Page 14 of Speed

But then, Logan turned his back on racing, paid his own way through college, and met Sadie. Grandfather had never spoken to Logan with anything less than open hostility after that. It infuriated Grandfather that Logan was my manager and handled contracts for several other high-profile athletes. He’d become a success on his own terms.

Shoulders back, jaw tight, I knocked once—sharp, purposeful—and then, opened the door without waiting for him to shout about me wasting his time loitering outside. Because he would’ve, and we both knew it.

“Sit,” he barked as soon as I stepped into the room, his tone cutting.

I swallowed the lump in my throat, schooling my features into the calm, detached mask I’d perfected over the years. I sat slowly, my back stiff, my jaw tight, waiting for whatever storm he was about to unleash.

His office was a shrine to his eighties glory days, a museum of the man he still believed himself to be. Photos lined the walls—him grinning with a champagne bottle in hand, standing next to his world championship-winning car, girls in tiny outfits kissing his cheeks—none of them my grandmother. Helmets were displayed on a shelf–pristine and untouched by time–and a massive cabinet gleamed with trophies he’d collected over his career.

And in the center of it all, behind a vast oak desk that seemed to fill the room, was the man I loved and hated equally.

At seventy-five, he was still strong, his presence as dominating as ever. His gray hair was neatly combed, his face lined but sharp, his pale eyes—still piercing. In this room, he wasn’t just my grandfather. He was the king of an empire he’d built from nothing, off the back of an engineering degree and a racing career that had made him a household name.

I respected him for what he’d done. For racing in an era when cars were little more than death traps, on tracks with unsafe barriers, in a sport where death wasn’t only a risk—it was an inevitability. He’d seen, survived, and built something legendary from it.

But I also hated that he was stuck in that time when he was my age and had the world at his feet. He wore his glory as armor, clinging to it so tightly it had become his identity. And God help anyone who didn’t live up to the standard he’d set for himself back then.

I respected the man, but my irrational temper was already flaring, and he hadn’t opened his mouth yet.

He leaned forward in his chair. “Okay, enough is enough, Brody.” His voice rose, and he slammed a hand on the desk, echoing through the room. “I have sponsors contacting me, asking what’s going on. I have journalists calling every hour, digging for answers. I’ve lost contracts because of you. Do you have any idea how this makes me look? After everything I’ve done for you?”

Wow, not even a hello. I opened my mouth, but he didn’t give me a chance to respond.

I flinched despite myself, hating how he could still make me feel small, as if I were nine years old and being scolded for scuffing my new kart. He had this way of distilling pure contempt into his words, hard and cold, and hurling them right where they would hurt the most.

“Grandfather, I retired?—”

“Enough!” His eyes narrowed, drilling into mine, and his voice dropped, colder now, sharper. “What are you? Afraid? Is that it? Are you too much of a coward to get back in the car? Too weak to face the pressure? To face the legacy I handed you on a silver platter?”

My head snapped up at that, the words hitting me like a punch to the gut.

My throat tightened, his words hitting every raw nerve I had left.Coward.Weak. Words from him I’d spent my entire life trying to outrun, words I’d built my career to silence. And now, he was dragging them out into the open, daring me to deny them.

But what could I say?

Tell him the truth.

“You owe me, Brody. Do you understand that? You wouldn’t be where you are if it weren’t for me. Every victory you’ve had, every podium and contract comes back to me.”

Tell him.

The words were stuck in my throat. I didn’t want his pity. I didn’t want him to coddle me like a broken toy or, worse, weaponize my condition in whatever power game we were always playing. I’d be damned if I’d let him turn it into another reason to control me.

“I’m not going back.”

“You’re the same as Logan,” he spat, his face flushed. “Ungrateful, selfish, weak. I gave you everything, and this is how you repay me. By ruining everything I’ve worked for? Everything our name stands for?”

My heart pounded, and his words reverberated in my skull. I stared at him, the man who had dominated my entire life, who had been both a mentor and a jailer. My grandfather had been a master of discipline, believing every mistake was an opportunity to be better—sharper, faster, more focused. He’d drilled that into me from the moment I first sat in a kart, calm but relentless, pointing out every flaw, every misstep, every tiny detail.

Focus, Brody. Again. Do it again until it’s perfect.

And I had. Over and over. I wanted to make him proud, and I scrambled for every approval, which rarely came. It made me a strong driver—a better one. I couldn’t deny that. The focus and the ability to block out everything except the track in front of me came from him.

But it had destroyed parts of me too.

Every time I fell short, every time I wasn’t perfect, it felt as if I wasn’t just failing him—I was failing myself. That constant need to prove I was good enough, fast enough, smart enough had carved something raw and unrelenting into my chest, a wound that never quite healed.

I learned how to handle and thrive under pressure, but I also learned how to tear myself apart when I didn’t live up to it. He never yelled or raised a hand, but his silence when I messed up was worse than any punishment.

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