Page 9 of Speeding Hearts

But he didn’t say anything about not test driving any of the cars.

I knew I was interpreting his words more liberally than his intention, but I was a grown adult, damn it. And what harm would there be in taking it in a circle around the lot?

Just slipping behind the wheel made adrenaline shoot through my stomach. When I turned it on, I was nearly sick. For a moment, the adrenaline running through me went cold and slick. What the hell was I doing? I’d never actually gotten this close to my dream of racing cars before. I’d driven nice cars in my career, sure. I’d topped the speed limit on the highway a hundred times over. But actually sitting in a street stock car with my hands wrapped around the wheel, my foot on the gas, the stick in neutral… I wondered for the first time if this dream of mine was reallymineor something I’d cooked up to show everyone how tough I was.

No. This was mine. It had to be. Checking to make sure the car was in neutral, I revved the engine.

It roared under me, making me laugh with the thrill of it. I did it again.

Man, this felt better than sex.

Not quite, but in the moment, it felt close.

Then I chickened out. I cut the engine and got out, slamming the car door behind me. Then I raised my fists in mock triumph, imagining the crowd screaming around me. I even made the sound I used to make as a kid playing with my brothers. Then someone clapped behind me.

I couldn’t help it, I yelped.

Whirling around, my ponytail hit me in the eye just like it had the last time I was caught out here.

“Shit!” I swore, both at the sting in my eye and the mortification at getting caught by the boss playing make believe.

But when I blinked, I saw it wasn’t Colin. The figure before me was tall. Broad across the shoulders. Covered in tattoos.

Looking at me with a grin that made my insides melt into taffy.

Dean.

Chapter 4

Stella

I stood there for a moment,my stomach churning with shock and embarrassment. “You cut your hair!”

Dean grinned almost sheepishly, sending a warmth curling through my stomach, mingling with the embarrassment rolling around in there.

“You like it?” He ran a hand over his shorn head, which caused his tattooed arm to flex. His eyes twinkled, and that warmth inexplicably heated into something deeper. Why did he have to be so goddamned gorgeous? How could a simple gesture like that make me want to throw myself at him?

Shove it down, Stella.

“I liked it before,” I said. I threw the dig, half to cut the feelings inside of me off and half because it was a little bit true. He’d had gorgeous, thick, black hair I’d often daydreamed about running my hands through while… shit.

Dean laughed, clapping his hand over his chest in mock offense.

“Anyway, you were supposed to meet me at the motel!” I said.

“I was early. Glad for it, too. That was quite the crowd watching you race.”

My cheeks grew hot. “Are you making fun of me?”

To be fair, Ihadlooked like an idiot. But I felt like he’d come in and seen me in my underwear. Not my sexy underwear either.

The smile left Dean’s face. “Never. It shows how much you want this.”

He was so serious, I found myself smiling. “It’s okay if you want to laugh at me sometimes. It’s important not to take oneself too seriously, you know.” I said this with a hoity-toity accent, and Dean threw his head back, letting go a deep rumble of laughter that made my poor overworked stomach swoop low.

“Okay, now I’m laughing at you,” he said. Laughing.

I had a flash of him sitting in the garage back at Jewel Lakes, not long before he’d told me he was going home. I’d told him some story that made him crack up like that. But when his eyes had landed on me again, his laughter had fallen away at the serious look on my face. He’d asked what the matter was, and all I could think wasnothing. Literally nothing had been wrong with that moment, and it was so pure and good and perfect I’d wanted us to stay like that. Perfect. Preserved. Suspended in time.

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