Crossing the Line (Hard Driving) (3 page)

Preferably while she was splayed open beneath him, letting him slide in and out of her body.
Fuck.
The wayward thought turned him on so hard that he had to grip the podium for a minute just to stop his hands from shaking.

He
had
to know who this woman was.

After a second, he lifted his arm and pointed at her. Next to him, Frank stiffened.

Poor guy. Ty was probably giving the publicist a heart attack, deviating from the norm.

But he did it, anyway.

“Yes, you. Miss—”

She stopped bouncing. A pity. “Uh . . .” For a second, she looked like a deer in the headlights, as though she hadn’t actually expected him to call on her. But she recovered quickly enough. “Cori Bellowes. I’m from
Gold Cup Sports
.”

She was flushed. Probably from all that bouncing. He wondered if she blushed like that all over.

He
really
needed to stop thinking of her that way.

Gold Cup Sports
. It was a young, but respectable enough, startup wire service. He’d heard the name before, anyway, even though he’d never met any of their reporters. From what he could remember, they were a pretty small operation, too.

But even if she were here repping a basement-based YouTube sports channel, he shouldn’t be objectifying her. She was here to ask him a question, not to provide fodder for his fantasies. Now, more than ever, he needed to maintain his image of honesty and forthrightness.

He straightened and did his best not to let his eyes wander away from her face, which right now felt more difficult than sweeping the series.

She cleared her throat. “Last year, you had to overhaul your car after crashing on this very track. This year, you were keeping your distance from other cars, even if it meant maintaining a more challenging speed. Did that accident influence your strategy this year?”

He swallowed hard. Yes, he
had
crashed, but it hadn’t been bad. It also hadn’t been the first time he’d been in an accident during a race. But that had also been his first accident since Dad’s cancer diagnosis had come back and, even though he’d walked away unharmed, it had been risky enough to spark a lot of deep thoughts. Realizations about how life was short and wanting to use his success to help others.

That crash had been part of the reason he had worked so hard to start his own program for underrepresented kids in racing. He’d realized then that he could become a role model, not just for racing but for life lessons . . . and now that vision was under fire.

But of course he couldn’t say all of that. No one knew about the program or the fallout. Talking about it would only cause more problems for Riggs Racing’s image.

He needed to give a pat answer and get out of there

“Well,” he began, just as she pushed up her glasses.

Good. It took away some of that sexy librarian look.

But then she reached up and unbuttoned the top button of her blouse.

It nearly made his head explode.

“Uh . . .” He panicked for a moment, grabbing at his train of thought. “I guess it made me not want to have another accident this time around.”

He grinned and forced a chuckle, and the whole room laughed. His answer had sounded just like his usual fare—good-humored, but dismissive—and no one would think twice about it. The look on that woman reporter’s face, though—what was her name again?
Right, Cori
—the look on Cori’s face was obvious disappointment.

At least it hadn’t been a question about fighting or cheating.

But really, had she been expecting something deeper? That usually didn’t happen in a post-race press conference.

Maybe it was because she was new. New to racing, but she also looked young enough that she was probably new to journalism, in general. But somehow, that explanation—that she was simply green—didn’t feel right. The way she’d
jumped
to get his attention felt too ferociously hungry. There wasn’t room in that equation for naiveté.

He liked that hunger in her. It made him want to stride across the room, pull her close, and replace that look with something else. Hotter, needier, and much more pleasurable for both of them.

He wouldn’t find her after the conference and chat her up, though. A driver getting mixed up with a reporter? That would most certainly draw more attention to him and to Riggs Racing, and no doubt make the wrong kind of story on top of everything else.

Instead, this time he
consoled
himself with the reminder that tomorrow was Media Day. Just a short time ago, he’d been dreading it. But now he realized that she might be there, which would give him a chance to talk to her privately without raising eyebrows—to see if she was really as hungry as she acted.

And it would give him a chance to find out what color her eyes were.

He followed Frank back to the hotel with the image of that single open button burning into his brain.

Cori smoothed a hand over her skirt, trying to calm her nerves.

Today was Media Day. She was at an actual Media Day! And she’d already done a couple of interviews that weren’t half bad, if she was being honest.

It felt so good to be doing the job she loved. In fact, she’d just walked out of a one-on-one with Kerri Colt that had been nothing short of amazing. Kerri had been so easy to talk to and really supportive of Cori, both women understanding immediately what it was like to frequently be the only female in the room. So Cori had left that interview feeling so powerful, and at the same time like a complete jerk for the questions she’d asked Kerri about Ty, trying to feel out Kerri’s knowledge about him.

She’d played it as standard journalistic curiosity, but the fact that she was using Kerri to try to gain an advantage on Ty was eating her up inside. The level of guilt she felt only kept increasing. She was starting to spend as much time thinking about ways to get around writing an exposé as she was thinking about actually doing her job.

The desire to wiggle out of what she’d agreed to started in earnest the second that Ty had heard her call his name during the post-race conference, then looked across the room and seen her. Like, really
seen
her. The expression on his face when she’d asked him about the accident hadn’t matched his answer. There had been a moment of . . . well, something deeper. A connection. Before he’d wiped it away.

She’d gotten the feeling she had been the only person in the room who’d noticed it. For the space of a second, he’d been vulnerable, somehow. And she’d felt a crushing wave of regret, almost as if in that moment she would have completely thrown away her reporting career in order to prevent him from getting hurt.

She felt like an idiot for not having thought of it sooner, but it hadn’t been until that moment that she’d started to wonder exactly what kind of investor would make their funding conditional on an exposé about one particular racer. In her excitement and desperation to get an assignment, she hadn’t thought too hard about it before then.

Now she kept flipping back and forth. What if she failed to get any information on Ty? Would
Gold Cup
fail anyway? Or worse, what if Ty somehow found out what she was doing and exposed
her
as a dirty journalist? Her career would be over forever.

She’d fretted about it half the night.

The other half she’d spent fantasizing about Ty. Imagining what it would feel like to kiss him. To unzip that fitted racing suit he’d been wearing and slide her hand inside, over the skin of his stomach . . .

Wow. Was it hot in here?

She stopped in the hallway of the big hotel where Media Day was taking place and took a deep, cleansing breath. She had to stop letting herself get so distracted. Ruminating on who the investor was or the future of
Gold Cup
wouldn’t actually change anything. The only power she had right now was in her own choices, and she was going to succeed, damn it.

Eventually the guilty feeling she’d been experiencing would pass . . . even if the desire for Ty didn’t.

She just had to make sure he liked her. To hook his interest enough to have him want to talk to her casually, from time to time outside of prearranged press conferences or interviews.

Speaking of interviews . . . where was she supposed to go next?

She glanced down at the schedule in her hand, reading the words in hopes that focusing on something concrete would help to calm her suddenly fluttering nerves.

RIGGS RACING. SUITE 1402
.

Oh. God. This was actually happening. And she wasn’t feeling any more calm than a moment ago. Apparently all that convincing she’d just done on herself—that her attraction to Ty was a temporary, unimportant thing and she wasn’t going to let it get in the way of her mission—hadn’t stuck, because the number of deep, cleansing breaths she suddenly needed in order to feel relaxed about this would probably result in her passing out on the corridor’s patterned carpet.

Better just get it over with.

She headed up one floor to the Riggs Racing suite, where she was greeted at the door by the same man who had been on stage with Ty at the post-race conference. He looked to be in his mid-forties, in good shape, with a shaved head but a bushy mustache.

It worked for him.

“Miss Bellowes, right?”

All she could do was nod.

He gave her a welcoming smile and handed her a packet of information on each team member, then pointed at an open door on the far end of the suite. “You’re with Ty first. You can head on in.”

Ty? First? Oh my God oh my God oh my God.

Somehow, she managed to put one foot in front of the other until she was standing just over the threshold of a room where two chairs were set up in a small empty space just in front of a big bed made up in fluffy white linens. Ty rose from one of the chairs as she walked in, coming to a stop at the sight of him.

Yesterday, he had walked into the pressroom at the track looking sweaty and grimy, and she couldn’t take her eyes off that square chin, his short-cropped dark hair, the way his broad shoulders filled out his racing suit . . . she’d been bowled over by his hotness, and when he’d given her his attention, it had resulted in her thinking sex thoughts about him for half the night.

While today . . .
someone please help me
. Today she would probably spontaneously combust if she got any closer.

Building a closer relationship with him was going to be more difficult than she thought. Not because she didn’t like him . . . but because she liked him too much. Wanted him too much.

He was wearing street clothes—gray dress pants and an expensive-looking lightweight sweater that matched the gold-brown of his eyes. Dressed like this, she could see just how lean and fit he was. Which was to say:
very
.

He wasn’t as tall as she’d thought he was. Maybe five-nine? Five-ten? But he
felt
big. He felt like he took up all the space in the room. With her heels on, she would only have to tilt her head back slightly to kiss him, to barely rise on her tiptoes so that the throbbing point between her legs could rub against his—

“Miss Bellowes.”

She squeaked in surprise, blushing immediately at how foolish she looked for having been caught daydreaming—and about something completely inappropriate, to boot. At least he couldn’t read her thoughts.

And he’d remembered her name. She struggled for composure. “Mr. Riggs.”

He was staring at her, and she belatedly realized he was holding out a hand for her to shake.

She slid her palm into his.

The sensation . . .
oh, wow
. Her eyes nearly rolled back in her head at the seductive pleasure of it. Just from shaking this man’s
hand
. But it felt like so much more than that. It was like sliding her naked skin against his body. As though he was touching all of her instead of just her fingers.

And she was drowning in his gaze. Those eyes . . . he had beautiful eyes, big and thickly lashed, and they were looking at her with so much intensity that she was suddenly all too conscious of the bed behind him. She flicked her gaze to it, trying to be discreet, but his eyes had followed hers, and when they looked back at one another, the heat in his expression . . .

Goodness.

She was in trouble.

“Call me Ty.”

His voice had changed. Low and rough, it hit her in all the most sensitive places. Her breasts felt heavy and achy, and her nipples tightened almost painfully. And merely from the sound of three little words!

How was she going to get through an entire ten-minute interview?

Keep this under control.
There was no way she could write a tell-all about him if she got
too
personally involved. It would feel too much like selling herself for a story.

Isn’t that what you’ve already done?

He squeezed her hand just before he released it. “Please sit down, Miss Bellowes.”

She struggled to regain control of her thoughts as she sank into the seat, staring up at him with wide eyes. He followed suit, settling in the chair next to her.

“Cori, please. Call me Cori.”

That was okay, right? He’d offered the same thing, after all. All the other reporters yesterday had called him Ty and he’d called them by their first names. Why shouldn’t she?

Because it
feels
too personal. That’s why.

And this was only the tip of the iceberg. She had to pull herself together and focus on her goal. But sitting here, next to this man who made her
want
with a power she’d never experienced before, she was having a hard time deciding whether or not her choice had been a mistake.

She immediately scoffed at herself. What did it matter? Entertaining fantasies like the ones she was currently having about stripping that sweater off of Ty and tumbling him back onto the bed . . . well, they were ridiculous. A guy like him probably got this kind of attention from hundreds of women. Focusing on sex wouldn’t get her the information she needed.

Ugh.
Her mind was like a seesaw. This was the worst possible time to be flip-flopping about how she felt.

And he was looking at her expectantly. She knew she was supposed to just fire questions at him. She’d been mostly successful at that with the other drivers she’d interviewed today, but this felt different. They’d had a moment of electric connection yesterday, and again, just now.

Okay, think, Bellowes. Think!

Even if it wasn’t going to go anywhere romantic, she couldn’t ignore the connection they had. She had to make the most of it and turn their chemistry into something she could
use
.

In the meantime, she couldn’t write a story about the guy who won the first
and
second races of the season, who had stepped out of character and punched a fellow driver last week, and have no good quotes from him.

She pulled her voice recorder from her bag. “Ready?”

He nodded, and she started the recorder.
Here goes nothing.

She cleared her throat. “This season you’ve won—not just the first Intercomm Cup race, but the first
two
. You finished last year on a high note but started off slowly. What’s different this year from last year?”

He looked nonplussed for a second, as though he’d expected her to immediately bombard him with questions about the fight he’d had with Gilroy, but then he smiled—the same smile she recognized from countless press photos. Magnetic. Approachable.

Hot.

“Well, I’ve got a great team behind me. That’s not what’s different, though. It’s the differences that those guys have made in my racing. My dad and I review the tapes of the races. There are some valuable lessons in hindsight. We spent a lot of time training to fix my mistakes. The engineers have been working all winter to overhaul all the Riggs Racing cars, so this one is a little bit tighter, handles a little bit better. And this is the third year that this pit crew has been working together. They’ve got it down. Every last thing makes a difference, and when you have this many moving parts, it adds up.”

Unf.
The way he talked about his team—like he really appreciated and valued them—was sexy. It was a far cry from her own work environment and how she was treated there.

Of course, she was beginning to think that
everything
Ty did and said would be sexy to her. Even the way he was sitting was sexy. His legs were at an angle to hers, not touching, but close enough that she could feel the warmth of him through her stockings.

“That’s . . . really great.” Was it just her imagination, or did she sound breathless? He had the most intense effect on her.

Keep this under control.

She tried to focus. “You just mentioned that there are valuable lessons in hindsight. What are some of the lessons you’ve learned in life that carry through into your racing?”

He eyed her for a moment, his gaze full of what looked like suspicion.

Oh, no.
Had she been too obvious in trying to disarm him by
not
talking about the fight, or Gilroy’s cheating allegations? Had she given away everything already?

Maybe she was a failure at journalism, after all.

But then his expression cleared, and he asked teasingly, “Are you not aware that there’s an elephant in this room? Are we really not going to talk about it?”

Well. That was an interesting development. She wasn’t sure, though, whether or not his question meant she’d succeeded in making him feel more comfortable with her . . . or less.

But at least she could answer his question honestly.

“Yes. I’m aware. But I’m not interested in talking about why you made an exception to your usual easygoing persona and beat down a driver who happened to be the only person to ever accuse you of cheating.” She sucked in a breath. “Since I have a feeling you’re not going to make a surprise confession if I ask you about it, I’m not going to write about it until I can do more than merely conjecture.”

“I see.” He shook his head slightly. “Huh.”

They were both quiet for a moment, seconds ticking as she held her breath. Had it worked? Did he believe she wasn’t out to get him?

She didn’t
want
to be out to get him. Not like that.

Her heart was beating too fast.

And then, thankfully, he smiled. “So. Life lessons, huh?”

She nodded, her breath rushing out in relief.

“Are you trying to convince me to give up my racing secrets?” He winked at her, then immediately added, “Nah, I’m just teasing you. On the record? I’ve learned that luck and skill go hand in hand, and that in the end, taking a win or a loss too seriously just sets a guy up for disappointment no matter what. That some things are simply out of your control.”

Was he talking about racing or about the cheating accusation? Either way, he sounded rather . . . fatalistic. Cori wasn’t sure she agreed, but it seemed to fit the easygoing image of Ty that she’d seen in the media. But it didn’t fit whatever was in his eyes right now.