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didn’t watch the whole race until the other week. That last pass on Mahoney was crazy. I thought the two of you were going

to touch, like, five times. I was freaking out. But you didn’t touch. Obviously.”

Okay, I need to shut up about this now.

Travis nods slowly. “It was a good race.”

He’s using his most neutral voice, and it breaks my heart a little. I don’t want him to talk to me like this.

I swallow hard. “I wish I could’ve been there.”

He looks a little surprised by that, but still wary. “Mm.” It’s not really an answer, more like an acknowledgment that I spoke.

He nods at my T-shirt. “Congrats on the Crosswire gig.”

“Oh. Yeah.” I look down at my shirt, as if I don’t know what it looks like. “Crazy, right?”

He shrugs one shoulder. “You deserve it.”

I feel a sudden surge of desperation and impatience. I don’t want us to stand here like this, being polite to each other.

I curl my hands into fists at my sides and dig my nails into my palms. Enough of this. It’s hardcore honesty time.

“I really miss you,” I blurt out. “Like—really, really miss you.”

He blinks. “What?”

My cheeks go hot. “I fucked up,” I say unsteadily.

“I was a shit boyfriend, and then I broke up with you for some stupid reason that didn’t even make sense, and everything was completely awful for months, and my parents just, like, pretended you didn’t exist, and physio was awful, and I didn’t think I’d ever be able to race again.

” I can’t look at him when I’m talking. I don’t think I’ve ever been this scared in my life.

“And then I flew to London to see you, but you were with some guy in the parking lot, which is—I don’t know, like, it’s fine if you’ve moved on, you totally should move on.

You deserve someone who hasn’t been a total asshole to you—”

“Hey.” Travis touches my wrist, and I stop talking. I’m breathing hard, and my heart feels cold and shaky. I’m cold everywhere,

actually, except where Travis is touching me. “Look at me.”

I lick my numb lips and force myself to look up at him. He’s standing a lot closer than he was before, and frowning at me

like I’m a math problem he’s trying to solve.

“Are you here because you want to get back together?” he asks.

“Yeah,” I say in a tiny voice. “I mean, if you want to. Yes.”

His mouth curves up. “Okay.”

And then he kisses me.

And oh, fuck , but I’ve missed this.

His lips are warm against mine, and one of his strong, calloused hands is sliding over my neck, and the other is on my waist,

pulling me into him. A strangled, happy noise slips out of my throat, and I kiss him back, rough and desperate.

After a minute—or maybe an hour, I don’t know—I pull back. I’m almost crying, practically. “Hang on—hang on.”

He leans back to see my face, but his hands are still on me. His thumb is pressed against the pulse point on my neck, and

his breathing has quickened. “What is it?”

“I don’t know.” My breathing has gotten faster, too.

It’s really hard to think with him holding me so close.

I can smell the soap on his skin, and feel the strength in his hands, and it’s almost too much after so long without him.

Too much and not nearly enough. “Don’t you want to, like, talk more? I had this whole apology planned out—”

“Tell me later,” he says, and then puts his lips to my neck.

Fucking hell, I forgot how good he was at this. Or like, I knew he was good, but I forgot exactly how it felt. Like he’s lighting me up from inside, electrifying every single cell in my

body. He’s holding me so tight, I don’t think I could move if I wanted to, and his mouth and tongue and teeth are moving over

my ear, my neck, my throat. He pushes me backward until my back hits the wall, and then his hands are sliding under my shirt

and dragging it off, giving him that much more bare skin to work with. I should probably be doing something, reciprocating

in some way, but he’s not really giving me the option. He’s got my wrists pinned to the wall, which is just—insanely fucking

hot—and all I seem capable of doing is panting.

He releases one wrist to grip me hard through my jeans, and that’s when some useless moron who I’m going to track down and

murder knocks on the door.

We both go still. Well, sort of still. My chest is still rising and falling rapidly, and his fingers are still squeezing me

tightly. “They’ll go away if I don’t answer,” he murmurs. And oh, god, his voice is sexy like that, all low and throaty.

We fall quiet, listening for any noise outside the door. The person knocks again. Travis quietly undoes my jeans with one

hand, and I try not to moan as he shifts his hand to grip me through my boxers.

“They’re not going away,” I say (alright, whine), when the person knocks for a third time. Travis is moving his hand ever

so slightly, and I seriously am going to kill whoever is out there.

He releases me suddenly and puts one finger to his mouth, telling me to be quiet.

“Who is it?” he calls.

I give him an imploring look, which he ignores.

A voice with a thick Swedish accent answers. “Stefan. Do you have a minute?”

Travis grimaces. Stefan is Harper’s team principal. Fuck.

“Give me five minutes,” he calls back.

The look I give him is probably a bit pathetic. But the things I want to do with him will take a lot longer than five minutes.

“Thirty,” I whisper, poking his shoulder.

His lips curl in amusement. “I can’t tell my boss to wait thirty minutes.”

I scowl (okay, maybe “pout” would be a better word) but I guess he has a point. We hear Stefan’s footsteps head away, and

I let my forehead drop onto his shoulder. God, he smells good.

“That’s not enough time,” I complain.

His lips brush over the shell of my ear. “Not enough time for me to fuck you, no.”

He kisses my neck again and then pushes me back onto the padded bench behind me. I let out a strangled laugh. His words sound

familiar. I think I said the same thing to him that first morning after we hooked up.

I open my mouth to say something in return, then all the words fly out of my mind as he drops to his knees.

Fucking hell.

All I can hear is the sound of my breathing, all I can feel is the heat of his mouth.

It’s been ten months since I’ve been with anyone, but even before the crash, Travis always had a way of dragging me to the edge embarrassingly fast. I tangle my fingers in his hair, gripping hard enough to hurt a little, because I know he likes that.

Sure enough, he groans when I do it, and I can see his arm moving.

He’s touching himself while he moves his mouth over me, and yes , the knowledge of that is just enough to do it.

My vision goes white at the edges, and I make a strangled noise as rings

of pleasure burst through my frame.

Things are still hazy when I drop to my knees in front of him and push his hand away. He drops his forehead onto my shoulder

and clutches my shirt as I touch him. I forgot how quiet he gets before he comes, and how fucking sexy it is when he finally

makes this soft, desperate sound.

Then we’re both just kneeling there, wrapped up in each other, letting our breathing settle. Impulsively, I pull him closer

to me, and when his arms wrap around me, it somehow feels even more intimate than when his mouth was on me. I hug him hard

enough to bruise, trying to get as close to him as physically possible. I feel sort of wobbly again, like I might fall apart.

Maybe he realizes it, because he leans back to look at my face.

“I really missed you,” I mumble. It’s hard to meet his eye again.

He drops his forehead against mine. “Missed you, too.”

We stay like that for a few moments longer, then he gives a reluctant sigh. “I think it’s been more than five minutes.”

“Yeah.” I pull back and quickly swipe the hem of my shirt against my cheeks. When I glance up again, he’s looking at me so

fondly, my cheeks go hot. I clear my throat. “Are you headed back to London tonight?”

He nods. “In a few hours, yeah. You?”

“Yeah.” I glance at my phone. “Like now, actually.”

Travis hands me some tissue and a bottle of water, and I stand up to clean myself off. “Where are you staying in London?”

“I moved in with my friend Kelsie, in Hackney. She was my girlfriend in high school. We’re just friends now,” I add hastily.

“Do you want to stay at my place tonight?”

I get this weird feeling when he says it, sort of like I’ve been running outside on a hot day and have finally taken a sip

of cold water. Or like I’ve been carrying something heavy and finally put it down. I let out a long, deep breath.

“Yeah,” I say. “I really do.”

“Meet me there later?”

I grin. “Sounds great.”

He takes out his phone. He has a new iPhone, I notice, and a fancy black leather case with his racing number on it. “What’s

your number?”

My grin fades. He knows my old number isn’t mine anymore. That must mean he tried to text me after I changed my number in

Albuquerque. God, I am a fucking idiot.

I fumble to get my phone. “I just got a new London number,” I say. “I don’t know it off the top of my head yet.”

He waits patiently while I find it and then taps it into his phone. He types something, and a moment later, my phone dings.

He’s sent me a smiley face. Not a smiling emoji, like most people would do, but a smile made of a colon, dash, and parenthesis— :-) —like we’ve traveled back in time to when people used flip phones. I smile at it foolishly.

“I’ll see you later,” he says.

“Yeah,” I say. “Sounds good.”

We grin at each other like total idiots for a few more seconds, then he closes the distance between us and kisses me again, deep and warm.

After a moment, he drags himself away. The moment the door clicks shut behind him, I collapse onto the bench and grin at the ceiling, fighting the urge to laugh hysterically.

If anyone walks in right now, they’ll think I’m nuts.

But I don’t care.

I’m back together with Travis .