My mouth twists into a grudging smile. That’s exactly what I said to him the first time we met.
“You’re freaking out,” he says.
It isn’t a question. I heave a sigh and sink back into the couch. “Yeah.”
“Nervous?”
“I wasn’t. But then there were all these people shoving phones in my face, and reporters asking all these questions, and my fucking father promised tickets to his friends?—”
“Wait, what?”
“Yeah. Isn’t that messed up? I know I shouldn’t care. I don’t care. It’s just—it’s so?—”
“I know.” He threads his fingers into mine.
“I really have to get back,” I say, though I make no effort to reclaim my hand. “There’s probably stuff I should be doing.”
“What you have to be doing,” Travis says, “is sitting here with me and looking at pictures of Morocco. Did I show you the one from yesterday? She is the world’s most perfect dog.”
He swipes open his phone again and shows me a picture. Then he scrolls to another one, and another. It’s kind of ridiculous, how many pictures he has of her.
Ridiculous and adorable. I hook my chin over his shoulder as he scrolls, and with every picture, my breath comes a bit easier. It’s not just that Morocco is, in fact, the world’s most perfect dog. It’s all the little reminders of our life back in London. A shot from the dog park where we take her to play. A photo of the dog bed we always try to make her sleep on before caving and letting her sleep on our bed. Take-out containers on the coffee table in the background from the Mexican place we tried a few weeks ago.
I let my weight sink into him a bit more. “We need to call someone to fix the dishwasher,” I say, as he swipes to a photo of Morocco in the kitchen.
“Yeah,” he says. “I can do it when we get back.”
He scrolls through a few more pictures. I take a few more deep breaths. The world backs up a bit, like a camera zooming out, and my heart rate slows down as I regain perspective. Fumbling an interview doesn’t matter. My father’s awful behavior doesn’t matter. My life is bigger than that. It’s the broken dishwasher we need to get fixed, and the pile of Morocco’s toys on our bed. It’s my coffee date with Kelsie next week, and Nate’s wedding next month. It’s the scrapbook I have to finish by Christmas, and the trips we have planned after the season is done. It’s London, and it’s Travis, and nothing that happens this weekend can change that one bit.
“Want to listen to my pre-race playlist?” Travis asks. “I’ve been told it sounds like the music they play at spas.”
I smile into his shoulder. That’s another thing I said to him the first time we met. “I love you a lot.”
He smiles. “I know.”
He taps on his phone and starts up some music, instrumental stuff that would absolutely get played at a spa. I wrap my arms around him and breathe in the smell of his skin, letting the warmth of his strong frame sink into mine.
“You,” he says eventually, “are about to drive a really fast car."
A slow smile stretches over my face. The good kind of nerves are rising up again. “Faster than yours,” I say.
He grins. “Tell that to the time sheets.”
“If you do beat me,” I say, stretching my shoes against the floor, “it’ll only be because my feet have gone so numb I can’t feel the pedals.”
Travis chuckles. “I can help with that.” He gets to his feet, retrieves a pair of race shoes from his closet, and tosses them to me. “Here. You and I wear the same size.”
“These are Harper shoes,” I point out.
“So?”
I laugh. “So they say ‘Harper’ on them. I don’t think Crosswire would appreciate that.”
“Right.” Travis frowns. “Hand them back to me a sec.”
He opens a drawer in his desk and takes out a black Sharpie. Then he scratches a line through the word “Harper” and writes “Crosswire” instead.
He hands them back to me. “Problem solved.”
