Page 39 of Rivals

My palms instantly grow clammy and my heart races as if it’s on a track. What the hell am I doing here? I don’t belong here. You can dress up trash all you want but at the end of the day it’s still trash. That’s me, I’m the trash. This isn’t my world and it never will be, not really anyways. The limo pulls to a stop and the driver gets out to open my door. I take deep breaths in an attempt to calm myself while he’s walking around the car but I’m only two breaths in when the door swings open and a hand that I’ve become all too familiar with appears. I’m frozen in my spot, until Rathe leans down and meets my eyes. “You’re going to have to get out of the car.”

“What are you doing here?” I whisper. I’m not sure how he even hears me over the roar of the media hollering his name, just trying to snap a picture of him.

“Currently, I’m trying to escort you inside the gala.”

I shake my head. “What about the contract?”

“Two teammates attending a gala that is linked to another Indy racer doesn’t seem to be breaking the contract, does it?” he asks, eyebrows raised. I shake my head. “Then take my hand Sutton.”

“Where’s the redhead?” I hate how my tone is laced with hurt and jealousy. It’s the two things I don’t want him to know he caused me.

Rathe shakes his head. “Okay, we’re going to do this now.” Suddenly, he’s climbing through the door and taking a seat beside me. “Driver, can you make a few laps around the block?” The car lurches forward suddenly.

“What the hell are you doing?” I ask. My nerves morph into anger quicker than I expect.

“Explaining.” It’s his only answer. A part of me wants an explanation but the other part of me doesn’t. I fell for Rathe while we were on tour and I’m not sure I can handle another disappointment right now. I turn away from him and look out the window as the city passes us by. I feel his hand encase mine, but I quickly and regrettably yank mine away. Instantly, I miss the warmth and comfort of his skin. “This should be fun,” he comments quietly. I whip around. He smirks, but it falls from his face quickly.

“Save it Rathe. I don’t need your excuses or fake apologies. We had a thing out of convenience. We were away from home and lonely and got caught up in the moment. You thought you’d slum it with the poor orphaned girl who was thrust onto your team and into your life. Guess what, the tour is over and so are we.” I turn away from him. I can’t look at him and hide everything I’m feeling inside. A huge part of me wants him to fight for me, but it won’t happen. He made it clear this afternoon where I stood with him. Actions always speak louder than words. I should have known he’d never pick me. My own father didn’t even care enough to pick me. Why would Rathe? “Driver!” The window between us comes down. “Pull over please.”

The driver slows before coming to a stop. I throw the door open and climb out, making sure to lift my dress to keep it from getting dirty. I hear the door before him. “What the hell Sutton?”

I stop on the sidewalk, but I don’t turn around to face him. “Just save it Rathe. I’m doing us both a favor. I’m doing the one thing you obviously didn’t know how to do.”

“Sutton, I didn’t even know about your past until today, so what happened on the press tour had nothing to do with that.” I hear the plea in his voice, and it pulls on every single thing I feel for him, but I choose to ignore it.

I shrug. “Either way we’re done. We have an event to attend and I’m sure your date is waiting. I’ll see you there.”

“You can’t just walk there,” Rathe calls out to me.

“You can bet your ass I can and if you keep standing there, you can watch me,” I call back to him over my shoulder. I have two blocks to get my shit together, because if I won’t let the world see me fall you can damn well guarantee Rathe McCall won’t either.

Forty-One

Rathe

I stand there for who knows how long, but long enough that eventually the driver of the limo gets out and comes up to me. I wave him away and eventually I walk the two blocks to the event. I knew things would be different once we got back to Sunnyville, but I had no idea they would blow up like this. I had no idea everything would go up in smoke in one day. As I walk, I replay the past two weeks away from everything and try to figure out what happened when we got back home. What happened from the time she got off the plane until this morning? What caused her to not reply to my texts? I understand that seeing me and Tabitha together wasn’t ideal, but there were a lot of factors. It’s not like I could tell Kevin no. If I had he’d want to know who I was taking, and I couldn’t reply with Sutton’s name. Our contracts and that damn clause are the actual issue. It keeps us from just being who we are when we’re around each other.

I have to figure out how to fix this. I don't know how but I know there has to be a way. I just need to get her to listen to me. When I reach the event, the red carpet is still just as crammed with media as it was when I left. Taking a deep breath, I step onto the carpet and prepare for the craziness that always comes along with the media. My name is yelled from every direction, the flashes from the camera are blinding and regardless of how many carpets you walk, camera flashes are never anything you can get used to. I do my best to give them all what they want and need but I know that tomorrow there will be some story about how I stiffed a person. It’s frustrating but unfortunately, part of the territory.

Eventually, I make it inside. The room is decorated in red, black and white. It instantly screams a CD Enterprises event but on every table is a picture of the kids that Corporate Cares helps to raise. They also hang on the wall along with achievements that the boys have made since living in the care of the counselors in a stable environment provided by the company that Rylee works for. It’s amazing to see. Seeing things like this reminds me that sometimes things do work out. There’s still hope in the world and that’s okay.

I make my way around the room, taking time to study each picture hanging on the wall. The smiles on the boy’s faces draw you in. They all seem so happy and it makes me wonder what Sutton went through. If I had seen her as a child would she have had a smile on her face like this? Or, was she just tossed around from place to place, with no one to really care for her, like so many of the system horror stories I’ve heard about? The idea of her childhood being like that guts me. I scan the room and find her standing with Rylee and Colton as the three of them talk with some older gentleman in his three-thousand-dollar suit and his much younger date. Sutton’s smiling now but I know it’s not real. It’s her act for the benefit of the gala. To help create a safe haven for orphaned girls. I’ve seen a real Sutton smile, and this isn’t it.

The moment she steps away from the group I beeline in her direction as she makes her way out of the room. I catch up to her just before she reaches the restroom. When my hand wraps around her elbow, the jolt to my system from the softness of her skin, the familiarity of it, settles upon me. She sighs but never turns around. “We need to talk.”

She shakes her head, her tropical scent filling my senses. “I have nothing to say.”

“Even better, because I have plenty. So, I’ll talk, you listen,” I whisper. My breath dances over her skin as goosebumps rise on it.

“This is a bad idea, Rathe. Someone might see us.”

I chuckle. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe I don’t care anymore?”

Sutton spins around so quickly that she slips through my grasp. I wasn’t expecting her reaction, so I wasn’t at all prepared. “That’s bullshit. You only care about racing. It’s clear as day, so don’t come at me acting like two weeks with me suddenly made me more important because I’m not. I don’t need you to pretend this was all something it wasn’t. I’m a big girl and I can take care of myself, so if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to use the restroom and get back to the gala and help orphaned girls. I want to make a difference with this career. I want to help people. This is more than racing for me. I’m not like you.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I ask. Her words sting more than she could possibly know. She has no idea that one of my biggest insecurities is being seen as just another racing playboy with no moral compass or respect for the world around me. Only Maxton and maybe Ryann know that.

Sutton looks away, guilt takes over her stance as she shrugs. “Exactly how it sounds.”

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