Sweet Carolina (10 page)

“Caro,” he said.

“Dell.” She didn't move away, but she didn't
move any closer either.

“Are you going to stop me?” he asked. His
heart lodged in his throat as he waited for her answer. If she
didn't want him to touch her, he wouldn't, but damn, he didn't
understand how she could deny what was so obviously between
them.

“We shouldn't,” she said on a whisper.

“Who's to know, Caro?” He traced her jaw with
his index finger and she trembled from just that tiny contact.

“We would,” she said, but she still made no
move away from his touch. He slipped his hand to her neck, letting
his fingers curve around to her nape, and still, she didn't move
away.

He dipped his head so his lips hovered over
hers. “I won't tell.” Then he kissed her. Her lips were soft under
his, warm and damp from where her tongue touched them a breath ago.
He brought his other hand up to cradle her face as he drank her in.
God, she tasted sweet.

He needed more.

Chapter Eight

She needed more. Even as she inwardly called
herself all manner of names, she craved more. His thumbs pressed
against her jaw, urging her to open for him. She groaned, pressed
herself against him and let him in. He thrust his tongue past her
lips and plundered. Her head spun as he took her on a wild ride
that left her body achingly unsatisfied.

Caro silently begged for more, wrapping her
arms around his neck and answering his kiss with all the passion
coiled inside her. When his hand drifted to her waist, a
desperation she'd never experienced took hold of her. She covered
his hand with hers and guided his fingers beneath the waistband of
her jeans. Their fingers tangled. His hand followed the zipper as
it slid down and down, until he found her aching nub.

Her heart slammed against her ribcage and
liquid heat pooled between her legs. She broke the kiss, gasping
for breath. Still cradling the back of her head, Dell pressed her
cheek against his chest and continued to explore between her legs.
A single warning thought flashed, and like dry tinder, was devoured
by the fire in her belly.

Dell's fingers dipped lower and she shifted
to give him the room he needed. One finger slipped inside her,
followed by another. The flames licked higher, threatening to
consume her. A sound, a whimper, escaped her lips. Strong fingers
stroked her head, soothing, calming. His words rumbled like a
distant storm beneath the layers of his fire suit.

“Shh, sweetheart. Let go, Caro. I've got
you.”

He was dangerous, on and off the track. He
drove like a demon with little regard to his or anyone else's
safety, but in his arms, she was safe. Dell would always keep her
safe.

Her legs became quivering, useless columns of
gel, her only support the strong hand between her legs. Caro
concentrated on the two pillars of steel impaling her, stroking
some invisible spot that made her weak and energized her at the
same time. Passion coiled tightly. Dell's voice vibrated against
her cheek, her breasts, “Let go, sweetheart. I've got you.”

The tight spring within gave way, and she
came apart in his arms. Inner muscles clenched around his fingers
and her vocal chords failed to form coherent sounds. Her body was a
mess of discordant muscles and useless bones. She clung to him, her
arms still draped over his shoulders. Time stood still. He slipped
his fingers from her body, his hand from her jeans, and with a
tenderness that brought tears to her eyes, he backed her to a chair
and urged her to sit. Her arms fell to her sides and she reached
for him, but he backed away.

He was at the door before she found her
voice.

“You're leaving?” she asked.

“Yeah, I am,” he said. “Before we turn rumor
into fact.”

Caro shivered as the blast of warm dry air
from outside mingled with the cooler air inside against her bare
skin. She jumped up, wobbling on shaky legs and zipped her jeans.
“Damn you, Dell Wayne,” she murmured to the closed door. “Damn you
all to hell.”

* * * *

Dell fired the engine and listened to the
familiar rumble. The caged power vibrated through him as he checked
the gauges and waited for the race to begin. The thrill of
competition sped through his system. He gripped the steering wheel
with his left hand, the gearshift with his right, and tried to
focus on the job at hand. He'd never been as distracted before a
race as he was today. He'd never lain awake all night, remembering
the feel of Caro Hawkins in his arms, or the taste of her lips, or
the way her hot, wet heat clamped his fingers, or her face when she
came. And the throaty whimper that accompanied her release.

Thankfully, he came to his senses before he
let it go any further. It would have been so easy to take her. She
wouldn't have said no, not the way she responded to him. But like
she said, they had a business arrangement, and sex didn't figure
into it.

He had to admire her. She was taking on a
business that defined sexist. Sure, there were a few women in the
business – a couple of drivers, some techs, and at least one
mechanic he knew of. But the only female team owner was the wife of
a driver, and she was only a partner in the business. No doubt, her
husband's status helped her, where Caro was on her own. It took
guts to do what she was doing.

But, damn, the woman was addictive. After
their first kiss, he'd sworn he wouldn't touch her again. His
resolve disappeared faster than rain in the desert, leaving him
with an unquenchable thirst for Caro. The road she'd chosen was
treacherous enough without him adding truth to the rumors flying
around the circuit.

“We're good to go,” Russell informed him.

“Everything looks good here,” Dell said.
“Let's race.” He pushed thoughts of Caro out of his head. His foot
tapped the throttle. He couldn't think of a better place to work
out his sexual frustrations than on the racetrack, pitting man and
machine against each other for five hundred grueling miles. If he
were lucky, he'd be too tired tonight to think about Caro, to dream
of driving more than just her car.

* * * *

Dell pushed harder, squeezing every drop of
power out of the car. Fifty laps to go and his car was held
together by crash tape and a prayer. He threaded his way between
two slower cars on the backstretch, dropped low on turn three and
traded paint with another car to climb one step closer to the front
of the pack. He cursed the cluster of cars in front of him and
kissed the bumper of the one directly ahead.

“Move over, asshole,” he said.

“He's got nowhere to go, Dell,” Jeff said
into his headset.

“Then they've all got to go,” he said,
referring to the cars three wide out of turn four, blocking his
way.

“Hang back. They'll break up on turn one,”
Jeff said.

A string of curse words flitted through
Dell's mind, but he kept them to himself.

“Go high in one, drop low in turn two and you
should be able to sweep underneath the 15 car,” Jeff advised.

Dell tried the strategy, edging underneath
the 15 car, but the driver wasn't ready to give up his track
position. Dell jerked the steering wheel to the right, sideswiping
the 15. The other driver backed off immediately and Dell shot past
him, one more position closer to the front of the pack.

Two cars ahead of him ran side-by-side
through the backstretch. Dell waited while they jockeyed for
position through turns three and four. As the car on the outside
tried to regain his position, Dell throttled up and squeezed in
between the two cars.

“Three wide,” Jeff said, as if it were news
to Dell.

Dell nudged the nose of his car ahead of the
other two. Turn one loomed ahead. Neither of his adversaries was
going to back down and let him go ahead. They couldn't go three
wide through the turns. It was a high-speed game of chicken, and
Dell wasn't going to be the first one to flinch. He throttled up
when a prudent man would throttle back, but prudence was for
stockbrokers, not stock car racers.

Adrenaline rushed through his system. This
was the thrill he craved, the headlong plunge into unknown waters.
The do or die scenario. The fight or flight reaction. The choice
was easy for him. Do. Fight. What would the other drivers
choose?

“Clear right,” Jeff said.

Dell glanced in the rearview mirror and saw
the car to his right drop back. He'd chickened out – chose flight.
That left the car on his left. Dell matched his speed, hitting the
throttle as much as he dared, edging ahead a little before his
opponent matched him. They battled side-by-side for an entire
lap.

Back to turn one, still side-by-side. Someone
tapped him on the left rear panel and he instinctively tightened
his grip on the wheel. He throttled up, hoping to push past the car
now plastered bumper-to-bumper down the left side of his car as it
propelled them both up the track. The wall sped closer. The
muffled, but unmistakable sound of metal scraping on concrete
penetrated his helmet, and in the same instant his car bounced off
the wall and elementary physics came into play.
For every action
there is an equal and opposite reaction.
And in Dell's opinion,
the opposite reaction was rarely good.

Dell's car now became the one doing the
pushing, maneuvering both cars back down the track toward the
inside wall.

Screeching tires. Grinding, crumpling metal.
The acrid stench of burning brake pads and disintegrating
engines.

It took all of ten seconds, maybe less. Dell
made a futile attempt to control his car as two, or was it three?
others crashed into him, sending him careening one way, then
another. The car tilted up on two wheels once, settled back, then
spun a couple of dizzying three-hundred-sixty-degree turns before
it mercifully came to a stop.

Smoke filled the interior, blinding him. Dell
mentally took stock. Alive. Breathing. Hurting, but not seriously.
Nothing broken. Car demolished.

“Dell?” Jeff's voice came through the
headset.

“I'm okay. All clear?” Dell asked, waiting
for an affirmation before he unhooked the restraint system and
lowered the net on the driver's side window.

With his feet firmly on the ground, he
removed his helmet, waved his hand over his head to indicate he was
fine, and looked around. He counted half a dozen cars in varying
stages of wreckage. Most wouldn't race again today, a few might
make it back out for the last thirty laps. His wasn't one of them.
But, damn, what a rush!

Only a true adrenaline junkie understood the
thrill of a violent crash – one you could walk away from virtually
unscathed.

* * * *

Caro counted to ten, then one hundred, then
ten again. She would not go ballistic in front of her entire pit
crew, and God-only-knew-how many other people, press included. By
the time she finished counting, she was alone on top of the war
wagon, and reasonably calm, given her state of mind. Dell was
trying to kill her, and her business. It was the only explanation
for what he'd done, and she wasn't just thinking about earlier in
the week when he'd taken her to heaven, or at least awfully close,
before leaving her without so much as a. “Thank you, ma'am.”

She spent the rest of the week avoiding him
as if he carried a deadly disease – which he did. She didn't know
what the scientific name was, but it was commonly referred to as
too damned sexy for his own good, on top of a serious case of
arrogance. It was the latter that kept her away for the last six
days and the former that kept her body yearning to be exposed to
him again. And again.

Caro desperately wanted to get close to Dell,
and sex had nothing to do with the reason why.

She climbed down from the war wagon and
smiled for the reporter waiting to ask her about the race. The
delay coming down gave her a few precious minutes to find a smile
to put on her face, and think of something to say besides the
truth. The racing world was full of sharks, and the pool they all
swam in was relatively small. Even a hint of weakness, and the
others would sense blood in the water. Then it was all over. No
caution flag to give you a chance to get your shit together. No
restart on equal footing. The predator sharks would pick your crew
off one at a time, and your creditors would show up on your
doorstep, padlocks in hand.

Caro smiled at the reporter, who smiled at
the camera lens before she launched into the interview – leaving
Caro no choice but to participate. Anything else would be
interpreted as just what it was – weakness.

“I'm here with Carolina Hawkins,” she said
into the microphone, “owner of Hawkins Racing.” She turned to Caro.
“Ms. Hawkins, what can you tell us about the wreck? Is Dell
okay?”

“I haven't heard the official word, but Dell
indicated he was fine, just a little bunged up, which is to be
expected. NASCAR does an excellent job of making sure the cars are
safe.”

“Given what happened to Caudell Senior,
Dell's father, I'm sure this kind of thing must be especially
difficult for Dell. How does he handle it?”

Caro resisted the urge to laugh. Was she
kidding? Dell drove like every race was a demolition derby – that's
how he handled it. A sudden thought chilled her blood. Could it be
deliberate? No. She'd mentioned it to him before. No. It wasn't
possible. Stupid to think that.

She pushed the thought away and gave the
expected answer. “As you know, there have been many improvements in
the safety systems within the cars since Caudell Wayne's accident.
Dell knows better than most how dangerous stock car racing is. He
takes every precaution, and follows every safety guideline – just
as we all do at Hawkins Racing.”

“Do you know what caused today's crash?” she
asked.