Page 2

CHAPTER 2

Connor

Senna Coulter stares at me like I’m a piece of shit on the bottom of her shoe.

With her hands on her hips and the man I thought was Niki’s assistant behind her, she looks every inch the big boss.

I cock my head to the side in a show of ambivalence, but my hands itch to call my best friend—former best friend as of this second—to find out what the hell he’s done now.

The woman in front of me reminds me of the Senna I knew, the feisty driver who was once one of my closest friends.

The memory of the last thing she said to me weeks after she was released from the hospital slams into me, making my chest vibrate. I hope one day you know what it’s like to have your life ruined like you’ve ruined mine. I hate your guts. You’re dead to me, Connor Dane.

I can’t forget the angry tears in seventeen-year-old Senna’s eyes as I desperately tried to explain that the crash wasn’t my fault. She has no idea what that crash was truly about, and I’ll never reveal the truth.

A sour taste fills my mouth. I expected to bump into her as she is—was—the comms director, but this changes everything.

“Are you fucking telling me you’re the boss now, Jumps?” I blurt.

Her eyes twitch. She used to hate the nickname because it highlighted her early failures. I grind my teeth. I’ve used it since I was eighteen in an attempt to remove my feelings for her and turn her into a faceless enemy.

She rubs the scar from where she smashed her hand because of me. Bile rises from my gut as I stare at the action. I could destroy the lives of everyone I know and still not hate myself as much as I do now.

“Yes. Niki is gone, and I’m in charge of Coulter Racing.” She pulls her rosy lips into her mouth. Her perfect cheekbones catch my eye, and her eyes sparkle. She’s fucking gorgeous, she always has been, and aside from a wedding I sneaked into last year, this is the closest I’ve been to her in years. Get a grip.

There’s a grunt from Antoine. He despises the idea that a woman is his boss. I hate that guy.

The way her eyes pinch reminds me of how she took down the male drivers during our teenage races. There is a quiver in those eyes, though. I know that movement. I saw it when we were younger and she’d tried to act aggressively around the male drivers to prove she was as good as them. She’s anxious as hell.

“I’m more than the boss,” she says, looking at me and Antoine.

“Yeah?” I ask, standing.

“If you’re on my team, I own you for the season.”

The room remains silent as eyes dart back and forth between us.

I scowl at her, but she doesn’t flinch.

I take a breath. “Hold?—”

“Own you,” she repeats before silencing my comeback with a hand.

She turns to the board members, who stare with their furrowed brows. “Everybody out. I want you back in here for a strategy meeting in thirty minutes.” I move slowly to the door, but her eyes flash as she swivels back to me. “Not you. I’m not done with you. Sit.”

I fold my arms, staring her down. She rolls her eyes.

As the board departs, I reposition myself nearer the wall. My nostrils flare as I square my shoulders, and I clench my teeth so hard my jaw hurts.

“You’re the new driver Niki has saddled me with.” Her shoulders are tight, and her left eye twitches.

I hold up my hands. “Saddled? I didn’t sign up to be ‘owned’ by you, but don’t forget that I’m one of the best drivers on the circuit.” Or I was.

“And one of the biggest liabilities, when you’re not seducing everything in sight.”

The stench of vomit fills my nostrils, and I tighten my lips. She doesn’t know exactly how much of a liability I am or why. Maybe this is a chance to get out of my contract. If I was in a better mental state, I’d consider this is fate telling me to recompense her for what I did to her.

“I’m not what you?—”

She holds her hand up again and connects her phone to the conference room screen. I will bust a vein if she keeps doing that. I study her fingers as I count to ten. Several marks suggest she’s not sitting in her office like a hands-off boss but continues working on cars. The line of the scar has embedded itself in her skin. I fist my hands. If I could go back…

I shake my head. I can’t go back.

Niki’s face appears on the screen.

Senna gasps, “Your hair.” But it’s so quiet that he doesn’t hear.

His head is completely shaved. The burns, still healing from his accident, make my hello freeze in my throat. It took mere seconds for the rescue crew to remove him from the car and extinguish the fire during his last race. I’m under no illusion that the damage could’ve been more than burns and broken ribs. The videos of him stretchered away haunt my Senna-free nightmares.

I close my eyes. This isn’t the first time I’ve considered walking away from racing like he did. At twenty-eight, I’m not one of the young racers anymore. I could retire. Each time I get into my car, the adrenaline no longer fuels a desire to win. Instead, a desperation to stay alive controls my hands.

“What the hell, Niki?” Senna’s grumble forces my eyes open.

I eyeball my best mate as he pops a cap on his head.

“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” I grunt.

The three of us haven’t spoken like this since the day before Senna’s accident when Niki was ill with the flu and told us he couldn’t race. If he’d been there, Senna would have remained safe. I shake the memory away and sink my teeth into my lip again, desperate for pain.

Niki smiles. “Look at you two getting on. You’re already agreeing about things.”

I want to drag him through the screen and smack him, even though I love the guy.

“If you were here, I’d punch your beautiful face,” Senna replies. She needs to stop speaking my thoughts. “Why is Dane the Dick here, and where’s my other driver?”

“No ‘how are you, bro’? ‘Where are you?’ I expected better of you, little sis,” Niki says, although his smile falters. A plain white wall is behind him. His turquoise Coulter Racing team tee gives away nothing about where he is or what he’s been doing.

“Niki,” I snap. “Get to the point. I came here for you. You begged me to join the team.” When I was about to walk away.

Senna glances at me with her big hazel eyes. When we were teenagers, I’d stare at her when she wasn’t looking, just to decipher the colours swirling through her eyes. She says they’re brown, but I’ve stared at them long enough to know.

I check myself. This isn’t the time to reminisce or open the box of emotions I closed when I saw her last year at the wedding. I meet her stare, and she looks away quickly. The room smells like every boardroom in this building: coffee and diesel with a hint of Old Spice as most of the directors are men over the age of fifty. But there’s something else. I breathe in and get hints of orange blossom. I want to get close to her and find out if it’s her fragrance.

I slam my palm against the wall.

Niki sighs. “Connor drives for us now. I’ve signed him for two years. It was the last thing I did before I left.”

Senna stamps her foot, and I try not to laugh or focus on how her wide-legged trousers hide the long legs I recall from the split in her dress at the wedding. “But?—”

“He can’t get a contract anywhere else because he drove like a dickhead last season,” Niki adds. “Vessa kicked him out, and no one wants him on their team.”

She stares at me and mouths, “Liability.”

I wink at her, and she glares back.

“Oi,” Niki says, drawing us back to him. “Senna, you know that Connor is a great driver and could be excellent if he stopped being Dane the Dick.”

“We both know why I’m called that, and it’s not because of my driving,” I banter, earning me a scowl from Senna. I grin and lift my eyebrows at her, the swirls hitting my belly again. “It’s not the insult you want it to be, Senna, and many women will wax lyrical about my?—”

“I can’t work with this idiot. This playboy. He’s going to ruin us,” Senna gripes at the screen, although it’s me she’s sticking her middle finger up at.

“No, he’s not. Connor will give us a chance to succeed, and he will be a very good boy, too.”

“I’m no one’s good boy.” My eyes snap back to his and away from his sister, although I want to witness her reaction.

“Senna, please leave the boardroom. I need to talk to Connor alone.”

She stamps her foot again, and a smile replaces the glare I’ve aimed at Niki.

“You can’t order me out of my boardroom. I’m the boss now. You were the one who told me that before you left. My team need to see me as the boss if they’re going to be on my side.”

I want to comfort her. Even as a teenager, Senna fought for every ounce of respect from the team.

But I don’t. I can’t.

“Just this once. I promise. I need to have this chat, but then the room, Connor, and the whole team are yours. Okay?”

She side-eyes me with a loathing that would make me feel like crap if I wasn’t certain she’s secretly struggling with anxiety about everything forced upon her.

“Fine. You’ve got five minutes, and then I’ll be back.”

“All right, Princess,” I tease, but she strides out of the room without a backward glance.

“Love you, Niki,” she shouts as the door bangs behind her.

As I watch her go, I remember her destroying me before a race when we were teenagers. I’d commented there’d never be a female Formula One racing driver. She beat me that day and changed my mind, too. Something sparks in my chest that I must ignore.

“What the hell, man?” I grunt at the screen. “We had a deal.”

“Open the door a second.”

My brow furrows, but I walk to the door and yank it open. Senna falls against my chest. The scent of orange blossom with a hint of mango envelop me. My hands skim her hips before she pushes her arms against my chest, huffs, and retreats in the direction of the bathroom. I lick my lips slowly before remembering I’m meant to be angry with her brother.

I return to the boardroom screen.

“So?” I snap, my hands flexing from our brief touch. Fuck, I shouldn’t be attracted to her like this, especially as I chat to her brother. “You told me you were signing me so we could realise our teenage dream and make this team the best in the world.”

“Nothing has changed.”

“Except we’re not doing this together.” My voice booms. “And your sister, who hates me, is my boss.”

“She hates you because you haven’t talked to her since you visited ours after her accident.”

“Because she wouldn’t talk to me.”

“Because you didn’t tell her what really happened,” he replies softly, pulling the heat from my argument. “She still probably thinks you did it on purpose.”

I drop my head and sigh. “This is the first time I’ve seen her close up in nearly ten years. She never came to award dinners or the other big events for drivers, and if we bumped into each other in the driver’s paddock, she’d turn on her foot and walk away from me.” I throw my head back and give the ceiling a silent roar. I also saw her at her Uncle Ralf’s wedding, but she doesn’t know, and I can’t share that with Niki.

“Maybe it’s time you told her what happened the day she crashed.”

Niki’s calm makes me slam my fist on the desk. “I’m not getting into this with you.” My shoulders tighten. “This better not be your way of making us friends again, because me and your sister will never be friends.”

Niki grins, and I nearly yank the screen off the wall. “Connor, please listen. You needed signing because no one else would take you?—”

“I walked out of Vessa before they could push me. And I could walk out of this team, too.”

“Our contract is watertight. I ensured it.”

“My lawyers will review it.” My head hurts from furrowing my brow. “How could you do this to me? We’re meant to be best friends.”

He smiles back at me, his hands open. “Mate, we are. Nothing changes that.”

“Apart from you double-crossing me.”

Niki sighs. Fresh lines display his weariness. The crash did a number on him. I dial back my anger.

“This team is my family,” he says gently. “And you must stay, because it needs you. My dad made some crap decisions before his heart attack, and the team might get bought out. It won’t belong to my family anymore, not that Senna knows, and you can’t tell her.”

“But—”

“And as much as she’ll disagree, my sister needs you. And I need you to be there for her, as there will be knives in her back. She pretends she can cope, and I saw the way she was acting the big boss just now. But Dad told me she’s scared. He’s not sure she can do this.”

“But she’s always been a fighter. Do you remember when we used to have to drag her away from the bullies because they targeted her as the only elite female racing driver? She took it all. She’s stronger than you think.” I swallow repeatedly. She took it all until the day I took the sport away from her.

“She needs protecting, Connor. Do this for me. You need to stay close to her. Even though she was a fighter, we still had to guard her when she raced because those guys tried to hurt her.”

“And look what happened when I shielded her. I can’t go there again, and she won’t let me anyway. She could’ve died that day.” I pace the room, my head in my hands. “Besides, your sister is big and ugly enough to guard herself.” There’s nothing ugly about Senna Coulter. I remember those hips, big hazel eyes, and kissable lips. She’s so damn beautiful I have to sink my nails into my palms to stop thinking about her like that. “So I can’t leave? Fine. I’ll get myself fired.”

Niki sits back. His eyes pinch like his sister’s when she reaches her limit. When she does it, I get a secret thrill. With her brother, guilt spikes my skin. “Don’t you dare.”

I pout. “I can’t return to those days when protecting your sister was my calling in life. She doesn’t need me. She’s always thought she could do everything on her own.”

“Which is why you need to help her, protect her, without her knowing.”

“Even if I could, she doesn’t want me around. I can’t work under her when she blames me for ruining her life.”

“Get over yourself, Dane. It’s time you thought about someone other than yourself and what you want.” My mouth drops. “Besides, it’s not just the people out there wanting to hurt her. You need to keep men away from her as well.” He folds his arms and eyeballs me through the screen.

I roll my eyes. “She works in Formula One, which is seventy per cent men. How the hell do you envisage me doing that?”

“I don’t care. Just do it. Loads of them will try to get with her now that she runs the company. They’re either going to try and destroy her or date her. You must protect her for me because I can’t do that from here.”

I catch the weary look in his eyes and how his fingers tremble as he readjusts his cap. I don’t doubt for a second that he’d be here to help Senna if he could be. Niki was the only one there for me when my dad left my family, and he stuck by me even when his dad told him I was worthless after Senna’s accident. I owe him and, to some extent, his sister, too.

I slump in a chair. “Fine, whatever.”

“One more thing,” Niki says, pointing at me through the screen. “Although I trust you to protect her without her knowing, I know your reputation with women, Dane the Dick. The pact we made as teenagers when we fought over Antoine’s sister still stands. Even though I had a chance with her, I walked away because of you.” That’s not what happened. Antoine’s sister never wanted Niki, and I was crushing on Senna but couldn’t tell him, like I can’t say anything now. “We don’t go after the same women, and you don’t get with my sister, ever.”

I laugh loudly until Niki’s glares force me to stop.

“There’s no danger of that. I can’t stand her, but we’re too old for teenage pacts,” I explain.

“Not when it comes to Senna. This is the only way I can make you behave. Promise me on your life. I can’t watch my sister get hurt like all your women have in the past. Your reputation is deserved.”

I throw my hands in the air and rock back on my chair. “Niki, I’ve always been clear with women that I’m not the settling-down type.”

“I don’t care. Give me the promise we made as teenagers. Promise me you’ll protect her and that you won’t try anything with her.”

The door opens, and Senna stares at me, her eyebrow cocked. “I heard Connor laughing. Are you two done? I’ve got balls to bust, and I’ll be starting with yours, Connor fucking Dane.”

Why does that sound so appealing?

“Promise me, Connor.”

I look between the woman I have messy feelings for and her big brother. Senna hates me, and I can’t let my thoughts about her own me again. This will be fine.

“Sure. Whatever,” I say with a roll of my eyes. “But I’m not going to make this easy for anyone.”

I glance at Senna, who says in a way that has me pressing those nails deeper into my hands as my belly coils, “You want trouble, Dane? Bring it on, because I’m all in.”