Page 38 of Love Collided

“Jesse isn’t here,” Fox said. I could hear the eye roll in his voice, making me grind my teeth together.

“Wow, thanks. Like that’s any of his business.” It was already embarrassing enough to admit to the crew. I hated admitting to Chase that my boyfriend didn’t even care enough to show up.

Chase’s hand wrapped around my bicep, pulling me away from everyone.

“Why isn’t he here? Or better yet, why is he supposed to be?”

“I don’t know. He said he was on his way, but he should have been here already. And I technically told him he could show up and we could try to fix things.”

The crew turned back to the car, apparently done with worrying about Jesse.

Chase pulled me further back until we were out of earshot from everyone.

“Why?”

“Because he pointed out that I wasn’t exactly acting the best at the restaurant either, and I was the one who messed up the night first.”

“Yeah, because you didn’t even trust him enough to ask to go with you. That isn’t a you problem, that’s a him problem. You should trust your boyfriend with something like that.”

“But that’s on me because I didn’t.”

“No, that’s on him because he didn’t make you feel like you could trust him.”

I only shrugged, my thoughts at war with themselves. Me blowing him off hadn’t been nice, but Chase was right. I should have no problem trusting my boyfriend with something like that.

“You don’t need him here.”

“But I wanted him to want to be here.”

“Why? To tell you how much better of a driver he is? To stare at some boobs? Piss off Fox? I can fill in if you need,” he said, smirking.

“Wow, aren’t you a true support system? That’s not what he would do to help.”

“Fine, what does he do?”

I shrugged, embarrassed I couldn’t think of anything big. “I don’t know. Kiss me, tell me good luck. Make me feel ready to race.”

“You’re lying.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes, you are. You can’t even look me in the eye and say those things. I’m literally getting a degree in bullshit. You think that pathetic attempt is going to get past me?”

“I can’t look you in the eye because you’re wearing sunglasses.” He shook his head, pulling them off.

“Jesse doesn’t have it in him to make you feel good about doing something like this. Doing something better than him. Between what I’ve seen and what Fox has told me, the guy’s a rat who makes you feel bad for being so fucking amazing.”

I pushed away, but he grabbed my arm, pulling me back in. There was a hint of anger in his face, but I didn’t know why. Hedidn’t need to take it upon himself to make me feel bad about Jesse, too.

The sadness of Jesse not thinking those things about me enough to show up tore through me, and I was worried I was going to lose control of all of my emotions. There were too many of them, and they were all coming to the surface at once.

“If he hasn’t already figured out what he has, he’s never going to.”

When I looked up again, Chase’s eyes had that dark gaze to them, so focused on me I couldn’t breathe. He stepped a little closer, his gaze dropping to my lips.

“What are you doing?” I asked, shoving my helmet into his stomach with a satisfying grunt.

“I’m not sure, maybe the right thing for once.”

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