“I know they did,” Hank said quietly. “Proving it is another thing.”
Bree shifted a little closer. “How would someone even cheat at this? I mean, in a way that matters.”
Brian leaned a hip against the trailer. “Hidden nitrous, illegal mapping on the fuel injection, modified injectors, traction control tricks. Stuff that gives a burst of power when you need it.”
“That sounds… complicated,” Bree said.
“Einstein complicated,” Colby added.
Bree watched him for another long moment. The way his fingers moved along the frame. The way he checked the same section twice. The quick glance over his shoulder, like he was making sure nobody was too close. He didn’t see her; he probably didn’t see anything except the machine in front of him.
A little shiver ran through her.
Hank saw it.
“You cold?” he asked.
“A little creeped out,” she admitted. “He’s so still. Everything around him is chaos, and he’s just… zeroed in. It’s like watching a surgeon who doesn’t care what happens to the patient, only that the cut is clean.”
Brian raised his brows. “Remind me not to show you any surgical dramas.”
“It’s not that,” Bree hurried to say. “It’s just a feeling.”
“You should trust those,” Hank said. “They’re usually right.”
She looked up at him. “What’s yours say?”
He thought about lying. About soothing her, telling her everything was fine, that the race was safe, and the worst thing she had to worry about was sunburn.
“They’re desperate to keep winning,” he said instead. “Desperate men take shortcuts.”
Colby blew out a breath. “And shortcuts get people hurt.”
“Not if we can help it,” Brian said.
He said it lightly, but Hank knew that under all the jokes and flirting, Brian watched everything. People, patterns, angles. The SEAL in him never really clocked out.
Bree hugged her sketchbook closer, then loosened her grip. “Maybe I should come down here tomorrow. Paint from the pits instead of the balcony.”
Hank’s first instinct was to say no. To tell her to stay in her room with the door locked, to watch from a safe distance where Marcus and his crew couldn’t touch her.
But she wasn’t a fragile thing to put on a shelf. She was a grown woman who’d survived losing her sister, who’d chosen to come here to try to live again. He didn’t get to cage that because it made him feel better.
“You can,” he said slowly. “If you want to be in the middle of it.”
Her chin tipped. “I don’t want to hide in my room. I’ve done enough of that.”
He nodded once. “Then we’ll make it safe.”
Brian looked at him. “How?”
“We put her here.” He gestured to a clear space between the trailer and the cooler. “Back against the wall, out of the main traffic. You or Colby walk her to the bathrooms or the concessions if I can’t. No wandering alone. You stay with her if you come down.”
Brian didn’t argue. “Deal.”
Bree blinked. “You’re all very sure I need guarding.”
“You’re new,” Brian said. “You don’t know which idiots to avoid yet. That’s all.”
