In the Fast Lane (14 page)

“Ranger.” She said it again, calmly, and he looked back at her.

“Yes?”

She held out her hand. “Come one step closer.”

*   *   *

Was she asking him what he thought she was asking him?

If I come one step closer …

Come one step closer …

He took a step.

She smiled.

Another.

She curled her fingers in, slightly, as though urging him forward.

Two more, and he was standing at the side of her bed.

Her hand landed at the top of his stomach, not moving. Just … touching. Her fingers on his bare skin.

His cock jumped as he stared down at her in that thin T-shirt that the lamplight made nearly transparent. Earlier he had tried not to stare, but the sight had been next to impossible to resist and he hadn’t been able to control his resulting arousal. He could see the points of her nipples, pushing against the fabric, surrounded by the deep pink of her areolas, her chest rising and falling faster as she stared up at him.

Now, he looked without any pretense of trying to be cool or keeping his distance. “You’re beautiful.” His voice was raspy. Rough. He barely recognized it.

Slowly, she slid her hand down, watching with an intense expression as it skimmed over the ridges of his abs, one finger dipping for a brief second into his navel before trailing the others down the line of hair that disappeared beneath his waistband. But she didn’t stop there. Lower, lower—

“
Yeah.
” He pushed his cock against the heat of her palm. He couldn’t stop himself from rubbing against it, trying to increase the pleasurable pressure.

She pulled her palm away and he nearly groaned, only to realize that her fingers were curling around the edge of his waistband, starting to pull it down.

If she touched him with nothing between their skin, he’d come. He was too close. Too wound up, too—just
too
.

In a flash, he grabbed her wrist and smiled down at her. “Ladies first.”

Before she could say anything, he leaned down and captured her mouth with his, pushing her back against the headboard with deep, sure strokes of his tongue. Her arms came up around his neck and she made a low sound of pleasure in her throat, making his cock throb in response.

Closer.
He needed to be closer.

He lowered himself down, straddling her hips and curving his back as he continued to kiss her, and her hands slipped lower to run over his back, rubbing and lightly scratching in turns as she licked and sucked into his mouth.

Holy fuck. This was incredible. She was incredible. He’d never been so aroused in his life, torn between wanting to bury himself in her so he could come immediately and wanting to draw out this heavy, heady
just
kissing
forever.

Forever?

The thought had him pulling back for a moment, her hands slipping off his body as their mouths parted on a soft, wet pop. She stared up at him, her eyes glazed, and ran her tongue over her bottom lip.

He wanted her so badly, it was going to kill him.

Slowly, without breaking eye contract, he slid his legs down and lowered his body so that he was lying half on top of her, his face so close to hers that he could focus
only
on those beautiful, changeable eyes. They were now pressed together from chest to toe, but the way she looked at him was the most arousing thing of all.

He felt her hips rise, pressing up against his erection, and the groan of pleasure that escaped him practically shook the walls as his body reacted, his hips pushing back as he rubbed his shaft between her legs, only the thin layers of her panties and his sleep pants stopping him from being completely inside her.

She was the one who kissed him this time, bringing her hands up to his neck and gently tugging him forward until she could reach his lips with hers. It was a hot, wet kiss that matched the movements below, a rhythm that was starting to pulse in his very blood.

Supporting himself on one elbow, he brought his free hand to her waist, spanning the place where it curved into her hip, and squeezed.

Fuck. He’d been wanting to do that for so long, and hadn’t even realized. There was just something about that spot that brought out the possessive side of him, and now that he’d marked it—

She rolled her hips again, and whatever he’d been about to think disintegrated into a haze of pleasure. He slipped his hand under that teasingly thin T-shirt, over smooth, firm skin, the bump of her ribs, until his palm closed over one perfectly rounded breast, his thumb rubbing over the taut nipple as he rubbed the ridge of his cock ever harder between her legs.

She broke the kiss on a gasp, arching into his hand and moaning softly.

It was an approval, encouragement to go further. But without the push and slide of her lips over his, his mind cleared long enough for panic to set in.

What the hell was he doing?

He was leaving in a matter of months. Less than that, if he could get the team in good enough shape to hand off this project to someone else. What did that mean for Kerri? She might not mind if they spent the next couple of months having a good time, and frankly, he usually wouldn’t mind that, either. In fact, it was usually his preference. No strings attached. No chance for broken promises or hurt feelings.

But watching her with her crew, her mother, her brothers in the past couple of days, had done something to him.

He couldn’t do this. Not knowing that he would only end up leaving her. Wasn’t that what Al had done to Ranger’s mom?

“Ranger.” Kerri reached for him again, but he rolled away and pushed off the bed, forcing himself back to his feet.

She was rumpled and flushed, and he couldn’t believe he’d just done that to her. He wanted to do more. And at the same time … he ran a hand through his hair and blew out a breath, trying to calm down. “Kerri, I—this is wrong. I’m sorry, but I can’t do this. I-I have a job to do and I can’t do this.”

Oh, God. The way her eyes first went wide, as though she were shocked beyond belief, and then her face simply crumpled …

“Kerri—” He tried to comfort her, which wasn’t exactly easy or credible when he still had a raging hard-on, but he couldn’t bear to see her look at him that way.

“Get out, Ranger.” She pulled the blankets up to her neck and turned her face away.

“Kerri, please.”

“I said. Get. Out.” Her jaw was tight, her shoulders stiff.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, but she didn’t answer, and eventually he turned and left.

Chapter Twelve

The flight to Kansas City had been more tense than any race Kerri had ever driven.

She’d had the window seat, with Mom in the middle and Ranger on the aisle. It had taken all her willpower not to glance over at him every five minutes. She’d spent the flight staring out of the window in silence.

Whereas he had used the opportunity to twist the knife a little deeper into her heart. He’d joked with her mom, jabbered with Lee and Grady, who had been sitting just across the aisle this time, and basically made it clear that he wasn’t giving a second thought to what had happened between them the night before.

I have a job to do.
Meaning that he couldn’t spend time making love to her when he had more important things to do. Not when she might distract him from what he believed was truly important— making money.

Asshole.
She’d thought she’d simply misjudged him. She should be thankful that he’d corrected that assumption before things had gotten too serious.

And yet, her feelings didn’t seem to be listening to that particular argument.

By the time they’d touched down in Kansas City, she’d gone through every possible emotion. Sadness, anger, hope, anger …

They’d arrived at the hotel and settled in. Lee, Grady, and Mom had left shortly after that to do the interviews that Lee had scheduled with local media stations. He was the youngest driver in the truck races this season, and because of that everyone wanted to talk to him and his mom. And Grady usually went along, just to make sure Lee didn’t say anything too stupid. It would be hours before they’d return, and the crew wouldn’t arrive until evening.

She tried flipping through the television stations, but nothing distracted her.

She was alone with her confusion and her hurt.

She’d just switched off the television when someone knocked at her door.

A peek through the peephole revealed Ranger. Kerri scowled. What was he doing here? Come to rub it in?

But she shook her head. Not likely. Even if she’d been wrong about his motives when it came to her, she’d seen how he behaved with the rest of the crew. He wasn’t petty. He might care more about money than relationships or—whatever it was they had, but he hadn’t been nasty.

Most likely, he was probably here to make sure that their
fake
relationship wouldn’t suffer. That might end up hurting their revenue, after all.

She made a face at herself. Now she was being the nasty one.

Enough.
If he could play it cool and professional, so could she.

She opened the door. “What do you want?”

Yes, very cool. Very professional.

He looked haggard. “May I come in?”

“Why?”

“We need to talk.”

“Your mouth works just the same in the hall as it does in my room.”

“Kerri—”

“Oh, fine, come the fuck in.”

He eyed her warily as he stepped over the threshold. She shut the door behind him, leaned against it, and crossed her arms over her chest. “You wanted to talk, so talk.”

She knew she was being hard on him, but she didn’t care. He deserved it.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.” His expression was sincere, but she didn’t allow herself to be moved. She couldn’t take that chance again.

“Well,
A
for effort and too bad it didn’t work out.” She moved a hand to the doorknob.

“My dad abandoned me and my mom when I was a baby.”

She froze, something shuddering down her spine, and slowly dropped her hand.

“Is this some kind of sick ploy to gain my pity so that I’ll keep pretending to be your fiancée? I gave you my word and I won’t go back on it. But I’d rather not be subjected to your presence unless I absolutely have to be.”

He drew a sharp breath at that, and she immediately hated herself for wounding him. But before she could apologize, he spoke again. “It’s not a sick ploy. It’s—I had to at least try to explain that it wasn’t about you. I wanted—I still want you.”

“Then why did you stop last night?” Shit, she sounded pathetic. She hated it.

“Because I can’t give you what you deserve.”

“And what is it that I deserve, exactly?”

“I don’t want to do to you what Al did to my mother.” He looked so downtrodden that she couldn’t help herself. She took a step forward, not missing the way his face lit up when she did.

“I’m not saying I forgive you.” Talking to him like this, face-to-face, was making her want to kiss him, but that would be a bad idea right now, so she abruptly moved away. She walked over to the bed and sat down, patting the cover next to her. “But I am listening. So … talk.”

For a second, he hesitated, but ultimately he sat, so close that when the bed dipped with his weight, they ended up pressed together side to side.

Maybe this hadn’t been the beter alternative to talking face-to-face. Now she wanted to do a lot more than just kiss. He had to feel the intense attraction between them, too, despite the tension, because she didn’t miss the way his breath shuddered a bit when they touched. But he didn’t try anything else. Just started talking.

“When I was a baby, my mother left my father because he spent all his time at work and none with her or me. She tried to work things out, but he bought her off every time. Or at least, he tried to. Expensive presents, vacations—except she always ended up alone. Even on the vacations he did manage to go on with her, he ended up working. A few months after I was born, she finally got fed up and walked out. Took me and went back to her mom’s in Tennessee, thinking that Al would finally realize what he was missing.”

Oh, God. She already knew how this story ended.

“But instead of coming after us, my dad called and told her that wouldn’t fight her for custody of me as long as she agreed to forego all financial support. We ended up living with my grandparents for years. And not in a nice house or with any of the things that my dad could have given me if he’d given a damn. We lived in a trailer, Kerri. A two-bedroom, falling-down trailer. While Al Colt lived in a fucking
mansion
.

Kerri’s anger with Ranger was completely gone now. For all that he had suffered, he was still trying to do the right thing.

His mouth twisted in a grimace. “When I was fourteen, I overheard my mom rehashing all of this to my aunt. We were going through some really tough times financially, and she actually said that she wished she would have stayed with him and suffered emotionally if it meant that her kid was going to be able to eat three meals a day and go to school without being hungry or cold. I’d never known before what had happened between her and my dad.”

“Ranger…” Kerri squeezed his hand in sympathy. What must that have been like, learning at fourteen that his dad had thought that money was more important than him?

Probably a million times worse than the way she’d felt last night.

“After that, I promised myself that someday I would be even more successful than my father and I would do it
without
hurting other people. I got a job busing tables. I finished high school with straight A’s. I got a scholarship to college and worked my ass off, then took a job at Colt’s biggest rival. I pulled my way up the ladder, rung by rung.”

Her eyes were wide. “I don’t understand. How did you end up at Colt, then?”

He gave a sardonic smile. “Colt bought out the company I worked for. By then, I was the second-in-command in the operations department and came into Colt directly under the VP of Operations. I thought about quitting, but in the end I refused to give my father the satisfaction of driving me away. I decided that beating him from the inside would be even more satisfying. I wanted to prove that I could do a better job in his own company than he could and didn’t have to act like people didn’t matter in order to do it.”