by Shey Stahl
“Gray, honey, are you finished?”
Gray placed the book over her face. “Nope.”
JoJo stepped down off the last step. “Do you need help?”
Beside me, I felt an elbow resting on my shoulder. Hudson glared at Dave right away and tried to push him away from me, but it didn’t work. “Do you think she has a school uniform and a ruler?”
Dave, oh Dave. How would I have described this guy who showed up at a track and never left the JAR Racing team? I couldn’t, really, because I tried not to get to know him. We kept him around because he was an amazing cook. I was sure that was how he’d gotten himself on the payroll ten years ago. Cooked the team dinner and they hired him.
If you were looking to get a job with a race team but you had no car experience and weren’t mechanically inclined? Learn to cook.
Dave was mechanically inclined though. He replaced Grady, a story for another day, as the fabrication specialist. He was a master at assembling wings. And if you were one of the unlucky bastards who had to do this job, you understood why it wasn’t the best job on the team. Dave, wild as fuck, was a horrible influence on almost everyone. And responsible for a few divorces with the team guys.
Watching Josephine kneel next to Gray and Hayden, I pushed Dave’s arm off my shoulder before Hudson bit him. It had happened before. Believe me, my kids are like feral animals. Don’t mess with them. “I don’t want to know,” I told him. “She’s too young for you.”
He quirked an eyebrow at me. “How so? I’m only forty-two. Per midlife crisis rules, I’m allowed to get a girlfriend half my age.”
I stared at him, confused. “There aren’t rules for a midlife crisis.”
He blinked slowly, as if I should know this. “Yes there are.”
There was no sense in arguing with Dave. Willie had been doing it since he met him and it hadn’t gotten him anywhere. “Shouldn’t you be doing something?”
He smiled Josephine’s way. “I am.”
“I meant not staring at her.”
“Oh, probably.” He held up tongs and snapped them at my face. “Making hot dogs.”
“I want a hot dog!” Pace wrapped himself around Dave’s leg. If you had food, Pace was your friend. If you didn’t, he usually ignored you.
I grabbed a hold of Pace. “You’re going to see Grandma.” I leaned into Dave. “You’re not allowed to be alone with my children again.”
“I lost them one time.” He laughed. “Rosa does it daily.”
“You lost them at a zoo. We found Knox trying to befriend a gorilla.”
“In my defense, I wrote my phone number on his arm.”
“Yeah, I’m sure the gorilla totally intended to call before eating my baby boy,” I grumbled, walking away from Casten’s motor home.
My mom was outside their motor home, ready to handle the kids for the night. “You’re not watching tonight?”
“We’re gonna watch on DIRTVision tonight.” Mom smiled and gestured inside their motor home where she had my brothers’ kids, and mine running around. Between my two brothers and me, my parents had eleven grandkids. And you would never know it looking at her. She had it down to an art. Always aware of everything they were doing, and gentle, understanding. It also helped that on the side of their motor home they had a seventy-inch television and a stash of candy.
Rosa walked over to us, her fanny pack on, and two corn dogs in her hand. “I’m here to help,” she told my mom, handing her a corn dog.
Mom adjusted the JAR Racing hat on her head. “You mean you’re here to drink wine and make fun of the pit lizards?”
Rosa sat down in a folding chair outside the motor home and pulled a juice box from her fanny pack. “Exactly, sister.”
Shaking my head, I handed my mom the diapers for the night. “Okay. I’ll be back after the main, and then I’m going to help the girls close down the merchandise trailers.” I handed Hudson over to her and she frowned.
“Has he eaten anything today?”
“He had some yogurt earlier, crackers he found on the ground, and my boobs.”
“Who’s that?” Pace asked from beside me, pointing at the chocolate-haired boy trying to play with him and handing a toy car with Easton’s number on it.
“Sorry about him!” a voice urged from behind me. “He loves other kids.”
Mom, Rosa, and I all turned around at the same time to see Jessie, Easton’s assistant and now wife. Yep. He’s remarried now. I didn’t know he had a kid though. Even Lexi, my cousin whose husband raced in the series with Ethan hadn’t said anything about him having a child. Or maybe I hadn’t been paying attention.
Rosa grinned at me. “I love all this drama.”
“Shut up,” I whisper-shouted.
“Hey, Arie,” Jessie greeted me, smiling and adjusting her bag on her shoulder. “I hope you don’t mind me bringing him by. He saw other kids and wanted to play.”
Pace leaned into my legs, shyly wrapping his arms around them. Bringing my hand down, I ran my hands through his thick dark hair.
Pace withdrew his hand, refusing to take the car.
“His name is Reed,” Jessie told Pace.
I looked at the boy closer and realized he was older than Pace. At least he had to be, or I had short kids. Which might be true, but still, something about the boy’s size stuck with me.
I motioned toward the boy and then at Pace. “You can play with him if you want.”
He looked to the boy, to me, then back to the boy. “No, thank you.” And my son walked away.
Pace took after Rager with his attitude, but at least he said no thank you.
“How old is he?” Rosa asked, slurping her third juice box.
“Oh.” Jessie’s eyes moved to her son and then mine, nervousness in them. “He’s… five.” Her eyes locked on mine, as if to say, whoops.
“Wow, you look like your daddy,” Rosa noted, taking her sunglasses from inside her fanny pack and placing them on the boy’s face. “Yep. Spitting image.”
Jessie looked at Rosa like she’d lost her mind and handed the sunglasses back to her. “He does.”
I was still stewing over the age. Five? No fucking way. That meant… I drew in a deep breath. I didn’t care. I shouldn’t, but it still hurt because I knew what him having a five-year-old meant. The model wasn’t the only one he’d been sleeping with.
Nausea rolled through me as I let go of Pace’s hand. “I have to catch the trophy dash,” I told my mom, hearing the cars rumbling on the track.
Bristol, my only daughter, and the sweetest soul ever, sat down beside Reed, touching his arm. “I’ll play with you, boy.”
Please don’t fall in love with him, honey. Your daddy will kill us both.
Kinsley texted me from the stands asking where I was. I held my phone up and walked away. “I’ll be back shortly.”
Easton had cheated on me, not once, but twice? Who knew how many times.
Arm Restraints – Straps attached to a driver’s arms to limit range of motion and keep the arms and hands inside the car in case of a flip.
I passed by Hayden on her way to the merchandise trailers with Lily. We made small talk about who would cover what times tonight, but all I could focus on was the heavy beating in my chest. How could Easton have done that to me time and time again? Why?
“Are we out of the JAR Racing hoodies?” Lily asked, making notes on her phone.
I nodded. “Yeah, we sold out last night.”
She nodded. “Okay. We should have more in Tulare.”
On race nights, I not only had my duties as the PR rep for the team, but I still made sure all the guys knew what heat race they were in and when the pill draw was. I knew lap times and who was fast that night, regardless of what team. I knew who had autograph sessions and what guys were having an off night, like my husband.
That wasn’t to say the other girls didn’t. Hayden kept track of merchandise sales. Lily made sure we stayed to a team budget, and if something broke and we need
ed parts, Lily was on the phone arranging for everything to be delivered.
“Thanks,” I told Lily and held up my cell phone. “I think we need more rack cards for Caden too.”
She nodded. “We do, and we’re down to our last stack for Jameson and Rager as well.”
See? We had a system down.
Making my way up to the pit grandstands, I feared what the night would bring. The interesting part of the night came when Rager and Easton were on the track during the trophy dash, lined up side by side.
Kinsley stood next to me in the pit bleachers. “Think Rager will behave?”
I chewed on my bottom lip. “Probably not.”
Kinsley dipped a chip into a big tray of melted nacho cheese. “Easton shoved him during the pill draw, and I know it wasn’t playful, though they acted like it was.”
My eyes narrowed in on the cars, swallowing over the lump forming in my throat. “They have history,” I told her, staring at my cell phone in fear of what would come later. My Twitter feed was blowing up with Tweets asking if I knew Easton was going to be there and what Rager thought. “He’s my ex-husband.”
She gave me a look. The one that said wow, I really don’t know you at all. “Oh really? I didn’t know you’d been married before.”
I waved my hand around in the air. “It was a huge mistake. Should’ve picked Rager to begin with.”
Kinsley’s cheeks flushed. “I would have.” I laughed and she added, “Just saying.”
I knew exactly what she meant. I quickly updated the JAR Racing Twitter feed for the line-up with a picture of the cars on the track. The lights of the track shined brightly against the top wings of the cars as they rolled by the front stretch.
“Why’d you guys get divorced?”
Given how public my relationship was with Easton, it was strange to get questions like this. But Kinsley was also eighteen. And I imagine she never followed NASCAR. “We weren’t right for each other even from the beginning. But he cheated on me and then asked for a divorce.”
“And then you and Rager got together?”
I nodded, not wanting to go into all the details of, oh, right, I slept with him while I was still technically married to Easton, but whatever. The truth was, I’d been in love with Rager from the beginning, but too afraid to believe I deserved his love until he showed me.
Kinsley sighed, a blob of cheese landing on her white tank top stretched tightly over her belly. “I can’t go an hour without dropping something on my belly.”
“Been there, so many times.” Laughing, our eyes now on the cars coming out of three, the pace car darted into the infield. “Are your parents going to come out when the baby is born?”
She shrugged. “Probably not. I figured we’d fly out to see them after she’s born. I haven’t talked to them much since we moved to Charlotte after Christmas.”
“Really?” It was a strange concept to me not to be around family, given mine was with me every day. But there had been a time when I was traveling with Easton that I only saw my parents and my brothers once every six months.
“They didn’t agree with me leaving home at eighteen to follow some race car driver they knew nothing about. And then to get pregnant a month later…” She paused and drew in a deep breath and licked cheese from her thumb. “They weren’t happy about that one at all.”
Caden joined our team when he turned sixteen. His first season he filled in for Axel when Jack died, and then again for Rager when he was injured at Grays Harbor the following year. It wasn’t until the twins were born that Caden came on as a part-time driver when he was eighteen. The next year, full time after he finished second in the points. That same year, he traveled the full schedule with us, living with my parents in their motor home. He hadn’t even graduated high school yet, but there he was tearing up the Outlaws and winning enough that between him and the other JAR Racing drivers, Dad never once dropped out of the owner championship points the entire year. Around summer, he started spending more and more time on the phone with his girlfriend, Kinsley, and we finally met her at World Championships in Charlotte that year.
Last season, he took a detour around June and showed up in Grand Forks with Kinsley and a van they were sleeping in. And now here we are, eight months later, and she’s about to have a baby. Personally, I love having them traveling with us. She’s great with all the kids and it’s really nice to have extra babysitters when you’re on this tour.
“What does Caden’s mom think about you guys having a baby?”
“She’s worried we’re too young and with Caden’s being a racer and no real stability in his job, she’s just really worried. But from what Caden tells me, that’s what she does.”
“Worries?”
“Yep. She’s a stress ball 90 percent of the time. And Caden is the exact opposite. He never worries, about anything. Even if he didn’t know where he’d sleep tomorrow, I don’t think it would faze him.”
I laughed. “I kinda gathered that when he zip-tied the air ride in your motor home with a spoon.”
“Right? He does that all the time. Not a care in the world.” And then she snorted. “But racing.”
My attention diverted to the track when the flag dropped and Easton was all over Rager.
“Just imagine how our opening ceremonies are going to go with the fire line,” Kinsley pointed out.
A lump lodged its way in my throat, the rumbling of the cars shaking the grandstands we were in as they hit the throttle halfway through turn four.
Since the start of the season in Volusia, we’d been doing the opening ceremonies with the top ten drivers standing in a row of fire. So far it proved to be interesting to the fans and annoying for the drivers. Last week the fans found out methanol near fire—bad idea—burns clear so you didn’t know that you were on fire, but you were. Casten decided to pour it on Axel’s leg prior to introductions.
Don’t worry. Axel survived with minor hair loss on his leg and a new driver’s suit. Now we have a rule where they have to stand back from the fire at least five feet and Casten wasn’t allowed to stand next to Axel. Or Rager. Or Dad. He stood alone for the most part.
All that aside, I was glad Easton wasn’t in the points battle with the Outlaws because I could imagine what Rager would do to him with fire present. Probably shove him headfirst into it.
Despite my anticipation for driver introductions going badly, it went smoothly. Obviously it was only the top ten drivers in the points battle, but seeing how Easton was a big deal with NASCAR, they introduced him too. I kept my eyes on Rager the entire time, surrounded in fire and “Ladies and Gentlemen” blaring through the stands.
Kinsley snorted beside me, her elbow meeting mine. “Think he’s tempted to push Easton into the fire?”
I watched the smoke rising and my husband standing there stone-faced with his hands hanging on his hips. “Oh yeah.”
They introduced each driver but I paid special attention to my husband’s name and the way it sent a thrill through me as usual. “Starting second tonight from Bartlett Tennessee, the Solar Seals number ninety-nine, Rager The Sweet Spot Sweet!”
Kinsley and I cheered for him, as did the rest of the crowd but for some reason, I kept my attention on Easton’s reaction to my Rager getting a standing ovation from the fans in attendance. He walked away, much like he did from my life five years ago.
WHILE THE HEATS and the dash went smoothly, the main event did not.
Because of the pill draw, Rager and Easton were on the front row together, side by side.
Kinsley sighed beside me. “I’m nervous.”
I scrolled through the JAR Racing Twitter feed and clicked on the icon to post the starting order for the main. “For Caden?”
She laughed. “No. For Rager.”
I looked up to see the shiny wings reflecting off the track lights as they shuffled around to the four-wide formation they did at the start of the A-Main. “You and me both.”
Jerry’s voice came through the lo
ud speakers. “They make their way into turn three and as they reach corner number four they get the signal to show you the most awesome sight in all of motorsports.”
The crowd stood, cheering as “Sirius” began to play.
“The greatest sprint car drivers in the world four-wide, this is their salute. The drivers are thanking you for your attendance this evening and ladies and gentleman in return we’d like you to stand and when they come out of turn number four we want them to be able to hear you over the rumble of those nine hundred horse power engines,” Jerry said. My heart pumped in my chest a little louder as I watched the cars, four-wide, the engines rumbling the stands. “Las Vegas Motor Speedway, you wanted the best, you got em four abreast, often imitated, never duplicated, the greatest show on dirt, the world of outlaws!”
Another part of the night I will never tire of hearing, nor will I ever see the image before me enough. My husband, dad, brothers, all on the track together living out their dreams racing on the edge.
The opening laps were caution filled from drivers in the back but once they got green, Rager got a jump on him early on, but Easton certainly didn’t back down to the defending World of Outlaw champion. He never would. I had a feeling it had something to do with proving himself. We saw it a lot with the guys who moved up to NASCAR, and then came back to run on a dirt track every once in a while. I think it went back to them wanting to show that they still had it.
Whatever the reason, Easton had something he wanted to prove, and he was about to right from lap one. They battled for six laps, Rager pulling an impressive slide job on him.
I didn’t know what Easton was thinking, but he basically drove right into the left rear of Rager’s car. Turned into him and then sent Rager’s car flying through the air. His car did a series of snap flips, basically really aggressive quick flips, and then came to rest near the wall in turns one and two.