“That’s my girl. Now get behind the wheel where you belong,” he says.
I smile. “I hear you loud and clear.”
When I slide into the driver’s seat, I familiarize myself with everything from the gauges and switches to the roll bars designed to protect me.
After a few more minutes, the pace car takes its place, and after three laps, the green flag starts waving.
My hip tightens as I shift through the gears, but I ignore the dull pain as it starts to bloom and remind myself to breathe.
I’ve held the lead for almost all the race, showing my hand and every maneuver I’m known for. Everything from dive bombs to misdirection.
As I round the final turn, the same guy who said I look like Lennon is closing in on my right side, so I shift gears again and give this car all I can. This race is mine.
“There’s my girl. Get it!” I hear Vinny in my ear.
I see the checkered flag waving me across the finish line as sweat pours down my face. The pain ricochetting through my hip and shoulder is shredding me. It’s all I can do to hold on until I get the car stopped safely.
“I need you out here now, Vinny. Please,” I say hoarsely as the pain starts to zap any remaining energy.
“On my way, amore. Hold tight.”
The track before me is almost spinning. I won the race, and people are going to expect me to be ecstatic when I’m barely hanging on by a thread.
Vinny reaches me in about two minutes and he’s helping me out as his security detail practically form a wall around us giving me the privacy I need.
I pull off my helmet letting it drop back into the driver’s seat. He takes one look at my face and frames it with his hands.
“How can I help?” he asks, concern etched in his features as his gaze hastily searches me for any obvious injury.
“I’m hurting. My injuries from the wreck…I’m not one hundred percent yet. My body wasn’t ready for this, but I hoped with it being a shorter race I could fake it,” I admit. A fact I never told him as I divulged this plan.
His lips press together in frustration, but when he speaks, he’s only encouraging. “You did it. You’re the most badass woman I know. If you can pretend to be okay for about ten minutes, I’ll get you out of here before anyone catches wind of anything but pure excitement.”
I close my eyes and nod as he releases my face.
“Take a few deep breaths and you’ll give one quick comment to the reporter I hand-picked and we’re out of here,” he says.
I let out a humorless laugh. “Breathing deeply isn’t the easiest feat since the wreck either. My lung collapsed and my ribs were broken.”
His gaze widens a bit before he’s grabbing a bottle of water from one of his guys and giving it to me.
“Here, drink this,” he says in a tone I know better than to argue with. I don’t have any energy left to fight back if I wanted to.
After I take several swallows, I feel less light-headed and give him a nod to let him know I’m ready. Before we take off inthe direction of his reporter, I reach back in the car to grab my helmet.
The reporter meets us with a coy smile firmly in place on her pink lips.
“What a race! How do you feel?” she asks as a camera is trained on me with a microphone held close enough to catch my words.
“I feel great,” I answer.
“What do you have to say about stepping into your sister’s racing shoes?”
“I suppose the Tyler legacy lives to see another day,” I answer.
“That’s all the questions she’s taking,” Vinny says as he takes my free hand in his, tugging me further from the camera flashes and curious, even dumbfounded glances of the crowd.
Once we’re back in the safety of his SUV again, he wastes no time driving me back to his house.
