Racing hearts, p.4
Racing Hearts, page 4
She shrugged. “You never know. It’s a lot of fun when you’re on a track. And not nearly as scary as the road.”
“I might have to try it one day,” I said, not really meaning it. Not believing that I would be around long enough to do that. I was pretty sure after today, I would never see them all again.
After shopping, we got back into Scout's little green car. I had come to hate these fast cars, but she seemed like a better driver than most people I had known, so I tried to keep my mouth shut and not complain.
“So, I have to ask because I’m not quite sure what the entire dynamic is here. I’m not causing any problems staying there with Jax, right? None of you have a problem with it and are planning on punching me or anything? I want to clarify that I’m sleeping on the couch, not with him.”
They all looked around and laughed.
“I’m already dating one of his friends, Ransom, and so is Ash, who is dating Fox. As for Scout, what do you think? Any feelings towards Jax?”
“I will pull this car over and kick both of your asses if you try to convince her that I do,” Scout said. “No, Carly. The only feelings I have, or have ever had, for Jax are the annoying older brother feelings. I love him, for sure, but there’s no romance there, promise. There’s no romance for any of the guys.”
I nodded, relieved that none of them seemed to have a problem. I didn’t want Jax, but I also didn’t want any of the girls coming for me.
By the time we made it back from the store and they dropped me off, I even felt a little more comfortable about the idea of having to sit and eat with the entire group later.
I was surprised at how nice they all were. I mean, they joked and gave each other some shit, but it seemed to all be friendly. It was so different from what I knew. I gave up on friendships, on any type of relationship, and learned to keep to myself. It had become easier than trying honestly, and it felt so much safer than handing over any part of myself to someone.
After walking Riot again, I went right to work. I started with making the pasta and prepping dessert before I would start putting it all together when the time came.
I lost myself in cooking, not paying attention to the time or to my worries. It was one of my favorite parts of it all. I had too much to focus on in these moments to worry about my life. I could turn on music or a podcast and be zoned out for hours.
The door shut, and I froze.
“Hello?” I asked, the edge to my voice sounding annoyingly nervous. I liked to think I was tough, but I didn't feel that way right now. I was so nervous that every little thing seemed to put me more on edge.
“Only me,” Jax said, walking in and throwing his stuff down. “How’s it going?”
“Oh damn. What time is it?”
There was no clock in the kitchen and without a phone, I was useless at keeping track. Although, to be honest, even with the phone, I was terrible.
“Almost five. Everyone will head home to clean up, then come over. Is that fine?”
“Fine? Like an hour?” I wasn’t nearly as ready as I wanted to be. I mean, the food was ready, but I wasn’t. I wanted this entire dinner done and over with, then I could at least make it to the next town before midnight then, and hopefully avoid any extra small talk.
Jax only laughed. “I’m going to shower quick and then I will help you.”
“No, you don’t have to do that. You worked on my truck all day. Dammit, you did get my truck, right?”
“I did. I figured you would at least text, but here.” He turned his phone around, showing me a picture of the truck in what I guessed was their garage. “We’ll talk at dinner about its diagnosis, but it’s locked up there now.”
“Thank you. It really means a lot that it’s at least safe.”
He grimaced, but shook his head in agreement. “I’ll be back in a few.”
The next hour went by fast as I put the food together and tried to push Jax out of the kitchen.
“The whole point is I do this in exchange for the truck getting fixed, so stop helping. Shouldn’t your friends be here soon?”
“Yeah, they should. I get you are trying to kick me out, but do you think I need to wait at the door and greet them?” he asked with a smirk. “You did meet the girls, right? There’s no formalities here. They will just let themselves in. I can help you in here.”
As soon as he said the words, the door burst open, a line of people filing in.
I could only step back, the apartment getting smaller as one after another came inside.
I hated get-togethers, hated parties. Honestly, I hated anything that had more than two people around me lately. I would be content here alone for weeks if I had Riot, fun food to cook, and a few books or movies.
Not only that, but big tattooed street racers made me nervous after hanging around Slaughter and Tristan, their illegal activities always bringing some sort of trouble around. Their gross, inappropriate friends always coming around to drink and grab at me. I could barely hide away in my room without them bothering me constantly.
Now I seemed to be in a room full of them.
“You okay?” Jax asked, stopping to look me over.
His hair was still damp, his shirt clinging to him in all the right places and making me forget what I was worried about. I could see more of his tattoos now, a band around his forearm, a few others littered on his biceps. They weren’t overwhelming, each one smaller and well done. I assumed there was more, but none that I had a chance to see yet. I, surprisingly, really wanted to see if there was more.
“Carly?” he asked again, pulling my attention back to his face.
“Yeah, I’m not great with groups, and yours is a bit too familiar and intimidating.”
“Damn, yeah, I forget that all of us together can be daunting. They are really great, though. They won’t give you too much shit or anything. What do you mean, familiar?” He was still smiling, stealing bites of food where he could.
“I already know all of your types. I know what they will give me,” I said, straightening my shoulders. “It’s fine. It’s only a dinner. Can you help me carry everything out?” I asked, trying to tell myself that I’d made it through many dinners with these types. One more wouldn’t kill me.
“Whoa, whoa, hold on. What are you talking about? You know what they will give you? Who?”
“The racer type. The street racer type. I know the rude, gross comments, and grabby hands. I can handle it for one night,” I said, trying to give myself a pep talk more than actually explain it to him.
His eyes went wide. “None of my friends are going to be grabbing you. That’s wild that you would even think that would be okay with us. I will personally hit anyone who thinks they could grab you when they want. As for the rude, gross comments, unless we are talking about open wounds or something, there should be none of that, especially if you’re insinuating it would be sexual. I don’t know if you could tell yet, but Fox or Ransom would quite literally get their asses kicked if they said something like that. You really were hanging around shitty people, huh? Just give them a chance for the night and then make your decisions.” A scowl came over his face as he looked back at the crew and then at me. “Where you were before, did they…hurt you?”
The clear concern on his face was surprising… and cute.
“No, nothing like that. Aside from a smack from my mom once in a while or a twisted arm from my sister, I was okay. Luckily, I’m rude enough that no one crossed the line into anything too extreme. But it made me hate groups of people like this.”
He leaned back on the counter, furrowing his brows. “So you have to tell me now. Who are you running from, exactly? I’ve been wracking my brain all day, but I can’t place the guy I hit last night.”
I could only stare, not knowing what to say. Telling him could have two outcomes.
One, he knows them and hates them too, so he would understand why I left.
Or two, he wants to send me right back, and have no involvement with them.
I guess the third option was that he actually likes them and will be on their side of this all.
He was still staring back. “I don’t know how long you can stare at me, but I will sit here all night waiting for your answer. Your eyes are beautiful anyway, so it’s really no problem for me.” His smile grew as he wiggled his eyebrows.
I could feel the heat creeping up my neck and looked away fast. He didn’t need to see how red that was going to turn my cheeks.
“I am running from Tristan. The guy from last night, but it’s more that I’m running from Slaughter. He’s kind of the leader of the group, and my stepdad.”
“Slaughter?” The shock in his voice made me look back over.
“You know him?”
“Unfortunately. I know of Tristian too, but I haven’t had the honor of meeting him formally. You’re kind of related then? Why are you running from him? I mean, aside from him being an asshole.”
“Slaughter is my stepdad, so please don’t consider us related. Tristan is his best friend, right-hand man, and is dating my sister. They want my help. Or more like he wants me to join whatever dumb gang they think they are starting so I don’t ruin their plans. Right before I left, I was with my sister and we went down to their garage. I always try to stay away from it, but my sister is with Tristian and she wanted to stop by, so I agreed.” I was quiet, thinking through it all. It was barely two days ago and it had changed every second of my life since.
“I’m assuming there’s an ‘and’ attached to this?”
“And I got a glimpse of what was actually happening. They are taking cars and tearing them apart to sell.” I didn’t want to add how I had been kind of helping them, and that I had taken the laptop.
I still needed to look at it, but was almost getting too scared to actually see what was on it.
“Damn. And what? They wanted your help or wanted to keep you quiet?”
“Both? They obviously don’t want me to rat them out, but they also want my help to grow their operations.”
“And you refused?”
“In not so many words. I just ran away instead,” I said with a tight smile.
“There was no way to stay and not help more,” he said, more as a statement, but I still felt guilty enough to elaborate.
“No, I would be locked in my room until I was on their side.”
His blue eyes were trained on me, and I was struggling not to stare again, but then he gave a tight smile. “Looks like we have a bigger problem than I thought. Come on, let’s eat and figure this out.”
“Figure out how to get me out of here faster?” I asked, with a small, nervous laugh.
He stopped and turned to me, grabbing the platter of food I had picked up. “No, just figure out how to help you. Now relax and come on before all of this gets cold and I pass out from hunger.”
I watched him go, trying to wrap my head around his words. What I told him didn’t seem to faze him too much, maybe a bit surprised but no anger, no outrage that I didn’t say anything sooner.
Now he only wanted to help me more?
FIVE
CARLY
Jax was already sitting down by the time I made it to the table. He nodded to the seat next to him and I reluctantly sat down, seven sets of eyes on me as I did.
It was as bad as I thought it would be, each of them smiling and looking me over, and I was almost holding my breath in anticipation for the comments. I already knew the girls so Jax introduced the guys. Ransom, a dark haired guy with more tattoos than I could count. Fox, who was tall, muscled, and had a nearly perfect face besides the scar running through it. And then Kye, who was possibly the most intimidating of them all but only because of the angry glare on his face. The tattoos and piercings didn’t help that either.
Jax knocked my hand and leaned in, making it even harder to breathe as I caught sight of a tattoo partially hidden under the collar of his shirt. It was still too covered to read the small lettering, but I was suddenly more interested in that than the table of people staring at me.
“Remember, you’re the one that bites,” he said, smirking. “Take a real breath.”
I met his eyes and listened, taking a deep breath.
“Good,” he said, the deep, pleased tone making a shiver run through me. “Now please keep doing that and eat.”
I nodded, trying to remember what we were talking about as I looked back up at him.
“I’m starving and this smells amazing,” Fox said.
“Wow,” Scout said, looking over all the food. “Did you seriously make all of this? There’s like ten different things!”
I laughed as Scout came up next to me. For being the girl who grew up with these rough guys, and raced, she seemed the opposite. Happy, bubbly, and welcoming. “There’s only three, but I doubled up the recipes. I assumed you all ate a lot?”
“You assumed right,” Jax said. It wasn’t exactly a dining room table, two fold-up tables pushed together with one nice tablecloth covering the entire thing. The small table that made up his real dining room table only had enough room for two.
I sat staring, a little surprised that everyone was piling their plates.
“Seriously, Carly, this all looks amazing. Are you a chef?” Ash asked.
“No, nothing like that. Want to be, maybe, but not yet.”
Fox groaned as he started eating, and Kye made a similar sound.
“This is the best focaccia bread I’ve ever had,” Jax said. “And this sauce. I want to bathe in it.”
I knew my eyebrows jumped higher than they ever had. “You know what kind of bread that is?”
I really didn’t take him for a guy that would know the difference between breads.
“And you want to take a bath in pasta sauce?” Scout asked, trying not to laugh. “That sounds disgusting.”
“And like it would burn?” Quinn said, her nose scrunched. “Eww, now the only image I have in my head is Jax is a big bathtub of sauce.”
The table erupted in laughter and groans as Jax turned to me.
“Yes, by the way, I know what type of bread this is. I can also tell you that this is bolognese sauce.” His smile grew, apparently proud of himself.
“Wow, I’m impressed. I thought all you street racers only knew cars and getting in trouble.”
All eyes turned to me and I shrunk back at the sudden attention.
I shouldn’t have said anything or brought more attention to myself. I knew the temper guys like them could have, and I knew what it was like to draw too much of their attention, or anger.
Suddenly, everyone broke into a smile.
“I’ll have you know, Quinn has worked hard to make sure we aren’t barbarians,” Jax said.
“And now you have to tell us what racers you are hanging around that make you know so much about them,” Scout said.
I tried to shrink back further, even though no one seemed mad about my statement.
“Carly?” Jax asked. “Care to answer the question?”
“I have some people in my family that are into that.”
“Really? Who? We might know them,” Fox said.
I let out a deep breath as everyone waited. “You apparently do,” I said, knowing how much of a fan everyone was of my newest stepdad.
Jax knocked my hand again. “Come on. We have to tell them.”
I tried not to notice the jolt that went through me as his hand lingered against mine for a few extra seconds. Or the way he said we instead of you, like I wasn’t sitting here alone to tell them where I came from.
But I was. I was alone, and it was me on my own with this. I could tell them who I was, and it didn’t matter how they felt, I would need to get going alone.
“Umm, my mom was alone for most of my life. You probably know my stepdad as Slaughter. Somewhere along the line, Slaughter met my mom and decided forcing his way into our lives would help him get ahead in life. Him and his friend, Tristian, are big into this stuff. He kind of took the role as head of our house after that, and my mom let him.”
The room went quiet as everyone looked at each other and then back at me.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Scout said, her mouth falling open.
“That’s who you were trying to get away from?” Fox asked, looking at me first, and then around the table.
“Yeah, him and Tristan. Ever since Slaughter took over, it’s been one thing after another going bad and I couldn’t take it anymore. I came across some things I shouldn’t have and my options were running off, or staying and helping them. I couldn’t handle being around them anymore.”
Quinn’s face scrunched as though she was in pain. “I don’t blame you.”
Ransom threw an arm around her, pulling her into him. “We know him and have had our own problems with him,” he said.
“Problems?” she asked, obviously pissed off. “He ran you off the road, tortured you, and tried to kill you. I don’t think that’s just having problems.”
“Serious?” I asked. “I mean, I’m not shocked he did that, but I’m surprised you guys know him that well. Of course I managed to run right into people that would have had such serious issues with him.”
Jax was shaking his head as he looked at me. “He thought we took some cars and went right to trying to kill us. We haven’t had trouble with him since it was proven that we weren’t the ones who took them.”
“You know that’s thin ice, though,” Fox said. “If he has the chance, he’s going to come right back after us again. He made that clear before.”
“Yeah, I know,” Jax said, his lips tight as he leaned back. His arms flexed as he crossed them, and I watched as his jaw clenched.
“Which would include finding out that I am hiding out here with you,” I said. “After I learned all about the things he’s doing, they wanted me to help them change serial numbers on cars to steal. I didn’t agree and left instead,” I said, not ready to add in that I took the laptop. I wasn’t sure how much I could trust all of them yet. “I will immediately be a problem for them. He’s not going to be relaxed about me running out. He takes the family thing seriously even though we aren’t even related, and they won’t be happy letting me go with what I did learn. I really should go. I don’t want to bring my trouble to you all. Is my truck ready? I don’t mind leaving tonight to save anyone from run-ins with him again.”
