Page 148 of Lemon Crush

Chick grabbed my hand and half dragged me away. As they harnessed me into the seat, the others offered up last-minute advice about how to handle myself on the track, but I wasn’t that nervous anymore. At least not about the race.

I couldn’t get Wade’s expression out of my head.

It was just bad timing, right? So why did it feel like I was missing something important?

30

AUGUST

There wasa scene in one of my earlier books where the tricolored eye guy—aka my hero/Wade substitute—found himself in a battle with a machine magically merged with an old forgotten god. Long story. It was a whole big thing for his character arc and the meaning of the human soul. A fantastical version of the artificial intelligence debate.

At one point, the machine started to fuse itself to him and, for a while there, neither the character nor the author was sure whether or not he would be able to escape or be the same once it was over.

He did, in case you were wondering.

In caseI’dever wondered what that might have felt like in real life?

You guessed it. I was getting a taste of it right now, because there was no way anyone had ever been as strapped into a vehicle as I currently was. Multiple seatbelts across my torso and over my lap. A head-and-neck restraint that attached to my seat and gave me the best posture of my life. Even the clothes on my body were plugged into a cooling system that was practically welded to thefloor on the passenger side, ensuring I couldn’t change my mind at the last minute.

This was not a drill or the first day of go-karts, and there would be no escaping now.

Not that I was going to try, even if part of me was still begging to get out and go home. I wouldn’t listen, because I was here to finish the quest and slay my dragon. To move on and move forward. To drive stupidly fast in a tiny little car wearing undergarments that circulated chilled water over my torso to keep me from overheating.

Okay, so notTronthen. More like those outfits inDune.

Adrenaline momentarily rushed through me, narrowing my field of vision to what was right in front of me. I guided a stripped and race-ready Jiminy to the edge and waited for an opening to rush into the flow of insanely decorated cars and leave home base behind.

“Kick their asses, August!”

I heard Morgan’s unexpected shout at the same time I pressed my foot down on the gas, shifting automatically as Jiminy slid between one car that looked like it was actually driving upside down and another that was covered in graffiti and going surprisingly fast for something that might fall apart at any moment.

I could do this, I told myself as my body vibrated within its confinement. Wade made sure the car was in perfect condition, the track was only two and a half miles long, and I’d driven it both during my practice sessions with Bernie and on yesterday’s test drive.

But there hadn’t been this many people around me, going quite this fast, and driving with so much competitive energy. This felt different. Scary. Thrilling.

I tried to remember to relax and breathe when I went into an odd turn Lucy called The Keyhole at forty-five miles perhour and felt like I was flying. My body squished over to the right so far that I was thankful for all those straps holding me in place.

I took the turn too wide. “Damn it!”

The car beside me slowed to give me room before I even had time to brace for impact, and I let out a whoop of excitement. The rumors were true!

Earlier, Kingston had said one of the women in charge had spent hours today spreading the word about us newbies, our car design and why we’d joined a veteran team, suggesting that everyone give us some leeway on the track. I needed to find that woman and bend a knee in fealty or something, because gratitude didn’t begin to cover what I was feeling right now. The fact that very few cars were crowding or coming close to me was a testament to her influence.

Then again, it could just be my lack of speed, since most of them had already passed me at this point. Even if that engine switch Wade made years ago meant Icouldkeep up with them, I didn’t really want to.

I couldn’t make myself go faster than eighty on the straightaways. It felt too fast, too dangerous, with all those other cars around me. And the section of track called the Bus Stop? That I took at thirty, certain I was about to be the bottom slice of a fifty-car shit sandwich.

I was on a real racetrack, driving a real racecar, in the middle of a real car race, andwhat the hellwas I thinking?!

“This is crazy. This is crazy. This is crazy,” I chanted under my breath, trying not to hyperventilate.

“Pit Master here, Little Sister. You’re doing great. You’re about to start your third lap in a minute. The first two are always the hardest.”

Third? That was all? Surely I’d been out here for two hours already. My arms were trembling from effort and I wasraining sweat like the pilot in that oldAirplane!movie. I should have worked out with heavier weights.

When a Toyota that looked like it was made of Legos nearly sideswiped me near the aptly named Gut Check section of the track, I shouted and jerked the steering wheel too close to the wall.

“Holy shit. Lego tried to kill me.”

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