Page 24 of All That Glitters (Endurance #1)

Ashton

She was the first thing that crossed my mind and reaching out to her was all I… She was what I wanted. Why did she affect me so much? I didn’t want or need anyone, but waking up in a panic with the nightmare still fresh, the imaginary flames licking my skin, the snap of bones from impact…

Helen.

She was the peace I needed.

And none of it made any sense to me.

Need you. Now.

I didn’t want to send the text. I didn’t want her to see me this way, especially after the way our last encounter ended, but I needed to see her.

I needed…her. She was the only one… How it happened, I didn’t know and I was so close to not giving a fuck.

I just knew… Something inside me had changed toward her that had nothing to do with what I had initially set out to do.

Where are you?

Home. Cottage.

She didn’t send another reply, but I knew she’d come. I knew she’d come no matter what, no matter the time of day or night. And I knew it had nothing at all to do with the bargain we made. She cared for me, whether I exploited it or not.

The old me wouldn’t have done that. Not to Helen.

Not to any of my friends. I was no longer the old me, though.

The truth was, I didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know this Ashton and I really didn’t want to.

I didn’t like him. I didn’t like me . I wanted to go back to being me and I wanted my friends back.

Everyone knew I wanted my career back, my car back, but that paled in comparison to having the friends and relationships I once had.

Even Hale. Especially Hale.

But there was too much anger inside me and it clouded everything.

I wasn’t ready to get back into a race car.

I may have been trying to convince others that I was, but the truth of it was that I wasn’t ready and I didn’t know if I ever would be.

That fueled the anger more than anything.

My mind wasn’t right. My body wasn’t cooperating.

Uncertainty wasn’t something I was used to experiencing.

I always knew who I was and what I was meant for…

I wasn’t anywhere near ready to be on a track with other people. Hell, I struggled just being in a regular car on the road with someone else driving.

Okay that wasn’t a good example. I never liked being in a car if I wasn’t the one driving and I’d been behind the wheel of some of the fastest race cars on the planet since I was thirteen. Younger, even.

Glitterati Racing had a test track nearby.

My father bought the land that an old, closed up public golf course sat on, leveled it, and built a track.

Most people didn’t know about it and there were no houses around it.

It was one of the only unpopulated and undeveloped areas of Ponte Vedra and I used to take cars from the garage and run them, test them before the drivers got behind the wheel.

I wasn’t even sure I’d be able to do that again.

The memory of the night in the garage with Helen came back. I could barely sit in the car, in the driver’s seat because the panic overwhelmed me. The feel that every part of me was on fire scared the shit out of me, even though I could see that it was all perfectly normal.

The panic was as real as the fact that my heart tried to beat itself out of my chest.

The only thing that helped was Helen. Her touch on my arm, my shoulder, my thigh. Her touch calmed me, calmed the fear as it began to spill over.

There was no way I could do any of this without her. I didn’t know when that had happened.

And needing her to that extent was uncomfortable as hell. I never needed anyone.

I wanted her, sure. How I hadn’t ever seen her as a beautiful, sexy, sultry woman before, I couldn’t say. Definitely a fault in my internal wiring that somehow got fixed during one of my surgeries. Now, all I could see was her beauty, her sensuality, her smile, her kindness.

Before the crash, I’d been casually seeing someone. She’d tried to get in touch. Maybe she’d come to the hospital. I couldn’t remember. I doubted it, though. But Helen… Helen had been there often.

I never thanked her for coming to see me, to visit me, to keep me company even though most of the time I was either out because of pain meds or pretended to be asleep until she left. I never thanked her for caring. I honestly didn’t know how.

Hale had come, too. I’d heard his voice and I remembered the panic that set in, the beeps and bleeps and buzzing all around me.

I remember something cold, then warm entering my bloodstream through the IV in my arm and then nothing.

When I became aware again, there was only calm.

As far as I knew, Hale never came back to the hospital.

I spent about a month there and when they deemed me ready to move on to the next phase, I hadn’t realized how scared I was to go back out into the real world.

No one really spoke about my hospital stay. No one really spoke about the months of rehab, the therapy, the anxiety attacks, the panic that kept me dizzy.

Then again, no one spoke about any of it because I didn’t let anyone in on the fact that I was still suffering, that I wasn’t healed on the inside, that I wasn’t ready for the only thing in my life that had ever made sense, that had ever meant anything to me.

Racing.

Though, there was something else now, too.

There were things I’d regret when it was finished.

One of which would be the loss of Helen.

She would no longer be in my bed or against my wall.

She would no longer be mine to take in her room or on the hood of a car as I’d dreamed of doing since seeing her in the shop the other night.

She would no longer be mine at all. Not my lover. Not my friend.

I’d already lost Hale. I would lose Helen, too.

The thought left a sour taste in my mouth and made my stomach roll with unease. Before the accident, I was not this person.

Now, after, I couldn’t figure out how to get back to who I was and I honestly didn’t know if I wanted to go back.

If I didn’t, though, I’d lose everyone I’d ever known, everyone I’d ever called friend.

That had been one of the hardest things through it all.

The loss of people that I’d known all my life.

It wasn’t their fault. It was mine. I’d refused visits.

I’d refused phone calls. I’d let text messages go for weeks, months without replying.

The thing was, I didn’t know how to let anyone back in. Helen had been the exception to the new rules I’d set in my life. Some by choice. Some not.

I sat up carefully. I couldn’t always move with as much ease as I once used to. I was stiffer. My muscles and some of my nerves were tight. My joints often hurt. I’d stopped going to physical therapy, but I still worked through the exercises they’d given me and could feel my body getting stronger.

Pain meds were a no-go for obvious reasons, unless approved by the governing body in racing and the kind of meds I would need for pain were on the no-no list. That was fine. I never liked taking those kinds of pills anyway.

Feet on the floor, I stood and slowly moved forward. In the bathroom, I splashed cold water on my face and avoided my reflection.

Back in the bedroom, I peeled off the shirt I’d sweat through and put on a clean, dry one. I did the same with the cotton pajama bottoms I’d been wearing.

The amount of effort it took sometimes to do the simplest things pissed me off.

I was a grown man. I knew how to take care of myself and yet the way I moved, the stiffness…

Exercising helped and I’d been adding more and more to my routine as I became stronger, but sometimes, I moved so slow, so timidly, so uncertain of my footing.

I wish I could take the text back, tell Helen not to come now that I was up and moving around, but even then, she’d still show up. She would be concerned. And deep down, I would be glad.

Headlights flashed through the living room window when Helen pulled to a stop.

When she’d been here days ago, I made her strip naked before she got to the door. I wouldn’t be doing that tonight. Nothing at all that happened then would be happening tonight. My mind was in too precarious a state.

The Jeep door shut, the beep for the alarm loud in the quiet that was the cottage and its surroundings.

Seconds passed and there was a single knock. I let out a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding.

“It’s open.”

When she turned the knob and stepped through, I felt a small smile cross my lips. This was not the Helen Troye that most people were used to seeing. This was the one only a few of us ever saw.

Baggy jeans. An oversized, long sleeve faded Taylor Swift shirt. Beat up Chucks. Hair up in a messy knot. No make-up, no jewelry.

I’d seen her this way more times than I could count, but this time, this moment something shifted inside me.

Had she been in for the night? Not that she was much for going out a lot. She didn’t go clubbing or go to parties. Maybe she’d been working. Maybe having a late dinner with Hale. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“It’s nothing, Ash.”

Ash . I liked when she called me that. She wasn’t the only one who did, but the way she said it, intimate and personal… It was a sort of balm and my soul ate it up. “I don’t care if you think it’s nothing. I want to know.”

“That’s not part of our arrangement.”

“Hm… Then maybe I need to change the terms. Or explain them further. Everything to do with you is part of our arrangement.”

“Don’t start. Are you alright? Did something happen?”

“Don’t change the subject.”

“I’m here because you texted me. So, you first.”

There was something off about her and I would bet my championship trophy that it had to do with Hale, but if I wanted to know for sure, I would have to meet her halfway and I wasn’t a meet anyone halfway person.

“Nightmare. I had one.”

“Do you have them often?”

“Some weeks I’ll have several. Other weeks I won’t have a single one.”

“Oh. Is it… I mean…”