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“Good luck,” Dyana singsongs. She pushes up on her tiptoes to give me a kiss on the cheek, then leaves.
“You can really sit down.” Kydd’s manic smile isn’t exactly reassuring. “We don’t bite.”
“Kydd. I swear you are fucking full of it,” Spencer gripes, but it’s light-hearted. I take his ease as a clue that it really is okay.
“What? We gotta keep him on his toes.”
“I think he’s dealt with enough,” Spencer retorts and looks at me, an apology written across his features. His mood has lightened, which I take as a good sign.
“Pssshhh… Hardly. He’s had it easy.” I take a seat just to the right of the one Ilya vacated, putting me almost in front of Spencer. The burly man leans forward, resting his forearms on the table, but he isn’t looking at me. Perhaps the third degree is over now that I’ve passed whatever odd test that was.
“What are you even doing here?”
Kydd scoffs. “I like the new kid. I want to be here when you tell him.” Spencer rolls his eyes and shakes his head before jolting to the side as if he is about to cuff Kydd, but Kydd carefully dodges the hit. I can’t help but wrangle my lips into a smirk.
“Tell me what?” I ask.
“Ilya wants you to drift for him.” Spencer’s words are straightforward, his tone a touch excited. Something I can appreciate.
“What? Why?” I’m stunned, intrigued and damn if adrenaline at getting back on some sort of track isn’t lacing my veins.
“All good questions. I’ll train you, and he’ll be around to help sometimes. I’m not sure if you know it, but the drift scene is huge in these parts. It isn’t just the Hellions. But all the surrounding gangs and some outsiders. It’s illegal as fuck, but it’s bigger than Formula Drift and makes us a hell of a lot of money. Ilya thinks you have what it takes. We hold our own sanctioned events. Can be dicey but the meets are neutral ground. For the most part.” Must be why Ilya left the pro scene. Spencer pushes out his chair and stands, then holds out his hand. “Give me your phone. I’ll give you my number and when you’re ready, we can discuss this further. Sit with it. Take some time to decide.”
“You don’t even know me.” I unlock my phone and hand it to him. He inputs his number, then lays it on the table in front of me. His own phone goes off in his pocket and I see that he’s sent a message to himself from my phone.
The lift of his shoulders is candid yet unbothered. “You’re right, we don’t.”
“Then why all this? Why bother when I could fuck you over?” To my surprise, he doesn’t balk or get angry. He places his palms on the back of the chair he’s just pushed under the table. He leans his weight on it and regards me.
“People don’t fuck over the Hellions.” The way he delivers those words without a care in the world sets me on edge. Kydd’s warning pops into my head. But when Spencer looks up at me, there is understanding swirling in his eyes which leads me to believe the coldness with which he regarded me earlier was all put on. “I can see you need this. Saw it in your eyes as soon as our doors met, and I looked at you. Need like that creates loyalty. Loyalty is what we need in our men and our drivers.” With that, he swivels his back to me and casually walks to the door.
“I don’t want to be a Hellion,” I say because it’s the truth. I’m not completely ready for organized crime to be the change I’ve been looking for. Though I can’t say I don’t like the atmosphere here, the camaraderie that seems to flow between these men. The protection they have for one another. It feeds something in me that has been lacking.Family.
He stops at the door and puts a hand on the frame, his head twisting over his shoulder so he can see me out of the corner of his eye. “Not yet, you don’t, but that will change.”
“You see that in my eyes, too?” It’s honestly a joke, but Spencer doesn’t take it that way. A calloused hand with black and gray tattoos swirling and vining around the fingers taps the door frame.
“Something like that.” He gives it one more pat for good measure, then leaves Kydd and me in silence.
“Ha. Oh fuck, bro. Welcome to Hell.” Kydd grins at me from across the table like the maniac I’m beginning to think he is.
CHAPTERSIXTEEN
TRACE
“Hold up.I know where I know you from.” With no clue that he was even here other than his voice, Spencer points a finger gun at me. I give him a confused look. He knows me from the mountain that night and can learn what he wants about me through my time in Superbike. We’ve talked, spent a little time together and from what I gather, he seems like a genuine guy. I still keep my walls up around him because he’s a Hellion, and I’m not ready to put that trust in them yet.
I’m on the outskirts of a drift event, sitting in my BMW and observing. A couple of days ago, I received a random text that had an address, date, and time. That was it. It wasn’t Spencer’s number, either. Assuming it was from one of the brothers that were there when I spoke to Ilya, I saved the digits. It might come in handy later.
Spencer makes his way from standing at my window to the other side of my car. When there, he whips the door open and drops his gigantic frame into the seat next to me with little grace. The entire car dips with the movement. I pan my gaze over my right shoulder with a dry expression. He’s grinning, knowing I think he’s a moron. The man really has a presence about him when you get to know him.
“Okay, I’ll bite. Aside from the fucking obvious, where do you know me from?” The door swings shut, but the sounds of the competition still fill the car through the open windows. An acrid burnt rubber smell has me wafting the air from my face. That is something I’m going to have to get used to. It’ll grow on me after a while, I’m sure.
“I thought I recognized you that night on the mountain.” I raise my brows, eager to get him to just spit it out, and exasperated, not in the mood for his sarcastic antics today. “You’re the one who took out those C.C.C. punks at the track. Saved that girl.”
The infamous career ending fight. My grim mood drops even further. If Spencer notices, he says nothing. “Lennox,” I murmur and my heart jumps in my chest. That fucking girl. I’d do it again in a heartbeat, though.
“She’s a rider,” he states, and I’m not sure what to say, so I just nod.Fuck yeah, is she a rider?Her on that bike is a beautiful thing.
