CHAPTER1
Ben
“How are Shelby and Miles?”
I stare at the well-dressed man across the table from me, not a hair out of place, his obviously expensive designer suit perfectly pressed. He’s a fish out of water in my local coffee shop, with its faded gingham curtains and ancient, scarred linoleum. Armani and middle-American blight just don’t mix.
“You didn’t come all the way to East Nowhere, Kentucky to ask me about my cats.”
Sure, they’re great cats. Shelby—named after legendary race car designer and driver Carroll Shelby, of course—can fetch. And Miles—named after Ken Miles, an engineer and driver on Shelby’s Cobra racing team—likes to sing along with my vintage Johnny Cash records. He’s especially fond of “Folsom Prison Blues.” Makes me wonder what he’s plotting when I wake up in the middle of the night and catch him staring at me.
But this guy—Jacques LaRue—is the owner and principal of a Formula One team. I know he’s got better things to do than leave his Bel-Air mansion–or maybe he was at his chateau in Montreal—to hang out with me.
And I’m afraid I know exactly what that better thing is.
Jacques chuckles. I swear, even his laugh has a French-Canadian accent. “So much for small talk.”
“I haven’t got time for small talk.”
I sip my subpar coffee and wonder, for a second, what the multimillionaire across from me, who’s used to champagne and caviar, thinks of the sludge in his cup. Then I realize I don’t fucking care. I don’t fucking care what anyone in Formula One thinks about anything.
Not anymore. At least that’s what I keep telling myself.
“Really.” He eyes me over a chip in the rim of his coffee cup. “That’s not what I’ve heard.”
“What have you heard?”
“That you don’t know what to do with yourself. That you’re holed up in this podunk town like a goddamn hermit, only showing your face in public when you need gas or groceries.”
He’s not far from the truth. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing here. Coming home was a split-second decision, made in the heat of the moment. In the depths of despair, from the bottom of a booze bottle that I fortunately managed to crawl out of. Hell, I hadn’t even called this place home in years. It’s not like I have any family left here, and the only person I can count as a friend is Zeke at the Pump-N-Dump.
I just wanted—no, needed—to be as far away as possible from racing. And Clearapple, Kentucky seemed like the farthest place, distance-wise and demographic-wise, from the fast-paced, high-stakes world of Formula One.
“I’m here, aren’t I?” I make a sweeping motion around the crowded restaurant. “Seems pretty public to me.”
“And to think, I only had to threaten to sic Elodie on you to get you here.”
Elodie’s his daughter and second-in-command at LaRue Motorsports. And as tenacious as Jacques is, she’s ten times worse. If there was a poster child for won’t-take-no-for-an-answer, she’d be it.
Which probably explains how we wound up sleeping together that one time. Something I hope to hell her father isn’t aware of.
I grab the glass sugar shaker from the middle of the table and pour a generous amount into my cup. I like my coffee sweet. Especially when it’s the consistency of motor oil. “You still haven’t answered my question.”
“What question was that?”
“Why did you want to see me?”
He lowers his cup and leans back, casually crossing his legs like what he’s about to tell me isn’t going to be earth-shattering. “You know Grady Lewis.”
“Not personally.”
Although I sure as hell know who he is. It’s hard not to, even with my self-imposed Formula One ban. Son of five-time World Drivers’ Championship winner Archie Lewis. Favorite of all the F1 fangirls and frequent motorsport mag cover boy, with his golden curls and electric blue eyes and confident, sexy smile that probably opens every door for him.
And LaRue’s current problem child.
“Then you know he’s had a rough time making the jump from F2 to F1,” Jacques continues as if I’d said the quiet part out loud.
I shrug, feigning an indifference I wish I felt. I’m not supposed to care what happens on the circuit. That part of my life’s fully and firmly in my rearview mirror. And if occasionally I glance atAutosportmagazine, or get the urge to tinker with a turbocharged 1.4 liter V6 engine, that’s totally normal. Like a chain smoker who quits cold turkey, going through temporary nicotine withdrawal.
