Page 128 of Broken Breath
The air is thick with heat and noise as sweat sticks to the back of my neck, soaking into my jersey’s collar. The sun’s relentless heat bakes down on the finish area where fans are packed in tight.
I’m still panting, my chest rising and falling faster than it should for someone who’s already finished his run, but that’s what the hot seat does to you.
Raine is holding first for now, but his run wasn’t the cleanest. He went out hard but butchered two corners. His lead won’t hold, not with the riders still left at the top.
I lean forward, my elbows braced on my knees and eyes locked on the big screen, my focus narrowing as the next rider’s name flashes up.
Delacroix.
The crowd stirs again, and I can feel the tension shift, not just mine, but the whole finish area as we’re all waiting to see what he’ll do.
Love him or hate him, Delacroix puts on a show.
He’s“Smooth Criminal” by Alien Ant Farm. There’s a flow to the way he handles the bike that doesn’t just comefrom talent. It’s instinct,rhythm, that unteachable thing that sets the great ones apart.
He jumps in, andhislines are buttery smooth, clean like someone slid him back into the groove where he belongs after the fucked-up disaster that was his last race.
I watch intently as he flies down the mountain, hits the final stretch, tucks low, and shoots across the finish line in first place by a margin wide enough that Raine shifts in his seat, that scowl settling in as he watches his lead slip away.
I stand and step down to take the third-place seat as Luc struts toward the hot seat, helmet swinging lazily from one hand, that grin of his cranked up to full throttle when he reaches me and bumps my fist.
We may have clashed a little, but credit where it’s due, the guy earns every fucking race he wins.
Raine is not like that.
He doesn’t win by being better. He wins by making other people worse, undermining them or throwing them off balance. It’s never about the cleanest line with him but about the crack he can force open in you.
I don’t trust that kind of racer. Hell, I don’t trust that kind of man.
Payne is up next, and like every race, he rides like he’s in a fistfight and the mountain is the opponent with aggression in every corner, every jump, and every second of airtime.But the bastard is fast.
I watch him muscle through the run, and even with the flaws, it’s enough to get him across the line in second place, sliding in between Luc and Raine.
When he sees his time, he yanks off his helmet, chest heaving, but scowling even harder than usual. He always races angry, maybe that’s what keeps him going.
Or maybe it’s what is holding him back.
Anyway, that’s my cue. I push up from the hot seat,shoulders rolling back, only to see Luc sprawled across first place like he owns it.
Yeah, let him be smug. Let him have this moment while he still can.
Because my baby girl is next.
And she’s going to kick all our asses.
The thought makes me smirk, but then I replay my thoughts, and the wind is knocked out of me.Mybaby girl? I almost stumble right there because she’snotmine. I made sure to fuck that up.Shit.
I catch sight of Dane at the edge of the finish area, standing off to the side where the crowd has thinned out. He’s looking better, less pale, though now and then he coughs into his sleeve. Moving toward him, my steps turn heavy with thoughts of his sister.
About the kiss that never should have happened, the moment when everything blurred together, right and wrong, want and guilt, until the only thing that mattered was her mouth on mine. The way she melted against me like we’d been waiting for that moment all along.I can still feel it.
The heat of her, the way her breath caught when I touched her, the soft, desperate sound she made when I kissed her back, the way her fingers curled into my hoodie like she didn’t want to let go. And fuck, I didn’t want to let go either.
I haven’t slept right since. Haven’tfeltright since.
Reaching Dane, I plant myself next to him and nod like I’m not torn up inside with guilt over wanting his little sister. “Hey, bro.”
“Hey, man, nice run. You good?”
