She was up here, staring through glass.
Her gaze slid to the hat on the back of the chair. Wide brim. Neutral color. The sunglasses she had bought on her first day in Copper Moon sat beneath it, folded neatly.
You’re not a child, she thought. You are not helpless. You know how to be careful.
She walked to the door and checked it again, deadbolt, security bar. Both in place. She picked up the hat and glasses and hesitated, listening.
Somewhere outside, far below, an announcer’s voice rolled over the speakers toward the boardwalk. The words were indistinct from here, but the excitement in them was clear. The engines that had been idling during warmups had shifted; more focused now.
“Twenty-four riders on the grid,” the commentator said a second later as the broadcast sound rose. “All eyes on local favorite Hank James, starting from pole in his Copper Moon Cup repeat.”
Bree’s heart knocked into her ribs.
The safest place for him is on a bike, he had told her. The safest place for you is behind a locked door.
Both statements could be true. So could the bone-deep need in her to see him fly with her own eyes.
“I’ll stay away from the pits,” she said quietly. “I can live with that.”
She grabbed her room key and slid it into her pocket with her phone, and tucked her hair under the hat. In the mirror, she looked like one more tourist who had underestimated the sun and overcompensated with accessories.
She paused one last time, palm pressed to the door.
“I am so going to tell you the truth about this,” she told the empty room. “Please still want to kiss me after.”
Then she opened the door and stepped out.
The hallway felt cooler than the room; the carpet muffled the sounds of her sneakers. A couple in matching team shirts walked past, debating tire compounds like it was a normal conversation, which, here, it probably was. She kept her head down, brim low, and moved toward the service stairwell at the far end.
Yesterday, she had noticed that door on her way back from grabbing ice; a plain gray exit with a laminated sign that said staff access. No one had yelled when she used it then. No one yelled now.
Inside, concrete steps and stark lighting greeted her. The air was warmer, tinged with detergent and grease. She moved quickly, trusting memory to guide her: down two flights; out through a nondescript side door that had opened, last night, onto a small service lane between the hotel and the first vendor tents.
Today, the lane was busier, but still not crowded. Two men pushed a dolly stacked with soda cases toward the concession area, a teenager in a volunteer T-shirt took a drink of water and checked his watch.
“General admission access?” she asked when he saw her, pointing toward a walkway marked with a banner and an arrow. “North stand that way. You’ll get a decent view of the back straight and the start.”
“Thanks,” Bree said, pitching her voice a little lower.
He looked right past her, eyes already moving to the next cluster of people. She took that as a good sign.
She merged into the flow heading toward the stands; families and couples and groups of friends, all in various stages of sunburn. Someone had a radio clipped to a belt; the same broadcast she had left behind in the room crackled from it, a slightly delayed echo of the PA system.
Around her, the air vibrated with engine noise and anticipation.
When she reached the base of the north grandstand, a woman with a lanyard checked wristbands. Bree held up the bright strip the ticket booth had given her earlier in the weekend when she had come down with Carmen to watch a support race. The woman barely glanced at it before waving her through.
Up in the stands, she chose a place near the end of a row, not too high, not too low. From there, she could see the front straight clearly, the start grid painted bright, and the sweeping turn by the dunes in the distance. The giant screen across from the stands showed what the cameras saw.
Her heart thudded so hard it felt like a drum in her ears.
Down on the grid, Hank swung a leg over Julie’s seat. He settled into position like it was the only place in the world he belonged. The sun glinted off his helmet, off the small Copper Moon emblem near the base of his visor. Brian crouched beside the bike, last words lost in the roar of the crowd.
The commentators’ voices rose. “Riders are clear. Fifteen laps to decide the Copper Moon Cup.”
The light sequence started.
Red. One. Two. Three.
