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‘Yes, sir,’ he muttered, grasping his handlebars to follow me, a small smile on his lips. ‘But it’s Belgian soap,’ he continued drily as we pushed off and headed for the next curve.

I snorted a laugh. Thank fuck it wasn’t Canadian soap.

‘Are you all right?’ he asked. ‘You’re bleeding.’

‘Are you offering first aid?’ I called back. ‘I’ve had worse. Let’s just get back down to the hotel.’

‘What are you doing up here alone anyway?’

Setting my jaw, I just said, ‘I prefer to warm up on my own.’ So I didn’t show weakness in front of the rest of the team. ‘Lucky for you!’

He remained mercifully silent while we negotiated the gravel and the hairpins. When we returned to the road, I gripped the drop bars and set a high pace, ignoring the sting of the grazes on my thigh. ‘See if you can keep up!’

When I glanced back, he had a wide grin on his face, with long dimples above that square jaw, looking cute and utterly ridiculous, with a blow-up doll and a bunch of balloons whipping in his slipstream.

I’d forgotten to ask his name. It was too late now. I’d got him mixed up with LoonieDunes in my mind – although I didn’t know his name, either.

As we rejoined the road, I glimpsed the men’s team ahead – a flash of blue and orange in the colours of our current sponsors – riding in a bunch. Standing up in the saddle, I pushed ahead.

‘Still there?’ I asked over my shoulder. ‘How’s the dust taste?’

‘Your dust, Lori Gallagher?’ he called back. ‘Like gold.’

The cadence of my pedalling faltered. ‘You idiot,’ I grunted, a piss-poor comeback. ‘You can’t eat gold!’

‘You can!’ he insisted. ‘There’s a European food standard for it!’

Damn it, I wasn’t supposed to laugh while my muscles were pushing these power levels. ‘You Belgians and your food standards! Less talk, more effort!’ I shouted, reminding myself as much as him.

We reached a gentle descent and flew. I was made of air, a master of gravity, as all my molecules vibrated with speed and power and force and it was all somehow more exhilarating because I was lending my magic dust to a guy with a nice smile and a comforting voice.

For a moment, I was me again on the bike.

Throwing all my strength into my legs, I slipped alongside the men’s peloton, waiting for Colin to notice me. When he did, his double take was an adrenaline rush all of its own.

‘I found something you lost,’ I called out, jerking my head in the direction of the new guy, whose chest was heaving with effort from the drag on his bike.

He tucked in behind the men’s group to a chorus of snickers that he didn’t seem to notice.

He had his nose up, as though appreciating the hint of thyme in the cold air.

Colin flashed me a cranky look as I joined the bunch as well, but I just lifted my chin pointedly at him. We both knew I got better results than he did and if I wanted to join the men for a day, the team manager – our dad – wouldn’t stop me.

We reached the rendered houses and apartment blocks on the outskirts of Girona, sprayed liberally with graffiti, and then the old town swallowed us up: stone churches and tree-lined streets, warm colours and pedestrians to dodge. Ten minutes later, we arrived outside the team hotel.

Watching the new guy pull up, unclipping casually, propping himself up on the handlebars, I had to blink away a fresh tingle of recognition. Colin strode up to him, holding out his hand for one of those macho clasps, since handshakes were apparently for wimps.

‘Fair play, mate,’ my brother said. ‘It’s good to see you can take a joke.’

‘A hazing, you mean,’ I said, showing Colin my teeth.

‘Are you defending him?’ Colin asked, giving me an affectionate shove. Sending the new guy a sidelong glance, he said, ‘Don’t get any ideas about my sister.’

‘I wouldn’t dream of it,’ he muttered. ‘I’ve got Matilda now anyway,’ he continued, jerking a thumb over his shoulder at the blow-up doll, who bobbed with excitement at his words.

‘Matilda?’ Colin said with a snort-laugh.

‘In honour of my new team. She can sit in the bus with the blow-up boxing kangaroo. I’d offer to let her share my room, but she might miss yours, Gallagher.’

So much for the new guy needing me to defend him.

‘You’re welcome to her,’ Colin said with a chuckle.

‘Can Matilda and I go?’ he continued. ‘Or do I need to get naked and eat worms so we can become “mates”?’

‘What you do with Matilda is up to you,’ Colin said emphatically, raising his arms in mock horror.

Untying the ribbons from the seat tube of his bike, the guy glanced up and caught me watching him. The doll was losing puff, because she bumped against his head as he freed her from her bonds. He approached me haltingly, biting his lip.

‘Thank you,’ he said softly, ‘for pacing me down.’

I gulped, unable to form a smart response while my mind was still replaying the view of his teeth sinking into his soft lip.

‘Matilda says thank you, too.’ Gripping the doll’s neck, he made her nod, folding over the drooping plastic until her wide-open mouth contorted. I was about to roll my eyes at his silly sense of humour, when he continued, ‘I hope you… find someone to get that gravel out of your butt.’

The tingles rushed back as I imagined him gently tending my wounds. Was he flirting with me? I felt scrambled up, when I was supposed to be steeling myself for the World Tour racing season. This breathless tingling was too much like weakness.

‘Bye, Belgian soap,’ I called after him as he handed his bike over to the mechanics in the car park and headed for the hotel. He gave me a wave over his shoulder.

Colin was watching me with an odd look.

‘Thank you for ruining my morning,’ I said grimly, before my brother could say anything.

‘Was he bothering you? Do I need to run him off?’

‘No!’

‘I should have run off Gaetano last year,’ he grumbled.

Lucky it had been months since my ex had dumped me or I might not have been able to put Colin off with a dark laugh.

‘He ran off himself, so it’s all good.’ The only positive about the end of that relationship was that he’d dumped me at the end of his contract and then changed teams. ‘But don’t worry.

I can take the new guy. Maybe I don’t want to run him off. ’

‘What? He’s a domestique, Lore. Dad brought him in at the last minute after his old team let him go. He’s never going to win anything. He’s in the team to bring me and Lars our water bottles.’ Unlike Colin and me. Gallaghers were here to win.

‘You have no idea how different that word sounds to a woman. You think being a support rider is somehow less masculine, whereas I think it sounds like the perfect man. You’ll learn one day.’ I patted him on the cheek.

‘Knock it off!’ Colin batted my hand away and gave me the same peeved look he’d been giving me since he was ten and I was twelve.

‘What’s his name, the new guy?’ I asked as casually as I could. ‘He only introduced Matilda,’ I added when Colin gave me a curious look.

‘Sébastien Franck,’ Colin said.

I’d heard the name, but he definitely wasn’t a lead rider.

Sébastien …

He couldn’t be LoonieDunes. I was imagining things. Besides, I was certain my Loonie was from Canada – except the argument for that felt weaker the more I thought about it. Maybe he just loved Bugs Bunny.

Colin turned me to face him. ‘But you’re not really interested in— Ah,’ he interrupted himself with a chuckle. ‘You’re screwing with me,’ he accused with a smile and I allowed him to think it. ‘Just… after Gaetano… no one on the team, hey?’

‘Don’t worry. I learned my lesson. There won’t be anyone this year.’