“I thought you couldn’t break free?” Jordan’s voice drowned the hum of the tires on asphalt.
My brother’s handsome face formed a grimace. “Had a fight about dirty dishes and it turned into listening to how, by knocking her up, I’d ruined her life. I got tired of it, so I left.”
“It’s time to get out of that, bro. Cut your losses and move on.”
After the way he’d silenced Vic and Devin, Jordan’s speaking that way surprised me. Just because he’d said it to Aiden didn’t mean he’d say it to the other guys. This was the Jordan Slater brand of loyalty. If he had something to say he said it one on one.
Aiden was silent for a long time. The passing streetlights illuminated his features. No matter how hard I searched, it was impossible to tell what he was thinking. I’d been gone a little more than two years, apparently, long enough to lose the ability to read my brother’s face.
My focus was directed intently on Aiden, so I could ignore how close Jordan was. I was all too aware of his presence. I could smell the hint of cologne he wore just beneath the faint trace of exhaust. He was warm despite the cool air that blew from the vents. It should make me uncomfortable, uneasy to be this close to a man.
After what had passed between us before I left home, it shouldn’t feel this good to be tucked against his side. Those were feelings I’d sort out later when I could think without his scent and heat wreaking havoc on my system.
“It’s no good, bro.” Jordan cracked through the troubling silence that was building.
“I know.” Aiden’s brow furrowed and his face darkened even in the flickers of orange light. “It’s the kids. She’s their mother, I can’t just walk away from that, from her. What if she tried to take them away from me?”
Something passed between them in that moment, something that had nothing at all to do with me. “A mother can do more damage than good. Not everyone is cut out to be a parent.” It wasn’t a secret that Jordan had a rocky relationship with his mother. When I met him, he’d moved in with his grandfather. I still hadn’t expected the vehemence in his words.
“Look at this!” Aiden ribbed me with his elbow and eagerly changed the subject. “Back at it all day like the old days? You go and get all smart, then come back home and start grease monkey living all over again?”
I smiled in the dark and laid my head on my brother’s shoulder. “How could I stay away from this?” Jordan shifted his weight around in the driver’s seat. I distinctly noticed the loss of his touch when I shifted toward Aiden. Something in my chest fluttered
as I suspected Jordan noticed that loss too.
He threw the truck into park. “Since you missed it so much, let’s get to work.”
We unstrapped both cars. With three of us unhooking the ratchet straps on each car it only took a few minutes.
I stood on the side of the dark concrete road as my brother used a flashlight to guide Jordan and the Malibu off the trailer. A little way down the street, Vic mirrored Aiden’s motions for Devin.
All of them were so different, bound together by their love for fast cars and adrenaline rushes. Vic was from a family bigger than mine, Catholic and Puerto Rican. They were loud, loving, and awesome. Devin had grown up in a swank house on the other side of town, the only child of two working, wealthy parents. Jordan had come from the same neighborhood as us, our neighbor, upper middle class. His family connections didn’t run as strong as ours. A love of racing, of cars and making them faster, had made them a family. Made all of us a family.
The connection had suffocated me as a teenager.
Now, it was an unexpected security blanket.
“So, he was not happy.” Breanna chewed on another piece of candy, this time I was treated to the scent of sweetened lemon. “Really not happy.”
“Who?” My eyes drifted to the large figure in black, illuminated by my brother’s flashlight, who unfolded from the race car.
“Devin.”
“Oh.” My stomach twisted.
She opened her mouth to tease me further but shut it when she must have made out my moonlit expression. I didn’t pick up the jug of sticky brown liquid until Jordan climbed back in his car. I made quick work of pouring it in front of each tire and getting out of the way. I’m barely a few inches above five feet tall, I was incredibly proficient at getting out of the way. It had come in handy at college, dodging exuberant coeds between classes.
The engine roared, silencing the buzz of the nocturnal insects, as Jordan launched the car into a smoke inducing burnout. None of those exuberant coeds could have stood in the noxious fog that enveloped me and found it gratifying.
I did.
Breanna’s eyes were wide and excited. For us, this was a religious experience. Rubber covered concrete and burn out smoke was our church.
The wind whipped through Aiden’s hair as he backed Jordan into the rubber he’d laid down on the concrete. Though he was our rising star, Aiden was much more in his element here. At the track, with its sponsors and stipulations, the love for racing seemed to drain out of him.
“Why’s he at the track full time now?” I asked Breanna. “It doesn’t seem right.”
“It’s not, but Dad always track raced for points and trophies. When Aiden bought the trailer for him and Wendy, he sold his car for the down payment. Racing Dad’s ’Vette just seemed like the thing to do.”
“And Dad doesn’t have to worry about bailing him out of jail.”
“There’s that.” Her body went rigid as the hum of the turbos in Jordan’s car began to spool up, building boost for the engine and gaining RPMs.
On a desolate country road, under the cover of night, Jordan’s Malibu roared to life. The front tires lifted from the road for the briefest second, the power the engine put down almost too much to hold to the ground. When another driver would have lifted from the gas, Jordan held it and tore off down the concrete hell bent for leather.
It was a fast pass, fast enough to have my brother jumping up and punching the air with a hoot. I didn’t have time to celebrate, instead, I jogged out to perform the same function for Devin’s rear tires.
Devin’s car stuck and didn’t lift. His pass might have even been quicker than Jordan’s since he didn’t pop a wheelie.
Riding high from the rush of it, I made quick work of stowing the ramps on the trailer so we could pick Jordan up. At the end of the road, his idling taillights were a beacon. Behind us, Breanna and Vic mirrored our actions with the other rig.
There was no safety net out here, no cops or security paid off to turn a blind eye like on race nights. Odds were someone had heard us, someone who could have called the cops. We had to get out as quickly as we could. If we were here when the cops showed up, the race cars could be impounded and we could end up in jail.
“She hit hard, son!” Aiden’s shout carried across the fields around us as Jordan pulled onto the trailer.
“Too hard, maybe?” I mused as he climbed out of the car.
“Nah, I had it.”
I couldn’t argue that point. Jordan had it, he was always in control.
With a surprising amount of grace, Jordan hopped off the trailer. I moved into his outstretched arms like I had a hundred times before.
For a split-second as he caught me, I was pressed against his chest. The magnetic appeal I couldn’t get away from pulled me back in time. It was a place I didn’t want to remember. I’d barreled headlong into disaster as a direct result of what happened that night. I couldn’t afford to go back.
My body’s response, the quickening of my pulse and the warming at my core, were enough to send me over the edge all on their own. The extra push I hadn’t needed was the flash of barely controlled desire in Jordan’s eyes. He had a good game face, but I could see past it.
His body trembled against mine as he let me slide down the length of him to the concrete. If I held on a little too long to his chest and wished for more, if I wished we were alone with no one else was watching, I was going to keep it to myself.
Every intention was to walk away. Yet as I started to slide from his grasp, his head tilted and his lips parted and threatened to kiss me.
I wished he would, with all my being I wished he would. I inched up onto my tip-toes. I was so close I could feel his breath against my lips.