It had been one ofthosedreams, or at least he assumed it had, the tiny portion he could remember was him and her between the pure white sheets of a rumpled bed. He remembered the sensation of skin touching skin, the thrill of being near her. Or who he imagined her to be.
Anna…
If there were any steamy details to the dream, they were lost to him.What he did remember was her laughter, the way she’d looked at him. Her eyes had been full of fun and teasing, but also something else. Something deeper. He’d felt known. Accepted.
He put the figure down, even though there were still a few small finishing touches that needed to be attended to. His chest hurt and he pressed a palm against it, sure another panic attack was about to descend on him, but was surprised to find his heartbeat sound and steady. This wasn’t his nervous system misfiring, telling him peril was lurking nearby when it was doing nothing of the sort. This was something far more dangerous.
It was want.
Need.
For something he couldn’t have. For something he’d promised himself he’d never look for again, because, after the mistakes he’d made, he really didn’t deserve it. And even if he had been so foolhardy as to open his heart again, it would be a very, very bad idea. Not just for him but for the poor woman he dragged into the pit with him. He would never want to do that to someone he truly cared about.
He realized he’d been avoiding looking at his creation and he forced himself to focus on her. He took in the large eyes, the faraway look that made her seem sad, but also the hint of a smile in her expression, not even fully formed enough yet to play on her lips, but it was there, waiting to burst forth.You aren’t real,he told the figure silently.You’re just a figment of my warped imagination. Nothing but my subconscious playing a vicious prank on me.
It didn’t matter. He wasn’t keeping her. She was for Moji,anyway. But after he picked the figure up, intending to complete it, he paused. She wasn’t the elf Moji had asked for, and he’d done too much to make any changes now.
He stared at her for a few seconds, then put her up on the shelf that held some of his tools above the workbench, and picked up another block of wood. He pulled his notebook closer and focused on the drawing. This time he was sticking to the plan.
Chapter Twenty-Five
THE CRASH HELMET fit snugly over her ears and went some way to drowning out the rumble of engines and the squeal of tyres. Anna stood at the edge of Brands Hatch racetrack, shaking. She’d turned up two hours ago with Spencer’s voucher, hoping there’d be an open slot today, and had finally got the word someone else had cancelled and she could have her go. The wait hadn’t helped her nerves much, though. Gabi would probably love this, but now the moment was upon her, Anna was definitely having second thoughts.
A sports car shot past at a dizzying speed. She clasped her hands together, closed her eyes and prayed.Please let me live through this…
‘Anna Barry?’ someone called.
Anna opened her eyes to find a guy who hardly looked old enough to have passed his driving test standing in front of her. ‘Yes?’ she said, wishing she had a bottle of water (or possibly something stronger) with her. Suddenly, her throat was very dry.
‘Your turn,’ he said, gesturing to the sleek gunmetal Aston Martin idling a few feet away. ‘Hop in.’
We have a deal, God, remember?Anna added silently as she slid into the supple leather of the driver’s seat.You make sure I get around this track in one piece and I’ll… I’ll… Well, no time to work that one out now. Let’s just say I’ll owe you one.
She closed the door, did up her seatbelt and then when Ade, the teenage driving instructor, was in the passenger seat, she pressed gingerly on the accelerator and pulled away.
Ade let her get away with twenty miles an hour for approximately ten seconds, then ordered her to put her foot down. There were other vehicles on the track, and it wasn’t safe for her to be crawling along like a pedal car, apparently.
Oh, how Spencer would have laughed if he could have seen her now.
Anna gritted her teeth, gripped the steering wheel. Ade sat in the passenger seat with a huge smirk on his face, like this was some big joke. Just like Spencer would have done. But for some reason Anna didn’t find it endearing, she just found it hugely irritating.
Without even trying, she discovered she was going faster.
‘Better!’ Ade said, looking unbearably smug. ‘Now, ease off the gas coming into this bend…’
Anna didn’t have much time to think about anything else for the next ten minutes. It took all her concentration to follow Ade’s instructions and navigate the hairpin bends the track was famous for. He would tell her when to hug the white line at the edge of the track, when to put her foot on the throttle, always urging her to go faster than she was comfortable with.
The worst thing wasnot brakinggoing into the bends. Every time Anna’s heart was in her mouth and she was desperate to close her eyes, despite the fact she knew it was the stupidest thing she could have done… and accelerating out of the turns was even worse! It seemed her whole body and brain were a bundle of overstimulated nerves,and all her emotions, dampened down and numbed for so long, were suddenly turned up to the max. That might have been a good thing if the overriding emotion she felt hadn’t been sheer terror. She couldn’t have been happier when they pulled back into the pit after her three laps.
Thank God for that. Literally. She opened the door and reached for the strap of her helmet.
‘Not yet,’ Ade shouted from the other side of the car.
‘What?’ Anna yelled back.
Ade circled the car and came towards her. ‘You haven’t finished yet,’ he said.
‘I haven’t?’
