Racing hearts, p.1
Racing Hearts, page 1
RACING HEARTS
HOLLOWS GARAGE
BOOK 3
KATE CREW
CONTENT WARNINGS
Sexual content (Consensual), acts and references to domestic violence, references to car wrecks, violence, & explicit language, dog attacks, gun violence.
Copyrighted Material
Racing Hearts
Copyright © 2023 by Kate Crew.
All Rights Reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means— electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise— without prior written permission from the publisher, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Cover Designer: Books and Moods at booksandmoods.com
Editor: The Author Buddy at theauthorbuddy.com
To the unapologetically grumpy girls who navigate the world with a scowl and a side-eye, but have hearts of gold beneath the surface.
RACING HEARTS PLAYLIST
Headlights - Alex Warren
Nightmare - Halsey
Blvck - Bryce Savage
I Know Places - Taylor Swift
Fred Astaire - Jukebox the Great
Middle of the Night - Elley Duhe
gold rush - Taylor Swift
Lips of a Witch - Austin Giorgio
Bad Blood - Taylor Swift
Heartbroken - Diplo, Jessie Murphy
I Wanna Be Your Slave - Måneskin
Delicate - Taylor Swift
Minefield - Nic D
I Guess I’m in Love - Clinton Kane
Daylight - Taylor Swift
Power Over Me - Dermont Kennedy
Call It What You Want - Taylor Swift
Sweet Dream - Bohnes
Monsters - Ruelle
Money on the Dash - Elley Duhe
Vigilante Shit - Taylor Swift
Look What You Made Me Do - Taylor Swift
CONTENTS
1. Jax
2. Carly
3. Jax
4. Carly
5. Carly
6. Jax
7. Carly
8. Carly
9. Jax
10. Carly
11. Jax
12. Carly
13. Carly
14. Carly
15. Carly
16. Jax
17. Carly
18. Jax
19. Carly
20. Jax
21. Carly
22. Jax
23. Carly
24. Jax
25. Carly
26. Carly
27. Carly
28. Jax
29. Carly
30. Jax
31. Carly
32. Carly
33. Carly
34. Carly
35. Carly
36. Jax
37. Carly
38. Jax
39. Carly
40. Jax
41. Carly
Epilogue
Thank you!
ONE
JAX
I tried convincing myself that I was out driving for fun, for practice on the turns, for the fresh air…anything but the real reason. That I was only trying to escape my friends.
It’s something I never thought I would say considering how close we all were, and it wasn’t their fault, but I could barely be in the same room as them lately without envy gnawing at me. The irony is that I was the one who had always wanted a relationship, and now I was the only one left currently who was single.
Well, aside from Kye, but I didn’t even know if that counted anymore.
I had tried to find someone. I was always looking for the person who I could be with long term, but somehow dating had only made my self-esteem worse. The last relationship ended because I wasn’t as much of a jerk as I supposedly led her to believe.
It was as though being decent-looking and having a fast car must mean I’m going to be a constant asshole to whoever I’m dating.
I had spent all summer debating giving up on dating since it was so hard to find anyone I even wanted to get to know in the first place, much less to know who to trust to take a relationship further.
Now, I was fully giving up. I was done putting myself out there. I kept finding the wrong person, and each one knocked me down further until I'd lost hope of ever finding someone who would like me for who I really am.
It had gotten so bad that I was constantly anxious and on edge, to the point that I couldn't feel comfortable around my friends and I could barely sleep anymore.
I thought I was completely fine with the decision to not date. That was until I woke up and realized summer was over. The leaves were slowly changing now, each day getting colder, and soon the crew would want to go do all the dumb couple shit that people do when it's cold.
Now, here I was, driving aimlessly all night because the thought of being surrounded by couples, lost to being sickeningly in love with each other, felt like my personal hell. It felt like I was an outsider at a party I hadn’t been invited to. Even though I loved the addition of Quinn and Ash, I was starting to hate being surrounded by all the happy couples. Even Scout seemed to be wrapped up in her new boyfriend.
The road wound through dense forest, this part of the area more secluded, untamed, and beautiful. It was the main pass from our town to the next, but at this time of night, not many people were out, so I could speed my way through the hills and back again before I headed home to pointlessly attempt to sleep again.
First, I needed to get my own personal pity party out of the way so I could get back to my life tomorrow and act like nothing was wrong. And really, nothing was aside from not being able to figure out my own life or relationships.
I wasn’t sure why I had to think about wanting more in life, but it was there nagging me. I had what I wanted, the garage, my work, the races, the crew. It was all there for me, but somehow it wasn’t enough. It didn’t seem fair to ask for more when I knew my life wasn’t bad at all.
A flicker of green caught my eye up ahead. I slowed, an old truck coming into view on the other side of the road.
An involuntary groan escaped my lips. Helping a stranger wasn’t exactly what I had in mind, but leaving someone stranded here all night with a broken-down truck wasn’t an option either. Especially not when the chances that this was some old farm truck being driven by an equally-old man were pretty high. I pulled across the road to it, to park in front of the truck, my headlights bathing the truck in light as I hopped out.
“Hello?”
The dull light inside the truck was still on, and I could finally make out someone sitting in the passenger seat.
At least, I thought it was a person.
Until it barked, and barreled out of the truck, right at me.
I spun, ready to get out of there, but shock tore through me when I came face to face with a beautiful girl and a baseball bat, pulled back and ready to swing.
TWO
CARLY
Sometimes you go to sleep and think that was the most terrible day of your life, only to be surprised when the next day is even worse.
I thought yesterday was it. I thought it would be marked as the worst day of my life. But then this morning, my stepdad and his best friend, Tristan, proved me wrong.
I spent the last eight hours locked in my room hiding, but I was sure they were gone now. I pulled open my bedroom door and peered out. The house was quiet, everyone gone or asleep, and it was my only chance to grab what I could and run.
Run as far as I possibly could, and hope that they didn’t come looking for me.
I rolled my eyes. Of course they would come looking for me. Somehow their idea of family was becoming a little gang, and they thought they needed me for that.
I hadn’t realized they had been tricking me for years, encouraging me to learn about computers, praising how smart I was when I’d help them. It started small, switching little things in the records for the cars at their shop. There was always a good reason for it, and my mother’s unwavering faith in my stepdad made me never question a thing.
Did I like him? Not even a little. I hated him and his gross friends, but I was told that he was taking care of us and I should help him whenever he needed it, so I did.
Until yesterday. When I walked into their dirty, creepy garage after months of staying away, all the pieces fell into place. First, I had walked past the guy grinding a VIN number off of a door before adding a new, what I realized was fake, VIN plate in it’s place. Then, we turned the corner, overhearing Tristan and one of the guys talking about the next round of cars and parts they were sending out of town to sell. There was no hiding what we heard as my sister had run over, throwing her arms around Tristan as he glared at me.
It was a mess, just like all the information in my brain, but then it all clicked together.
I had been inadvertently helping them steal cars.
I felt so stupid. I should have known, I should have made myself pay more attention, but whenever my stepdad was around, I couldn’t think straight. He honestly terrified me and I learned fast that quiet and out of sight was best with him. So every time he asked for help, I put my head down to quickly do what he needed before going to hide back in my room.
I did exactly the same thing yesterday. I went back home, shut myself in my room, and laid in bed wh ile I tried to figure out what I should do now that I knew what they were doing.
I thought I'd have more time, but this morning, I found out I was wrong.
When my stepdad and Tristan sat me down and made my options very clear. I was going to help them steal new cars. They planned to take new cars off the manufacturer lots and I was going to adjust their VIN numbers to make them look legal, along with creating fake titles for them. Then, they could sell them for full price, and be long gone before anyone caught on.
They had gotten this idea that I could help them by casually hacking into some national database to change legal numbers.
As scared as I was of both of them, I couldn’t help but laugh in their faces. I could build websites, organize their accounts, run their programs, and suddenly I was supposed to hack into secure databases. In their delusional state, they really believed I could do this.
It didn’t matter if I could or not, I wasn’t going to.
That made it clear that if I stayed to help them, they would ease up on me and make sure I was taken care of, and if I didn’t do this for them, they would make my life hell. More than they already were, apparently. They had thought that everything was wrapped up so nicely, but they forgot to account for the fact that I finally opened my eyes and realized this was it. If I stayed, there would be no turning back to a life outside of their illegal lifestyles.
I slipped into the small garage attached to our house and opened up Slaughter’s laptop. He had one at his garage too, but last I knew, he kept copies of most of his files on this one.
I only hoped it was enough information.
I moved every single file I could find over to the thumb drive, my hands tapping against the table the entire time. My dog, Riot, came up, whining and knocking into me, probably annoyed at my sudden anxiety.
“We are really going this time,” I told him, trying to calm my racing heart down as I watched the files load. “No doubting ourselves again. We are leaving.”
It wasn’t the first time I had daydreamed about leaving, telling Riot that we could have a better life, but it was the first time I was actually doing it. My life had transformed into a living hell, and yesterday was the last straw. It had become unbearable, pushing me to desperate measures like this.
It hadn't always been like this, but at some point, Slaughter saw my mom struggling and took his opportunity to snake his way into our lives. He took over the uninvited role of the man of the house, claiming that my mother shouldn’t have to do all of this alone, and that he could help her as my new stepdad. It wasn’t long before his "help" quickly escalated into a dictatorship, turning our lives upside down in a matter of days. Somehow, my mother thought this was better than handling this on our own. I tried over and over to talk to her, but she was adamant that she was happy and things were not changing.
But now I knew that I would rather be alone than stuck here. The relentless questioning, the demands, the arguments, the nasty comments about my weight or outfits, the days or even weeks spent locked in my room as if I were still a child – like I wasn’t a grown woman. For so long, I thought that I owed them something, but I don’t. That was just the weight of their manipulation on my shoulders.
The laptop pinged, showing that the thumb drive wasn’t working. Something was corrupt on it or on the laptop.
Of course it wouldn’t work. Why would this be easy?
Riot whined again, making me more anxious.
“Alright, nothing stopping us, right?” I said, slamming the laptop closed and taking the entire thing with me.
I ran back to my room, grabbing my packed bags, trying to take as much as I could carry. I had my bags, my truck, my money, and Riot was already next to me. There was nothing stopping me.
Tristan and Slaughter were headed to the neighboring town to pick up – or more likely steal – car parts because I couldn’t think of any parts store that's open past 10 PM. My mom was a heavy sleeper, so that was no issue. Luckily, my sister had finally moved out and lived down the street with Tristan. It was the perfect opportunity for me to go in the opposite direction. I had been saving money for months to eventually move out and now I only hoped that I would have enough to make due until I started a job and got a paycheck.
I threw the last bag into the back of my truck and helped Riot up, his big Rottweiler body apparently too heavy for him to get himself up to the seat. Every minute that went by shrunk my window to leave, and the anxiety was starting to get to me. I didn’t know how long Tristan and Slaughter would be gone, but they would know I had left as soon as they saw my truck gone. With everything that happened today, I knew they would be hunting me down immediately, especially when they saw both me and the laptop were gone.
I turned the truck over, not letting myself panic when it didn’t crank the first time.
Or the second.
I almost cried until, on the third try, it finally turned over and roared to life.
I held back a sob as I took one more look at the house and prepared myself to let go of the only life I knew. It wasn’t like I would miss it, but leaving behind such a deep part of who I was felt strange. It was freeing and scary, and I realized just how long I had been waiting for this exact feeling.
I tried to not jump every time a car passed, but it was hopeless. Every set of headlights made me worry that they had caught onto what I was doing and was following me.
I made it almost five miles down the road before the truck started to sputter. Then it popped, the entire thing shutting off and the power steering going out, making me cling to the wheel to try and pull onto the side of the road.
I cursed as the truck came to a stop and Riot perked up.
“No, you stay here,” I said, jumping out. “This can’t seriously be happening.”
I popped the hood, laughing at myself that I thought I would be able to diagnose it. I knew how to change the oil, change a flat tire, and check fluids. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong with an engine that decided to stop going down the road. I still tried, checking all the fluids and finding them a little low, but I couldn’t imagine that made it shut off.
I leaned back on the bumper, looking out into the dark. There were no cars, no sounds, and nothing even remotely within walking distance.
There was nothing.
If this was the universe telling me I wasn’t going to get to leave, it wasn’t funny. Or maybe it was telling me that my life was what it was, and that I just needed to accept it.
It was hard to believe there could be this many roadblocks without it being some sort of sign to turn back, go home, and live out the rest of my miserable life.
I don’t know how long I sat there. It could have been five minutes or hours but the sound of a car approaching finally caught my attention.
The familiar sound of an engine revving before shifting down, the curves here too dangerous to take at full speed.
My body tensed at the sound, the tears threatening now, but I pushed them away. Now was not the time to fall apart. If I was a crying mess, I would have no chance against whoever it was.
I grabbed the bat out of the back and opened the passenger door, unclipping Riot’s seatbelt and ducking down to hide.
Just as I expected, the car came to a stop. If Slaughter, Tristian, or their friends were already looking for me, it wouldn’t be hard to spot this old green truck if they passed. My grandpa gave me the truck, and I was grateful for it every day, even if it did stand out so horribly. There was no way I would be able to afford any other vehicle right now and it gave me the chance to save to leave instead of having to save for a car.
