Black Flag (Racing on the Edge) (25 page)

“Do you recognize this
kid?” the track announcer spouted off enticing the crowd further. “He’s a super
star these days!”

Jameson shook his head
and pulled the microphone to his lips. “I think you have me confused with
someone else. You guys can’t possibly be this excited to see a kid from Elma
Washington.”

That did it. It now
sounded like a rock concert.

Most thought that a
sprint car racer would be from the Midwest but no, the Riley family was raised
in the Northwest. Sure they spent a lot of time traveling but Jimi and Nancy
did that by design. They wanted their kids to grow up in a small town.

Tommy and I got another
good chuckle. Back in the day when he used to race here, he got cheers but
nothing like this.

Jameson’s arms hung
loosely on his hips as he watched the crowd with curiosity and amusement to
their reactions to him; a small town boy made out to be some sort of mythical
creature. You could see the sweat pouring from him in his dark racing suit, the
top half-pulled down around his waist.

“So Jameson Riley
...
” the crowd screamed again. “You made it
out to old Summerville. Is this heat from you?” the announcer taunted the crowd
further.

“Nah,” Jameson smiled
toward a group of girls. He knew how to work them when needed. Shit, look at me
all knocked up and sweaty. I was proof of that. “It must be the
...
” he eyed the girls again. “
...
the homegrown.”

They went into an
absolute frenzy. Like I said, he could work it when needed and I knew that was
all he was doing. He meant nothing by the gesture.

“How are you feeling
after that wreck in Pocono?”

“I feel great.” He
wasn’t about to tell him that his wrist aches at night or he can hardly catch
his breath from the lung injury, or that he had double vision at times which he
refused to tell the doctors or NASCAR about but he was feeling good because he
was back.

We could hardly hear
what they were saying with the women surrounding him so we made our way back
over to the sprint car hauler. Justin and Tyler huddled around their cars
scraping clay and laughing.

Justin’s girlfriend,
Ami, smiled toward me. “How are you feeling?”

Kicking a few rocks
free from my shoes I was forced to wear in the pits, I answered with my usual
smile when I thought about the life between Jameson and I growing inside me.
“Good.”

“Morning
sickness yet?”

“Oh yeah, nearly every
morning, afternoon and night,”

Tommy nudged the small
amount of cushion that had grown on my sides these past few weeks. “It looks
like you’ve been
makin
’ up for it though.”

“Ignore him,” Ami
kicked Tommy in the ass. He jerked back to dodge her, his feet skidding along
with the layer of dirt inside the hauler. “You look beautiful.”

Ami Lewis was about as
sweet as the tea in these parts. With her golden blonde hair, usually in wavy
layers, and her eyes were as bright as her personality. I adored her not only
because she reminded me of one real full-grown Gerber baby, but she wasn’t in
it for the fame with Justin.

Being a World of Outlaw
driver, he too had his fair share of pit lizards but Ami was far from that and
good people in my book.

“How’s Jameson doing
now?”

Ami and I sat down on
the edge of the hauler ramp watching the guys get the cars ready. “Cranky when
things don’t go his way but he’s healing since the accident,” My gaze over the
cars fell on Jameson walking toward us. “He’d never say it, but I think he is
still not feeling that well
...
but
he’s managing. I think it’s more of him being angry that it happened in the
first place.”

Ami seemed to
understand and let me vent a little to her. It wasn’t like I needed to vent,
but she also understand the frustrations that follow when your other half is a
racer. They kept so much hidden underneath that helmet at times it was hard to
get through it. She knew that.

“You’re really great
for him.” I told Ami motioning to Justin just as Tommy smacked him in the gut
with a spare shock when he saw Justin trying to adjust something on the engine.

“He’s pretty special to
me.” Ami beamed looking over at him.

“Hey Ami,” Jameson
bumped into her shoulder. “When did you get here?”

“Just a few minutes
ago,” She wrapped her arms around Jameson for a hug. “I’m glad to see you out
here.”

“Me too,” Jameson
pulled back to kiss her cheek. “It’s been a while.”

To some girls, a kiss
on the cheek would bother them. Not me. I knew the bond we all held with each
other. Ami would never make a move on Jameson just as I would never cross a
line with Justin or any other driver or team member. It’s just the way it was
with us.

Alabama blared through
the loud speakers carrying through the pits with the wind.

Ami was distracted by
Justin dumping ice on her after that. With the heat today, I had half a mind to
sit my fat ass in the cooler full of water and Gatorade.

“Hey dude, there’s
Quincy
Saller
.” Justin pointed toward the well-known
outlaw owner.

“He hates me.” Jameson
said taking a drink of his Gatorade in hand.

“How do you do that?
You’ve been here all of five minutes.” Tommy mocked Jameson.

He shrugged. “It’s a
talent I guess.”

Playful Jameson was out
tonight, dancing around behind to the beats of an upbeat country song. Dressed
in his racing suit that formed nicely to his toned physic, he swayed his hips
slightly with a wiggle and then slid across the hauler, repeating the same move
on the other side.

I threw my head back in
laughter at his country dance he just made up as did Ami.

His lips slid over my shoulder.
“This reminds me of that summer.”

“Me too,”

His gaze on me remained
playful and I couldn’t look away. He blinked, dark lashes casted a shadow on
his cheeks. My eyes focused on his sun kissed nose, the same freckles I traced
when we were younger present.

“Come here,” his slow,
husky voice drew me to him as he motioned with his head to the hauler behind
us.

The sprint car hauler
wasn’t too much different from Jameson’s cup hauler but there were a few
differences. The biggest difference was where the cars were located when they
transported them. In a cup hauler, the cars were stored above with the team
electronics and work area below.

In a sprint car hauler,
the cars are stored in the rear near the door almost similar to those toy
haulers people use to haul around dirt bikes.
Same concept.

When they unloaded
them, it left a large work area for them. Most electronics were kept up front
creating on office up there. They usually hauled two cars to each race, extra
wings, a few engines, shocks, torsion bars, springs, rear ends, tires and
axles.
All ready to repair a wadded up race car.

The spare wing and
numerous other parts were hauled to the infield prior to the feature events in
case they needed to make changes during the two-minute break they allowed to
get back to racing. Though it’s the south where most feel life is slower,
sprint car racing was fast paced, adrenaline fueled and hot tempers. It was
dirt track racing. It was where the local guy could compete with legends. It
was where the man who worked 8-5 all week could get his next fix. It was where
clay met rubber.

“What are you doing?” I
asked when he closed the door behind him. There was no air conditioning inside
the hauler either. With the humidity, closing the door made it like a sauna.

“Getting my girl
alone,” he said lowering his voice. “She has been far too sexy today strutting
around the pits. My engine has reached the rev-limiter.” His lips brushed
against my neck as he spoke the last part, arms leaving me as he walked
backwards toward where all the spare parts were stored. A sly smile slid across
his lips.

I’m not sure if it was
intentional, but at that moment, I didn’t care.

“Come on honey, I got a
few minutes to kill.”

He waited for me to
draw up alongside him, and instead of turning away; he continued to walk
backwards, his smirk only getting bigger.

That smile got me every
time. It was the same smile he had the night we met in Elma, the night he won
Knoxville Nationals, the night he won the Chili Bowl, and that night he won me
in Charlotte.

It was my smile.

“Do you remember that
first night in Charlotte?”

“Yeah,” I swallowed. “
why
?”

He shrugged pushing me
back further into the parts area. “I think about it a lot. It changed
everything between us. Something I’d been holding onto for months was decided
with one look.”

“One
look?”
I gasped remembering the night, the way he felt against me, the race, the bar,
and the way his body hovered over mine. The way it felt when he entered me for
the first time, knowing our relationship would never be the same. Oh, I
remembered all right.

“I remember the way you
looked in victory lane
...
”

His mouth moved to my
lips, just for a second, taking me off-guard as he slid his tongue to mine, and
his moan made my skin tingle.

His hands moved to my
hips, fingers grasping tightly, pushing into my skin as my shirt lifted
slightly, then it was gone completely by impatient hands. “I thought about you
that entire race,” he continued, the light layer of stubble on his chin
scratched my jaw as he drug his lips back to the corner of my mouth. “The way
your eyes lit up with each touch and the fire between us
...
I know you felt it too back then.”

I nodded. It was all I
could do. My fingers gripped the front of his shirt as my breathing became
shallow.

“Fuck, I remember what
it felt like to be inside you for the first time, the noises you made, and the
grip of your fingers in my hair.” He exhaled slowly. “You felt so good, you
drove me crazy.” His teeth nipped at my neck reminding me he was still here,
the feel of his tongue was a brief reprieve to the haze of the heat. His
fingers went to the waistband of my jean shorts and mine went to his race suit
pulling it down. Next was his t-shirt and that was gone too within seconds.

“What’s gotten into
you?” My hands gripped into his hair so tight I incited a groan from him.

“Must be the heat,” I
knew he wasn’t
just
referring to the heat between us.

I moaned, or at least I
thought I did. Some kind of noise escaped but was quickly swallowed by his
mouth as he curled his free hand into my hair pushing my face almost painfully
to his. He shifted all his weight forward. We fell back against the shocks on
the wall. Jameson smacked his head on the rear end hanging above us. It didn’t
stop him though. H just winced slightly, rubbed the spot and continued.

His steady hands pulled
my panties down, palms ran up my bare thighs before his body pressed into me.
Watching me with half lidded eyes, he nipped at my wrist and then moved back to
my neck.

He pressed forward,
assembly prep completed and it was time for some align boring.

And then
...
we heard Tommy.

Jameson’s head fell
forward.

“Damn it.” His
shoulders hunched as he seemed completely defeated. His sigh heavy with
annoyance.

“Where’s Jameson?” we
heard Tommy ask Justin who was apparently out there too. My cheeks flushed at
what he must have heard. He had to of heard.

Justin laughed. “We
found his pants in the hauler.”

Jameson chuckled
remembering that he dropped those near the door earlier today.

“Where’d the rest of him
go?”

“Beats me,”

“You’re helpful.”

“Never claimed to be,”

Knowing this wasn’t
happening, we both sighed and untangled ourselves right before Tommy
peeked
his head inside and laughed when Jameson kicked it
shut. “Get out of here.”

Tommy cackled leaving us
to right our clothing.

When we finished and
stepped outside, Tommy, Justin and Tyler all stood with smiles.

“Do you honestly know
how many times I’ve seen this boy’s ass over the years?” Tommy asked Justin
holding a wrench in his left hand and a beer in the other.

“Don’t answer that.”
Jameson bellowed from the front of the hauler trying to find his helmet he’d
tossed aside earlier.

They all got a good
laugh out of our disappearance, as did Ami. She smiled wiping some grease from
my shoulder. “It’s really hard to get it on in there. Tommy is always walking
in.”

I slung my arm around
her. “It’s nice to know I’m not the only one.”