by Gina Wilkins
Behind him, his rowdy team shook up champagne bottles, spraying Jake and everyone around them with the bubbly liquid. Jake hardly seemed to notice the champagne pouring off the brim of his cap and wetting his shoulders as he stepped up to the reporter with a broad grin.
“How does it feel to be back in Victory Lane, Jake?” the reporter wanted to know.
“Fantastic,” Jake answered fervently. “Really great. I want to thank the Woodrow Racing team for giving me an amazing car today. That Number 82 Vaughan Tools car was just awesome.”
He worked in the names of a few more sponsors, thanking all of them with the same enthusiasm, and the reporter patiently allowed Jake to earn his pay before breaking in with another comment and question. “That was an extremely close finish, Jake. Looked like the Number 76 car had a shot at taking you there at the end. Did you ever get worried?”
Having turned to exchange congratulatory man-hugs with Wade and Woody, who had just made their way to him, Jake turned back to answer, “Yeah, the Number 76 did an awesome job out there. Raced me clean and gave it everything he had. It was a lot of fun.”
“Anything else you want to say, Jake?”
“Just that I’m really glad to be back and I want to thank all my fans again for their support. And a special shout-out to Stacy Carter. This win was for her.”
All of the stiffness going out of her legs, Stacy sat down on the couch with an inelegant plop. Her heart in her throat, she looked at her brother. “Tell me he didn’t just say that.”
Nick nodded sympathetically. “I’m afraid he did.”
“Man, that was so cool!” Andrew crowed. “Did you hear, Aunt Stacy? He dedicated his win to you. Aren’t you excited?”
She thought she might be sick. “I, uh, think I need some more coffee,” she said, hoping her legs would hold her now as she stood.
By the time she made it into the kitchen, her temper was burning as hot as the fresh coffee in the carafe.
STILL BUZZING with the excitement of the close win, Jake and Wade were finally able to break away from the photographers and reporters, sponsors and fans and make their way back to the hauler in preparation to head back to North Carolina.
Ronnie Short joined them halfway there, his own hauler being parked next to theirs. He congratulated Jake on the win, and Jake congratulated him in return for his promising points lead. Both of them were quite satisfied as they approached the haulers and the people who waited for them there.
Jake’s steps faltered when he saw Lisa and Katie standing with their heads close together, both of them frowning. They looked at him as he approached, and rather than congratulating him, they both looked as if they wanted to strangle him.
“Wow,” Ronnie murmured, looking taken aback himself. “What did you do?”
“Not a clue,” Jake answered honestly, wondering if they were only imagining that the women looked furious with him, for some reason.
But Katie put an end to that question the moment he came within her hearing. “What on earth were you thinking?” she demanded.
Jake looked cautiously behind him, to see if there was any chance she was talking to someone beyond his shoulder. “Uh, when?” he asked when he accepted that he was the object of her irritation.
“You dedicated your win to Stacy,” Lisa said, looking as exasperated as her friend. “Please tell us she knew you were going to do that.”
“Well…no, I guess she didn’t. But what’s so bad about it?” he asked defensively. “Most people would consider it a compliment.”
Lisa and Katie groaned loudly in unison.
Annoyed with the way they were acting, Jake turned to Ronnie. “Do you have any idea what they’re talking about?”
“No, not really,” he confessed, looking nervously at his wife. “I mean, I thought it was kind of, you know, romantic.”
Planting her hands on either side of her hugely pregnant belly, Katie stared at both of them in apparent disgust. “I can’t believe you two. There are things that are more important than a race, you know. Even a winning race.”
“After all the trouble we went to last week to keep Stacy low profile at the track so she wouldn’t be the subject of gossip while you and she were in the early stages of a relationship, you go and do something like this,” Lisa added curtly. “Didn’t you learn anything from blurting out her name in the car last week? You knew that bothered her. But she forgave you for that because we all assured her that was inadvertent. This was deliberate.”
“Neither of you understand,” Jake insisted, beginning to secretly worry that he’d messed up again. “She called me last night and said she’s coming to Atlanta next week. I mean, we’re sort of officially seeing each other now. We couldn’t really keep it a secret much longer, anyway.”
“When she agreed to see you again next week, did she give you permission to announce it on national television?” Lisa asked archly, sounding like the cutthroat prosecutor he knew her to be.
He didn’t like being on the witness stand in front of everyone like this, on the defensive and sweating with guilt he was trying not to show. “That isn’t what I did,” he muttered.
“You might as well have,” Katie said with a shake of her head. “All the fan sites are going to be buzzing with gossip about whether you and Stacy are getting serious and whether she’s going to take you out of the eligible-bachelor pool. Whether she’s good enough for you or pretty enough for you or whether she’s just after your money and your fame. Trust me, I’ve been there. But at least I was a little more prepared for it, since Ronnie and I had been dating a while before we made it public.”
“A while? You and Ronnie were married six months after you met.”
“That’s true,” she agreed coolly. “But he never once pushed me into the spotlight against my will.”
“It isn’t like that,” Jake insisted again, knowing he sounded less certain every time he said it. “Uh, I’ve got to go make a phone call, okay? I’ll talk to you all later.”
Looking at him with as much pity as vexation now, they watched him hurry away.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
STACY’S CELL PHONE rang incessantly that evening. Most of the calls were from Jake, but others were from reporters, friends and passing acquaintances who wanted details about her relationship with the famous race car driver.
She didn’t answer any of them. She would have turned the phone off entirely, but she knew her brother and mother would worry if they couldn’t reach her. She didn’t have a land line, using her cell phone as her only means of communication.
She was still so angry with Jake that she couldn’t stop pacing. Oscar stayed discreetly out of her way, sitting in his doggie bed with his squeaky toy and a wary look on his furry face.
Finally cooling off enough to check her messages, she listened as Jake grew more and more insistent that she call him back. He’d started out all cheery and jovial, but he must have finally figured out that she was deliberately ignoring his calls.
“Look, Stacy, I hope you aren’t mad about what I said after the race,” he said into her voice mail service. “Lisa and Katie thought you might be, but Ronnie and I couldn’t really understand why there would be a problem. I mean, most people like having a win dedicated to them. I was excited and I was wishing you were there to see it all, and…well, I just blurted it out, okay? Darn it, I hate talking into these recording things. Call me, will you?”
So Lisa and Katie both understood exactly why she would be furious with him. Why she would feel betrayed by his thoughtless actions. If they, who barely knew her, could see how much that would hurt her, why couldn’t Jake, who claimed to have a special bond with her? Who knew exactly why she had been so reluctant to find herself and her family back in the aim of the gossipmongers?
He quit calling at midnight, her time. Either he’d accepted that she wasn’t going to talk to him that night or he’d gotten angry himself and decided she wasn’t worth the effort. Maybe that would be best, she thought, lying
wide awake on her bed with Oscar curled beside her, snoring softly. Maybe she’d been foolish to convince herself that she and Jake had even a slight chance of a lasting relationship.
Okay, so maybe she had fallen head over heels in love with him. Oddly enough, she had acknowledged that only today, when she’d realized that what he’d done wouldn’t have hurt nearly as badly if she hadn’t started to love him. To trust him.
But she couldn’t let that matter now. There could be nothing between them if he couldn’t respect her wishes. Her feelings. If he saw her only as someone to be there to support him in his career, then he’d chosen the wrong woman.
As she had pointed out to him recently, she had a life of her own. A satisfying life. He needed to understand that she would be sacrificing the contentment she had found for herself if she became involved with him, and that her life here was as important to her as NASCAR was to him.
She had finally decided she was willing to take that risk because he had convinced her he genuinely cared for her. But now she was questioning him all over again. And as badly as it hurt now, she told herself it would have been much worse if she had let this go any further, only to discover that Jake didn’t even know her, much less really love her.
STACY HADN’T EMERGED from her apartment by midmorning Monday. Her phone kept ringing, but she answered only a few of the calls. Her mother. Her brother. Mindy.
Jake didn’t call again. She told herself she was relieved about that. Apparently, he’d gotten the message loud and clear. She hadn’t had to spell it out for him. Lisa and Katie must have done an adequate job of that.
When someone knocked forcefully on her door at just before noon, she was almost afraid to answer for fear that it could be a particularly persistent reporter. But then, deciding that it must be Nick, she moved to answer, looking through the security viewer just to be sure.
She nearly stumbled against the door when she saw who stood on the other side. It took her several long moments to get up the nerve to answer, during which time he knocked again.
“Stacy, it’s me,” he called out, “Jake. Please open the door.”
Drawing a deep breath and keeping her face impassive, she turned the knob.
At least he wasn’t holding flowers, she thought when she saw him standing there in his gray polo shirt and jeans, looking more like the guy she’d met at the river than the famous driver who had broken her heart. She could do without the clichéd apologies.
“Shouldn’t you be in North Carolina?” she asked without inviting him in.
“I should be at a meeting with my sponsors,” he answered bluntly. “Followed by an ad I’m supposed to shoot for spicy potato chips. After which I had an interview scheduled with the cable racing channel. Pam’s doing her best to reschedule everything, though she may not talk to me for a while after this.”
Shaken by the list of important responsibilities he had shirked to come here, she bit her lip. She supposed the least she could do was ask him to come in. It would be somewhat more civil to end their relationship in her living room than with him out in the hallway.
Accepting her invitation, he stepped inside, bending to greet Oscar, who almost attacked him in a frenzy of welcome. “It’s good to see you, too, buddy,” Jake murmured, rubbing the dog’s ears and making him roll over in bliss. “I’ve missed you.”
He certainly said those words easily, Stacy thought, trying to hold on to her anger. He’d missed her. He’d missed her dog. He’d totally missed the point.
Straightening from the dog, he pushed his fingertips into the front pockets of his jeans and studied her gravely. “You could have called me back.”
Her eyebrows rose. He was criticizing her actions? Maybe this wasn’t going to be as difficult as she had anticipated. “I could have,” she agreed coolly. “I chose not to. I had so many messages on my phone last night and this morning that I couldn’t possibly return them all. A lot of them were the same reporters who bugged me after the courthouse incident.”
He grimaced. “I’m sorry about that. I guess I just spoke without thinking.”
“Something you apparently do a lot. Especially where I’m concerned.”
“Look, I know you’re mad—”
“Yes, I’m mad,” she shot back at him before he could make excuses. “I asked you to keep me low profile. You said you would. And then you broke that promise.”
“I guess I did,” he said grimly. “I was just so excited about the win. I wanted to share it with you. I didn’t—”
“The win,” she repeated irritably. “It’s all about the win to you, isn’t it? You warned me that racing was more than a job to you, but I guess I just didn’t realize that it’s the only thing that matters to you at all.”
“If that were true, I wouldn’t be here now,” he replied evenly, his eyes narrowed. “Do you know how annoyed everyone is going to be with me for cutting out today?”
“Then why did you come?” she asked wearily. “There really wasn’t any need for you to.”
“I came because I realized I screwed up. And I wanted to tell you in person that I’m sorry. I know I betrayed your trust and I feel lousy about that. I can’t believe I was so stupid and thoughtless. I don’t really have an excuse, except for the adrenaline rush of the win. All I can do is ask you to give me another chance to prove that we can do this. That I can be what you want me to be.”
He still didn’t get it. She shook her head sadly. “I’m not trying to make you into someone you aren’t, Jake. You shouldn’t have to guard every word you say when you’re celebrating a hard-fought win. Even though you spoke without thinking this time and accidentally broke a promise by doing so, the real problem is with me, not you. I’m not cut out for your life. I don’t fit there. Ignoring that is only going to make us both miserable in the long run.”
“I don’t believe that. There are lots of different personalities represented in NASCAR. Wives and girlfriends who enjoy the spotlight, and others who avoid it. Couples who are never more than a few feet apart, and others who pretty much go their own ways most of the time. We don’t have to be like anyone else. We can make our own rules for our relationship. Just give us a chance.”
He would probably never know how tempted she was to take him up on that. How touched she was that he had risked so much to come to her today. How hard it was for her to shake her head in the negative. “I’m sorry. I can’t.”
“You were willing to try Friday, when you accepted my invitation to Atlanta,” he reminded her. “Was dedicating the win to you really so bad that it made you completely change your mind about us?”
She sighed and crossed her arms in front of her. “I’ve accepted your apology. I know you didn’t mean to hurt me. But all of this has made me think hard about what I was about to do. To realize that I was on the verge of making a mistake that would affect both of us. I’m not right for you, Jake. It would be easier if we both just accept that now. If we say goodbye as friends, and enjoy the memories we made together.”
He shook his head with a stubborn expression she had come to recognize all too well. “I won’t accept that. We could have a lot more than friendship. And we could make a lot more memories together. A lifetime of memories, if you’d only take a chance on me.”
How could he be talking about a lifetime when they’d known each other less than two months? When they hadn’t even been able to make it that long? “I can’t.”
He looked stunned. A little sick. “You’re ending it? Just like this? Now?”
“I suppose I am,” she whispered. “I think it’s for the best.”
He stood without moving for a long time, his expression suddenly closed to her. And then he nodded curtly. “I told myself I wouldn’t beg,” he muttered. “I guess I have to accept your decision.”
Oh, no, please don’t beg, she thought with an inner shudder. She wouldn’t be able to bear that. Not from Jake. “Thank you. I think you’ll agree eventually that I’ve made the right choice.”
He looked briefly angry then. “No, I damned well don’t agree,” he said. “And I won’t change my mind later. We could have been great together, you and I. I’ll always believe that.”
Because she couldn’t believe that he wouldn’t come to his senses eventually, if not soon, she said nothing.
He moved toward the door, his shoulders slumped, his head down. He looked miserable, and she felt the same way. This was the hardest thing she had ever done. Maybe someday he would understand that she had done it as much for his sake as for her own.
He paused at the door to look at her with tortured eyes. “I really am sorry, Stacy.”
“I know,” she whispered. “So am I.”
“If you ever change your mind…well, I’m not that hard to find.”
She nodded, certain that she wouldn’t go looking for him.
“Tell Andrew I said goodbye, will you? Anytime he wants to write to me or call me or anything, he’s welcome to do so.”
“That’s very kind of you.”
Her words only seemed to annoy him more. He turned abruptly toward the door, putting his hand on the doorknob. She steeled herself to watch him walk out.
And then he paused, his head down. “I just want you to know that if I handled everything all wrong, it was because I’d never been in love with anyone before. Maybe I got carried away. Maybe I shouldn’t have tried to rush you into something you weren’t ready for. But I did it all because I fell in love with you during that week at the river and I wanted so badly to make you a part of my life.”
He swallowed and gave her one fulminating look. “You said racing is my life, and you were right. It has been my life until this point. I was hoping that, with you, I’d found something more to live for. I’m more sorry than you’ll ever know that you couldn’t feel the same way about me.”