Page 13 of Wrecking Boundaries (SteelTrack Racing #2)

“Where are we going?”

Jake takes his truck further into the residential neighborhood. “Almost there.” We drive past a young family on an evening walk and a couple walking their dog. “Dinner is at my place.”

To prove it, he pulls into a short driveway and shuts off the ignition.

It certainly explains his choice of clothing. After his creative text messages, I settled on a salmon pink sundress with cap sleeves and a low back since it splits the difference between formal and casual. Jake put much less thought into his fashion choices, choosing red board shorts and a yellow Hawaiian shirt. They clash horribly.

We climb out, and I immediately notice the front yard. “You have a white picket fence,” I say, and my heart skips. Martin commented on them in our DMs yesterday, and when I planned out my ideal future, including an imagined family home, I wanted a white picket fence.

Jake glances at a small section and shrugs his shoulders. “Looks nice, doesn’t it? I replaced it a short time ago,” he says while my world shakes.

I follow him inside, half expecting a mirror on the ceiling and a sex dungeon where the dining room is supposed to be. Instead, his house is rather ordinary, no different from what you’d find in any residential neighborhood.

“I pictured you in something bigger,” I tell him, which may be unfair. Boone owned a condo before living with Maddie.

“Why?” Jake grabs my hand, leading me to the kitchen. “I’d be lost in anything bigger than this, especially traveling so much. Maybe when I have a family, it will be different. Sit down.” He indicates a chair tucked into the island. “Gazpacho to get us started while everything else cooks.”

“You cook?” Our evening has barely started, and he’s giving me a third shock.

He gestures at the empty house around us. “There’s no one else to do it, and I get hungry sometimes. Don’t be impressed. I have a lawn guy, and a housekeeper comes every two weeks.”

I’m afraid to ask the next question. “Can I ask what we’re having?” It will be complicated. Jake didn’t bring me to his home for macaroni and cheese with hot dogs, although it would be helpful if he did. That way, it will be easier to keep up my mental image of an immature jerk. An adult man who keeps house and cooks bursts that image apart.

“I planned shrimp, then couldn’t remember if you were allergic, so it’s wild salmon and roasted summer vegetables.” His self-satisfied grin tells me he knows it sounds impressive. “I get called surfer boy, so I might as well go with it.”

Boone called him that once and only stuck with it after witnessing Jake’s reaction. “I thought they lived in rivers.”

He puts the baking dish in the oven. “I’ve been to the ocean three times in my life,” Jake double-checks, using a finger to count every visit. “Yes, three times. Are you ready for the first course?”

Jake planned courses. Someone pinch me because this is clearly a dream.

∞∞ ∞

“That was amazing,” I say after taking my last bite.

“You don’t cook?” Jake asks.

“My spaghetti from a jar gets rave reviews every time I make it,” I say with a shrug. Cooking for one isn’t fun; cooking for several is work. “My mom is amazing—southern food covered in butter. Madelyn learned from her dad, and it’s phenomenal. She brings cookies to headquarters all the time. I made them sometimes before she started, but that’s it.”

“Dessert.” Jake gives a cocky smile. He needs to trademark the damn thing. “You’re going to love dessert. It’s a statement.”

“What did you do?”

“You’ll see.” He drops our dirty dishes by the kitchen sink and leaves. He returns with a giant box. “I called a bakery and begged for the largest, most obscene tiramisu available. Even I’m impressed.”

He opens the box, and I gasp. It’s gigantic, enough to feed a hundred people, if not more. “It’s a work of art.”

“Princess,” he says, and my skin tingles.

How does he do this? All my mixed-up, complicated, guilt-riddled feelings for him are back. Jake was banished from my life, and now we’re in constant contact. If I’m not careful, he’ll be removing my clothes soon.

Jake feeds me a bite, and I moan. It’s heavenly.

I was wrong. Very soon, I’ll be removing my clothes for him. His ego outmatches every other driver I’ve met. It’s difficult to tell when he’s teasing or being sincere. Either way, his greatest joy in life is making Boone’s difficult.

“We need dessert plates,” I say because it’s impersonal and doesn’t matter.

“Why?” We each pick up a fork as he slides the obnoxiously sized box of Tiramisu between us. “We don’t need to share this with anyone.”

“I expected you to take me to a restaurant.”

“So we can hurry through a meal and then take you home? Hell, no. You’re staying the night.” Jake licks his lips, letting me know exactly what he planned.

There he is, the Jake I’ve been looking for all night. “That wasn’t the deal. It was a date and nothing else.” I should have practiced a better response.

“Then pretend we renegotiated.”

I want to give him a sarcastic comment. The Rivers are fantastic with sarcastic comments. Boone’s skill is nearly legendary, whereas mine has recently encountered a dry spell. Dammit.

“I learned something yesterday that you should know. It might explain your rookie’s attitude,” I say, relaying Julian’s gossip. It’s a great way to ignore Jake’s seduction.

“Less than halfway through the season, and he’s asking for a multi-year contract extension?” Jake gives a low whistle. “Balls.”

“That’s missing the point. He was shot down completely. I suspect he was told there’s plenty of time for discussions or a drawn-out negotiation.”

I’d enjoy seeing Joey Fisher cast out altogether. Let him apply for a job pumping gas somewhere far away, where I no longer see his stupid face.

I might trust Jake if it wasn’t for Joey.

We might never have broken up if it wasn’t Joey.

“We’re finally starting mine this week. What do you think I should do?” he asks after a long pause. “Bert approached me, saying we would talk about it. That doesn’t sound like a rejection to me. ”

“Slow it down if you can. Say you want your lawyer to review it.” I take another bite while considering. “You’ve worked under Bert for most of your career.”

“He signed me before I graduated high school. My career has been spent in different series, but all with BPR.” Jake’s eyes watch my lips as I eat. “You eat sexy.”

“You eat like a constipated frog,” I say, drawing a chuckle from him. “So you’ve spent your entire career with him, respect him, and genuinely like the man. He’s treated you well, I presume, right?” Jake nods. “Why do you want to go out on your own? That’s a lot of capital and risk for one man to assume. You can spend the rest of your career with BPR and grow even richer.”

Jake looks down at our shared dessert and then back at me. His expression is unusually solemn. “I have less than you might think. Do you know how my father died?”

His father, John Knowles, died years ago. Jake mentions him even less than he does the rest of his family. I swallow, unsure what to say, sensing our conversation is about to take a serious turn. “It was a heart attack.”

“I was a surprise baby. My parents married after they found out.” My eyes grow big with surprise, but Jake doesn’t notice and says, “He was a car mechanic during the day and worked at a gas station for extra cash during the night. There was me, Mom, and three sisters to care for, so we always needed more money.”

The dessert dries in my mouth. The difference in our backgrounds is stark. How many times have I mentioned my childhood and all the privileges that came with it? “He sounds like a good man.”

“He was the best. They were twenty years old when I was born. Can you imagine being parents that young? I can’t. Anyway, there was a race the night I signed with BPR. I won too, won easily. My whole family promised to be there but never showed up.” Jake wipes at his chin with the back of his hand. He absently picks up his fork and sets it right back down again. “They never showed, and I was angry. It was a big win, and a contract was signed. That’s a huge deal, right? It was the first step in my career, and they didn’t care enough to keep their promise.”

My stomach twists because I know where his story is leading. “You don’t need to tell me, Jake. You don’t owe me your secrets.”

“It’s not a matter of owing, Princess. I want you to know about me. Anyway, he had a heart attack. Who has a heart attack at thirty-six?” Jake shakes his head like he’s annoyed at his father, the heart attack, or maybe both. “They asked a neighbor to watch my sisters and took off to the hospital, thinking it couldn’t be serious. I didn’t find out until after he died because he didn’t want me to know. He didn’t want me to worry when it probably wasn’t serious. I’m winning, and he’s dying. I was angry, too, and planning speeches in my head when they finally showed up so they would feel bad. How twisted is that?”

I’m not sure how to respond. Pity would annoy him, and an apology would be hollow. “That’s why you want more,” I say, finally realizing. “You want to give back to show how much his sacrifices meant.”

“Yeah, something like that.” Jake finally takes a bite, and his solemnity disappears. “Bert was incredibly supportive during that time. He was there for all of my family. I guess that’s why I never left. This tiramisu is amazing, isn’t it?”

“It’s good there’s so much. This way, we can feel extra selfish for not sharing any of it,” I say, picking up on his deliberate change in conversation. Finally, I announce, “My stomach will explode if I eat any more.”

There was so much dessert we barely put a dent in it. The image of Jake begging some overworked baker to whip up a giant tiramisu without notice is endearing. He probably did it in person, giving an infamous smile while flashing his baby blues. She probably melted and worked overnight to finish the job, but that part is less endearing.

And I’m cynical.

“I’ll clean up,” he says.

“Not by yourself, you won’t.”

“Who hurt you?” Jake asks. He turns his back to me and speaks quietly enough that I barely hear him over the sink’s running water. “I want you to tell me.”

I don’t want to tell him, especially the name. Jake has enough challenges this season; adding more conflict between him and a teammate would make it much worse. I don’t want anyone to know, not ever.

“There were two. The first one was long ago, and we weren’t serious. He asked for an introduction to my father, and I refused. He called me a snobby bitch, and I dumped him.”

The first one was easy. It was a one-off.

“And the second?” Jake asks.

Shame fills me at the memory. I worked hard to forget it ever happened, and now it keeps hitting me in the face, and I feel dirty again because this is the one that hurt. One mistake isn’t anything; everyone falls into at least one bad relationship, right?

“It was two years ago, and he was more talented. There were rumors we planned to take on another driver, and he asked me to help him. By then, we were already in serious negotiations with Julian, which I tried to tell him. This time, I was called a selfish bitch and got dumped. We signed Julian, and he had to find another way into the Cup Series.”

“Is that the entire story?” The way Jake asks tells me he knows there’s more.

“I promised myself that I’d never tell anyone.”

“Sometimes, sharing a secret makes them less of a burden. You might find telling me lessens his power over you,” he says.

I doubt that. “We were in bed together, and he said some cruel things. I didn’t look in mirrors for a long time because I was afraid everything he said was true.”

Joey Fisher was always ready with a compliment. He used to say I had a perfect body, like Marilyn Monroe in her prime, and I lapped it up. It took one insult from him to shatter my self-confidence and see him for the little boy he was. There were more, but I was already numb, and after the first one, there was nothing I could do but wait for it to be over.

I wipe my eyes. “Words hold power over you, don’t they? Well, that was the last time we spoke, and I’ve mostly managed to forget he exists.”

Water from the wet dish in my hands drips onto the tile floor. I don’t even remember picking it up.

Jake pulls the plate from my grasp to set it on the drying rack. “Sarah.”

He said my name. Jake’s nickname for me is an endearment. I believed him when he said I reminded him of a princess—or, at least, my heart wanted to believe him. This is why I stayed away. “Jake.”

He grabs my hips, moving us both so I’m wedged between him and the counter. My hands land on his chest, and I know he’ll get his way again. I don’t have the strength to leave tonight.

“I can’t imagine being with you and then choosing to walk away. There won’t be a third time, not with me. Not ever with me. Your heart is safe.” He briefly rubs a thumb over my chest. “It won’t ever be broken again. You can trust me with it, Sarah. ”

It won’t be broken as long as we’re together; that’s what Jake means. I want to trust him, and maybe I already do.

I close my eyes and allow myself to do what I’ve wanted since the night he rescued me.

My eyes open and meet his. We’re close enough that I can feel the heat from his body. I part my lips and prepare to lean in for a kiss, but his lips land on mine first.

All the doubt screaming in my head abruptly goes silent.