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“No, no.” Criss came up to me and waved me off. “She doesn’t like being touched, and she’s apparently deaf. So she also doesn’t like to speak.”
Awesome.
“Okay, so did you get the whole spiel over with?” I asked.
“I did. You can jump right in and start driving when you’re ready,” he promised.
Meaning, the liability waivers were signed, and she wouldn’t try to sue me if shit hit the fan. Or she broke a fingernail.
“I’ll go get changed,” I said as I headed to the locker room and changed out of my Crocs—fuckin’ man, they were comfortable, and though I would never admit it, I was glad that Zip forced me to wear them—and into my jump suit and shoes.
When I came back out, she was already in the car, waiting for me to arrive.
I scratched my head as I walked toward the car.
I didn’t like giving rides to anyone. Mostly because they interrupted my flow, and I hated sharing my peace with someone else.
I’d been putting off Zip, too, but not for the same reasons. Mostly, the thought of her getting into my car, and something going wrong, absolutely terrified me.
“Ready?” Criss asked, interrupting my thoughts.
“Yep,” I grumbled, heading to the car.
She didn’t look over when I got into the car, but she did bounce in her seat a little bit.
This particular car was different than our usual race cars. For one, it had a seat for a passenger. Two, it didn’t go as fast, though that didn’t matter because I would never take anyone as fast as they could go based solely on the fact that I was responsible for their life if shit went wrong.
“Are you rea…” I trailed off, remembering the girl was deaf.
I would just have to assume that she was.
Starting the car up after I got my own belts in place, I started slowly down pit road, picking up speed a little at a time to ascertain if the woman at my side was okay.
There was something so damn familiar about her mannerisms, too.
She was practically vibrating in her seat in excitement, and I thought it was cute.
Which felt like a gut punch because the only people I thought were cute were my son and my wife.
Swallowing hard, I turned to get my attention back on the road and picked up the pace.
For the first lap, I kept it slower, making sure to check that she was okay for the first few turns.
Only when she seemed to be doing just fine did I start picking up the speed.
I made it through three full laps—of the thirty I was required to give her—when the woman threw her hands up.
I looked over, startled by the movement, and found myself staring at… my wife.
Something like euphoria rolled through me, then I said, “What the absolute fuck?”
She grinned wickedly at me, flipped me off, then said, “Go!”
“Deaf my ass,” I grumbled, then hit the accelerator.
But since I was already here, and I’d already broken the seal…
“Yesssss!” she squealed, throwing her hands in the air at the sound of the engine revving.
I gave her a whole lot more than thirty laps.
Honestly, it was more like a hundred and fifty before it started to get too hot.
I wasn’t prepared for a whole entire race, and with my own actual race being in two days, there was no reason to get dehydrated before it.
This season was going amazing. Much better than last.
Though I was able to race the last fourteen races of the season, we did abysmal in points and rankings.
People still loved me, though.
And the day I came back, they’d been so damn happy that it hadn’t mattered that I got second place.
I was a winner in their book.
This season, though, I had something to prove.
And I had two great sidekicks in the pits cheering me on.
Though, one did a whole lot of sleeping still.
It was hilarious because one would think that the sound of a race, even muted as it was with the headphones on canceling out the noise, would keep a baby awake.
But not my kid. No, Nash Whit Christopherson was no normal baby.
He loved loud things, and every time he heard a motor running, a battle scene in a movie, or anything with a decibel that was chaos related, had him going right to sleep.
Zip giggled, pulling me out of my thoughts, and back into reality.
At the next pit road exit, I took it, and pulled over onto the line.
Zip squealed and started to unfasten her belts.
It took her too long, so I started helping her after I undid my own.
When she was free of the confines, she turned to me.
“What the fuck?” I repeated when I pulled the helmet off of my head and put it on the dash. “Why?”
“Why?” she asked as she took her own helmet off.
