Hot-Wired / Coming on Strong: Hot-Wired. Tawny Weber

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СКАЧАТЬ a blue wrist band. “Put this on.”

      Natalie complied but asked all the same, “What is it?”

      “It shows you’re a pit crew member. C’mon, let’s go race.”

      Whatever. She’d only shown up to make sure Mr. Stillwell didn’t conveniently “forget” their appointment. However, if being a pit crew member was what it took to drag his butt out to Belle Terre, then she was pit-crewing.

      She shrugged and climbed up on the four-wheeler behind Scooter. Today she wasn’t riding sidesaddle, and instead of wrapping her arms around his waist, she merely held on to the rack that fanned out over the rear fenders. Hmm. In retrospect she could’ve held on to that rack on Friday night, too. Oh, well.

      “You settled?” Scooter asked over his shoulder.

      “Yes, sir.” Even though he’d sent her in the toter home the other night knowing good and well she’d probably find Beau in some state of undress, she liked Scooter Lewis. With his freckled face and dancing eyes, he reminded her of a mischievous elf.

      They took off with a roar, but instead of going to the left in the direction of the pits, Scooter drove into an eight-lane asphalted area where cars, some still attached to tow ropes, were lined up one behind the other and drivers milled about. At the front, the cars converged into two openings and then rolled forward for their turn down the track.

      “Staging lanes,” he yelled over his shoulder.

      She nodded in return. Staging lanes. Okay. Whatever that exactly was, she wasn’t sure, but it was loud and noisy…and kind of exciting. Above the din of car engines and male voices, the announcer sounded like a circus barker. “Get ready for some driving, folks. It’s the event you’ve been waiting for—the bad boys of outlaw racing, 10.5’s Beau Stillwell and Jason Mitchell taking it head-to-head down the track. Nitrous versus turbo in the final round.”

      Scooter pulled up next to the black and purple Camaro and she climbed off the four-wheeler. Every inch of her was aware of Beau Stillwell, but she deliberately looked at and spoke to his crew members, Darnell and Tim, first. A whoosh of red ran up Tim’s face at her hello. He was obviously one of those guys more at ease around a fan belt than a female.

      Finally, she turned to face Beau Stillwell. He wore a half-cocked smile but it was the lazy sweep of those bright blue eyes framed in dark lashes down and back up her that sucked the breath from her and sent her mind skittering to naughty places. “You clean up nice, Ms. Bridges.” He leaned down and for one heart-stopping, pulse-pounding moment she was certain he was going to kiss her. There was a lambent sensuality in his eyes, in the way he bent his head. Her whole body tingled in anticipation. The air between them seemed to crackle.

      He canted his head to the left, his dark hair teasing against her cheek, and sniffed delicately. She could almost feel the faint scrape of his five-o’clock shadow against her neck. She was on the verge of spontaneous combustion. He straightened. “You smell a whole lot better, too.”

      He smirked and she wanted to do something awful to him. Instead she smiled sweetly. “You smell terrible.”

      Okay. Not the wittiest comeback in the world, but good lord, he’d paralyzed over half her brain cells when he’d leaned in close that way. Her heart was still tap-dancing against her ribs. It was the best she could do on short notice and short-circuit.

      “You’re not into eau de oil and sweat?”

      “Afraid not.”

      Tim, she could’ve kissed him, chose that moment to interrupt. “I brought the tires down to ten and quarter and heated the bottles to nine-hundred.” He handed Beau a jacket, which he shrugged into.

      Beau zipped up the jacket. “Good deal.” He reached into the open door of the car and took out a black neck brace and snapped it into place. He pulled on a helmet, buckling the chinstrap, leaving the visor up. Unfairly, he was even more gorgeous in a helmet. Last was a pair of black, heavy gloves.

      Natalie had never been much of a uniform woman. Cynthia, her assistant, got all hot and bothered by firefighters, cops and soldiers. She said the uniform did it for her. Icing on top of a male cupcake. Natalie had always favored a man in a suit and tie, but Beau was all suited up in racing gear and looked sexy and hot, and it was even more galling that he was the one who was flipping her switch.

      He folded himself into the car, sliding between foam-covered bars that formed a cage inside. “Wish me luck,” he said with a flash of a smile.

      While she’d wanted to do him bodily harm two minutes ago when he’d left her feeling like a fool, she quite suddenly realized that all that safety gear was in place for a reason. Even though he was annoying and infuriating and generally rubbed her the wrong way, she wanted the arrogant bastard to win safely. She was wearing his pit crew band, after all.

      “Good luck.”

      “When it’s a pretty woman doing the send-off, it’s customary to offer the driver a good-luck kiss.”

      His gaze lingered on her mouth. That look in his eyes and the very thought of kissing him weakened her knees and sent a bolt of heat through her. “I’ll pass.”

      “Too bad.” He winked at her and clicked his visor down into place.

      Tim leaned in, fastened a heavy-gauged “net” over the window opening and slammed the driver door shut.

      Darnell handed her what looked like an old-fashioned headset. “Put these on. They’re ear protection. It’s about to get loud.”

      She put the headset on and she could still hear, but everything was muffled. The car roared to life and she was glad to have the protection, because even with it, the sound was loud enough to vibrate through her body.

      Inside the car, Beau sat with his hands gripping the wheel, staring straight ahead.

      “He’s going through the run in his head, visualizing it,” Darnell said, next to her.

      She nodded to let him know she’d heard.

      The rest happened fast. She and Darnell rode the four-wheeler up to an area closer to the starting line, on the other side of the low wall that separated the track from the stands. Spectators packed the stands. The crowd’s excitement was a nearly palpable thing. She knew how they felt. From the moment Tim had slammed the door and Beau had started the car, she’d been revved up inside.

      Tim was out between the two cars with a video camera but Darnell stayed with her on the four-wheeler and explained what was happening as Beau “smoked” the tires in the burnout box, which was essentially standing on the brake and the gas at the same time. This created a cloud of choking tire dust but heated up the slick tires so they’d stick to the asphalt track. Scooter then stood in front of the car, giving hand signals, directing Beau left or right, lining the car up “in the groove,” where the tires would have the best chance of gripping.

      A final tap on the hood by Scooter, a sharp nod of acknowledgment from Beau and he rolled the car forward until the yellow bulb on “the tree”—the staging sequence of red, yellow, green bulbs in the middle of the starting line between the two cars—lit up. Then the roar really became deafening as both drivers revved their engines. The lights changed and they were off. Fast. Furious. For a second it looked as if the driver racing in the other lane was going to swerve into Beau’s lane and СКАЧАТЬ