by Audra North
What he wanted now was to share his secrets with her. To tell her the truth, because he believed in her. That decided, he didn’t want to wait any longer. Instead, he stopped and turned to face her. “Cori.”
She stopped, too, her expression turning to concern. “Ty? Are you okay?”
“Off the record.” He bit it out, too impatient all of a sudden to explain.
She blinked at him. “Off—yes. Of course. I—”
“It was my dad. He—his team, I mean—is the one that cheated. Twenty-two years ago. It has nothing to do with Riggs Racing apart from my dad’s connection to the team now.”
There. He’d said it. He’d come clean to someone, for fuck’s sake.
But all she did was stare at him. Silently.
For too long, because he was getting tense again. “Cori!” he barked, and she jumped.
“Oh! God. Ty. I—I’m sorry. I just . . . why?”
That last word came out as a whisper.
“Because his crew chief at the time wanted a win under his belt and he didn’t have enough faith in my dad to count on him winning the race. So he paid off the top contender’s crew chief to mess up on purpose and throw the race.”
Cori looked oddly stricken. “I meant”—she visibly swallowed—“why did you tell me?” Her face crinkled in confusion, and he still thought it was sexy.
His girl.
He took her other hand and faced her. “Because I trust you, Cori. Because when you looked at me, you saw me. When you wrote about me, you wrote about me and not who I punched or whether I might be corrupt, or God—about my skin color, or anything else except the name I’ve built for myself on the track. That’s why. With all this pressure to pretend and put a happy face on things that I don’t agree with, I need someone I can be real with. No pretenses. You’re the most truthful thing in my life, Cori Bellowes.”
A strange sound escaped her, almost like pain. He looked over at her, and she was frowning. Had he been too forward? Yeah, they still didn’t know each other well, but he’d shared more of himself with her than he had with people he’d known for years.
She swallowed hard. “Oh. Ty, I—”
Ring!
Fuck. His goddamn phone. He should have turned the ringer off. He stopped and looked at her again, and her face was so serious. He didn’t want to keep her from saying whatever she needed to tell him. He squeezed her hands, trying to encourage her to continue. “Yes? What is it?”
A small whimper escaped her. She sounded distressed. Had he said too much to her? It didn’t seem right. She seemed like she was so bold with him, so accepting of everything he gave.
She sucked in a breath and tried again. “I—”
Ring!
She shut her mouth, shaking her head.
Fuck.
The moment was gone. And his phone was still ringing. He practically ripped it from his pocket and barked “Hello?” into the speaker.
“Ty, it’s Frank. I’ve been looking all over for you. Ray Lester from Cabot was supposed to do a meet-and-greet with the Favored Fans in an hour but he’s fucking drunk, man. The organizer asked if you’d be willing to step up and take his place.”
Goddamn Lester.
Favored Fans was what the teams called the special needs kids who won a chance to meet one or two of the drivers during the racing weekend. All the teams took turns volunteering their time, and it was a uniquely rewarding experience that Ty usually loved. The kids he met were always there as part of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, having won the chance after entering a “Why I want to meet a race car driver” contest.
He couldn’t let them down.
“I’m on my way,” he told Frank, then ended the call. He’d have to head back immediately, even though at the moment he wished that Lester wasn’t such an irresponsible idiot. The kid was all of nineteen years old. Legally, he shouldn’t be drinking, but on top of that he was probably going to get kicked off the Cabot Racing team. And then what? He didn’t come from a well-off family. He’d probably dropped out early from school, too, in order to race.
And yet, Ty had a hard time feeling much pity for the kid. Everyone made choices they had to live with, even if the consequences were ragingly unfair.
He shook himself. He needed to figure out his shit before he got too angry. He wasn’t going to let his experiences make him bitter instead of inspire him to do better. Cori had a hard time with her parents, but she’d come out on top. She was his inspiration, and he wouldn’t let her down.
Maybe he’d have a serious talk with Lester tomorrow.
“Ty? Ty!”
He blinked, realizing that Cori was waving her hand in front of his face. He must have spaced out, deep in his thoughts.
“Fuck.” He winced. “I mean, sorry. I, uh, I have to cut this short. That was Frank—the Riggs publicist. You met him at Media Day.”
She nodded. “Bald guy with a big mustache.”
Ty laughed at her description, feeling his mood shifting already, the seriousness of what they’d just been talking about and the frustration with Lester fading away.
Damn, she was good for him. “That’s the one.” He shrugged. “Anyway, I’ve gotta go fill in for someone at a PR thing. Starts in an hour, so I have to hurry back . . .”
She pushed at his chest. “Go on, then. Go, and I’ll find my way back.”
But he didn’t go. “No, I’ll at least make sure you’re safely back to your car.”
She laughed, but it sounded weird. Almost forced.
But he didn’t have too much time to think about it before she said, “All right then, Galahad. Let’s see if you’re as fast off the track as on it. Ready?”
Before he could process what she was talking about, she’d shouted, “Go!” and took off down the trail, a blur in a lavender shirtdress . . . and hot pink running shoes.
Maybe he didn’t need anything more out of life than this.
He sprinted after her, laughing all the way.
Chapter 9
She was the worst person in the world.
She had enough information now to write an absolutely scandalous article about Bobby Riggs and the fact that Ty was covering up something his father had been involved with years ago. She had enough of a lead that she could find people involved or records from the incident that would make for a solid, truthful article.
But it would be the most dishonest thing she’d ever done, and she’d promised Ty.
You didn’t promise him you wouldn’t write about his dad. You only promised him you wouldn’t write about what you thought at the time was someone at Riggs cheating.
She hated how obvious it was that she was justifying doing something awful.
She’d been about to tell him. Right after Ty had said she was the most truthful thing in his life, her conscience had practically shattered any resolve to continue lying to him in any way, and she’d been about to tell him the truth, that she’d been sent to dig up dirt on him and that she was terribly, horribly sorry and was trying not to have to write an exposé on him, when his phone had rung.
And the chance had slipped away.
But the distraction had given her time to rethink her confession. Things were going well with him. She still had a chance at not having to write anything so revealing. The hit counts on her pieces had been solid, thank God, and she could do this. If she succeeded in keeping up the hit count, she wouldn’t have to write the exposé and Ty would never have to find out why she’d gotten close to him in the first place.
But if she told him now, he’d hate her. She’d seen how worried he was over his father and how it killed him not to be able to fix things the way he wanted to. Best-case scenario, if she told him the truth now, he’d never speak to her again. He was a good man, but given how much he’d opened up to her, she didn’t think he’d take something like this lightly. He probably cut her out of his life.
And she didn’t want to be out of his life.
So after the phone call from his pub
licist, she’d avoided dealing with it by racing him down the trail, keeping ahead of him until almost the very end, when he’d caught up to her, grabbed her around the waist, and swung her around to kiss him, hot and dirty and not enough.
She wanted so much more. She wanted to come apart in his arms again, but this time with no clothes between them. Skin to skin, heart to heart . . .
There was so much crackling energy between them. A physical connection, yes, but also an emotional one that felt like it had been there for years. She so desperately wanted to explore that, to explore his body and see how far this heat between them went.
Maybe she could sleep with him and it wouldn’t be a big deal. Thing were going well with her articles. It really did look like she would be off the hook for the exposé. Maybe sex wasn’t such a big deal . . .
But they’d only had time for a kiss and a hasty good-bye. He’d said he was tied up with team stuff tonight and he had the race tomorrow, but that he’d call her. And then he’d peeled out of the parking lot, leaving her standing there, staring out at the road long after his car had disappeared out of sight.
He texted her just before he went to bed.
Good night, gorgeous. I’ll win for you tomorrow.
She didn’t see him before the race started, even though she’d looked everywhere. Now, she was sitting in the press box ten minutes before the flag went up, and she could see his car waiting at the front of the pack for the start of the race.
I’ll win for you.
She stared at Ty’s car out on the track. Wondered if he’d thought about her last night. If he was thinking about her right now.
“Gentlemen!” The voice was heavily accented, and she recognized the California governor on the large screens in the press box. “And Ranger Colt’s wife,” he added, making the crowd roar with laughter.
Cori felt annoyed on Kerri Colt’s behalf.
“Start! Your! Engines!”
The cars started with a scraping, roaring shout that ripped up through the stadium and shook the walls of the press box.
Wow. She wished she could be down in the pit right now, witnessing all the intensity up close and personal.
But how would she manage to do that now? If she got a chance to go down there, it would be because of Ty. And if someone got wind that she and he might be more than just a sports journalist reporting on a driver, they’d make assumptions about him. Unpleasant ones. He didn’t need that on top of everything else.
Just like he doesn’t need you lying to him.
It annoyed her that those kinds of thoughts were happening more frequently, and at a louder volume.
She was going to make this work.
She pushed the doubts away.
The flag went up and the cars were off, seeming to slide out from behind the starting line like someone had reached out and flicked a giant finger into the back of each one. A few broke away quickly, while others were blocked in a big pack behind, with a few stragglers already struggling to keep up, not even a lap into the race.
Cori watched Ty’s car in the lead, keeping tight to the inside. It wasn’t easy to stay in front the entire race, and she wondered if he planned to drop back eventually, to hopefully get another of his team members up front so that he could take a rest and draft a little while.
But so few racers equaled his abilities—at least, others on his team—and that meant either cooperating with a rival driver or exhausting himself too quickly.
For the next two hours, she watched him closely. Gasped when Kolchek bumped Ty’s right rear fender, making Ty swerve dangerously close to the wall. Breathed a huge sigh of relief when Ty managed to save it, even though it cost him a couple of places. Barely refrained from whooping with joy in the press box when he crossed the finish line in fourth. That would have raised a few brows.
As it was, she should have been paying closer attention to the others, too, but it was difficult when it hadn’t been just Ty Riggs she was watching. He was the man who drove her crazy every time he kissed her. The man who’d raced her down a mountain trail. Who’d told her that she was the most truthful thing in his life.
He was hers.
She only hoped she could keep it that way.
* * *
It had been almost two weeks since Ty’s last race, and therefore way too long since he’d seen Cori. He’d wanted to get together last weekend again, but he’d had an exhibition race that she hadn’t gone to—she’d watched the sports channel coverage of it. And things had been so busy during the week, with her working and him on the road, that there just wasn’t time.
But they’d talked on the phone every night. She’d called him on the way to the airport after he’d come in fourth in California. He’d been too caught up in post-race duties and hadn’t had his phone, but she’d left a message teasing him about how, if that was winning for her, then was he trying to tell her she was fourth best? And then he’d tracked her flight online and called her back as soon as she’d landed in Norfolk.
She’d written a couple of pieces about the races that weekend and he’d read those several times, too. They weren’t even about him, which surprised him. It sounded conceited, but he hadn’t realized that there had been a small, lingering worry that he might not be able to trust her.
Now he was completely sure. It meant a lot that the risk he’d taken by telling her about Dad had paid off. As far as he knew, she’d told no one and wasn’t going to.
She was his truth.
In her articles, she’d gone over the details of the race, mentioned the bump and Ty’s close brush with the wall, and then gone on to report on Granger’s win. One of the stories was being reblogged by the official franchise and posted by some of the bigger news outlets. She hadn’t said anything about it explicitly, but when he’d called to congratulate her on another extremely popular piece, he’d heard the big smile in her voice.
Not to mention that she’d told him the success of that article, and the slightly smaller hit count on the other one she wrote, meant she had travel budget for the next two races. There’d been something else in her voice when she’d said it, that sounded oddly like competitive triumph, but he supposed it was natural to feel victorious over something like that.
Regardless, what was most important was that he was going to get to see her after too long apart.
He was already in Florida, getting ready for Daytona, but she was going to be flying in tomorrow for the start of the long weekend, and she’d agreed to text him her room number so that he could pop by and say hi.
But he was hoping for more than just a hello. Fuck taking it slow. They’d talked enough. Every. Fucking. Night. Their conversations had gotten more suggestive with every passing day. More amped up, more . . .
Just more.
That was why he’d called her a couple of minutes ago. He needed to hear her voice. Needed more of her.
“So, I’ll see you tomorrow?” Cori asked.
He didn’t miss the excited note in her voice.
He threw a glance around the hotel business office. It was a small place, and quiet, and he was trying to grab a few minutes in here before heading to the track. He grinned into the phone. “Yeah. You’ll see me.” He put just enough innuendo into his voice that he hoped she’d hear his intention to show her every last inch of him. And hopefully he’d see just as much of her.
She laughed, low and suggestive.
Yup. She’d picked up what he was puttin’ down.
“I’ll try to last past just a kiss.” The way she said the word “kiss” made him so hard . . .
He had to suck in a deep breath and shift the front of his jeans a bit. If he were in his hotel room, he probably wouldn’t be able to resist stroking himself, just a little. He’d been jerking off constantly these past two weeks, just from hearing her voice and remembering the way she’d been so ready for him in front of that café.
It felt like a lifetime ago.
He searched for a less dangerous subject. “I boug
ht War and Peace to read on the plane. Got a few chapters in during the flight. Were you seriously trying to tell me that book is better than the article you wrote?”
For a moment, she was quiet, and then—“Wait. You mean like, when I said that four weeks ago? The first time we talked on the phone?”
“Yeah. Why?”
“I just can’t believe you remembered that.”
He snorted. “Of course I do. I remember everything we talk about. I mean, I’m not a journalist or anything . . .”
“Do I detect a hint of smugness in your voice, Ty Riggs?”
Damn, he liked her so much.
“Maybe. But I also need to tell you that I couldn’t finish it. It’s really long and, I hate to admit it, but kind of boring. So that’s why I was a little surprised you made the comparison.”
She giggled. “I still can’t believe you remembered that. But honestly? I’ve never actually read it. I just used it as a marker. You know, as a classic.”
“I can’t believe you misled me. How can I trust you after this?”
He was obviously teasing her, but she laughed all harsh and weird. Strange. It had happened a couple of times before, where her mood had seemed to shift, but she never said anything about it, and he’d never asked.
Was there something she was keeping from him?
But he dismissed it almost immediately. No way. Couldn’t be. He’d told her so many things that she could have published by now and destroyed him with, and she hadn’t. He was probably just reading too much into something, trying to be perceptive like his mom and not doing nearly as good a job.
“Can I ask you something?” Her voice cut into his thoughts, and he smiled at how tentative she sometimes still was around him.
“What’s that, gorgeous?”
“Since it doesn’t seem like there’s going to be an investigation, why don’t you go to Belgrave and ask him to pick up your youth program again?”
After his interview with the board of directors the other week, the entire team had waited for a decision to come down as to whether they’d be launching an investigation. As the days passed, the possibility seemed less likely. There’d been fewer mentions in the media of the altercation between him and Gilroy and even fewer about the allegations of cheating.