Page 52 of Twisted Trails (Rogue Riders Duet #2)

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Alaina

“You said you don’t know how to let go of the revenge,” Dr. Mira says gently, her French accent curling around the words. “But let me ask you this. What’s always harder to hold onto than the anger?”

The hotel room is still wrapped in that colorless pre-dawn gray, and I’m sitting cross-legged on the bed, wrapped in one of Luc’s hoodies, fingers tugging absently at the frayed cuff.

The phone rests face-up on the pillow, speaker on, her voice the only sound aside from the low hum of the air-conditioning.

“I don’t know.” It comes out too small.

“Hope.”

Hope .

“And in your case…” she continues, “… hope means identity. What person, sister, even teammate you were before you had a target.”

I blink up at the ceiling, letting the quiet stretch. My mind drifts to dirt under my fingernails, to the taste of blood, sweat, and fear at the start line of my first World Cup as Allen Crews, and to every time I heard Raine’s name and felt my stomach twist.

Before all that, I was just me. I was reckless and fast, and so in love with this sport, it hurt.

I was someone who knew how to laugh even after a crash.

Someone who used to sleep with her medals under her pillow like they were proof she could take up space in the world that belonged to her brother.

That girl feels far away now, but maybe she’s not gone. Perhaps she’s just buried under years of fury, drive, and the belief that revenge was the only thing holding me upright.

“Hope,” Dr. Mira says again, softer now.

“You’ve already walked past that moment, Alaina.

You know how to let go because you’re still here.

You’re still breathing, still planning, still riding, even without winning.

Letting go isn’t erasing the past, it’s making space for everything else you could be . ”

My chest squeezes as something in me cracks open just wide enough for something new to grow.

What could I be if I’m not the girl chasing revenge?

If I’m not Allen Crews with something to prove?

“Letting go of one thing doesn’t mean losing everything,” she adds. “It’s actually choosing what deserves to stay.”

I close my eyes and think of Luc and Mason’s laughter echoing across the BMX track.

Of Finn picking wildflowers with pizza grease still on his fingers.

Of Dane, always watching out for me, even when I didn’t deserve it.

Of Piper, being my first real girlfriend.

Otis and Toulouse, Jim and élise, even Dad.

And I realize that’s what I want to stay.

Them.

This.

A version of my life that isn’t built on ruin. I don’t have to burn it all down to feel whole again, and maybe I’ve already started rebuilding without even knowing it.

“Thank you,” I whisper.

Dr. Mira’s voice softens even more. “Is there anything else that’s worrying you?”

I swallow. “Yeah. I’m still afraid of what happens when the meds stop working.”

“Alaina…” she says, firmer now, “… they won’t stop working. We will make sure you are always medicated correctly until you’re able to try pain therapy or another surgery. Like we already said, we have a solution. You just need the time to get there. There is no need to worry about that.”

I nod slowly, even though she can’t see me. “Okay.”

“Thank you for showing up this morning. I’ll hear from you in a couple of days, but reach out if you need me sooner.”

“I will,” I murmur. “Thanks.”

She hangs up, and I let my phone slide off the pillow and flop back into the bed with a long, uneven breath. My eyes burn, and it’s not grief this time, more like relief. Therapy sessions are hard, but they’re getting easier.

Just like life is getting easier.

Piece by piece.

Breath by breath.

There’s a soft knock at the door, barely more than a tap, and I sit up at the sound. Who could be up this early? Luc? Mason? Maybe Finn?

“Come in.”

Dane pokes his head in, his hair a sleep-mussed mess. “You’re up early.”

“Forgot about the time difference to France.”

Dane steps into the room and closes the door behind him. “Therapy session? ”

I nod, shrugging. “Yeah.”

He walks closer, lingering at the foot of the bed. “How was it?”

I exhale through my nose, not sure what to call it. “Good. I think it was good. Why are you up?”

“Jetlag.” He hovers for a second longer, then asks, “Can I?”

I snort. “Since when do you ask if you can sit on my bed?”

“Since I’m not sure anymore what you’re doing in those beds,” he mutters, but there’s a small, crooked smile on his face when I glance up.

“Sit down, dumbass.” I laugh but feel my cheeks warm. “I was alone last night.”

He climbs on, settling beside me like we used to back home when neither of us could sleep, back before any of this started.

“Okay,” he says quietly. “How are you, Al? I feel like we never have time alone anymore, to talk.”

I raise a brow at him. “Oh, don’t put that on me, Mr. In Love .”

He scoffs. “Well, Ms. In Love three times .”

“Shut up.” I chuckle, bumping my shoulder against his.

Dane’s smile fades into something softer. “No, really. How are you ? I feel bad for not checking in more.”

“You don’t have to,” I say, a little too quickly. “I’m feeling good. But…” My voice trails off, and I feel the crack forming before I even finish the sentence. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

His head tilts. “Anything.”

I hesitate. Not because I don’t trust him. I do. With everything. But this? This is the thing we’ve carried together from the start. The fire that kept us moving forward when we couldn’t look back without falling apart, and I’m about to ask him to let me put it down.

My thumb finds a loose thread in the blanket and tugs. I can’t look at him yet. I’m afraid of what I’ll see if I do. Hurt. Disappointment. Maybe even betrayal. Because this revenge is not just mine. It was never just mine.

I inhale slowly and then lift my gaze to him. “How bad would it be if I let go of our plan?”

His eyes snap wide like I just pulled the ground out from under both of us, and maybe I did. Maybe that’s what this is. The unbuilding of the thing that used to keep me alive. The part of me that used to think justice and vengeance were the same thing.

Now, I’m starting to think there’s a difference.

“I know,” I rush out. “I know it’s yours too. I know he ruined your life as well, and it’s not fair of me to say that, but…” My voice catches, and suddenly my throat feels tight.

I look down at my hands and the tape wrapped around my fingers. Every time I move them, I’m reminded how far I’ve fallen behind.

“I have to win the next race to even stay in the running,” I whisper. “And we both know that won’t happen. Not with these fingers, and it’s not just that. It’s just…”

The words falter again. I can’t bring myself to say it. That I’m tired of chasing pain for the sake of a goal I don’t recognize as mine anymore.

“It’s not the most important thing in the world anymore,” Dane finishes softly.

A truth I’ve been circling in my mind for weeks.

“What if…” I barely manage the next words. “What if I just wanted to finish the season in a good way? Not gunning for the overall. Not telling anybody about my secret. Just letting Allen Crews disappear into nothing afterward. ”

He doesn’t answer. Just watches me like he’s watching a thread unravel, waiting to see if I’ll break or hold.

“And what if…” I continue, pushing the words out before my courage disappears.

“What if I did the hip surgery as soon as the season’s over?

Took the time to actually heal this time.

Get strong again, and maybe next season, or the one after, I come back.

As me. Alaina Crews. In the women’s field.

If no one finds out what we did, there’s no reason I couldn’t, right? ”

Silence stretches between us, but when I finally have the courage to look up at him again, his eyes are wide and brimming with too many emotions. Grief. Relief. Love.

I blink back the burn in my own and ask the question that’s been strangling me from the inside.

“Would you be mad at me for that?”

He shakes his head wordlessly, but the way his eyes hold mine says everything.

The relief hits first, then the guilt. That horrible twist in my chest that I even had to ask him. That I made him carry this with me all this time without really seeing how heavy it was for him too.

I blink, and the tears are already rising fast. “Mason said it doesn’t matter what the world thinks.

As long as our people know the truth, I think that’s enough.

It’s okay if just the people who matter understand what happened, and we can still love our sport, our lives, even if the Raine siblings are out there doing the same. ”

“Yeah.” Dane swallows hard, so hard I can hear it. “Yeah. I think we can do that.”

All the breath leaves my lungs as I reach out and hold up my uninjured pinky. He stares at it, then at me, and a tear slips out of his eye and runs down his cheek.

“I promise you…” I whisper, “… to give life a fighting chance, Dane.”

He grips my pinky so hard he almost breaks this one, too, then yanks me into him. It’s not a careful hug. It’s a collapsing one. Arms clinging, shoulders shaking, every breath ragged.

He cries into my neck like he’s finally letting go of everything he’s been holding in since I crashed, since I broke, and I hold him like he’s the only thing that matters, because for so long, he was.

“I’m so sorry,” I whisper through my tears. “For all the pain I gave you. I didn’t see it, I couldn’t. I was hurting so much, and I didn’t see you.”

“Don’t you fucking dare.” He pulls back just enough to look at me, and his eyes are red, wet, furious in the way only love can be.

“This is everything I ever wanted, Speedbump. Everything . Not the revenge. You choosing yourself.” After a long while and a few more sobs, he lets go, scrubbing at his face with his sleeves and laughing wetly. “Fuck. Look at us. Fucking cry babies.”

I laugh, too, even as I sniffle. “Yeah, but the toughest ones.”

“No one’s tougher.” He grins, eyes still shining. “Imagine if Dad saw this.”

“He’s so weird lately, he’d probably just join in. Like the jet, the hotel rooms, and all the extra drama? Weird.”

“He’s desperate,” Dane agrees, shaking his head with a half-smile. “You could ask for anything right now, and he’d hand it over with a bow on it.”

I huff out a laugh. “We should absolutely milk that.”

Dane grins at first, but then his expression shifts. “We should .” His eyes stay on me, searching. “Is there anything you want?”

“You just heard what I want.”

“Yeah, but how? How do you want to come back to racing? What’s the plan? You thinking of signing with a team? Maybe Delacroix’s?”

“I haven’t thought that far yet.” I pause, then turn the question around. “What about you? What is it you want?”

Dane frowns. “What?”

“You sacrificed years for me,” I say, picking at the loose thread in the blanket again. “For this, and I just told you it was for nothing.”

“It wasn’t for nothing.”

“It was,” I say softly. “I’m sorry, but that’s not the point. The point is, you’re just as important. So, what do you want, Dane?”

He huffs and runs a hand through his hair. “The plan was to work for the company.”

I make a face before I can stop myself. “I mean, if that’s what you want, okay, but I never saw you doing that.”

“Neither did I, but it would be the logical next step.”

“And what’s the illogical thing you’d rather do?”

He hesitates, glancing toward the window. The light is softer now, golden almost. It’s still early, but the world’s beginning to stir.

“I think I’m not quite done with DH after all,” he finally admits.

“You wanna race?”

He’s thirty-four, and it’s late to start again, but if he wants it?—

“No, silly.” He smiles, and the affection in it makes me smile too. “But being on the circuit again. Being your manager. Running numbers. Strategy. Logistics. I liked it. I want that.”

“You want us to run a team?”

“You gonna forgive Finn?”

The shift in conversation has me reeling, and I’m not quite sure how open I should be with my answer, or how mad Dane still is at his best friend. “I’m getting there. Are you?”

He shrugs. “Getting there too.”

Huh.

Then he hesitates again, and I feel the air tighten.

“What if I wanted to help Finn with his junior team?”

“A junior team?” I squint at him. “With what juniors?”

“He hasn’t told you?”

“No?”

“Huh.” Dane scratches the back of his neck.

“Well, yeah. Finn’s got plans. He’s had them since way before we got back.

He wants to start a junior team, and I saw the mockups, the proposals, stats, all of it.

It’s good, Al. It’s really fucking good, and yeah, he is a dick for what he did to you, but he’s still my best friend.

We dreamed about this once, and he never stopped working toward it. ”

There’s a beat of silence as I let that settle, let it swirl with all the tangled things I feel about Finn.

“And when I think about a nine-to-five in a suit…” Dane adds, “… or being back here, training, doing the season, working toward something that matters, I want this .”

“With the guy you punched in the face?”

“Oh, shut up, you know I love him. I just love you more.”

“I know.” I smile, warmth spreading in my chest. “And I love you for it.”

“If we get backing from Dad, we might actually pull it off. Not only juniors, but we could sign you, and even Mason. It doesn’t have to be Crews Racing 2.0. We could do whatever we want, we could…”

He trails off when I grin at him too hard, because my heart is so full. I haven’t seen Dane this excited about something in ages .

“Fuck, I think we’ve both changed in the last few weeks.” He huffs.

Change used to feel like betrayal and losing pieces of myself just to survive. Now it feels like choosing better pieces.

Stronger ones.

Softer ones.

“We did.” My lips twitch. “Okay, I’m in, and I might know someone who could be the team physio.”

He squints at me, his ears turning red. “She said she was done.”

“Because she was bored, not because she was over it. As if Piper wouldn’t jump at the chance to babysit us professionally.”

That earns me a full grin. “So, what now?”

I let the question hang in the air, and let the possibility stretch out because I’ve spent so long in fight mode, it’s almost terrifying to hope again.

Taking a deep breath, I smile as I say, “Let’s see if Dad answers his phone this early.”

Dane beams, then he pulls me into another hug. He kisses the top of my head, and my heart, for the first time in so long, feels like it belongs in my body again.

He pulls back and grabs his phone, thumb already scrolling for the contact, then dials our father’s number, and for once, I don’t brace myself to talk with him.

I lean back on the pillows and let it ring.