Aflame (Fall Away #4)(24)
Author: Penelope Douglas

I pulled off my helmet, having never felt so fucking humiliated.

I’d just lost a bike race to an old rival I could barely stand in front of a hundred people I went to high school with.

I’m not going to kill her. I won’t hurt her.

But I was going to do things to her. I slammed my helmet down on the handle bar. Lots of fun things.

I hung my head, breathing in and out steadily as Tate climbed off the bike and stepped up to my side, removing her helmet.

“You know,” she started, looking off toward Roman, “You made him pretty damn happy. Derek doesn’t really have that much going on in his life,” she told me, looking thoughtful. “He has some friends and the Loop, but that’s it. He’ll never be one to rise high or have the world at his feet. This will probably keep him high for a month.”

Her mouth tilted in a little smile, and I looked over to see him laughing with his friends, enjoying the praise and admiration. The win clearly made him feel good, and it probably made him look good. I looked at Tate, realizing what she was doing for him.

I shook my head and gave a half smile. “What did you promise him if he won?”

“Nothing,” she replied. “I just guaranteed him he would win.”

“You were that sure,” I said, knowing she must’ve told him her plan to ride with me.

She nodded. “He likes me and trusts me. More than he does you.”

“Great,” I bit out.

She jerked her chin. “Look at him, though.” She smiled. “This is probably the best he’s felt in a long time.” And then she looked back at me. “He doesn’t need a reward. He just needed the win.”

I looked over at Roman, realizing she was right. He wasn’t a threat to me anymore, and I had a lot to be happy about. No harm done.

She let out a hard sigh. “But this really sucks for you, though,” she teased, fake sympathy written all over her face. “Jared Trent, up and coming motor bike racer for CD One Racing losing to an amateur on this small pond?” She laughed. “Yikes.”

And I watched her walk away, my face hardening as she went up to Ben and wrapped her arms around him.

I climbed off my bike, staring after her.

It was definitely time to step up my game.

***

It wasn’t a turn-on a year and a half ago, so why the hell was I turned on now?

I shifted slightly in my seat, the swirl of heat shooting from my stomach to my groin, and I watched, wanting him to touch her.

I actually wanted it.

I dared him to slide his fucking hand higher up her thigh, so I could feel more of what I’d missed feeling the past two years.

Only Tate did this to my head. Only she twisted my body up like this.

Nothing had changed.

“Jared, what are you doing?” I hear Pasha’s breathless voice as she shoves the hotel room door open.

I tip back the rocks glass and down the rest of the whiskey, the thick burn tearing up my throat before it warms my stomach. Dropping the glass to the floor, I fall back onto the bed—one of many beds on which I’d slept alone, completely faithful to Tate—and I feel the tears wet the corners of my eyes. But I tighten my jaw, refusing to let them fall.

I just want everyone to leave me alone.

I breathe in through my nose, defiant, willing myself to either forget or accept what I’d seen tonight through Tate’s bedroom window.

She had a boyfriend.

The ceiling spins above me, and I bring my hands up to my head, digging my palms into my closed eyes.

Six months ago, Tate loved me, and now I was nothing. The last time I was nothing to her—the last time she talked tough and tried to convince me that I didn’t matter—I’d stolen our first kiss.

And I knew she had lied.

But now . . . she’d shown me that she was forgetting me.

I feel like I did in high school. Before she was mine.

I can’t stop the first tear from falling. “Tate,” I breathe out, wiping my face quickly.

“Who’s Tate?” Pasha sounds worried, and I know she doesn’t understand any of this. “Jared, are you crying?”

“Just get out,” I growl.

I gave her my extra key, so she could get in to get anything I might forget for tomorrow’s race, but unfortunately, she must’ve heard my commotion when I kicked over the portable bar and broke a bottle earlier.

“You have a race at ten a.m.!” she shouts. “You have to be at the track by seven, and you’re drunk off your ass!”

I shoot up into a sitting position. “Out!” I bellow. “Get the fuck out!”

“What the hell’s going on?” I hear a male voice and instantly know it’s Craig Danbury, the team’s manager.

“Oh, my God,” he swears under his breath, probably taking in the sight of my drunken disarray.

I don’t look up from my hands, but I see his shoes near the door.

“What the hell is wrong with him?”

“I don’t know,” Pasha says. “And I don’t know if he’s going to be okay tomorrow.”

I press my head between both hands, unable to concentrate on anything except her. She didn’t wait for me. Why didn’t she wait?

Anger charges through my body, and I want a fight. I want to hit someone.

“He better be okay,” Craig snaps. “I don’t care what you have to do. Get him a girl or a pill . . . just get him back to one hundred percent by morning.”

I hear him leave, and I shake my head. I’m losing control, and I hate this feeling. I never wanted to feel this again.

Pasha’s hands land on my forearms as she kneels in front of me.

“Jared,” she pleads, “tell me what the hell happened.”

I close my eyes, feeling like my body is swaying. “I lost Tate,” I whisper, my eyes burning.

“Who’s Tate?” she questions. “Is he a friend of yours?”

I let out a bitter laugh, kind of liking the sound of that. I wish our new neighbors ten years ago had had a boy instead of a girl. I wish Tate was a guy I’d gone to school with instead of the girl I liked, bullied, and then fell in love with.

I wish my world had never revolved around her. Maybe we both would’ve been happier.

“Drink this,” Pasha orders, handing me a bottle of water.

I grab it lazily and unscrew the cap, downing the bottle. When I finish, she pushes another one at me.

I shake my head. “Enough. Just leave me alone.”

“No,” she pushes. “You have a race tomorrow. A responsibility to me and your team. Drink this and then go get in the shower, while I go rustle up some aspirin and food. We need to get the alcohol out of you.”