Page 117 of Happy Hour

“Right,” I nodded. It made a lot of sense from our conversations last night. I looked over towards Phillip, my attorney, “Don’t ask,”

He patted me on the back laughing. “Your father is waiting at the airport.” He paused, looking over my appearance. “I once flew to Germany for a girl.”

“How’d that work out for ya?”

He smiled. “Don’t ask.”

“Find out what the hell they are up to.” I ordered as we walked outside the jail. “I’m not sure what it is but it’s not good.”

The bright morning sun shocked me at first, having spent the night in a dark cell. I took a deep breath of the warm summer morning. It hurt, but not my lungs, it hurt deep inside my heart because for the first time in three weeks, I didn’t wake up in Sway’s arms.

“Will do kid, now take care of yourself. I’m out of town for the next few days so...try not to get arrested.”

I just shook my head. “I’ll try not to.”

An hour later, I was on a plane with my dad of all people. Not the person you want to bail your ass out of jail, believe me.

I’d been listening to his ranting since we left Sonoma and I had a feeling it would be this way until we reached Olympia and then of course the drive to Elma.

Thankfully, he agreed to let me fly to Washington today and then I had to leave first thing in the morning, fly to North Dakota and meet with Simplex. Then, I fly to Loudon for a press conference and then the race weekend began again. It’s an endless cycle.

The only problem about flying to Elma was he was coming with me, he wanted to look over the paperwork Charlie was having me sign and I had a feeling he wanted to be sure I made it back to North Dakota tomorrow.

Phillip assured us Chelsea didn’t have shit on me. She claimed I assaulted her, which I did, but she also claimed I forced her to give me oral sex.

Yeah, that never happened.

The Vin Diesel dude claimed he witnessed the entire thing and feared for his safety, so he did nothing. He had at least a hundred pounds on me, maybe more, so I doubted the charges would hold.

My biggest concern was Tate. He was good friends with Marcus, president of Simplex, so if Tate said pull my sponsorship...Simplex would pull my sponsorship.

I had to think of a way to get to Tate without Chelsea and explain this. Also, Tate was a friend of mine. I couldn’t have him thinking this lie. I may be an asshole most of the time but I valued the relationship I had with him. After all, he did give me a start in NASCAR.

“You’ve got more talent behind the wheel of a race car then anyone I’ve ever seen but you’re fucking it up with this goddamn attitude of yours.” Jimi poured himself another shot of whiskey.

Here we go again.

“Jesus Christ dad, give it a fucking rest already.” I couldn’t take much more of this shit. First, he makes me spend the night in jail with Chester and now I get this four-hour long lecture after I told him everything that happened, including the shit I didn’t want him to hear and promised Charlie I wouldn’t.

“I won’t give it a rest. When are you going to get your shit together and be the man I raised you to be?”

I finally looked at him dumbfounded. I knew I’d missed various parts of what he said that I personally felt didn’t pertain to me but how was this related?

“Huh?”

“With Sway,” he huffed. “Jameson, you’re going to lose it all if you don’t pull your head out of your ass and admit to yourself that you love her and want to be with her.”

“I’ve already lost her and I don’t love her.” I lied.

Though I didn’t want to admit it, I fucking loved that woman so much it hurt to breathe without her next to me.

“Cut the shit!” he threw the newspaper he’d been looking at across the cabin. “You’ve loved that girl since you met her. I honestly thought you two would come around sooner when you decided to complicate matters by sleeping with each other. But no, you’re still as dumb as you’ve always been when it comes to women.” He sighed and looked over at me.

You know the look, the one that says I’m about to tell you something important so you had damn well better listen, yeah that look.

“Youcanhave it both ways son. It’s all about balance. You need a woman who can understand the sacrifices you’ve been forced to make and she’sthatwoman. She’s always been that woman for you. Any man worth his salt will stick up for what he believes is right but it takes a better man to admit when he’s wrong.”

“What the hell did that last statement have to do with anything and why are you quoting Andrew Jackson?” I asked laughing.

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