Page 57 of Lorcan's Obsession

“All right, your turn to be Luke Candid. Why did you quit racing? You were avoiding the subject earlier.”

Lorcan chuckled, but his muscles tensed beneath me. I sat on my heels, taking his hand in mine and drawing lazy circles on his palm. After a few seconds, he spoke, his voice grave.

“It has to be real talk.”

"What is real talk?"

"It's like a safe space where anyone can be honest and not get judged or punished for it. My mother used it with my brother and me."

"I won’t judge. I promise."

“Racing was my outlet after my mom died. I left all my anger and aggression on the tracks. I did burnouts until the crowds choked on smoke, and when I flew past the finish line…I felt free of everything. It wasn’t just an insane high of winning, the world inside me went quiet. There was no more hurting.”

I nodded silently, but at the back of my mind, images of women with nipple covers for bras fawning all over him at the street races made my stomach churn.

“The last race of the season was the most contentious because the pool money and bets were in the millions. It’s normal to have trash talk before the race, but my opponent, Santo, said some vile things about my mother, what he’d do if she were alive.”

“Shit. What happened next?”

“I did not finish the race. Halfway through, my vision blurred. It took a second for me to realize my eyes were flooded with tears. I parked the car and broke down. The next day, I met Santo and told him that when he attended his next family reunion, all the women there would be talking about how good I gave it to them.”

“Is there more?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Go on then.”

“I started a roster. His girlfriend, cousins, aunts…I even flew some of them from Mexico to—”

“You can fast forward that part.”

I’d stopped stroking his palm. My body was coiled tight, ready to spring out of the room.

“Yes. Sorry.” His silver eyes watched me cautiously. “Are you okay? I can stop if it is—”

“I said I won’t judge,” I cut him off. My words claimed one thing, but my voice announced I was hurting. Hearing about his past with other women was like gutting my insides with a chainsaw.

“Okay. The women were all too willing. I felt no remorse doing it, and I continued until…until it was Santo’s younger sister.”

I stiffened, ice pooling in my gut. “Was she legal? Was it consensual?”

“Yes. I swear it. She was in her second year at college,” he stated assuredly, reaching for my palm and holding it against his evenly beating heart.

“Then what was—”

“It was her first time and I wasn’t exactly gentle.”

“Fuck, Lorcan.”

I ripped my hand from him and distanced myself. If I could, I would have paced around the room, but one look at the glass floor quenched that urge.

“Tristen, I swear I didn’t know. She didn’t say anything and I stopped as soon as I saw the—”

“Enough! That’s enough real talk for one day, Lorcan,” I gritted. “I want to get out of this room. It feels claustrophobic. I need to go out for a walk or something.”

“I can give you space if you need it. But I’d like to come with you.”

I palmed his insanely chiseled jawline, now covered with a day’s stubble. “I promised not to judge. But that doesn’t mean I won’t react normally when I hear something that unsettles me. Besides, it’s not like I can run out of here if we have an argument.”

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