Page 331 of Rogue Riders Duet

All the breath leaves my lungs as I reach out and hold up my uninjured pinky. He stares at it, then at me, and a tear slips out of his eye and runs down his cheek.

“I promise you…” I whisper, “… to give life a fighting chance, Dane.”

He grips my pinky so hard he almost breaks this one, too, then yanks me into him. It’s not a careful hug. It’s a collapsing one. Arms clinging, shoulders shaking, every breath ragged.

He cries into my neck like he’s finally letting go of everything he’s been holding in since I crashed, since I broke, and I hold him like he’s the only thing that matters, because for so long, he was.

“I’m so sorry,” I whisper through my tears. “For all the pain I gave you. I didn’t see it, I couldn’t. I was hurting so much, and I didn’t see you.”

“Don’t you fucking dare.” He pulls back just enough to look at me, and his eyes are red, wet, furious in the way only love can be. “This is everything I ever wanted, Speedbump. Everything. Not the revenge. You choosing yourself.” After a long while and a few more sobs, he lets go, scrubbing at his face with his sleeves and laughing wetly. “Fuck. Look at us. Fucking cry babies.”

I laugh, too, even as I sniffle. “Yeah, but the toughest ones.”

“No one’s tougher.” He grins, eyes still shining. “Imagine if Dad saw this.”

“He’s so weird lately, he’d probably just join in. Like the jet, the hotel rooms, and all the extra drama? Weird.”

“He’s desperate,” Dane agrees, shaking his head with a half-smile. “You could ask for anything right now, and he’d hand it over with a bow on it.”

I huff out a laugh. “We should absolutely milk that.”

Dane grins at first, but then his expression shifts. “We should.” His eyes stay on me, searching. “Is there anything you want?”

“You just heard what I want.”

“Yeah, but how? How do you want to come back to racing? What’s the plan? You thinking of signing with a team? Maybe Delacroix’s?”

“I haven’t thought that far yet.” I pause, then turn the question around. “What about you? What is it you want?”

Dane frowns. “What?”

“You sacrificed years for me,” I say, picking at the loose thread in the blanket again. “For this, and I just told you it was for nothing.”

“It wasn’t for nothing.”

“It was,” I say softly. “I’m sorry, but that’s not the point. The point is, you’re just as important. So, what do you want, Dane?”

He huffs and runs a hand through his hair. “The plan was to work for the company.”

I make a face before I can stop myself. “I mean, if that’s what you want, okay, but I never saw you doing that.”

“Neither did I, but it would be the logical next step.”

“And what’s the illogical thing you’d rather do?”

He hesitates, glancing toward the window. The light is softer now, golden almost. It’s still early, but the world’s beginning to stir.

“I think I’m not quite done with DH after all,” he finally admits.

“You wanna race?”

He’s thirty-four, and it’s late to start again, but if he wants it⁠—

“No, silly.” He smiles, and the affection in it makes me smile too. “But being on the circuit again. Being your manager. Running numbers. Strategy. Logistics. I liked it. I want that.”

“You want us to run a team?”

“You gonna forgive Finn?”