Sweet Carolina (24 page)

* * * *

“Stay here,” Dell said. “I don't want you
anywhere near Renfro ever again.”

“You aren’t going to keep me from seeing his
face when he realizes he's been found out,” Caro argued.

In the end, Dell couldn't stop her. The two
of them followed a pack of NASCAR officials across the infield to
Butch Renfro's motor coach. It was late, but the lights were on
inside. No doubt, Butch was celebrating what he thought was the end
of Hawkins Racing.

“Promise me you won't do anything stupid,”
Caro said as they approached.

“Define stupid,” Dell said.

Caro's fingers on his forearm stopped him.
“Please, Dell. This isn't funny. Don't give the officials a reason
to sack you, or Renfro a reason to have you arrested.” Dell wrapped
her in his arms and held tight. She apparently knew him well,
because that was exactly what he had in mind. But her pleading tone
and the shimmer of tears in her eyes was enough to cut through the
rage that had been building ever since he walked into the garage
tonight and saw what was going on.

“I promise, Caro.” His hands stroked her back
as he pressed a kiss to the top of her head where it rested against
his chest. “You're the only person who's ever cared enough to worry
about me. It's sweet.”

“I'm not being sweet, Dell, I'm being
practical. I don't have money to bail my driver out of jail.”

“Come on.” He set her away with a kiss to her
forehead. “Let's go. We don't want to miss all the fun.”

Dell didn't expect Renfro to be happy to see
him when he and Caro entered behind the officials, but he wasn't
prepared for the thundercloud of hate that rolled off the man
directly toward them. Dell put a protective arm around Caro and
stared the man down.

“What are they doing here?” Renfro asked.

“We thought they had a right to be here,”
Stan said. Dell thought he might grow to like this Stan fellow,
given time.

Renfro scowled. “What's this about?”

“We just had a talk with your nephew, Trenton
Biggs. He told us everything.”

“Well, I don't know what he said, but I
wouldn't believe him. The kid's bad news. Why do you think he
doesn't work for me?”

“But he does work for you,” Stan said. “He's
been working for you all season, and in exchange for his sabotaging
Hawkins Racing, you paid off his mother's mortgage and back
taxes.”

Renfro dropped all pretense, rounding on Dell
with a rage that had Dell shuffling Caro behind him. His face
turned puce as he pointed a finger at Dell. “You. It's all your
fault. You ruined my life, you miserable son-of-a-bitch.”

“Whoa,” Dell said, taken aback by Renfro's
hatred. “What did I ever do to you?”

“You exist. That's enough. If it wasn't for
you, she'd be mine.”

“Oh no,” Dell said. “Carolina would never be
yours, and if you ever touch her again, I'll kill you.”

“Dell,” Caro hissed behind him.

“Shh, Caro,” he said. “I won't let him hurt
you again.”

“I'm not talking about your bitch, Junior.
I'm talking about your mother. I asked her to marry me, but she
didn't want me. Caudell knocked her up and she married the bastard.
I told her not to. Told her he couldn't keep his goddamned pecker
in his pants, but did she listen to me? Hell no. She went ahead and
married him, and the next thing you know, Pauline Warner shows up
at the track with Caudell's bastard. Says she wants her man back.
That's all it took. The next thing I know, Pauline and her whelp
are hanging around, and Maggie was gone.”

Dell absorbed the tirade. As horrible as it
was, it had the ring of truth.

“So, you set out to destroy Hawkins Racing
because of me?” Dell asked.

“Damn right I did. I hired Caudell's bastard
and by damned if he didn't kill his old man for me. You should have
seen his face when I told him Caudell was his sperm donor.”
Renfro's laugh made Dell's skin crawl. Caro clamped the back of his
shirt in her fists and he wished to hell he hadn't let her come
tonight as Renfro continued.

“Then the bastard went after you. I couldn't
have scripted it better if I'd tried. I was trying to get that
idiot, Trent, into Anderson's garage when Virgil wised up and fired
your sorry ass. But you made it easy on me. You went over to the
bitch's garage. I knew I had you then.”

He was insane. Dell couldn't care less about
the fact Butch Renfro wanted him dead, but he did care about
Carolina. “Watch who you're calling names, Renfro. I'm not going to
warn you again. Carolina hasn't done anything to earn your
scorn.”

“Dell,” Caro warned.

“Let's go, Caro. I've heard enough.” Dell
ushered Caro out the door to Renfro's enraged shouts of, “It's all
your fault”.

Chapter Eighteen

“Just hear her out, okay?” Dell faced the
solemn group gathered around the conference table at NASCAR's
headquarters in Daytona Beach. The last forty-eight hours were
sheer hell for Hawkins Racing, and NASCAR in general. Having one
team sabotage another didn't do anything for the credibility of the
sport, coupled with Renfro admitting to sexually assaulting Caro,
and NASCAR was fighting a massive PR battle.

However, Dell hadn't felt this good –
ever.

Renfro was certifiably crazy, and under
arrest for a variety of charges, including assault on a NASCAR
official after Dell left with Caro. As crazy as Renfro was, he'd
answered a lot of questions for Dell and Dickey, and all Dell felt
was relief. Later that night, with Caro wrapped in his arms, he'd
found what he was looking for.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah, I am. I always thought there couldn't
be anything worse than having Caudell Wayne for a father, but I was
wrong,” he told her.

“How so?”

“Just think, if things had been different,
Butch Renfro could have been my father.”

“Thank God for small favors,” Caro said.

“No, thank God for you.”

So now he had a new cause, Caro Hawkins.

The officials gathered around the conference
table represented the highest levels of ownership and management
within the organization. Dell faced them as if they didn't have the
power to end his career with the stroke of a pen.

“We aren't asking you to reverse your
decision. We'll live with it. You did what you had to. But you need
to see the data Ms. Hawkins compiled before and after the altered
gas was put in the car. She's one hell of an automotive engineer,
and she's built the best damned engine I've ever run. You owe it to
yourself, and the sport to hear her out.”

Caro sat quietly while Dell went around the
table handing out the packets they'd hastily put together only this
morning. Dell called in favors, mostly owed to his father, to get
this meeting. She'd argued that he didn't need to do it, but Dell
countered her objection, saying for once, he didn't mind trading on
his old man's name. He figured Caudell owed him a favor or two.

“You can glance through the first few pages.
You'll see the engine performance is steady, not much changes from
one lap to another. I can tell you, she was running like a crazy –
smooth as glass. So, go ahead, scan the graphs on those pages. Stop
when you get to page eight.” He looked down at Caro and smiled. “I
think it would be better if Ms. Hawkins explains the graph on that
page to you.”

Caro stood, taking Dell's place. “As you can
see, precisely four minutes before Dell's last pit stop, engine
performance went up by seven percentage points. If you'll flip over
to the next page, you'll see a detailed readout from the weather
station at the track. At that exact time, a cold front came
through. The track temperature dropped ten degrees in a matter of
seconds. Now, if you'll turn back to the other page… do you see
where the car pitted? “

Caro nodded at the murmurs around the room as
they figured out the chart. “That's the stop where the altered gas
was put into the car's fuel cell. Now, if you follow the timeline,
you'll see Dell went back out on the track, and even though the
track temperature was significantly lower than it was when he
pitted, the car's performance, though elevated, was less than the
seven percent improvement exhibited before the pit stop.” She
paused to let the men absorb what they were seeing.

“So, gentlemen, the data supports my
conclusion that the additive actually produced a negative effect on
the engine's performance, rather than a positive one. Dell won the
race despite the additive, not because of it.”

Caro sat. She gave Dell a brief smile. He
reached over and took her hand in his and squeezed. Whatever they
decided, Caro was okay with. As long as Dell believed in her, it
didn't matter if no one else in the whole world did, and she was
darned tired of letting other people dictate her private life.

* * * *

Goddamn she was cute, Dell thought as he
shook the bottle and sprayed champagne on Caro's scrunched up face.
She'd told him more than once how much she hated this part of the
Victory Lane celebration, but after their first win following the
Talladega disaster, when he'd bathed her in champagne in Victory
Lane, then minutes later took her to the hauler and proceeded to
lick it off her skin, she'd come to tolerate it. For his sake, she
said. She might not admit it, but behind those scrunched up
eyelids, she was imagining his lips on her skin, making her squeal
and moan as he drank champagne from her navel, celebrating, Dell
Wayne style.

“Stop! Dell!,” she protested with a laugh.
“Enough!”

He passed the near-empty bottle to the
closest person and tugged Caro close. She lowered her hands from
her face and allowed him to brush the champagne from her eyelids
with his thumbs. He followed that by kissing the champagne from her
lips. She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back as a
chorus of whoops rose from the crowd.

When she pushed against his chest, he let her
go, but not before brushing his lips across the shell of her ear
and whispering, “I love you.”

A reporter shoved a microphone in between
them, and Dell shifted to face the reporter, holding Caro close,
with an arm around her waist.

“Dell, your season got off to a rocky start,
and here you are now, celebrating another win, and you're on your
way to the Chase for the Championship. How do you feel about
that?”

Dell gave Caro's hip a reassuring squeeze.
They'd come a long way since Talladega, and he'd won more races,
and had more decent finishes in the last half of the season than
ever before in his career, but none of it mattered to him.

“For me to end up where I am right now is
proof positive that anything is possible in NASCAR,” Dell said.
“I've got my work cut out for me in the next ten races. I can't let
my brother win – that just wouldn't be right.” Dell smiled and
waved at Dickey who was waiting for his turn to congratulate the
winner.

“Speaking of your brother, it's been quite a
season for the two of you. Do you and Richard Warner have any plans
to team up in the future?”

“I don't think so, but you'd have to ask him.
He's a big-shot team owner now, and I'm just a lowly driver.”

“Are the rumors true you loaned Richard the
money to buy out Butch Renfro after NASCAR banned him from racing
for tampering with your car?”

“I didn't
loan
Dickey anything,” Dell
said. He'd only given him what was rightfully his, half the
remaining money he'd inherited from Caudell Senior. Given Renfro's
desperate circumstances, the money was more than enough to buy him
out and keep the garage running. But that was no one's business but
theirs.

“So you have no plans to drive for Warner
Racing next season?”

Oh, hell no! Dell frowned at the camera. “No,
I don't. I drive for Carolina Hawkins, and no one else.” He tugged
her around, shifting at the same time so they stood face-to-face.
He winked.

“Dell,” she whispered, “what are you
doing?”

“Cameron,” he addressed the reporter, “if
you'll forgive me, I have something I'd like to say.” Dell didn't
wait for the reporter's agreement, barreling on as if he had every
right to hijack a national television broadcast. “I know this is
highly improper, but I've fallen in love with my team owner.” He
turned his gaze to Carolina who stood, open-mouthed and wide-eyed.
Damn, he hated to blind-side her this way, but he didn't want to
wait another minute to tell the world how he felt about her, and
claim her as his own. He smiled at her, then dropped to one knee on
the champagne-soaked ground.

The crowd grew quiet, or maybe she couldn’t
hear them over the roar of blood rushing past her ears. Dell had a
flair for the dramatic, but she never guessed he'd do something so
foolish, and so sweet. He reached for her hands, and she held them
out to him. He took them in his and placed a silly, smacking kiss
on the back of each one. She laughed, despite the serious look Dell
maintained. He looked up at her and she felt dizzy for the first
time in her life. He squeezed her hands, and she steadied.

“Carolina, my sweet, Carolina, I love you,
and not just because you build a wicked good engine. I love you,
because from the beginning, you saw the real me, on and off the
racetrack, and not someone you wanted me to be. You believed in me,
even when I didn't believe in myself. You make me want to be a
better man, Carolina. I promise to try every day to be the man you
see inside this shell. Will you marry me?”

All seriousness gone, Dell's eyes twinkled
with amusement and his wicked smile promised all sorts of things
she'd come to need as much as she needed to breathe. Lord, if she
said yes, this man would keep her off balance for the rest of her
life. And wasn't that one of the things she loved most about
him?

She forgot all about the reporters, the
cameras and the crowd. Only one man mattered, and he'd chosen this
moment to declare himself. Maybe, just maybe, she could keep him a
little off balance too.