Page 7 of All That Glitters (Endurance #1)

Hale got out, shook the hand of someone I didn’t recognize, then walked with measured steps around to my door and helped me down from the Jeep. “Who was that?”

“I have no idea, but he knew me so…”

That wasn’t uncommon, either.

I took my time putting one foot in front of the other. My legs didn’t want to carry me forward and my brain was screaming at them to turn me around and run me back home.

But that didn’t happen.

Instead, I walked side by side with Hale up the stone steps to the wide-open front door. I squeezed his hand and he squeezed mine, a silent agreement that we were in this together.

We were swallowed up from the second we stepped inside the marble foyer.

“Finally! Friendly faces!”

I looked up to find a smiling Braxton Glitterati bearing down on us. I felt the tension in Hale ease a little.

“I was beginning to think y’all were going to leave me to manage all of this alone.”

“You’d have managed just fine,” I said. “Besides we’re not late.”

For that, he clucked his tongue.

“You’re on time, which means you’re late.”

He wedged himself between us and draped an arm around Hale’s shoulder and an arm around my waist. He’d filled in for Ashton after the accident and had a light, just here to have fun approach to racing that was far and away the opposite of Ashton’s overly serious, weight of the family legacy on his shoulders style.

But that was just a facade for Brax. He wanted to cement his own legacy in the world of endurance racing, though I wasn’t sure he’d limit himself if other opportunities came along.

“My two favorite people. My night’s complete now.”

He was rewarded with a soft elbow to the ribs for that comment. “Two favorite people?”

“I can’t say you’re the favorite all on your own, my darling Helen. Hale’s feelings would be hurt.”

Hale shifted away from Brax with a grin. It was the first genuine one I’d seen from him in months and it eased something inside me.

“Nah. I’m good.”

“You know you’d be jealous.”

“For all of a second.”

“See? He’s already covering his sadness. How about a glass of wine?” he asked.

“I’m sure there’s something stronger around here.”

“There is. What’s your vice tonight?”

I didn’t hesitate. “Whiskey?”

“Oh, straight to the hard stuff. Follow me.”

My gaze met Hale’s before I was helplessly led away.

“Holler for me if you need to be rescued,” he said, earning a scoff from Brax.

“She won’t need to be rescued from me, thank you very much. I am a perfect gentleman.”

I shook my head and Brax steered me around a small group of women.

I smiled at the ones I was familiar with.

And while I might not need to be rescued from Brax, but there was another I might need help with.

I kind of hoped Ashton kept his distance.

I also kind of hoped I could and would stop obsessing over him.

“Maybe we shouldn’t leave Hale on his own.”

Brax sobered, his eyes lifting over my head. I turned and we both watched Hale shake hands with several other drivers, one of which was a teammate. He smiled, then laughed at something one of them said. They soon disappeared out of sight.

“He’ll be fine. I think maybe both of you need this little outing instead of staying all cooped up in that big house.”

I gave Brax my attention. “It’s not like we’ve been inundated with invitations.”

“Hale hasn’t returned single call or text.”

“I didn’t know he’d gotten any.”

“Well, now you do. He’s weathering all of this alone and it’s not been good for him or for you. We’re all still here.”

“Not all of you.”

He nodded knowing exactly who I was talking about.

“How are you doing?” he asked.

“I’m good. How are you?”

“Oh. So, we’re going for formal, stilted replies? Okay. I can do that.” He cleared his throat and straightened his shirt before standing ramrod straight. “I’m doing very well, thank you for asking.”

“Stop.” I playfully rolled my eyes. “I’m… It’s strange being here.” That was an understatement. Hale and I had spent enough time in the Glitterati home that once upon a time, and not so long ago, as comfortable to us as our own.

“Why? You… Oh. Right.” He sighed. “No one holds Hale responsible. It was an accident. Unfortunately they happen in racing. Sure, maybe he could’ve made a different choice in that moment.

It’s a move we’ve seen other drivers make.

Some successfully, and some not. That just happened to be one of those unsuccessful times. ”

“Always looking on the bright side, aren’t you?”

He poured my drink, then handed it over. “Ashton…” Brax nodded, knowing exactly what I was thinking.

I should’ve realized Brax was tuned into my every move, my every emotion. He had an uncanny ability like Hale to know what I was thinking at any given moment.

Hale’s connection was understandable. Wonder twins. That power was undeniable.

Brax’s wasn’t.

“I don’t think he knows how he feels. Blaming everyone else, being angry with everyone else seems to be the easiest thing for him right now.”

Brax had a point. Maybe Ash didn’t know how he felt and maybe blaming everyone else kept him from having to look too closely at himself, at reality. Maybe he never thought something like that could happen to him. Maybe he thought himself invincible. I think all of us did.

He was best of us, on the track at least. He was flawless. Reckless. But he’d avoided scrapes.

It appeared he was also unpredictable now and none of us could let our guard down around him until he figured himself out.

“You’re not having one?” I asked, lifting the crystal tumbler to my lips.

The first sip burned on its way down. The second trailed pleasant fire to the pit of my stomach.

My nerves slowly began to unknot themselves and by the third and fourth sip, warmth eased the tension in my shoulders and allowed me to relax.

“No. I stopped drinking the day after Christmas.”

“Really?”

He nodded. “Yeah. If y’all had come to the New Year’s party, you’d have known that.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t know you’d tried to get in touch with Hale. You should’ve texted me. So, why did you stop drinking after Christmas? New health routine?”

“Something like that. I don’t want anything to impair my judgment, my thoughts, my words, my memory.

I want to be, have to be at the top of my game.

Everything I do is an audition for a ride.

I want to be the driver a team thinks of first. I want to be the one that they call when there’s an opening. You know how this works.”

“I do.”

I’d known from a young age how it worked. I knew firsthand how it all worked.

“Speaking of driving, which car will you be in this season?”

“I don’t know, yet. Uncle Leo pulled me into the office the other day. There seems to be a difference of opinion on Ash being ready. One says one thing, the other says something else and…” Brax glanced around, then leaned in close. “He didn’t show up to the test yesterday.”

I wasn’t shocked. It saddened me, but it didn’t shock me.

I don’t think anyone knew, especially Ashton, if or when he’d be ready to get back into a race car.

And if Leonardo Glitterati wasn’t sure which car he was going to put Brax in when they could have any available driver on the circuit…

I needed to file that bit of information away and think about it later.

“What’s that look? Do you know something? Have you heard something?”

I locked eyes with Brax. “I… Not really.”

It wasn’t a lie, exactly, but I wasn’t going to say anything until I’d had a chance to find out how much truth versus rumor was out there.

“Evasive minx,” he said lightly, smiling.

Brax really was handsome, fun and charismatic. He’d been like a brother to me, sometimes more than Hale had and I adored him.

I missed the simplicity of our foursome friendship before Hale and Ashton got their rides, before Brax became the replacement for anyone who needed a driver, before I… No. I wasn’t going to go there. There was nothing useful on the other side of that thought.

“How are you and Ashton getting along?”

“I’m not his favorite person any more than anyone else is. He thinks we’re all out to step in and replace him. He said I’d be sitting in pit lane, waiting. The back-up again.”

“I’m sorry, Brax.”

I offered a small sympathetic smile and shook my head. The movement made me feel a little light headed and I touched Brax’s sleeve to steady myself.

“Considering he didn’t show yesterday…” He shrugged and lifted his gaze, scanning the room, before looking at me again.

“To be honest, I want Ashton’s seat. Not because I want to take it away from him, but because I felt comfortable in the car, with the other drivers on the team, with the crew.

I felt relevant as a racer for the first time in a while. ”

“You’ve always been relevant as a race car driver.” But I also understood being born into a family where there were preferences.

“Is that the whiskey talking?”

“Not at all.” But the lightheadedness hadn’t dissipated.

I wasn’t a heavy or light drinker and given that the hard stuff was my drink of choice over wine, I was more than a little surprised that this one was affecting me so much.

Then again, I couldn’t remember eating anything since breakfast and even that hadn’t been much.

“I used to race against you, too. You’ve always been good.

Better than good. You held your own against Ashton and Hale and —”

“And you held your own against all of us. Man, those were fun days. There wasn’t any of this to worry about.”

He wasn’t wrong. Those were fun days, easier days, too. I knew he had his own demons within the racing world and within the Glitterati family at large, just as I had my own demons within my family.

Hale and Ashton were the ones who had been pit against each other professionally, in both the press and out on the track by commentators and the luck of qualifying. There were always questions and comments about the boyhood friends who were now racing for money and glory.

Until last summer, nothing had changed between them.

“I need some air,” I finally said, my body turning to fire from the inside out. The room began to close in on me and I blinked several times before focusing on Brax again.

“Want me to take you or should I go get Hale?”

Before I could answer, another voice joined the conversation.

“I’ll take her.”