Page 76 of Head Over Wheels

Her quick intake of breath sounded tortured and guilt prickled under my skin. She felt something of what I did. I didn’t want to hurt her, but I remembered how I’d felt when she’d disappeared from Zpeed back in November. I had to keep some boundaries.

‘Will you at least wait until after the Tour to formally refuse the offer – and end the fake stuff?’

‘Why? Because you think I’ll change my mind?’

‘Because I like having you around, you idiot!’ She gave me an abortive shove and swiped at her face. ‘Because it’s an excuse to hang out while we still can!’

She didn’t look at me, instead turning to stare into the side-chapel where we’d found ourselves, but I couldn’t have said what was in it. I was stuck on her words.While we still can. The boundaries could maybe wait until after the Tour.

As I matched her gaze, trying to reason with myself that ‘hanging out’ with Lori for another few months wouldn’t hurt me, the objects in front of me gradually took on form and colour.

I stepped back with a start. ‘Wh-what is that?’

She peered at the sign off to the right, reading, but my stomach lurched. A casket of sorts, gold and silver and covered in gemstones, lay on a carved dais and it didn’t take a genius to work out what would be inside.

‘Let me guess. Bones? Hair?’ With a shudder, I remembered the head in Siena with a strange mix of revulsion and fondness for what had happened after that.

‘It’s bits of his skeleton and a piece of his skull,’ she explained out of the side of her mouth. She came in close. ‘Are you scared?’ she asked softly.

I didn’t hesitate. ‘Yes.’

When she slipped her hand into mine, I was sure I felt something break. Awareness of her rushed in my veins. She glanced at the floor, but I felt her uncertainty in the light tremor of her hand. Twisting my fingers with hers, I held on, blinking back light-headedness. Her hand in mine shouldn’t have felt more intimate than everything we’d done in bed – or the kisses in front of the cameras.

But it was just us.Us. FolkyDunes. Standing together in the face of success and failure and weird religious relics. After the argument, it was everything.

And Iwantedso badly, in a way I hadn’t dared towantbefore because built into wanting things was the disappointment of not getting them. Working hard for a race and losing. Waiting for Papa to come home…

But as I brushed my thumb over the back of her hand and soaked up her muted inhale, disappointment didn’texist. She turned to me – slowly, questioningly, her eyes lit with wary anticipation – and I dipped my head. Her breath ghosted over my lips and I could already taste the relief in the impending kiss.

‘Lori,’ I whispered, just because I liked saying her name.

With deliberate slowness, shared breaths and the history of every moment we’d known each other – both virtually and in real life – our lips met, softly, achingly. This wasn’t the desperation of a post-race kiss when I’d been dreaming of her for days, or the need we awoke in each other in the bedroom. It was something else – something that would haunt me in its tenderness.

This was Lori with her armour cracked.

Bringing my other hand up to her face, I kissed her as though nothing else mattered.

The high-pitched sound of shoes scuffing on the tiles echoed suddenly and I pulled back, belatedly remembering where we were. My chest was heaving and the way she sluggishly blinked open her eyes and smiled reordered everything inside me. She was still clutching my hand.

Lori spoke first. ‘I suppose we should stop before the bones wake up and get us in trouble for kissing in a church.’

‘Don’t even—’

She silenced me with another quick, hard kiss that left me off balance. ‘Do you still want to hang out with me tonight?’

I couldn’t have stopped the words even if I’d wanted to. ‘Of course.’

‘Good.’ She tugged me away from the chapel, heading for the portal. When she wrenched it open, it was dim outside, but the heavy rain had stopped. ‘Because I want a beer.’

I was glad I’d stuck with the non-alcoholic version of a golden Belgian brew later that evening when I dragged her back to the hotel, already dreading what Colin and her dad would say. She’d had two – fairly small – beers, but I should have guessed how poorly she’d metabolise the alcohol. Post-racing drinks were always dangerous, especially after a bad result where the crash in adrenaline was immediate.

She hung off me in the lift, her lips at my neck.

‘Do you think my brother would clear out so we can get naked?’

My hands tightened on her waist. ‘Colin isn’t the only problem here,’ I muttered, brushing her hair out of her face. She’d tugged it out of her plait during the second beer. She was loose and beautiful and fun – and far too tipsy for anything more than a kiss.

‘But I don’t know when we’ll get another chance,’ she pouted. ‘Our training schedules are mad.’

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