Total pages in book: 40
Estimated words: 37846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 189(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 37846 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 189(@200wpm)___ 151(@250wpm)___ 126(@300wpm)
I turned the full weight of my stare on him. “Keep talking, Edge. See how fast I wire your bike to fart glitter next race day.”
His grin went wolfish. “Do it. Be the most amazing explosion you've ever made. Just remember, people’ll be wondering why you’re playing with unicorn shit, not why it came outta my ride.”
Even Kane’s mouth twitched at that one. But then his gaze cut back to me—hard. “Two days. That’s it. After that, if she hasn’t told you herself, I put it on the table. Understood?”
“Understood.”
Kane’s expression didn’t change, but something in the room shifted. Weight rebalanced, decisions made.
“Good.” He leaned back, arms still folded. “Now get the fuck out of my office before Edge starts telling me about the raccoon again.”
Edge smirked. “Still my favorite story.”
“Then go tell it to Drift,” Kane ordered, his tone making it clear the meeting was over.
I pushed off the chair, heat buzzing under my skin. The crooked smile broke through this time, sharp as a fuse wire. “You boys better get used to her. She’s not going anywhere.”
Edge called after me as I stalked out. “Neither are the Skulls, brother. Keep your head on a swivel.”
I turned on my heel, heat burning under my skin as I strode toward the door. Then I paused and looked back over my shoulder.
“Not a bullet, Edge,” I growled low. “A fucking warhead. I’ll take it head-on if it means keeping her safe.”
Kane exhaled slowly through his nose. He didn’t smile, but there was something like respect in the weight of his stare as he reached for his phone.
It occurred to me that maybe he understood more than I realized. If it were Savannah involved in this shit, he’d move heaven and earth to make sure she was safe.
Without another word, I nodded at them and stalked out.
If Jana Jennings thought she could keep running, she was about to learn that I didn’t chase unless I planned to catch. And whatever I caught, I fucking kept.
7
NITRO
The Pit was humming with its usual chaos—tools clanking, compressors groaning, the smell of burnt rubber and engine oil hanging thick in the air. Florida heat pressed down like a punishment, sweat prickling under my shirt even with the big fans chopping the air overhead. Prep night before a run always made the garage feel tighter than it was, the energy thick with nerves and adrenaline.
I cut through the bays, nodding at Gauge as he barked orders to a couple of prospects stacking tires. My mood was steady—until I saw her.
She was near bay three, standing by one of the prep benches with a bottle of water dangling from her fingers. Her normally loose white T-shirt was plastered to her skin in the heat, and her jean shorts pushed at the edges of my patience. They left too much freckled skin bare—long legs, a slice of thigh showing when she shifted her weight. The light from the overhead fluorescents turned the sweat on her collarbones into something obscene, each drop sliding lower than my control wanted to allow. Her red hair was pulled up in a messy knot, strands escaping like flame that refused to be contained.
And she wasn’t alone.
One of the rookies she’d smoked last weekend—with big shoulders, a cheap grin, and the kind of swagger that came from confusing horsepower with backbone—stood too close, leaning on the bench like he thought his shadow belonged on her. He said something I couldn’t catch over the buzz of a drill, and she laughed. Not like the one she’d given me when I’d muttered something filthy just to see her blush, but it was still sound enough to light a fuse, dragging through me like a live wire.
Jealousy wasn’t an emotion I entertained. The emotion was pointless, wasteful…a distraction. You either claimed something or you walked away. But right then, it hit like a shot of nitrous in my veins, a hard jolt that blurred the edges of my vision. My hands curled into fists, and every part of me screamed to rip that cocky bastard away from her before he mistook her patience for an invitation.
She shifted her weight and tilted her chin in a way I’d seen before. One that said he shouldn’t mistake her politeness for interest, and I knew she was about to shut him down with a line dry enough to sand a door.
But he was clearly too stupid to read the room. His gaze flicked down to her chest. He wasn’t subtle, wasn’t even trying.
Red. Just red. The kind that comes before the blast.
My boots carried me across the floor before the thought finished forming. I didn’t slow, didn’t speak, just reached for her wrist mid-sentence and hauled her toward bay four. Her water bottle hit the bench with a plastic crack, the rookie saying something after us, but I didn’t hear it over the pounding in my ears.