Page 34

CHAPTER 34

Connor

Her legs are impossibly smooth, like silk. I bite my lip. Does she taste as soft as she looks? Spending these days with her has made me want to shout my feelings from the rooftops. I want to get a reaction and know she wants me as much as I desire her.

She focuses on the cars flying around the track on screen, her hazel eyes swirling with amber and burnt orange.

I need to enjoy the friendship and get over myself, yet I grip her legs again. She must moisturise hourly, or more likely, she’s a fucking angel. She’s wearing her tiny denim shorts again, but I refuse to look above her knees. I grip her legs tighter to stop my hands from drifting.

“I have a question,” she announces. Please ask me if I love you so I can get on my knees and prove my answer with my tongue. My cock begins to harden, and I will it to calm.

“Sure.” I clear my throat.

“You said that before a race, you’ll run through everything you hate about racing.”

I shrug. “Yeah.”

“You don’t wear headphones like the other drivers before a race. Why is that?”

This is an appropriate question from a friend. I can’t fuck things up. But I can’t stop my eyes from drifting up her legs and higher. Shit, her nipples are pressing against her T-shirt.

“Connor?”

I move her legs off me and stand, walking a few steps to the kitchen part of the open-plan house. I force distance physically and hopefully in my head, too. “No reason. They all do it because they have music they listen to, but I don’t. Do you want a drink?”

“You don’t have music, or you don’t want to listen to music?” She stands and follows me.

“I don’t have music to listen to. Is this important?” I wring my hands together.

“Yes. So you don’t have a song you listen to when you get ready to race?”

Her toes touch mine as she lifts her head and pins my gaze. Everything about this woman is unrelenting, and I can’t resist it. And I’m trying. I’ve been trying most of my life.

“I thought that was something only boxers did and people who are crappy townie drivers.”

She gives me a playful shove. “No, you didn’t.”

“I’ve never found my song, so listening to music before racing distracts me and frustrates me. So what?”

I try to walk away, but she grips my hands.

“But every driver on this circuit has one. I have one for when I go into meetings.”

“Fleetwood Mac’s ‘The Chain,’” I reply with a smile that’s erring on cocky.

She shoves me again, although she’s blushing and grinning this time. “Yes, and sometimes ‘The Man’ by Taylor Swift.”

I lick my lips. “And do you have a walk when you listen to ‘The Man’? Because I’d like to see that. It will help my song research.”

“The only thing you’ll see is me flicking you the Vs as I walk away.”

“I like the idea of watching you walk away,” I say with a wink that makes her shake her head as a grin broader than the sky takes over her face.

“Back to the song. I’ve got a couple, but one jumps out.” And then she walks to her bag, her gait slow. I swear she gives her butt an extra wiggle.

A grunt escapes my mouth, and she looks over her shoulder, her brows furrowed. I shrug and lick my lips as I stare at her butt. Senna sticks her middle finger up at me as she grins. I’m a dickhead, but I think she likes that.

She likes me. Fuck. I can’t stop messing with her.

She pulls her headphones out of her bag and walks back. As she reaches me, she cups my face. My breath catches. I’m like some giddy teenager desperate for his crush to kiss him rather than a man who’s usually in control.

She flips her headphones from the box and slides them into my ears. Her fingers brush my neck, and I hold in a gasp that threatens to reveal I’m not just a cocky guy giving charm to his friend. Her sweet scent of orange blossom lingers on my skin as she grabs her phone from her back pocket. Her eyelashes flutter, and she bites her lip as she scrolls through her music account. I swallow loudly, the sound like a blast of noise with the headphones stuck in my ears. “Here we go.”

Her big hazel eyes focus on mine as I listen to the first beats of the song. I can’t figure out what she’s mouthing, so I try to remove the earbuds, but she holds her hands against mine to keep them in.

“Just listen,” she mouths. It’s nearly impossible to focus on the music. She hasn’t dropped her hands, and her heat penetrates my skin, filling my veins with her. She strokes her thumbs behind my ears.

“Close your eyes,” she mouths. Half of me wants to keep my eyes open so I can drown in the intensity of her stare, the amber swirling in her eyes, and her tongue edging across her bottom lip. But if I’m going to listen to it, I need to have a view that is much less sensory than her beauty.

I close my eyes as the rhythm builds. There are violins and an Irish melody I don’t recognise. The power continues to take hold, and it’s frantic and consuming.

It’s like a revelation and everything I’ve needed. Like she’s everything I’ve needed. I can imagine listening to this song before a race. The punch of the rhythm gives me power and presence and makes me want to act, destroy, and control, too.

I wish her hands were against me in the build-up to a race. That would give me power. With her, I’d take on the world, every driver, bastard, and anyone else who gets in my way. I shake my head, and goosebumps smatter across my skin.

The song ebbs and fades, and Senna’s hands disappear. I miss her touch instantly. I remove the earbuds.

“Not it? I can try others.”

“It was perfect,” I say, my voice gruff.

Her smile and puffed-up chest warm my heart. She flips the phone to the speaker and puts it on the counter beside us. The song plays again.

“I knew it. It played in a bar I hung out in years ago, and I immediately thought of you. It has your energy and a melody that refuses to leave the body.”

“You thought of me in the past?” We haven’t talked about those years where we didn’t speak. She wasn’t in my life until she worked in the comms department, and then she avoided me. I didn’t think I existed to her.

Her eyes widen as if she’s revealed more than she intended. “Oh, well, sometimes. Usually, it was thoughts of hate,” she says with a stunted laugh.

“Usually? So there were other thoughts, too?”

I’m not letting this conversation go away. I’ve let too much get away from me. This thing between us is coming to a head.

The song moves through the chorus and is as unrelenting as she is. She’s always been this way, pressing and pushing in my heart. The intensity makes me straighten my back, and my shoulders rise.

“Yes.” She dips her head, and I tuck my finger under her chin and lift it. Our eyes meet.

“And what were those thoughts, Coults?” The danger of the moment has me fisting my other hand so she’s oblivious to my tremble. This feels more significant and adrenaline-filled than any race and podium win.

“I missed you. I missed my friend who made me laugh and filled my days with hope and joy I didn’t believe I’d experience again.”

She didn’t always hate me.

She holds my stare. “Did you ever think of me?”

I take a breath and laugh awkwardly.

“Never mind.” She pulls away, but I reach for her hand to draw her back.

I cup her face like she cupped mine. “You wonder if I ever thought of you. Every. Fucking. Day. Some days, you were all I thought about. There was a space in my heart that was all you, and nothing else filled it.”

As I talk, new colours join the amber in her hazel eyes. I’m mesmerised by the blue flecks. She’s so fucking beautiful.

“There would be days when I got through Senna-free hours, but there were also days when each breath I took was infused with you. I woke most mornings curious about what you were doing or wishing I could see you and explain. I caught a joke and wanted to tell you it or I’d read something about racing and question if you’d heard the same story. When I visited your brother, I wanted to ask him about you and ensure you were okay, but I didn’t cross that line. I kept it inside, although it ate at me. I tried to hate you, but even when I did, I was lying to myself.”

She studies my eyes, leaning into my hands as if she can’t let herself believe me. “I wanted to ask him about you, too. I should’ve been able to cut you out of my heart as I cut you out of my life, but you’ve always been there, filling my dreams and reminding me of the happy times. We were close, weren’t we?”

The song nears its crescendo, giving me the energy and presence I need to drive. Only now, it allows me to share my truth.

“The closest. I missed your laughter and your joy. I hoped no other man got to know what it was like to make you smile. I wanted to believe you saved all your smiles for me. I hated that other men got to touch you like I wanted to.”

She holds my hand against her cheek and fixes me with a look that makes me shiver. “Like a friend?”

I shake my head. “Like a lover.”

Her stare penetrates mine. “I wanted that, too. I imagined it.”

I tremble at the admission.

“Some days, I’d punish myself with Google press shots of who you were dating. And then the other days…” She pauses so long that I raise my eyebrows. I grit my teeth to stop myself hurrying her.

For months, I’ve tried to be the best driver for her, even while fighting my struggles and the knowledge she can’t be mine. But as the song embeds itself in my soul, the music that reminded her of me, I brush her lower lip with my thumb. She runs her tongue across it, as if tasting me.

“Other days,” she eventually adds, her voice gravelly and saturated with arousal, “I’d search for your sexier shots and fantasise about kissing you and?—”

I press my lips hard against hers, claiming her. She gasps. I need to slow down. If this is my one opportunity, I must remember her. Our moment in the bar was too brief. I want to know her taste so I can revisit it nightly. I want to make her whimper. I need her softness.

My other hand cups her other cheek, and I brush kisses to her lips. “I imagined your kisses,” I say between the grazes of my lips. “I longed to be the man in your bed and in your heart.” She leans closer. “I wanted to hunt down your dates and tell them they weren’t good enough for you. That no one was good enough for you, including me, but you were mine anyway.”

I back her up against the counter. She wraps her arms around my neck, and I lift her and ease her onto the countertop. I slide my tongue into her parted mouth, and she moans against me as my hands slide underneath the gap between her shorts and her thighs. We’re making out, and although I want to do more, I want to spend time discovering her body slowly, too. She opens her legs enough to let me stand between them. I pull the tie out of her hair and let her short waves cascade down like a drawer of messy ribbons.

She tries to undo my jeans, but I still her hands. “Senna.” My gruff voice reveals what this moment does to me. “I want this. I want you writhing beneath me as you say my name and lose everything but your words for me. But for now, I want to kiss you and enjoy the sexy noises you make and feel your body shake against mine.” She trembles. “Do you want that, too, baby?”

“Yes, Connor.” I’m not the only one whose voice is saturated with passion. “I want everything. Now fucking kiss me again like I’ve never been kissed before.”

“Yes, boss,” I murmur against her lips before giving her everything she wants and more.