“Is that what you think we should do?” Mack asked. She tried to flex her right hand, inhaling sharply when the slightest movement sent searing pain from her pinkie to her elbow.
The older man raised his eyebrows impassively. “Dammed if you do, dammed if you don’t. Guess it depends if you’d rather wait and see what happens or try to go do something about it.”
Do something,her brain screamed. Her hand throbbed in protest.
“If she uses the priority lane, she loses the spot she has!” Janet barked.
Leo looked at the large clock on the wall. “If Mack goes back out, she has to use the slow lane and hope Roethlisberger doesn’t jack around out there. If we’re out in ten minutes ... it could work.”
Jimmy clicked his teeth. It was nearly impossible to get the car towed out and her gear on in ten minutes. “Yep.”
Janet checked her watch as if the time calculation would magically change, then sighed heavily. She studied Mack, and the undisguised hope and fear Mack saw on her face made her feel like Janet wantedher to make the field not just for the team, but because she wanted it for Mack herself. “Your choice, Rookie. But slow lane only. Don’t throw away the shot you already have.”
Wes taught Mack that when there was no clear answer, her gut would never steer her wrong, and as she stood in the garage with Jimmy and Janet and the crew all watching her, her instinct shouted that she didn’t want to let life happen to her anymore. She wanted to take every chance, even if it meant risking failure. Wes told her to live big, and there was nothing bigger than not wasting a second more of this second chance.
“Pull it onto pit lane. We’re going out.”
Mack had her helmet in one hand and was trying to zip her fire suit with her aching hand before she registered the sound of crying. Shaw stood at Billie’s side, weeping into her hands while Billie rubbed her back and whispered soothing words. Mack kneeled down in front of her daughter.
“What’s this, Shaw?”
“Sccccaaa . . . monster . . . nooo waaann go.”
Janet called from the other side of the garage, and Mack held up her index finger.
“She’s scared,” Billie said softly. “She’s afraid you’ll wreck again since the car is made up of so many different pieces. She called it the monster car.”
Mack squeezed her daughter tighter but her eyes strayed outside the garage where the crew towed her car toward pit lane. She had to leave now if she had a chance of getting in a run before time ran out, but Shaw’s pain pulled at her resolve.
“I promise you, Shaw, I will be okay and I will come back to you. Always. Always.”
A hand tapped her shoulder, and Leo lifted his brows in a request for permission. “Hey, Shaw, have you ever really seen inside an IndyCar? There are hundreds of components to keep drivers safe. Your mama needs her car right now, but my car is in the next garage over, and Icould use help making sure everything is ready to go. I need someone to try on my helmet, too. Would you want to do that?”
Shaw looked skeptically at Leo, and then to Mack, visibly torn between her fear and her interest in her favorite IndyCar driver. Mack felt similarly torn between her desire to stay with Shaw and get onto the track. Sometimes parenting meant trusting the inner resilience of your child, and the adults that filled your shoes for a moment.
“Maybe your, uh ... your Billie would stay here in the garage with us, and you can check out my car, and we’ll listen to your mom’s run on the radio. That way you don’t have to watch. Even though she’s going to be super safe and come right back here, sometimes it feels better to listen. Would you like that?”
Shaw nodded slowly, and Mack gently encouraged her toward Leo’s garage space. Billie winked. “Go. She’ll be fine, but you won’t be if you don’t get out there and give it everything you got. Show her that moms get to chase their dreams, too.”
Chapter 36
1 week until the Indianapolis 500
“What speed do we have to hit?” Mack pulled on her balaclava as she and Jimmy speed-walked behind the car as the crew towed it back to pit lane. Her family and Janet followed close behind.
“A hair shy of 231.”
Mack’s stomach dropped. She’d used every muscle and tool available to wrestle the car on her last go-round, and she wasn’t sure how to eke more out of the rebuilt machine, even if her hand wasn’t throbbing. Mack pulled gas-tinged air into her lungs, then puffed out her cheeks, exhaling in an even stream as she tried to calm her shaking body before pulling on her helmet with one hand.
To Mack’s surprise, Janet reached around and buckled the HANS device to her helmet. “This is ridiculous,” she muttered.
“We have to try,” Mack argued, as she unwound the tape from her fingers. Pain zipped up her arm as soon as it was released and Mack sucked in the acrid air between her teeth. The throb was now radiating up her forearm and zinging through her elbow.
Her boss shook her head vehemently. “That’s not what I mean. What I’m about to say is ridiculous, especially when that”—she pointed at Mack’s hand—“is clearly broken. My first time here, I was slow as shit. Partly the car, partly not knowing what the hell I was doing. It was the early eighties and Little Al Unser was as green as I was, buthe taught me something I’ve never forgotten.” Mack nodded impatiently, irritated and surprised Janet was indulging in story hour now of all times. “I was lifting too early. When you think you should lift for the turn, wait. Only the smallest microsecond. It feels like you’ll drive straight into the wall, but you won’t. It will extend your line through the corner and cut time.”
There was no way. Mack was already pushing as late as she could. Any later and she’d drive straight into the wall.
“It’s fucking insanity for me to tell you this right now, I know. If anyone can make it work, it’s you.” Janet’s raspy voice quaked. “Do what you can, Rookie.”
