never met you—I wouldn’t have feelings for Devin. They aren’t there, whether you are there or not.”
“He’ll hate me.” I choked with pain scorching my heart.
“No, he won’t.” Jordan moved toward me then. “He won’t hate you, Rae, he’ll get over it.”
“You’re wrong.” I looked over my shoulder at him. “That’s what you don’t understand. I know. And no matter how much time passes”—I reached up and fingered the chain at my throat, the cool touch of the metal against my skin—“no matter what destructive things you put yourself through, you don’t get over it.” I had to say it then, with tears streaming down my face. I had to make him understand. “If I wasn’t in love with you, if I’d never loved you, it would have been so easy to hate you.”
“Rae—” He cleared the distance between us in two strides and crushed me against his chest. “I’m so sorry.”
His lips were soft on my hair, but I managed to pull away from the warmth of him. It was hard to do, but in that moment taking comfort from him was a betrayal I couldn’t afford. I couldn’t do it, not now…not for this. This was all too much for me in one night. “Can you take me home?”
“Sure.” He pulled his hat off and rubbed the dark stubble on his head before backing away toward the door.
“I’ll meet you around back, I’m not up for any of that right now.” I waved a hand past the glass. I didn’t want their questions or their condemnation.
He gave a curt nod and disappeared out the door. I locked it behind him and was left alone in the dark, with silence as my only comfort.
It was all I deserved.