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She looked at her watch and gasped. “Oh, shit. The bosses are going to think I’m a lazy ass. Where’s Stephie? I hope she wasn’t waiting on me to do those calibrations.”
I led her from the room and back toward the lockers where we kept all our stuff. “Stephie was in there, taking bets on who would win. I had twenty bucks on you,” I told her, and she thumped me in the chest.
“You should have saved your money. He’s the best driver in the world. I didn’t stand a chance.”
I pulled her into my arms, pressing her against the lockers. Leaning forward, I brushed my lips across hers. “I have nothing but faith in your abilities, Tally Palmer. You could drive us into Hell, and I’d still believe in you.”
She stroked my face, the soft curves of her features making my heart beat faster. Someone wolf-whistled from the garage, and I moved away. Man, I wanted to take her home and lay her on any flat surface available so I could make her scream my name.
Unfortunately, we had to collect Jesse, then head over to Will and Colin’s house for dinner. Tally had talked to us about her backup plans when it came to the baby and birth, and she was going to ask them to be guardians. We were also going to tell them about us.
I grabbed the shirt I’d hung in my locker and headed into the men’s bathrooms. “I’ll be back in a minute.” Tally nodded, grabbing her dress and disappearing into the women’s.
It was kind of nerve-wracking. William Love was not a small man, that was for sure. And he was super protective of Tally, though by all accounts, she hadn’t made that easy. But without a doubt, he adored her. There was very little he wouldn’t do for her, and I wanted to suss him out more. Was he in love with her, despite the obvious love he had for his boyfriend? If anyone knew that love was a complex emotion, it was me.
Tally was quiet on the way back to the house, and I knew it probably had something to do with running into Rupert Ballantyne. His words had been honed to hurt her, though what he got out of inflicting that kind of pain on Tally was beyond me. As far as I was aware, they’d never had a relationship outside of the professional one that all drivers had with the media. However, you only needed to look at the venom in Rupert’s expression to know that he hated her, or maybe what she represented.
I made a note to talk to Antony about it, because I didn’t want Brick Willtot or Rupert ruining this opportunity for Tally. I reached across the center console to grip her fingers. “Do you want to talk about it?”
She shook her head, but directly contradicted herself when she asked, “Do you think he could tell I was pregnant?”
I shrugged, because to me, it was blatantly obvious and always had been. But that was because I’d always been professionally aware of her build. I’d had to create the cockpit for her cars in the team; I’d had all her measurements. I knew how much she weighed, how tall she was, what she looked like after six beers and two tequila shots. We’d been professional colleagues, and it had been part of my job. But more than that, we’d been friends.
Rupert had never been anyone’s friend. If he’d been able to tell she was pregnant, I’d be surprised. She had popped a little more lately, but not enough that you’d think she was nearly seven and a half months pregnant. I couldn’t rule it out, though.
“If he did, he wouldn’t think it was Buck’s. You look three months along, at the most. He’d probably think it was mine.” I lifted her fingers to my lips.
“You’d be okay with that? God knows what the rumor mill will say back at Ryclo, if it gets out.”
“One hundred percent okay with me.” I smiled at her. “I don’t know if I’ve said this, but I’m in this for the long haul, Tally. Me, you, Jesse and the baby are going to be a family. So if he thinks the baby’s mine, then he’s right. It’s ours. I’ll love and take care of him, because he’s a little piece of you.”
She let out a shuddering sigh. “You make it very hard not to weep like a baby, Hayes Davis. I don’t know what I did to deserve your… care, but I promise, I’ll take care of you right back.”
We fell back into a comfortable silence, each deep in our own thoughts. I meant every single word I’d just said, although I was just skimming the surface of my feelings for Tally. She wasn’t ready for the big words yet, but I could wait.
Jesse and Norton were standing on the front porch when I pulled up, and my best friend had put on his finest button-up. With his hair combed back, he looked like he’d stepped out of a sixties issue of GQ. He was a handsome fucker, and he knew it. Even Norton was brushed within an inch of his life, wearing the jaunty little bowtie that Tally had bought for him off the internet.
They both loped down the porch stairs, and Jesse put a blanket down over my upholstery in the back so Norton didn’t scratch up the leather. We really needed that family car already.
Norton was a good dog, though, and he knew to sit in the footwell behind the passenger seat. Jesse closed him in, leaning through Tally’s open window to kiss her soundly. “Hey, baby.” He jogged around to the other side, climbing in the back seat.
“What, I don’t get a kiss?” I joked, as I reversed the car out of the driveway.
Jesse snorted. “Nah man, you aren’t my type.”
“Too handsome?” I teased back.
“Too hairy. I’ve seen your ass; you’re one stray spark away from a forest fire back there.”
I gasped, my eyes flicking to Tally. “That’s a lie! My ass isn’t hairy at all!”
Tally laughed, giving me a mock sympathetic look. “Of course not…”
“Assholes,” I grumbled, but I was smiling. This right here was perfect.
TWENTY
TALLY
