Racer (Real Book 7)

Lana

“We’re changing this right now.”

I watch Racer in our tent, his racing suit halfway down his body, his hair standing up after a practice session, and he’s looming over Adrian as he points at the motor and gives him some specs.

“What the fuck do you want to take out? Why the fuck are you changing this shit an hour before qualifying?”

Racer laughs and slaps his back confidently. “Do it.”

“Tate,” he calls as Racer strides over to grab a water bottle from the cooler.

“I’m aiming for another track record,” Racer says calmly, coming back after guzzling down half the bottle of water, peering into the engine as Adrian and the mechanics get to work on the changes he wants.

I feel a little thirsty myself.

But not for water.

I don’t think that when my brothers commanded me to keep him out of trouble, the idea was to keep Racer Tate entertained with my body. But my body seems very entertained by feeling his.

Of feeling his hands run over me, let his eyes look at me in ways no guy has ever looked at me.

I grew up with four brothers, and my mother didn’t even let me walk out to breakfast in my pajamas. I was always quite modest in that respect.

While they went around shirtless and in boxers, I’ve never really stood in my underwear in front of a guy. But this guy makes me greedy for those eyes of his, the way the blue turns a little more electric when he looks at me, and I’m both shy at the idea of those eyes seeing me, and at the same time, I’m excited about it.

What do I really know about BP? What do I know about mental illness except that it takes lives, that it’s hard for everyone, the families, those suffering. It’s scary, and it makes the scared girl in me, who’s lost a loved one and fears of losing another every day, want to stay away—that is the truth. I’m only human and nobody wants to see the fire and fly straight in except the moths who don’t know better. I’m not a moth, I’m a girl, and he’s not only bipolar but a racer. And yet no matter how much I rationalize, the truth is that I don’t get a choice, not when I’m already falling for him.

I’m trapped—helplessly and totally—in Racer Tate’s irresistible fire.

I want more dates with him like the one we had the night before I found his pill bottle. Where we talked and ate in a small street café, stealing touches only because I was so worried that my brothers would walk past.

I want to find out his every secret, figure out what makes him up.

I want to make a bible out of his body, an encyclopedia out of his muscles and bones, every detail registered, examined, and stored away for me to enjoy and relive, over and over.

I want to do what we did last night again and again and again.

The problem is, my brothers seem to be noticing something’s going on, and they’re being … well. They’re being my fucking brothers.

“Lana used to be a very fussy baby,” Clayton tells Racer as we eat in one large table at the tent. “Even Mom said she was born with everything. Acid reflux, colic, she was born with it all, right Drake?” Clayton says.

“Yep. We never wanted to sleep near her ‘cause she’d never let anyone shut an eye.”

Racer just looks at me, one sleek eyebrow coming up questioningly, and I scowl at my three brothers, even Adrian who hasn’t said a thing. Yet. “Stop telling Racer what’s wrong with me,” I whisper-hiss at Clayton, kicking Drake under the table too.

“Come on.” Clayton laughs, not bothering to whisper. “Thank me we’re not telling him how you are at the same time every month. Moody and crampy and chewing everyone’s head off.”

Racer grabs his drink, steps away, shooting my brothers a hard glare.

“Nice way to impress him.” I glower, watching him head to the motorhome.

“That’s the thing, Lane. Why are you not giving him the cold shoulder like you do all the other guys,” Clayton says.

“He’s on our team! And he’s …” I stop myself from saying more.

My brothers are watching me. I think they suspect. They look pissy and protective. Are they trying to scare him off?

I start getting riled. “Shut up, Clay and Drake, and you shut up too,” I tell Adrian.

Adrian raises his hands defensively. “I didn’t say shit.”

“You’re trying to scare him off!” I grab my shoe and toss it at the table, spilling their food. “You’re absolute dicks!” I throw the other one, and they laugh as I march to the motorhome.

Racer’s grabbing his phone and his earbuds. He seems pissed.

“Hey,” I say.

He clenches his jaw and tosses the earbuds and phone aside.

“Do me a favor,” he growls, eyebrows slanted. He paces a little, cracks his knuckles, and wheels around. He curls his hand around my wrist and squeezes me, his gaze penetrating me all the way to the depths of my soul. “Don’t ever let them treat you like that.”

“They’re my brothers, that’s what they do.”

“Don’t ever let them talk about you like that.”

I open my mouth, then shut it. “They were trying to scare you away,” I breathe.

He stares at me, his eyes narrowed.

“Besides. Why do you care so much.”

“Because you’re mine.”

“What?”

“That’s right,” he growls, still mad.

“Racer …” I start laughing, and he looks at my mouth, and I stop laughing because I want to kiss him so hard too that my lip gloss is going to be all over that sexy mouth of his.

“They’re saying all that because they can obviously tell that you, that I … that I’m obsessed with everything about you. Your beautiful eyes and your hot bod, your personality and just … who you are.”

He grins a little bit, studying me with those intense eyes. “Go out with me again. Let’s go for a drive. Just you and me. Some music. The breeze. No cares in the world.” His lips quirk mischievously, and so do mine. “Or will you have a cramp or colic?”

“No, no cramps or colic. I just had my period so I won’t be ovulating until, well, another week or so …” I trail off.

“I have a sister, I know all about cycles. She and Mom talk about it over the dinner table.”

I laugh and picture him and his father just bearing it. “Do you two get along?”

“I suppose. I feel protective of her. She’s younger than me.”

“Do you treat her like a baby like my brothers do?”

“Maybe. I don’t mean to.” He looks at me with intimate intensity. “You’re very regular?”

I nod.

“Wh … why do you ask?”

His eyes are very dark.

“You’re not thinking to have your way with me without any … um …”

“I want to come inside you.”

I think my ovaries just shuddered.

“I want to put my stamp in your walls.” He smirks, and I start to perspire.

“We’ll … we’ll see.”

I sit on his lap, and I start to realize that something very hard is growing beneath my bottom. And growing even more. I hear—I actually hear—the sound of me catching my breath, my eyes flying up to his.

He looks at me, his eyes a little hooded. “Can’t help it.” A smirk touches his eyes and I want to kiss the smirk on his lips and those eyes too.

I swallow nervously instead, reach out and place my hand on the squarish curve of his shoulder, holding his eyes.

His smile falters, and his eyes shadow like midnight.

I watch his Adam’s apple work as he swallows too, his gaze dropping and fastening to my lips.

He tugs me close, his nose almost against mine. “I’m starting P2 today. P2’s got to be more than kissing.”

“You’ve just got to have the healthiest self-esteem of anyone I’ve ever known.”

“I can be very stubborn too,” he gruffs out, his eyes gleaming mischievously. He winks.

He lifts my hand and turns it around, gently kissing the center of my palm. I’m so surprised I hear my mouth open on a gasp, but my throat doesn’t seem to release the gasp, it gets caught somewhere in the middle when his tongue flicks out to lick me.

Slowly, I look at his bent head, the head of messy black hair, his chiseled profile, his eyes drifting shut as he savors my palm like I’m the most delicious morsel on the planet.

“Racer …” I begin.

He circles his tongue around the center, then sort of drags it into the sensitive skin on the inside of my wrist, where he presses both his lips and his hot wet tongue to my pulse point. I’ve never been seduced by a guy, or ever been wanted like this by a guy.

I can’t move and am paralyzed from the pleasure as I simply watch him, grappling with the urge to duck my head and nuzzle the top of his head, nudge his face around so that his tongue—rather than lick my wrist, is licking inside me, inside my mouth.

I’m salivating for this guy and so wound-up that I’m suddenly doing just that, following the impulse to drop my head and nudge his face around, and as he turns, his hard jaw rasps against my cheek and then … then the softness of his mouth is pressing against mine and I’m pressing back just as hard.

I’m trembling so hard, my body is jerking a little, but my arms wind around his wide shoulders and I press closer, feeling as though he’s the only thing that will center me right now, that will give me some semblance of balance now.

Our mouths move, simultaneously, his opening wider and going slower than mine.

His chest is a wall against my puckered nipples and his strength is like a cloak around him, around us both.

“Eight p.m. tonight, baby,” he says, pecking my lips as a finale.

“Yes, baby,” I whisper back, pecking him back.

His expression slips, and instead of indifference or arrogance, his expression reveals the rawness of his need.

It does something to me; seeing that he wants me like this.

He seems to lose control and pulls me closer, deeper into his arms. “You turn me on like nothing in my life, Lana,” he rasps.

“Not even Kelsey.”

He smirks, eyes dancing. “She’s a close second. But yeah. Not even her. Or Dolly.”

His contagious grin makes me smile and I wiggle free, perspiring head to toe, my toes curling as I step out of the motorhome, watching my brothers watch me walk away. I flip them the bird, seeing their smiles fade as my own appears. Bullies.