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His uncle. Just from what I’d heard about the man, I doubted that monument to douchery was doing anything, and it pissed me off on Axel’s behalf. I didn’t want to throw shade at the older man, but I’d witness enough of his actions via what Axel’s parents had said.
“But is he?” I asked.
“I don’t know. He just chews me a new one at least once a week.”
The shock had to show on my face. “Axel…that’s—”
“I know. It’s untenable. I need to stand up to him. I need to do a lot of things, and I’ve taken too long to do them while I let time slip through my fingers.”
“You know, I’m acquainted with some computer geeks—their term, not mine. My cousin Fiona’s boyfriend’s brother and his best friend. I guess they’re hackers. Whizzes at programmingandbusting into systems. I’m not supposed to know that, but Fiona trusts me.”
“Little Fee is old enough to date?”
I laughed. “Yeah.Little Feeis in college. If you want me to hook you up with those tech guys…”
“I’ll think about it.” He nodded, clearly considering my questions and the offer.
His hand squeezed mine again, and he turned, leaning against the railing that ran along the walkway. Letting go of my fingers, he transferred his grip to my hips and pulled me between his splayed legs. I fell into him, my hands pressed to his chest. His warmth seeped into me, even though we had our coats between us. The comfort of nostalgia heated places that had been ice-cold for too long.
God, I’d missed him. I hated admitting it. For so long, I’d tried to convince myself I despised him. I didn’t.
“There was no one for me, either,” I told him, circling back to what he’d told me about being celibate. “I… I wasn’t ready.”
In more ways than one.
His cool fingers framed my face while his eyes met mine, and I melted. His warm breath mingled with mine. The moment locked around us, neither of us moving. I started to lean in, craving his kiss. With barely held will, I stopped myself. Not yet. Not before we got this out. But dang it! He was making it difficult with our bodies aligned chest-to-chest as they were.
“So that video?” I rasped out, struggling to stay on topic, before we digressed back into our past and the apologies started again. “You’re saying it wasn’t you? I’ve seen the clip. Some people in town make it a point to keep me apprised of ‘all things Axel’. Even when what they show me is highly inappropriate. You know how it is in Cherish Cove. I haven’t been stalking your career, but I know all about it.”
I hadn’t stalked much anyway.
I still couldn’t decide if those people had been well-meaning, trying to make me feel better about Axel’s terrible choices or if they were rubbing his new life in my face. Since it was usually people who weren’t in my friend circle, I leaned toward the latter, but I couldn’t be sure.
Axel jerked a nod, inhaling as if to draw in strength. “I’m sorry you saw that. Did anything in it seem off to you?”
His tentative tone made it clear he didn’t want to talk about it, was hesitant to lay the issue in front of me to examine. I sure I wouldn’t want to talk about allegedly prancing through a public fountain butt naked or engaging in all sorts of sexual situations or driving drunk—all of which he’d been accused of recently.
“Well…Thingswere blurred,” I said. “But, yes. Where was your birthmark? Even with strategic blurring, that should have been visible. Clearly, whoever created the video is unaware of it.”
“Exactly! And thank God for that, too. Because it’s not me. I’m not hooking up with groupies every night. And the pics of me supposedly coming out of a room where I’d been with two women… That’s me, but there was no one in that room but me. And as you detected, I wasn’t part of a drunken escapade in that fountain in the middle of the city square.AndI wasn’t stopped for intoxicated driving.”
He shook his head, the cool air turning his angry exhale into steam. “Believe it or not, that last rumor pissed me off the most. Driving infractions like that have to be investigated by the circuit’s officials. If it were true, none of the media smear would matter. I’d be out of the car. And I’d be out of NASCAR,” he railed, riled up as we delved deeper into the situation. “But…yeah. That video… No one’s seen my birthmark. Even my workout shorts cover it because it’s high on my thigh and hip. It’s not like I go around dropping trou.”
I let that sink be in. I wanted to believe he hadn’t been with anyone who would have seen him naked. With resolve, I reminded myself he’d told me he hadn’t, and Axel wasn’t one to lie outright to me—even if he had secrets he was loath to share. But even drivers on the amateur circuits had women throwing themselves at them. The proverbial pit lizards, who wanted nothing more than to fuck a driver, haunted all levels of the sport.
Swallowing back my unwarranted jealousy, not even wanting to picture someone touching him, I focused on the main topic at hand. The smear campaign. “Do you have any idea who’d have it out for you? Why would you be targeted?”
“No idea. The thing is—and this will sound weird—it feels more like someone is trying to manipulate me. For most drivers, the circuit couldn’t care less about this stuff. They’d frown on it, yeah, but they’d talk to me and tell me to keep my nose clean because this is a ‘family sport’—other than the drunk driving thing they had to investigate. The NASCAR company isn’t who’s threatening to sanction me, to sideline me, whether with fines or not letting me race for some bullshit number of races. It’s my uncle, my own team, having it out for me. But people don’t know about my uncle and his ultimatums.”
Uh…Ididn’t know about them.
Shocked, I leaned back to study him. “His…what?”
Axel shook his head. “This is what I needed to talk to you about, what I was alluding to this morning. I need to explain some things, and it goes way back. Lots of things do. Remember our spring break trip?”
My brows drew together. Okay…Holy topic leap, Batman.And this was the second time that vacation had been brought up in two days. “Yeah. And Ginger was talking about it at the bar last night.”
“Yeah…” he echoed, seeming deep in thought. “What a coincidence, huh? She found the pictures of the…uh…wedding.” He went silent, visibly gathering his thoughts, and I didn’t push him, not wanting to probe too deeply into whatever troubled him. He’d tell me before we left this embrace. That had been one of the points to this walk: his promised explanation.
