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Duck Lips pouts then bats her eyes at Matty.
“Stay away from me,” he deadpans.
I haven’t been sleeping for shit and maybe I’m delirious but I can’t stop myself from laughing as I rub my exhausted eyes. I mean really, what the fuck has happened to my life?
“Ahem,” Jack clears his throat, “Candi with an I is apparently the best candidate the Dragon Lady could find on short notice.” His eyes swing to Mallory, then back.
“I’m very eager to please,” Duck Lips pips at me, swiveling her upper body back and forth on her hips. I don’t know if she thinks that’s attractive or if she has to piss.
“Are ya’ now,” I ra
ise an eyebrow at her. “Go fetch me a bottle of water, will you, Candi with an I?” I almost called her ‘love’ at the end but even though Scots call everyone ‘love’, I couldn’t do it. I called the bloody trash collector ‘love’ last year when I was half asleep, but now I can’t speak the word.
The woman I thought I loved is presently twenty feet away from me running her hand up Digby’s back, oblivious to me. He puts an arm around her and runs one finger through her long brown hair.
“Go on, get,” I swat the most vapid nanny on earth on the ass and she squeals and skirts out of the garage giggling. As I thought, Mallory couldn’t ignore that, a flash of her eyes gave her away.
This feels like shit. I feel like shit acting like this but there’s nothing else to be done about it. As much as she hurt me, I called Sandra the Dragon Lady and had Mallory transferred to Digby so she wouldn’t even lose her precious job. So her dream would be intact when she leaves after the final race in Abu Dhabi.
Now I can either mope around like a pussy or I can keep the mask up for the next three months.
“Come on,” Jack slaps my arm and I suck in a breath and jerk awake. I hadn’t realized I was leaning up against the car in a vacant trance for who knows how long, staring at her. Staring at her staring at me.
I can’t read her eyes. They’re swollen but I can’t place the emotion. Fuck, I’m exhausted and out of my skull. Pity, it’s probably pity in her eyes.
“She looks like shit,” Jack mumbles when we’re out of earshot and walking back to the motorhome to pack up and leave for the night.
“Aye, and how do I look?”
“It’s not a competition,” he snaps.
“Everything in my life is a competition.” I don’t want to talk about this. I want it to go away. Unless I keep up the sarcasm and facade every waking minute, the pain in my chest returns.
“You can’t do this the rest of the season.”
“Do what,” I grumble as a statement instead of a question because I know damn well what he means.
“She’s hurting, mate. You’re hurting her.”
“Me?” I snarl. “What the fuck, who’s side are you on?”
“I’m just saying, this isn’t going to work for the next three months. Just let Sandra fire her if this is how you’re going to act.”
“No,” I fire back immediately. I’m filled with rage and hurt but I won’t steal her dreams like mine have been taken from me.
“Christ mate, figure your shit out.” Jack throws open the door to the motorhome and leaves me standing in the entryway alone.
Figure my shit out. What is there to figure out? I have my plan.
Twenty Seven
“I hope you’re happy now, I could never make you so. You were a hard man, no harder in this world. You made me cold and you made me hard. And you made me the thief of your heart.” - Sinead O’Connor - You Made Me the Thief of Your Heart
Mallory
I can’t make it ninety days.
Not being this close to him, watching him take alternate routes around the paddock to avoid me. Not when I have to stand in the garage with him so close I could take ten steps and shake him, slap him, scream at him, wrap my arms around him, kiss him.
