Page 143 of Overtake
“So you shut him up.”
“Yes, I did.” The memory brings a fierce satisfaction. “One perfect punch. Thumb outside, wrist straight, just like you taught me.” I flex my hand again, working out the phantom ache.
That earns me a small smile. “I’m so proud.”
“Worth the bruised knuckles.”
“But Nico followed you in there like a white knight. Is that what’s bothering you then?”
Ah, fuck.She’s as bad as Dad, always shoving my nose into the question I’m avoiding. “I don’t want a bloody knight in shining armor, Cin. I don’t want a man who thinks his job is to protect me.”
“Did he say that’s why he was there?” She hasn’t moved from the door.
“He said he was there as my backup.”
“So he cared enough to show up. That sounds like a Belmonte move.”
“He looked pleased,” I admit. “Like he’d been waiting for someone to knock Wyn on his arse for years.”
“Probably had been.” Cin grins. “The tosser had it coming.”
“But it had to be me, didn’t it? The woman. Theonlywoman.” I shake my head. “Now every time I raise my voice, every time I defend myself, it becomes a story about whether I can handle the pressure, or if I’m too emotional.”
“Or it becomes a story about a driver who refuses to be diminished.” Jacintha’s been watching me navigate this world for a decade, patching up more than just physical injuries.
“I don’t know. Does it?”
She presses her lips together and nods. “Hmm. What else is bothering you?”
“Kelley.” There’s a small window in my room that overlooks the track. I raise the roller shade. The crew’s busy around the hot lap car.
“What’s The Incubator got to do with today?”
I consider my need for hyper-control, precision, and for everything to be exactly right. Old habits from darker times when controlling my environment and myself were the only way to feel safe.
“Nico and I are about to do this FuegoFrío thing together and I don’t know how to...” I trail off, not sure how to finish.
“To do what?”
I squint, thinking hard about feelings and questions that are only half-formed in my head. “How to let… him… have my back without losing myself in the process.” I nod because that’s what it is and why Kelley’s tangled up in it. “When Nico showed up in the gent’s room... part of me was grateful. And that scares me more than any drunk idiot making crude comments.”
Cin nods slowly. “Because caring about Nico feels like giving him power over you.”
“Yeah.” I hop up on the massage table and lie flat. “What if I let him in and I become one of those women who disappears into the man’s story?”
“Like Kelley.”
“Exactly like her. She’s never existed on her own. She defines herself by whoever she’s attached to—Dad, Richard, me. What if I become just like her?”
“There’s no ‘what if’ there, Tonka. You’re nothing like Kelley.” The certainty in Cin’s voice hugs me. “Nothing. You show up. You’ve been showing up for everyone around you since you were six years old. That’s not using people, it’s caring about them.”
I stare at the white ceiling. It’s so featureless, my eyes have trouble locking onto a reference point. “What if caring makes me weak again, Cin? What if it makes me need things I can’t control?” I turn my head to meet her gaze. “What if this thing with Nico falls apart, then I fall apart?”
She reaches over to the table where I’ve staged my gear and deliberately pushes my helmet askew. “In Singapore you decided to defend yourself, right?”
I stare at the displaced helmet, fighting the urge to straighten it. “Yeah.”
“Well, you also can care about someone elseandbe strong enough to survive unscathed if the relationship shunts into a wall. You’re not Kelley. You won’t disappear if you’re not attached to someone powerful.” She finally pushes off the wall and comes to the side of the massage table. “Because you are strong, Petra. And you’re definitely strong enough to let Nico care about you too.”
