Page 2 of Down & Dirty (Holden Cove #1)

CHAPTER 2

SKYLAR STONE

W hoever said, “Timing is everything” clearly never met my ex.

Or his girlfriend.

Tommy and Geena hadn’t had my son, Micah, ready to go on time in nearly a year. Tommy hadn’t managed the feat by himself before her, either, for the record. It had been three years since we’d split and I’d adjusted a long time ago, padding my schedule for every pickup, knowing he’d be late. The addition of Geena had sparked a short-lived hope that I might see some sort of improvement.

I was wrong.

In the opposite direction. By like, thirty minutes, wrong.

“You guys almost done in there?” I called from just outside Tommy’s trailer.

I hadn’t been invited in since Geena entered the picture. But I wasn’t complaining. Tommy’s downright refusal to put anything away set my anxiety on high. Clothes. Dishes. Shoes. Paperwork. None of it was ever organized. It just piled up around him like a fun-house maze, the walls closing in, until they tipped over. At which point, he’d shove it under the furniture and start again.

At least this way, I got to wait for our son in the uncluttered, fresh air of whatever town the motocross tour had us racing that week.

“Hold your horses,” Geena grumbled, pushing the trailer door open and taking the fold-out metal stairs down in the sideways way she did, her black pleather mini skirt too tight to do otherwise. Her bright red blouse shifted in the breeze, revealing the strappy bralette she was wearing underneath.

I stepped back to give her room. “Just hoping to catch dinner with my folks,” I explained.

Again.

We’d had this conversation when I’d arrived. And when I’d made these arrangements with Tommy two days earlier. It was hard not to imagine that the delays, and the attitude, were some sort of control thing. That was Tommy’s MO. And apparently it was Geena’s now too.

“You should be happy he wants to spend so much time with his son.”

I turned away, coughing to hide the irritation that I knew my face would reveal. Geena acted as if Tommy was doing me a favor, instead of just showing up as a parent. Which he was. Disrespecting my time didn’t endear me to him for doing the bare minimum. But I knew better than to hope she’d understand that. She was under Tommy’s spell.

I was ashamed to admit I knew exactly what that felt like.

“Micah needs both his parents,” I said, hating every second of this conversation. “And he loves seeing his grandparents. We’re lucky they made the trip from California to Maryland, so we’d like to make sure they get some time.”

Tommy shoved the door open and jostled the trailer as he descended the stairs. The white T-shirt he wore sported a shotty screen print of his own face, the cheeky grin he used to win me over back when we were kids emblazoned across his chest like a warning sign I was too young and foolish to understand back then. His frosty box-blond hair fell in his eyes as he leveled me with a petulant glare. “They came to see your brother’s race. Don’t act like they’re here for Micah.”

A quick glance behind him showed Micah was still inside packing his tiny backpack and I let out a muffled curse. “It’s not a competition, Tommy. Two things can be true at the same time.”

My parents adored my son. His father, on the other hand...

But still, they’d always done their part to keep things civil. We’d never been married, and our arrangement on custody worked since I was on the racing circuit with my little brother, Ronnie, most of the year. We all knew that Tommy was the least stable variable in our delicate arrangement.

“Don’t shrink me, Sky,” he grumbled, wrapping an arm around Geena’s shoulders. “He’s packing up his stuff. Just chill out.”

I’d chilled out for half an hour. After getting there a half hour later than we’d agreed because I knew better. I was hungry, tired, and annoyed. If I was any more chill, I’d be on ice.

“Mommy!” Micah squealed, as he burst from the trailer and leapt down the stairs, his pants sporting new grass stains on the knees and marker all over his hands. He wrapped my legs in a bear hug that was getting stronger by the day, and looked up at me with eyes the same shade of blue as my own. “I missed you.” For a five-year-old, he was an ace at the guilt trip.

And I didn’t have any doubts about where he’d learned that little skill.

“Me, too, bud,” I said, knowing full well it had only been a day since I’d seen him. I took his backpack from him, opening the front pouch to make sure his inhaler was still in the right spot. Micah’s asthma had been acting up more and more, and seeing the rescue medicine there settled a rattle of nerves I’d grown used to whenever I was away from him.

“We’ll see you in a couple of days at Crawfordsville, okay, little man?”

My son knew the names of the towns we traveled to for races about as well as he knew calculus. But he nodded emphatically as he gave his father and Geena each hugs.

“See you in Indiana,” I said, with a nod as I took Micah’s hand and led him toward my car.

“Mommy,” he said as soon as we’d climbed inside and he was buckled in. “Guess what daddy got me.”

I braced myself. Tommy had a bad habit of giving Micah gifts that I’d have to take away. A paintball gun in the hands of a five-year-old was a bit much, even for a woman like me, who’d grown up around motocross and hunting.

“What, sweetheart?” I asked, putting the car in gear and keeping my eyes on the road so he wouldn’t see the aggravation on my face.

“A paint set.” He unzipped his backpack and pulled out a long thin watercolor palette, holding it up so I could see the slurry of colors dripping out of the plastic cover.

“Wow. That’s great.” I forced myself to look back at the road and not the colored droplets streaking down my center console.

“Dad said if I couldn’t shoot paints, I should at least be able to make pictures with them.”

Of course he’d said that. Nothing had ever sounded more like Tommy Bridges, motocross wonder kid and champion pain in my ass.

“I bet you’ll make some really pretty pictures with that.”

“I made one for Grammie and Grumps.” He fisted a page of watercolor paper in his chubby little hand and I tried to see it in the dashboard light.

I had no idea what it was. “Looks great, kiddo.”

We’d arrived at the hotel my parents had booked us all into for the night. This place had an indoor pool and breakfast in the morning. There was even art on the walls that hadn’t been fished from a dumpster. It was a far cry from the side-of-the-highway, polyester blanket type of joint I would have chosen, and Ronnie would have been fine in his trailer. But Grant Stone wasn’t about to let his family stay in a fleabag motel .

And I wasn’t about to tell him how often we did just that so I could pocket some extra cash.

My job was to keep Ronnie from railroading his own career on the motocross circuit. I was essentially his assistant-slash-agent-slash-lawyer-slash-babysitter. And my dad helped supplement what Ronnie paid me to keep us afloat. Once Ronnie got a few endorsements, we’d be in better shape, but for now, things were what they were.

“There’s my boy!” My father bellowed from the living room of the hotel suite as we entered.

Ronnie rolled his eyes at my father’s greeting for Micah. He went over the top to make sure my son felt loved, and I adored him for it. Ronnie was a big boy and he got it. Most of the time.

“Grumpy!”

It took all of two seconds for the dripping watercolor palette to make another appearance and I watched with a laugh as my mother swooped in with some paper towel and a dirty look in my direction.

I shrugged. “Talk to his father.”

She strode past me toward the kitchen. “Not if I can help it,” she muttered only loud enough for my brother and me to hear.

“So,” Ronnie started, getting all of our attention—even Micah stopped jabbering and looked his way. “We’ve got a development.”

My pulse ticked up and I saw my father’s jaw tighten. Ronnie hadn’t mentioned anything to me after the race, which was unsurprising given his preference for drama and his love of a captive audience. But I didn’t like getting caught off guard like this. We were supposed to be a team. My brother was an adult, a twenty-four-year-old man, and a brilliant rider. But when it came to everything else about the business of racing, he was a hot head with eyes bigger than his stomach.

“They announced a combined season for next year. An overall points winner for both Supercross and Motocross. ”

“One long season?” my mom asked, the concern in her voice poorly masked by the forced smile on her face.

“Yep. And the manager for OTM stopped me on my way out. He wants me to join their team. Make a run for it.”

With a sigh, I sagged back into my chair. OTM, or Olbrich Thorun Muhler, were three pioneers of motocross in Europe back in the eighties, who many still regarded as the grandfathers of our sport. Now their company produced some of the fastest bikes in the business. Of all teams to show an interest in my brother, they would have been his top choice.

I’d heard rumors that this combo season might be coming. It was an idea as ambitious as it was logical. The two sports were inextricably entwined, it was about time they met somewhere in the middle.

But keeping up good standings in both the indoor Supercross circuit and the outdoor Motocross tour was going to put every rider through hell. The two types of tracks took different skills, and riders tended to be better suited to one versus the other. Ronnie had always focused on the longer motocross course.

January through September was going to be a long season. And I’d come to like having the spring to ease back into the madness of training. Taking Micah to the park, catching up on reading, hell, even cooking the two of us dinner in the tiny apartment I sublet each year from a family friend across town from my folks in northern California. Without as much time off, I’d lose out on all of those normal routine things everyone else took for granted in their stationary lives.

“So, no off season?” I asked, knowing that going for the whole thing was going to be Ronnie’s choice no matter what. By the look on his face he’d already made it.

No need to talk to me. Per usual.

“The purse is worth the extra time,” he said, as if it was obvious. “And,” he glanced between us all, a glint in his eye. “They’re pulling together a killer team this year to kick it off.”

I took a sip of my water, curious. Getting Ronnie on a competitive team would help him land endorsements. And a good deal would mean more money for both of us. “Who?”

“He said they’re still vetting guys, but right now the lead contenders are Tate Lawson, Kip Waters, and Cory Ellis. If they each signed on, we’ll have the numbers and experience.”

When I’d started racing as a kid, I’d known the name of every motocross racer that had hit the top twenty. It had been my sport before Ronnie’s. But he’d shown more promise, and there were still too few shots for women. It was getting better, though. I wondered sometimes what would have happened if I’d kept going. Would I be as well-known as the names my brother had just listed off?

“Waters is going to want number one for himself,” my father said, turning between Ronnie and the artwork Micah was shoving into his hand. “And Ellis?”

Cory Ellis had already been a household name when Ronnie started. Over a decade ago. No one lasts that long in motocross, so why was he still fighting kids half his age? It made me wonder what OTM would want with a guy like him, all showy and arrogant and old. From everything I’d seen, he’d never struck me as much of a team player.

“He was on the podium last week,” Ronnie said, his brow scrunched tight, as if we’d insulted him. “And he’d be bringing his wrench, Billy Morlow.”

The duo was still together? It was hard to believe they’d been able to stay a team this long. What kind of pull did Ellis have with OTM management that they were already catering to him? As appealing as this idea was to Ronnie, getting him on a team that already had a favorite would be a waste of time.

“It’s the best chance I have of getting into the top three,” Ronnie said, his eyes on the beer in his hand.

“Then we’ll all support you, honey,” my mother said from the tiny kitchenette. She glared at my father first, and then me. Between Ronnie and her, it didn’t feel much like a discussion.

I gave my brother a nod. “I guess we’ll give it a shot. ”

“But not with paint!” Micah roared, bouncing to his feet and waving his paintbrush in the air, watercolor spraying out around him as my father tried to catch him in his arms, laughter peeling out of them both.

“They’ll let us know who they pick after next week’s final race,” Ronnie said, accepting the plate of take-out my mother handed him. “And then training would start in Murietta two weeks after that.”

In my head I ran down the list of tasks this put onto my plate. Moving. Getting Micah settled. Making new arrangements with Tommy. OTM was a much bigger organization than any we’d worked with before, and it would be on me to sort out the new players and what they’d want from Ronnie beyond just race days.

“We’ll be ready,” I said, knowing that was as likely as me getting my ex to stop giving our son sugar right before I picked him up.

Maybe Tommy knew more about timing than I thought.