Page 28 of False Start

“Put in the work?” she barked out a laugh that made me bristle. “Didn’t you get reamed out for showing up to a game hungover?”

I raised an eyebrow.

“I thought you didn’t read the gossip columns and you hated football.” Her cheeks burned tomato red, and I laughed. “You’re such a liar.”

“Hey, better a liar than a guy who wastes his talent by partying all the time. If I got paid millions of dollars to catch a dumb ball, I wouldn’t leave the field.”

“Sure, that’s easy to say when you haven’t been doing it for a quarter of a century.”

Thanks to the loud clanking of the engine, the awkwardness that followed wasn’t silent.

“If you think you’re getting sympathy from me, Texas,” she said, voice barely louder than the engine, “you’re in the wrong car. If you want to prove that life is so easy for you that you can win a rally you’ve never even thought about before yesterday, have at it. I can’t wait to bring home that trophy.”

TEN

KIT

As we pulledinto the starting point, I wondered if this might actually work. Or at least end up being a positive experience rather than a vacation I’d look back on with vague regret because I didn’t get to enjoy it with my best friend.

Trent had quietly read the rules for the rally before pairing his phone with the stereo to play a podcast I hadn’t listened to before. We shared a collegial silence on the long drive: Trent messing with his phone while I focused on the podcast. The only interruption was a quick bathroom break and a phone call from Derek that put me slightly more at ease. He’d pulled through surgery just fine, Gavin at his side.

A shortcut and lack of traffic brought us to the starting line thirty minutes before the rally would start.

“We’re a little early,” I said, pulling into the mostly empty gravel lot. A few signs poked out from the ground directing racers to the starting line, but the only two other cars in the parking lot looked abandoned. “Do you want to practice driving?”

Trent shifted down in his seat, focus on his phone. Clearly, he didn’t. And more to the point, I didn’t have the energy to force him to try.

“Fine,” I shrugged. “You’d probably suck at it, anyway. I’ll drive, you navigate.”

“I won’t suck at it.” Trent scowled as pocketed his phone. “I just didn’t finish watching the video.”

I choked on a laugh. “You don’t need a video to drive a stick shift. You need to just practice it.Practice. Maybe you’re not familiar with that concept.”

He reached for his pocket before dropping his hand. “You don’t think anyone’s going to show up, do you?”

I shrugged, glancing around the currently empty parking lot.

“Probably not. Maybe. Who cares?” Hell, maybe we’d get more points if the judges saw how shitty he was driving stick. “On second thought, why don’t we wait until there’s more people around to give you feedback.”

I didn’t want to drive the entire rally. Five days in a car for sixteen hours a day in a car with original fabric seats sounded like a nightmare, even with stops. And I didn’t exactly trust Trent’s navigation skills. Not until I had some proof that he wasn’t a disaster with a map.

As much as I wanted to humiliate the cocky football star, I also needed him to drive. I put the car in neutral, pulled the parking brake, and slid out of the seat.

“Come on, Texas. You got this,” I deadpanned.

“I don’t believe you when you say it in that tone.”

“What tone?” I lied. But my goading got him to move his ass out of the passenger seat. “So, did you watch enough of your video to get the idea, or do you need a primer?”

He scanned the parking lot. “IthinkI’ve got the idea.”

“Well, it’s a shitty old car. Worst thing you can do is blow the transmission.”

Derek had stalled the car a dozen times before getting onto the road, and then another half dozen on the street. I doubted Trent’s learning curve would be anywhere near as bad.

I held out the keys, and his face paled slightly. “I really can blow the transmission?”

“Don’t you have a slew of fancy cars? Why don’t you know anything about them?” I groaned. “Nice things are wasted on you.”

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