Page 85 of Midnight Racers

“She offered me the latest designs she put in your car,” he replied. “The price was a little high, but today was about assessing your car out there. A lot of people would be interested in that technology.”

I knew he was lying with every word, because I’d been with Charlotte every step of that journey. She’d been ecstatic when we visited Robert and she showed him her plans. None of that had been faked. I doubted Dale had told Craig that Charlotte’s contract meant that she owned the patent to the engine that currently resided in my car. Technically, we bought the engine but not the rights to reproduce it in any way. His story had more holes in it than a sieve trying to stay afloat.

I stepped forward, my punch landing on his stomach, as no one would see the damage as he left. My hands grabbed his shoulders and my knee came up to shove his tiny dick inside him with the force I used. He fell to his knees on the ground, and I leaned over him.

“Stay away from my team,” I hissed for him alone to hear. “And go anywhere near Charlotte, and I will personally make it my life goal to destroy you. Do I make myself clear?”

He nodded once, his hands still covering his injured dick.

I calmly lifted my racing outfit and left. Charlotte stood beside my car with Megan, her troubled gaze moving from me to the man who shuffled out of the building moments behind me.

“Ready?” I asked, opening the back door to throw my stuff onto the backseat.

“Is everything okay?” Megan asked, her brow furrowing in concern.

“Uh-huh, all good. We won the race, didn’t you hear?” I gave her that practiced smile that meant nothing.

“Jordan is good at deflecting as well,” Megan muttered. “Neither of you can fool me.” She hugged Charlotte and then me before returning to her dark protector who never let her out of his sight.

“Ready?” I asked again.

Charlotte nodded, her face pale and her bottom lip trembling. Seeing what Dale and Craig had done to her ignited my rage once again, meaning I couldn’t bring myself to speak. I swallowed hard, and fought the urge to find both men and kill them.

***

Chapter Twenty-Six

Charlotte

The car was a lonely place, even with Flynn sitting beside me.

Dale’s words had cut deeply, but my blood had turned cold when I saw Craig following Flynn from that building. Craig had been the biggest mistake of my life. I thought I had loved him, believed his lies, and had been stupid enough to let him use my computer, which contained all my designs on it. Dale had used my laptop as well back then to search for himself on the internet. Craig had stolen from me, humiliated me, and left me feeling less than worthless.

Flynn’s face was that neutral expression he wore when he didn’t want the world to know what he was thinking. Except for his eyes—they were burning pits of fury that deserved to be in the darkest realms of Hell.

Several times, I thought of something to say to Flynn, but his dark and brooding presence halted the words before they came out. I had heard what Dale said about me, and I could only guess at what Craig had said.

I needed reassurance right now, but my emotional default position to confrontation was silence and retreating into myself. So, I sat in silence and stared at my clasped hands on my lap. He drove like the demons from Hell were chasing him, and my own demons were with them, following and tormenting me.

It was the first time I have ever felt afraid when with Flynn, because he was no longer the man I knew, but the dangerous stranger who first walked into the warehouse that night and put a gun to my head.

The sky darkened as we sped home, and trepidation bubbled in my stomach. I didn’t know what to say, how to approach him. He was obviously furious about what Dale said and whatever Craig had said to him behind closed doors.

He skidded to a halt in front of his garage and pressed the button on his key fob to open it. Even inside, he got out of the car without a word and stormed into the house, leaving me to follow in his wake.

I stood in the garage and sucked in a staggered breath, trying to brace myself for the coming storm that I had no idea how to weather. Sickness engulfed me and made me dizzy.

The house was in darkness, the silence surrounding me in a void that sucked all the light out of my life. I crept through to the kitchen and into the sunroom that Pixie tended to lie and sleep in. The lights made me blink when I turned them on to prepare dinner for Pixie. We should have been going out for dinner and drinks tonight to celebrate, but the mood had turned sour.

I made a quick stir fry, even though I could barely swallow with the lump in my throat, and ended up sitting eating alone since Flynn had disappeared. When he still hadn’t appeared an hour later, I wandered outside to ensure the geese were in their house safely, giving them treats and settling them for the night.

Then I went to bed, which felt cold and too big. Shadows crept across the wall and I stared at the stars in the dark sky outside. I didn’t know how to fix any of this, and even though I hadn’t done anything wrong, I couldn’t shake the feeling that this was all my fault.

The bed dipped beside me around two in the morning. I pretended to sleep, not moving a muscle, even as I continued to stare outside. The bitter scent of alcohol hung in the air, and I pursed my lips together and willed myself not to cry. This morning, I had been sure I was falling in love with Flynn, and this evening I didn’t even know the man in the bed beside me.

I’d never felt so alone in my life.

Flynn’s breathing evened out, and the tears that I’d been holding back began to spill silently into the pillow. Fuck it all, there was little point denying it anymore. I had fallen helplessly and hopelessly in love with him. He had crept under all my defences and decimated the barriers I’d built around my heart. From the moment he first kissed me, I hadn’t been able to resist the magnetic pull he held over me any longer. With every day, that got stronger until he had created a gravity between us that meant my life moved seamlessly around his.

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