Jacked Up (8 page)

He shrugged. “Sure. It’s long enough. We’ve always gone off-road, too, but we don’t want to risk killing your engine before the derby.” He clapped his hands together. “This is going to be fun.”

“I’m warning you, Eve, he cheats,” Rhett said, smiling at her again as he wiped his hands on a rag.

“Do you think you can stop being a jerk for five minutes? God, I feel like we’re teenagers again.”

“We weren’t teenagers at the same time,” Rhett pointed out. “I’m eight years younger than you.”

By this point, Eve very possibly would have hit her brother. But Nolan just looked amused. Even when he grumbled at Rhett, he didn’t really sound angry.

In response to Rhett’s comment, he just laughed. “You’ve got a point, bro. Even more reason you shouldn’t be so disrespectful to your elders.” He gave Rhett a nudge and Eve a grin. “Eve would never talk to me like that.”

That was reason for all of them to laugh. But to give Rhett credit, he didn’t guffaw. He just shook his head and said, “Alright, I’m going in for a shower. I don’t want to be around for whatever is about to happen. I’m of an innocent and delicate nature.”

“That’s the biggest load of bullshit I’ve heard in a while. But thanks for your help. Appreciate it.”

“Yeah, thanks, Rhett.” Eve pulled the keys out of her pocket. A sudden rush of adrenaline pumped through her at the thought of racing. She had always loved it. The speed. The strategizing. The triumph as she drew past an opponent. She’d loved it all and she realized how much she had missed it.

In the years since she’d quit, she had ignored the feelings, shoved them in a box and kept the lid on. When she was at the track, she thought in very clinical, professional terms. She never stood and watched a race with the eye of a spectator or with the thrill of a driver. She saw it with business eyes.

Not nearly as entertaining.

Happier and lighter than she had felt in ages, Eve reached out and gave Nolan a smacking kiss on the lips. “Start your engine, strongman.”

* * *

NOLAN
was starting to think that his passing crush on Eve Monroe had increased. A lot. It was the only explanation for why seeing her smile made him feel like a kid with one fist full of candy and the other full of fireworks.

“Let me get my keys and it’s on, girl.” Nolan wondered if he could snag another kiss, but figured maybe he should wait for her to come to him again. He really had enjoyed it when she’d taken the initiative because it showed him she’d let down her guard, something he just knew she didn’t do very often.

“Now I’m ‘girl’?” She put her hands on her hips. “We really need to have a talk about this nickname crap. After I kick your butt racing I’m going to make you write ‘Her name is Eve’ a hundred times.”

“You don’t scare me.”

“Well, I should. I scare everyone else.” She tossed her keys in the air.

It wasn’t often that Nolan brought a woman to his parents’ house. It had probably been a few years since he had. Yet he liked Eve standing in the driveway, her derby-ready car behind her, the late harvest corn in the field behind that. She was just wearing jeans and a sweatshirt again. It seemed to be her out-of-work uniform and he liked that. She didn’t wear a lot of makeup either, and he had no trouble picturing her as a rough-and-tumble tomboy, wrestling with her brothers and getting into trouble. Some men might not find that sexy, but he did. He didn’t want a high-maintenance woman whose every conversation revolved around clothes, gossip, and her latest diet.

He liked a woman who could wear heels when the occasion called for them, but play in the dirt the rest of the day.

Like Eve.

“I guess I’m just not like everyone else.”

She studied him, like she was debating a wisecrack or not. It was a look Nolan was already familiar with. Finally, she just shook her head. “No, you’re not. And you’re nuts.”

“Come on inside for a second so I can grab my keys and hit the garage door opener.” His dad had told him his mom was in the shower, but Nolan figured she had to be done by then and he kind of wanted her to meet Eve, even if it was just for a minute.

“Sure.”

When they went in the back door into the kitchen, Eve asked, “Should I take off my shoes?”

“Oh, Lord,” his mother said, at the counter slicing a tomato for a sandwich she was assembling. “Don’t worry about it. After nine kids, this floor has seen better days. When I win the lottery I’m replacing it.”

It was one of his mother’s favorite statements. There were a lot of things she intended to do when she won the lottery, except she never bothered to play it.

“Hey, Momma.” He kissed her cheek and swiped a tomato. “This is Eve Monroe. Eve, this is my mother, Sandy Ford.”

Nolan had seen Eve irritated. Uncomfortable. Antagonistic. But he’d never seen her shy.

At the moment, she was looking just that.

“Hi, Mrs. Ford, it’s a pleasure to meet you. Thanks for letting me work on my car in your driveway.”

His mother waved the knife in the air. “Oh, sure thing, honey. The boys are always taking things apart in this driveway. Tractor parts, car parts . . . they’re scattered all over. It’s nice to meet you, too. You’re Evan’s sister?”

“Yes. Elec’s, too, obviously.”

“She is their PR rep,” he told his mother. “She’s like the person between the drivers and the fans and the drivers and the sponsors.”

“So you deal with all the pain in the butt stuff and everyone else gets all the glory, huh?”

His mother was good at cutting to the chase.

Eve grinned. “Yeah. That about sums it up.”

“I guess not everyone is born to be a show-off. Hopefully your brothers appreciate you.”

“Sometimes. But that’s okay. Because I don’t always appreciate them.”

“It’s hard that way with family. You take them for granted.” His mother finished making her sandwich. “Are y’all hungry? Do you want a sandwich?”

“No, thank you,” Eve said. “I ate a late breakfast.”

Nolan would have liked to have said yes, but he could wait a little while. He didn’t want to pass up a chance to race Eve. “I’m fine, too, thanks. We’re going to test out Eve’s car.”

He’d left the keys to his car on the wooden key rack that had been hanging by the back door for as long as he could remember. Its lettering stating the obvious—
KEYS
—was almost completely worn off.

“Have fun. Your sisters are bringing the grandbabies by this afternoon, so cease and desist when you see the minivan pull up. It’s not safe.”

“What time?”

“About an hour.”

They weren’t going to be drag racing for an hour. Nolan wanted to be kissing by then. “Okay, no problem.” He wasn’t sure which sisters his mother meant. Five of them had kids and they all lived fairly close by. Only his sister Rachel had moved away. She’d gone to college in Atlanta, then had migrated all the way out to California, which his dad seemed to think meant she had suffered brain fever. In his eyes, only crazy folk wanted to live in a state that might fall into the ocean.

Nolan snagged another tomato slice and popped it in his mouth. Eve made a face at him. “What? You don’t like tomatoes?”

“No.”

“Tomatoes are perfect. How could you not like tomatoes?”

“They’re slimy. And seedy. And the rind is chewy. They’re a guaranteed gag.”

“Tell me how you really feel.”

“I always will.” She opened the kitchen door. “Now quit avoiding your butt-beating. Thanks again, Mrs. Ford.”

“Call me Sandy, honey. And don’t show my son any mercy out there.”

Eve laughed.

“Gee, thanks, Mom. I appreciate the support.”

“I just think the best driver should win, that’s all.”

That was going to be him. If he could stop staring at Eve’s butt long enough to focus on driving, that is.

As he pulled his car out of the garage, Nolan automatically checked his brakes and his engine. Everything felt good. He pulled up next to Eve.

“We need a flagger,” she yelled out her window at him.

Damn, she looked hot behind the wheel. She was surrounded by that hunk of metal, windows out, doors a sloppy white, her hair pulled up in a ponytail. It was beyond sexy and he had to remind himself to focus again.

“Nah. Fingers up, on three.”

She nodded and they both brought their hands up. “One, two, three . . .”

Eve managed to hit the gas a split second before he did, which made him grin. Cupcake had some good reflexes. Then he concentrated on the straightaway. They had agreed to go to the end of the drive, turn in the field, her right, him left, then back to the garage. It was a bit narrow with two cars and they were kicking up a bit of dust, but that was what made it fun. He nudged ahead of her, but to her credit, she held within two feet of him. But he was going to smoke her on the turn. She didn’t know the feel of the drive the way he did, and she hadn’t been racing in years. The turn was going to kill her speed.

Or not.

Damn.

Nolan came out of the turn hard and hit the gas, amazed to see that Eve had only lost another foot on him, but not nearly what he had expected. “Hell yeah!” he yelled, even though she couldn’t possibly hear him. He was impressed. Turned on. Adrenaline pumping.

As he put the gas pedal to the floor, gravel spinning out behind him, Eve narrowed the gap between them. Shit, she might actually tie with him. Nolan went from impressed to concerned she might beat him. He lost the grin and focused on holding a straight line, making sure he avoided her drag. His car wasn’t running as well as he’d like, but then again, he’d built it for the derby, for short bursts of acceleration, not a full-out race.

But so had Eve’s.

They were coming in on the garage and neither one of them was slowing down. He realized that because he had assumed he would outpace her by fifty feet or more, the winner would be obvious and they wouldn’t need a finish line. But they were neck and neck and the only finish line they’d stated was the garage. Which meant they were both riding up on it hard and fast, unwilling to be the one to brake first.

Eve had guts, he had to give her that.

Or they were both just stubborn.

Which he already knew she was.

He should brake. Any second now.

But he knew his car, knew the road, knew precisely how much time he had before he would hit the door.

She braked a split second before he did, coming down hard, tires spinning, her brakes squealing, his eyes focused on the rapidly approaching aluminum door. They both slammed to a stop just a hair’s breath before impact, his body continuing forward until the seat belt jerked him back. Glancing over, he made sure Eve was okay. She was grinning as she killed her engine.

Yep. She was okay. More than okay.

“Holy shit,” she called over to him. “That was freakin’ awesome!”

“Baby, you were on fire!” he told her, grinning from ear to ear as he climbed out of his car. He leaned around the front of his car and measured the distance between his fender and the door. It was two inches, tops. He held up his fingers to show her, still grinning. Damn, it was fun to be around her.

She was climbing out of her car and she climbed right out onto the hood of her car, then his. Leaning over, she studied the difference between the two. “Dude, we are dead tied.”

“That’s because we were both stupid enough to ride up the ass of the garage door. That was driving, cupcake!”

Eve stood there, one foot on her hood, one on his, and laughed. She looked sexy as hell, windblown and happy, freer than he had ever seen her. The sun rose behind her, the sky blue and stuffed with clouds, a perfect fall day, a perfect woman.

God, he was in trouble.

But if this was trouble, it felt pretty darn good.

The kitchen door opened and his mother’s head popped out. “Next time wear a helmet, for Chrissake!” she screamed. “I don’t need any more gray hairs, Nolan Junior!” The door slammed shut again.

He laughed.

Eve looked sheepish. “Oops. I’m not making a good impression on your mother.”

“She just likes to make her point loudly. You kind of have to when you’re the mother of nine. Don’t worry, she’ll hold it against me, not you.” He wasn’t worried about his mother. He wasn’t worried about anything.

He jumped up on the hood next to her.

“Hey! You’ll bang up my car,” she protested, backing up, smiling slyly.

She knew what he was going to do. She knew he was going to kiss her and she wanted it just as much as he did. And she wasn’t even remotely worried about her car, he’d bet the farm on it.

“You’re standing on it! What’s the difference if I stand on it?”

“You’re bigger than me.”

He was stalking her on the hood as she backed up in a circle. “I’m not that much bigger.”

“You calling me fat?” She backed up again, giggling.

“No. You calling me fat?”

“No. I’m calling you bigger than me. Muscular.”

He liked the sound of that. “So stop moving and let me wrap my muscles around you.”

“I don’t even want to think about how dirty
that
sounds.” She took a light jump backward and moved from her car to his.

“That doesn’t sound dirty. It sounds weird if you even try to make it dirty.” He put one foot onto the hood of his car. “Why are you running away? Do you have more pictures of me on your phone that I should delete? Did you catch me picking my nose?”

She laughed. “While going a hundred miles an hour? If we could do either one of those things we’d be freaks.”

“I could probably pick my nose while driving. But I didn’t. I actually don’t ever pick my nose. So you don’t need to run.” Nolan was finding their whole exchange highly entertaining. They had descended into the ridiculous.

“I’m running because it’s fun to make you chase.”

He laughed. Her honesty cracked him up. He also knew just how to make her stop backing away. “Tease.”

She came to a grounding halt. “I am not. I’m never a tease. That’s for ditzy girls who suck lollipops.”

“What?” Nolan laughed even louder. “Lollipops? Are you for real?”

“Yes. I am not a tease,” she said adamantly.

“I was just giving you a hard time, you know. But Lord, now I know to never offer you a lollipop. You’ll take my head off.”