by A. M. Mahler
Revved
A Driven World Novel
A.M. Mahler
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead are entirely coincidental.
© 2020 KB WORLDS. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people.
Published by KB Worlds LLC.
Cover Design by: Tugboat Designs, LLC
Formatting by: Fox Chase Books, LLC
Published in the United States of America
Dear Reader,
Welcome to the Driven World!
I’m so excited you’ve picked up this book! Revved is a book based on the world I created in my New York Times bestselling Driven Series. While I may be finished writing this series (for now), various authors have signed on to keep them going. They will be bringing you all-new stories in the world you know while allowing you to revisit the characters you love.
This book is entirely the work of the author who wrote it. While I allowed them to use the world I created and may have assisted in some of the plotting, I took no part in the writing or editing of the story. All praise can be directed their way.
I truly hope you enjoy Revved. If you’re interested in finding more authors who have written in the KB Worlds, you can visit www.kbworlds.com.
Thank you for supporting the writers in this project and me.
Happy Reading,
K. Bromberg
This book is dedicated to all of us
that race the Driven world.
Settle in, enjoy the story, and I’ll see you
at the finish line.
Simon
I
pressed my back against the wall and willed my body to still. Bringing up my gun, I took a deep breath and let it slowly back out. I had been preparing for this day for months. Trained and trained until the gun became an extension of my arm. I would not falter. I would prevail. I had to. I chose a small gun instead of a rifle to provide me with a more intimate kill shot and craved the kill like my next breath. When I got so blood thirsty, I didn’t know. It was a transformation so gradual I barely noticed it happening. Being a lover and not a fighter, battles were never my strong suit. But when you’re staring down the barrel of a gun, things in a man change. You become hardened. Obsessed with revenge on the one who did you wrong.
It’s you or him, and my moment had come.
“Boots on the ground. Thugs on the north side of the building. I’ll pick them off as I can, but when they come around the corner, you light their shit up.”
I looked up into the trees at the sound of the voice in my ear. My brother-in-arms was sprawled out on a limb above, siting his rifle, barely visible in the waning hour of dusk. I had no idea how he even got up there. I said nothing in response. What do you say to a man you’ve known your whole life when he sounds like another person to you? He might have been worse off than I was.
The pounding of approaching feet on the ground sent my heart hammering and adrenaline racing as a thrill ran through my blood and I looked up. The first stars of the summer sky were popping out. I barely had time to register Orion as the footsteps got closer. My breath came out in pants. This was it. The moment I’d been waiting for—training for. The very nanosecond I got a glimpse of them running my way with their fingers on their triggers, I jumped out of my hiding spot and got all of one shot squeezed off when a hail of bullets hit me everywhere in my body. My chest. My stomach. My legs. Falling to the ground, I covered my face with my forearms.
“They have a Tommy gun! How did they get their hands on that!?” My teammate shouted in my ear.
“Help me!” I screamed with everything I had. I was going down in a blaze of hell fire and my partner was nowhere to be found.
“I’m trying! I’m trying!”
My eyes in the sky were totally useless. Laughter came over the headset. All my training, preparation, and research was circling the drain with me.
It was game over. I had failed.
One of my enemies cackled. “We got you, Uncle Simon!”
I went limp on the ground as the little monsters pounced on me with tickles, more Nerf bullets, and from one, a body slam that made my breath whoosh out with an elbow to my stomach. My brother dropped down from the tree and walked over with his Nerf N-Strike Elite leaning over his shoulder. All I had was the Hyper Fire Blaster. It had about two dozen darts but was no match for the motorized beasts the boys were armed with.
“All right,” my brother Devon addressed his little heathens. “Who got you the Ultra Blaster? We didn’t leave the house with that sucker.”
“Grandma!” My nephews chorused.
Sold out by our own mother!
I pounced to the balls of my feet and scooped up my youngest nephew, Marcus, flipping him over and dangling him by his feet.
“Ah, I’ve taken a prisoner of war!”
He hooted wildly as I swayed him back and forth. His shirt rode up, exposing his small belly, and I swung him up, pressed my mouth to his stomach, puffed out my cheeks, and blew raspberries all over.
“Help!” Marcus cried out for his two older brothers. “The torture! The torture!” His twin brothers, all of seven years old, decided to leave their five-year-old younger brother to the claws of their uncle. My brother wasn’t raising any fools.
Gently, I lowered Marcus to the ground. His breath came out in heavy spurts as he rolled around on the grass as if he were in the worst pain imaginable from “the torture.”
I loved these three little monkeys. I would take real bullets for them without a second thought.
But that wouldn’t stop me from trying to take them out in Nerf wars.
“All right, minions,” Devon said. “Bath time. Then you can put on Star Wars.”
“YES!” They fist pumped the air and rejoiced for their good fortune all the way inside, brown hair sticking up at all angles, faces and bodies covered in dirt. They weren’t cheering bath time, of course. They cheered Star Wars. They’d been waiting to watch this latest one, and my brother had been hanging it over their heads as an incentive for them to do what he wanted. My brother was not above extorting his children.
Halfway to the door, Marcus stopped and turned around. “I’m going to miss you, Uncle Simon. I really wish you weren’t moving away.” Then he turned around and took off after his brothers, blissfully unaware he left shards of my heart all over the place.
I released a long breath and rubbed my chest with the palm of my hand. My brother clapped my shoulder. “It’s all right,” he said. “You’re only going to be a couple of hours away.”
“I see them every weekend though.” I turned to look around at the dark backyard of my childhood home. How many summer nights had Devon and I spent camping out there? How many snow villages did we make in the winters? This was my nephews’ playground now, but I hadn’t given up my fun with them.
I followed my brother up the creaky back steps and into the house covered by cedar shake and white trim. The wooden screen door closed with a groan of rusted springs and a snapping crack behind me—one of the most comforting sounds of summer, followed by the ice cream truck, crickets, and boys laughing, and begging my mother for a treat before bath ti
me. Of course, she refused. She’d been helping my brother raise his hooligans ever since his wife died.
“Listen, as much as the boys and I are going to miss you, you can’t live your life scheduled around them,” Devon said. Our mother bustled around the country kitchen getting her popcorn party set up. She had an air popper and like eight different popcorn seasonings. All her boys, including myself and Devon, loved to “make our own” popcorn for movie nights. “You need to have your own life. You’re going to be three hours away. You can still drive down on a Friday night and spend the weekend. The boys and I can come up to you on school breaks. You’re moving to New Hampshire, not the moon.”
But it felt like the moon, even though I was trading the sleepy little coast town of Cape Brandon, Maine, for Grayson Falls, New Hampshire. Small New England town to small New England town. Same lifestyle, different faces. As a web designer, I could have done this new job from the comfort of my own home—read that my mother’s home—but my new boss really wanted me on-site.
This would be the very first time I would live on my own, not including college. Pathetic right? A twenty-eight-year-old man that still lived with his mother sent up all kinds of red flags, but I just didn’t feel the need to get out of my mother’s house. She was a great mom, and she wasn’t over-bearing. Then again, it wasn’t like I brought women here or anything.
When my sister-in-law died, my mother made a full-boar attempt to get Devon and the boys to move in with us. There was plenty of space. My mom worked as a freelance writer, and even after our father died, she kept her desk set up in the master bedroom and let me take over our father’s home office. That still left two extra bedrooms and a finished basement, which the boys had made their own anyway. Devon was a police officer in town, and the boys often stayed here if he was on a night-shift, or I’d go to their house. But Devon wouldn’t hear of taking the boys away from the house their mother lovingly decorated and made a home out of.
“And maybe you’ll meet a nice girl in New Hampshire.” My mother winked at me and I rolled my eyes. She didn’t hound me often about my love life, but I knew she desperately wished for another daughter-in-law and more grandchildren.
“At this point, any girl will do,” Devon muttered, and I scowled at him.
It was true. I didn’t date. But that was mainly because I grew up with all the women that lived in this town. Cape Brandon was a small fishing village that urban sprawl and tourism had overlooked so far. There was a bed-and-breakfast in town that did a good business, as well as a campground, but vacationers usually headed to Portland or bypassed this area entirely for Bar Harbor. I loved the women I knew here, but nobody created that spark inside that everyone talked about. I had a very specific type of woman in my head, and none of the lovely ladies of this sleepy little town fit my idea of the perfect woman for me. I wanted what my parents had—what my brother had before his wife died. I wasn’t interested in settling for anything else than that spark.
The boys came back down into the kitchen after what must have been the fastest bath in the history of hygiene. Devon was skeptical that a thorough job was done, but their faces and hands were clean, and they were in pajamas, so maybe that was the best we were going to get.
“Grandma? I want bacon and cheddar.” Travis, one of the twins, climbed up onto one of the stools at the breakfast bar. A wrought iron pot rack with lights hung overhead. Devon helped Marcus up onto another stool, and the other twin, Gavin, made his way up onto the last stool on his own.
“And you shall have it.” My mother lined up the popcorn seasonings like little soldiers along the tiled counter in between the boys and the gas stovetop. She moved to the other counter to start pouring popcorn into individual plastic cartons with red and white stripes that looked just like what you get at the movie theater. It was a nice touch.
Devon handled adding the seasoning to each bowl because the boys couldn’t be trusted with that task, while I crossed over to the refrigerator and retrieved juice boxes for the boys and beers for the three adults. Once the boys were set and headed off to the living room to get the movie ready, Mom handed us each our own bowl of popcorn. We seasoned them and joined the boys.
Everyone had their assigned spots. It wasn’t official or anything, just our routine. Mom liked to curl up in her chair and a half with a big ottoman, and she usually got at least one of the boys at some point. My brother and I took the recliners on either end of the large leather sofa, and the boys normally sprawled on the couch, the floor, or with Mom. Tonight though, Gavin climbed up with Devon and cuddled down, putting his head on his father’s shoulder. Mom looked over in interest. Devon covered his son up with a blanket and tucked him in before looking up and making eye contact with Mom. I knew that shared look. It meant they thought Gavin would probably be puking soon. I hoped if he did, it was just from too much fun and not a stomach bug that was about to rip through my family right before I left.
These were the things I would miss. When all three of the boys get sick, we adults divided and conquered, each taking on a kid who got all our care and attention. It worked for us. But now there would only be two adults. The opening credits began, and the iconic golden scroll rolled up through the seventy-inch screen. The familiar symphony rang out through the surround-sound speakers.
Dammit, I couldn’t take my system with me. My mom would have a better home theater set up than I did. And again, I was questioning my decision to leave. I’d miss this living room. The furniture had changed over the years, as had the entertainment system. The wide-planked hardwood floors accompanied cream colored walls and thick faded green molding typical of New England homes. This room had been the center of my family forever. The comfortable feeling hugged you like a blanket just out of the dryer.
About half-way through the movie, Marcus was up with Mom, and Travis was curled into my side, sweating with pink cheeks. All three boys were sleeping.
Mom looked over at Devon. “I think you should spend the night,” she said softly. “I’ll go get Margo and bring her here. They can stay with me while you work tomorrow.” Margo was the boys’ big, goofy mutt. Devon nodded and frowned, brushing his hand over Gavin’s head before pressing his lips to his son’s forehead. A little trick to taking temperature I learned on the “uncle job.” Mom and I leaned down to our little guys and did the same. Travis felt warm, but not quite burning up. He was sweating, so that was a good sign. Maybe he wouldn’t be down long.
Mom looked back up to Devon. “They’ll need something to bring the fevers down.” Devon switched off the movie and tossed the remote control on the end table before standing up. Slowly, gently, Mom and I stood with our precious bundles, and we all walked upstairs in a line to bring the boys to their room here. Three twin beds stood in a row evenly spaced out, and we eased each of the boys down on their assigned beds. The room shared a bathroom with mine, so I’d hear if they got up tonight, but I doubted I’d be called upon. Devon pulled the zipper open on a bean bag chair and pulled out a big, fluffy pillow mattress. Mom disappeared and returned with sheets for it. Looked like Dev was bunking in here tonight.
“Wake me up if you need reinforcements.” I squeezed his shoulder on my way out of the room. Devon and Mom whispered for a few more minutes, but I couldn’t hear them anymore once I crossed into my half-packed room. Boxes were stacked in the corners. Removed photographs left behind discolored squares and rectangles on the gray walls. The room looked barren. There wasn’t much for me to move, but thankfully, I was renting a fully furnished apartment in Grayson Falls. Then I’d figure out what to do next. It could be that I didn’t stay.
But I knew I would. It was almost like I had to stay. I was determined to shake my life up a little bit and get out of my comfort zone. The company I was going to was family-run. They would understand extended weekends in Maine for family visits. I could work anywhere as long as I had a laptop.
After changing into flannel pants and a baseball t-shirt, I headed into the bathroom to brush my teeth.
Right as I started to swish my brush in my mouth, I heard, “Daddy, I have to ‘fro up.” I jumped out of the way as my brother made a fast beeline through the door and to the toilet with Travis. The retching sound coming from his little body made me want to vomit in sympathy. While Travis hurled, Devon prepared a dose of children’s Tylenol. After rinsing out my mouth, I walked into my room and retrieved the book I was reading from the bedside table then crossed back into the boys’ room to take up residence on the pillow bed with my brother.
It was going to be a long night.
Maggie
T
he sounds of summer were in my blood. It wasn’t the same things others might hear—like ocean waves or carnival rides. My summers sounded like the roar of forty eight-cylinder engines all hitting the gas at the same time. The vibrations of the grand stands as the field thundered by. An excitement so intense it made your entire body quake. The highs of winning, the lows of crashing, and everything in between. I spent my summers on the stock car circuit, and when I had to go back to school in September, it felt like the loss of a limb. From February until November, my whole being was absorbed by racing, breathing the smell of exhaust, wearing my ear protection like an extension of my head, and soaking up every bit of knowledge I could about cars.
By the time I was eight, I took apart my first engine. At twelve, I did oil changes, rotated tires, handled lube jobs, and tune ups. I wore engine grease on my face like other girls wore blush, and instead of short shorts and tank tops, I wore coveralls and overalls. Steel toe boots replaced flip flops, leather gloves in place of cute manicures. I spent my formative years in the garage surrounded by men.
One day, legendary stock car driver Jimmy Reilly dropped his hat on my head with a wink and a smile—told me to come see him for a job when I was old enough. That moment defined my life. I still had the hat, and I got the next best thing to working with my idol.