Someone with a flashlight stepped into the center of the lane, as he waved me forward. I crawled to the starting line, the tires of my vehicle digging into the damp, packed sand.
I glanced to my left, expecting to see the usual mix of young adults and local thrill-seekers. Instead, there was only one other vehicle.
The rig idling beside me was just as battered and salt-crusted as mine—a heavy-duty vehicle that looked like it had spent the last decade being beaten by the tide. But even under the layers of dried mud and rust, the vehicle sat with a certain predatory stillness. I didn't need to see the driver to know who it was. The sheer arrogance of the idle gave it away—the way he kept the revs perfectly steady, waiting for the bite. I wondered for a split second if he’d peeled off a few extra hundred to clear the field, paying the guy to keep the other racers back just so he could get me alone on the sand.
Never mind.I didn't care.
I gripped the wheel, my fingers finding the familiar grooves. I stared ahead into the black expanse where the shoreline met thesky, the only markers being the distant, rhythmic white of the breaking surf.
The official raised the flag high. The world narrowed until all that existed was the dim light on my dash and the dark horizon.
The flag dropped, and the roar was instantaneous.
I slammed the pedal, the force pinning me back as my vehicle fishtailed, tires screaming for purchase in the loose, dry powder of the upper shelf. Beside me, Dominic was a blur of speed and aggression. He didn't spin; he launched. His rig hit the sand with the kind of clinical efficiency you only see on a starting grid, his gear shifts so crisp they sounded like cracks of a whip.
I shifted, the vibration of the gearbox humming up through my spine as I fought to close the gap. He was driving with a reckless precision that made my heart skip—he wasn't just racing; he was hunting.
The first turn came up fast—a sharp, banked curve where the dunes dropped toward the wet shoreline. I didn't brake. I threw the weight of the vehicle, the back end sliding out in a spray of salt and grit. I steered into the skid, muscles locking to hold the line, but Dominic was already there. He’d taken the turn with terrifying speed, his fenders inches from mine. He was forcing me wide, using his car to squeeze my lane, his engine practically radiating through my door.
We hit the flat, wet sand of the low tide, and the real chess match began.
He was using F1 lines—perfect, geometric arcs that maximized every inch of momentum. But this wasn't asphalt. I watched him hit a patch of washboard sand that made his rear suspension bounce, a tiny opening I’d been waiting for. I jerked the wheel, diving into the spray of his wake, using the slipstream of his own speed to pull myself alongside him.
For a hundred yards, we were locked. Door to door. Every time I gained an inch, the roar of his engine surged, his fronttire hovering right at the edge of my peripheral vision. He’d look for a way to cut me off, and I’d counter, feinting toward the surf before snapping back to the harder pack. It was a dance of weight and torque, skill versus raw, unyielding instinct.
The wind shrieked past the windshield, a chaotic howl that drowned out everything but the frantic thud of my own pulse. I saw him pull ahead by half a length, his taillights mocking me. He thought he had it. He was driving like he could out-muscle the ocean itself.
He knew the shoreline, but he was driving like he owned the tide. He was too blinded by the red mist of the chase to see where the shelf dropped off, turning the packed sand into a graveyard of heavy machinery.
Ahead, the beach turned dark and deceptively smooth where a tidal pool had drained, hiding a sudden ledge beneath the silt. I saw Dominic’s brake lights flicker for a millisecond—a reflex from someone used to avoiding imperfections. But on this sand, weight-transfer was a death sentence. In that second, he lost.
I didn't flinch. I shifted down, letting the engine scream, and aimed right for the center of the soft patch. The rig bucked, the steering wheel jerking violently in my hands, trying to rip itself out of my grip as the sand tried to swallow my tires. I kept my foot floored, heart in my throat, feeling the suspension bottom out with a bone-shaking thud.
Then came the surge.
I hit the hard-packed grit on the other side and the rig launched like it had been shot out of a cannon. I surged past him, the sudden, weightless gain of speed leaving him a blur in my rearview.
The finish line was a pair of flickering headlights not far off. I didn't look back. I didn't look at his headlights. I just watched the distance grow larger until I crossed between the orangeglows, the engine screaming in one final, triumphant note that echoed off the area.
My foot let off the gas, the vehicle slowing as I coasted into the dead stretch beyond the dunes. The silence that followed was deafening, broken only by the ticking of the cooling metal and the distant, heavy crash of the ocean.
I’d won.
I yanked my helmet off, my hair sticking to my damp forehead as I sucked in the night. To my left, the other vehicle had skidded to a halt, kicking up a final, defiant cloud of grit. I expected a confrontation—I expected him to come over and demand a rematch or finish the fight we’d started by the bathroom.
Instead, the door to his rig swung open and Dominic stepped out. He didn't look at me. He didn't even glance toward the spectators lining the edge of the path. He simply turned and started walking away into the dark, his silhouette sharp against the moonlight as he headed toward the dunes. He looked solitary, like the beach had rejected him and he hadn’t bothered to argue.
"Unbelievable! Carter!"
Luka’s voice cut through the surf, loud and full of a genuine, infectious energy. I looked over to see him jogging toward me, waving his arms, a massive grin on his face. He didn't look like someone who’d been ditched; he looked like he’d just watched a masterclass.
"I thought you went to wash your face, not put on a clinic for the locals," Luka said, leaning his arms on the window frame. He was smiling, but there was a tension around his mouth that hadn't been there before. "That last line you took through the soft pack? I thought for sure you were going to roll it. That was incredible."
"You're not mad?" I asked, my voice still breathless from the adrenaline.
"Mad?" Luka’s laugh was short. "I got a front-row seat to you smoking a professional. I should be taking notes. Though, I think I owe my brother an apology—I didn't realize he was that desperate for a workout tonight."
I looked at him, trying to let his energy ground me, but my focus kept drifting back to the dunes his brother disappeared behind. Luka was still talking, but the silence Dominic had left was the only thing I could actually hear.
