Shifting Gears: The Complete Series (Sports Bad Boy Romance) Page 5

  “Okay, Mick,” I say, turning. “You got me. I’m really scared.”

  Only, Mick hasn’t budged from his spot near the office. Why would he do this if he couldn’t see the look on my face?

  The man calling himself Jax sighs, saying, “If you choose not to believe I am who I say I am, that works for me. However, I doubt you will take what I am about to say very seriously unless I confirm your friend’s story, so…”

  He unbuttons the top button of his sports jacket. I’m scoffing until he undoes the second button and opens one side of the jacket, revealing a very large handgun in a holster on his hip.

  “Are we done with the foreplay, or do I have to fire a couple of rounds to convince you I am not here to play games?” Jax asks.

  “What do you want?” My voice is about half the size it’s been the rest of the day.

  Jax smiles at me. I’m still not certain it’s him, but I am certain that’s a gun on his hip. Maybe it’s a fake, but it sure doesn’t look like it. Whoever this is, even if it is the real Jax, my best bet is to just go along with it.

  I go along with it, the worst case scenario is that I make a fool of myself. I don’t go along with it, the worst case scenario gets a lot worse.

  “I trust you’ve heard at least some scattered rumors of a tournament I’m putting together,” Jax says.

  I turn back toward Mick. He was telling the truth.

  “I’ve heard about it,” I answer.

  “What you may not have heard is that it is by invitation only,” Jax continues. “Maybe we are different, but I do prefer knowing a driver can race before I put him on the line.”

  “So?” I ask. “What do you want with me?”

  He reaches inside his jacket, and I’m already halfway turned toward the nearest exit, but he just laughs. I glance back to find he’s just reaching into one of the inner pockets—much too high for him to be going for the gun.

  Of course, if this is the real Jax, the rumor goes that he’s got at least three guns on him at any given time, so all things considered, I should probably start running.

  “Why would I want to kill a man who calls himself Ransom? You are not a threat to me. I am merely here to give you this,” he says, pulling a card from his inner-jacket pocket.

  It’s the size of a normal business card, but the only word on the front is the name “Jax.”

  “On the back, you will find instructions on where to go and who to talk to if you are in,” he says. “Three heats. If you make it to the third heat, you have made it to the final. If you win the final, you win the tournament.”

  “And what happens then?” I ask. “Based on your reputation, you don’t really strike me as the kind of guy to put up a quarter-”

  Jax holds up his hands. “I am not here to discuss specifics. I am here to offer an invitation.”

  Mick, who has slowly made his way over to my side, breaks his silence. “What about me?” he asks.

  “What about you?” Jax returns.

  I turn my head and whisper, “Maybe you shouldn’t be trying to get more involved in this right now.”

  “I want in,” Mick says. “If you don’t have me, you don’t get him.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” I retort.

  “Hey, Eli!” a cheerful woman’s voice comes from back toward the office, and I’m really hoping it isn’t who I think it is.

  “Leave now,” I tell Jax, “for all our sakes.”

  “Hold on a minute,” Mick says. “I’m the one who told you about the tournament, Eli. You’re not just going to cut me out like this.”

  “Dude, shut up,” I mutter.

  “I don’t think I will,” Mick says.

  This is the wrong time for him to display how butt hurt he gets when he’s left out of something.

  “I trust one card will be enough for the both of you, then?” Jax asks.

  He doesn’t wait for an answer. He just starts walking toward the bay door until he’s out of the shop and around the corner.

  “Sorry,” Kate says from behind Mick and me, “I didn’t know you were talking to a customer.”

  Yeah, a customer.

  “It’s all right,” I tell her. “We were done, anyway. Are you ready to go?”

  “Ready when you are. Hey, Mick,” she says. “It’s good to see you up and walking around.”

  “Thanks,” he says with a smile, then whispers to me, “Dude, we need to talk about this.”

  “I have plans and none of them include getting my brains blown out by some phantom mob guy,” I whisper back. “Now be cool or I burn the card.”

  “It’s great to see you, Kate,” Mick says, “but I’ve got a few things to go over with the boss before I can get back to work. You two have a good afternoon.”

  His face is red as he walks to the office.

  “Shall we?” Kate asks.

  “Hold on just a second,” I tell her and point in Mick’s direction.

  When he gets to the office door, he tries the knob, only it’s not turning.

  “Hilarious,” Mick calls over his shoulder. “Toss me your keys.”

  “I’m already clocked out, man,” I tell him. “I gave my keys back to Maye so you’d have a set for the night.”

  Mick knocks on the door, calling out “Maye!” and I’m finally ready to go.

  “Okay,” I tell Kate. “Tonight, I’m going to take you around town in the Chevelle. The point of tonight is to start teaching you when you need to drive like you’re just heading to the store and when it’s safe to race.”

  “Where is it?” she asks.

  I smile.

  One of the lovely things about being involved in a somewhat less-than-legal deal with my boss is that I get some great perks: clean money, a place to make repairs or upgrades, and a nice spot to hide a car that police will chase on sight.

  We head around back to the junkyard.

  Maye owns the junkyard, but she doesn’t run it. The shop keeps her too busy for that. I’ve never talked to the guy who actually does run it, but where I’m going isn’t near his office.

  “Are you all right?” Kate asks.

  “Yeah,” I answer, though my mouth is a little dry. “I’m fine. Why do you ask?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t hear you rip on Mick back there and you’ve been quiet. I figured something pretty serious must be going on.”

  “No,” I say forcing a laugh. “I was just trying to get out of there so we could be on our way.”

  It’s a flimsy explanation, but she doesn’t pursue the question further.

  “So,” she says, “you keep your car in a junkyard?”

  “Yeah,” I tell her. “It’s not exactly street legal, so most of the time, we have to load it onto the back of Maye’s flatbed tow truck and then cover it so the cops don’t know what’s under it.”

  “They know your car, huh?”

  I shrug. “It happens. In about half an hour, they’re going to think they’ve got it where they want it, too. They’ve been trying to pin me down for a while now.”

  “You’ve never been caught?”

  “I’ve gotten pulled over in the Galaxie,” I tell her, “but I’m usually long gone in the Chevelle before the 5-0 shows up.”

  “So you’ve been to jail, then?”

  “No,” I tell her. “Not for racing, anyway. I got into a lot of trouble when I was a kid.”

  We’re in the junkyard about five minutes before she finally asks, “So, where’s the car?”

  “We’re almost there,” I tell her.

  We come around a stack of compacted cars and there, in a little alcove and covered, is the Chevelle.

  “There it is,” I tell her.

  “Wow,” she says blandly.

  “It’ll probably be more impressive once the cover’s off of it.”

  Going around the car, I untuck the car cover from under the frame and slowly lift it off the car.

  “Wow,” she says again, only this time, there’s animation
in her voice.

  “I call it a 454 because that’s the engine that was in it when I got it,” I tell her. “I’ve upgraded since then.”

  “How many horses under the hood?” she asks and crosses her arms over her chest. I think she’s having a little fun with the car talk.

  Still, I’m impressed enough with the answer that I still give it to her. “About twelve-hundred, last I had it tested.”

  “That sounds like a lot,” she says. “Is that a lot?”

  “Have you heard of a Bugatti Veyron?” I ask.

  “Yeah,” she returns.

  “It comes with about a thousand,” I tell her.

  What I don’t tell her is all of the incredibly expensive mods I had to get on the Chevelle to be able to say that.

  “So this is faster than a Veyron?”

  “It accelerates faster, anyway,” I tell her. “I’ve never topped it out on the road. It’s pretty heavy, so it takes a couple hundred more to get it going.”

  “So,” she says, “when do I get to drive it?”

  Judging by her glare, I get the impression my laughter is out of context.

  “Oh,” I say, “you’re serious?”

  “I did tell you that I’m interested in seeing what it’s like to be a street racer. In order to find out if I’m any good, don’t I have to be behind the wheel of a car?”

  “Let’s start with something that’s not going to kill you just to see you die,” I tell her. “This car’s a little hostile until you get to know it.”

  Her shoulders slump a little, but I really am just looking out for her safety. Besides, once cop sees this car, the lights go on, and if either of us wants to get out of there without shiny metal bracelets, I’ll have to need to pull every trick in the book.

  I’m not trying to be mean; she’s just not ready for something like that. Hell, I barely am.

  “Okay,” she says, “so what are we doing today then?”

  “I told you,” I smile. “Today, we’re going to learn how to run from the cops.”

  “Whoa, whoa. I knew there was a possibility of that, but you didn’t tell me that was actually a goal of yours.”

  “Actually, I like staying as far away from cops as possible,” I tell her. “If you’re going to get into this, though, you’re going to need to know how to lose a very active tail.”

  She swallows.

  “Okay,” she says, her voice almost too soft to hear.

  “If you’re not up for it,” I tell her, “we can do something else.”

  She narrows her eyes at me, and I’m trying not to smirk. Giving people just the right kind of push is one of my many hidden talents.

  “Get in the car,” she says. “It’s on.”

  Without waiting for me, she walks around to the passenger’s door. I don’t tell her I just had her bucket seat put in earlier today. Usually, it’s in the shop to save weight.

  She gets in and closes the door after her. I can see her through the front window trying to figure out the racing harness, and I can’t wait to see how she’s going to react when we start going.

  I open the driver’s side door and get in. While I’m getting my harness on, I’m telling her, “Now, this is going to be a little bit louder than the Galaxie. I’ve got some earplugs taped to where the glove box used to be.”

  “You gutted this thing,” she says. “Why?”

  “It’s to save weight,” I tell her.

  “So it’s an inertia thing, then? If it’s heavier, it’ll take more power to get it moving and keeping it moving?”

  “Exactly.”

  “What else did you do to it?”

  “How much time do you have?”

  I notice she hasn’t reached for the earplugs yet. That’s likely to change in about two seconds.

  Sliding the key into the ignition, I say, “Are you ready?”

  “Wait,” she says, “if the car’s going to be so loud you think I need earplugs, how am I going to hear what you’re saying? This is supposed to be a lesson, right?”

  “I’ll slow it down when I need to tell you something,” I answer. “You know, assuming the po-po aren’t coming up my tailpipe. Mostly, I just want you to have a point of reference, so you’ll know what I’m talking about when it’s time for you to get behind the wheel.”

  I turn the key and the engine, which took almost a year of winning race after race to afford, roars to life.

  Kate’s reaching for the earplugs.

  “We’re not going to use the flatbed today,” I tell her. “We’re just going to go. That’s going to make this a lot more dangerous because if anyone sees me pulling out or pulling in here, there’s a good chance they find the car and with the shop next door, there’s a good chance they’d find me. We’re going to need to start out fast. Once we get some distance between us and the junkyard, I can slow it down and we can start.”

  She nods and then puts the earplugs in her ears.

  “Did you get your harness on all right?” I ask, looking over at her, trying not to spend too much time just looking at her breasts. “Hold on. Right in the middle, right above your heart,” I tell her. It comes off better than breasts would have. “You’ve got that flipped around.”

  She fixes the buckle and looks down, checking for anything else. I already know there’s not, so I ease off the clutch.

  We go slowly through the junkyard. Right now, the car is loud, but once I give it any kind of gas, it’s going to be waking up roadkill for about half a mile in every direction.

  I picked a day when the junkyard was closed, but it’s always possible Davis, the guy who runs the junkyard, is around here somewhere. As far as I know, the only instruction Maye ever gave him on the topic was simply to stay away from that part of the yard.

  “All right,” I yell. “We’re about to come out into the open; are you ready?”

  Kate wraps her fingers around the front of her harness and nods.

  My foot comes down on the gas pedal just as we’re hitting tarmac and the tires spin before biting.

  Kate is either screaming or squealing next to me, but I can’t ease off until I’m well out of the area. Maye would kill me if I got caught in this thing so close to her shop.

  As soon as I’m on the road and pointed in the right direction, I hit my gas and the speedometer’s showing one hundred mph before we get to the end of the long block.

  Right now, I’m on a road heading away from town, but in about three miles, there’s going to be a long curve to the left that will take me back to civilization.

  I really am going to show and tell Kate everything she wants—and needs—to know about what’s about to happen. At the same time, though, I’d be lying if this wasn’t intended to give her a decent scare.

  Easing off the accelerator, I slow us down for the bend ahead. It’s gradual enough, and I made damn sure the Chevelle has more responsive steering than the Galaxie, but looking down, the needle is sitting right at one-fifty.

  I tap the brakes and double-clutch down to third gear as we drop beneath the one-hundred mark.

  “A lot of people get into this without knowing what they’re getting themselves into,” I yell, hoping she can hear me over the engine and through her earplugs. “That’s not going to happen with you.”

  “What do you mean?” she shouts back.

  “Once a cop’s seen your car on the street, he’s going to remember it,” I answer. “You may get one race, maybe even two or three before you roll by a light bar, but nobody does this without getting chased every once in a while. The more you do it, the more cops are going to know your car.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “We’re going to make some new friends in town,” I answer.

  “In town?” she protests.

  We’re reaching the end of the long curve and, as the road straightens in front of us, my foot is back on the gas.

  I wait until we’re passing one-seventy-five on the speedometer before I glance at Kate out of the corner of
my eye. Her knuckles are white, and her mouth is open wide as she lets out a little scream every time I correct course.

  That’s probably enough.

  I start slowing down, and I’m going over my prepared “don’t feel bad, it’s really not for everyone,” speech when I hear something else.

  “What are you doing?” she’s shouting. “Go faster!”

  I glance down at the speedometer. The needle’s still on the right side of one-hundred.

  It looks like I might have stumbled across the real deal here. I’ve had some pretty hardened guys chicken out way before we got this far.

  One of the things that Mick made me promise before he started unloading all of his knowledge on the subject was that if I ever taught someone anything about racing, I’d start with something like this.

  For me, it was a run to the state line and back averaging over one-hundred-fifty in Mick’s old Mustang. That may sound like a gentler introduction, but Mick’s never been that good with a wheel. He can press the pedals just fine, but every time he’d even make an adjustment, he’d nearly lose control. It was kind of a relief when he sold it.

  Kate’s getting it easy.

  There are some things I’ll want to say that are going to require me to slow down a little before we come all the way back around to town, but for now, I decide to indulge her.

  As I apply more pressure onto the gas pedal, Kate’s her hands are in the air as she’s howling, “Woo!” I’m just trying to keep a straight face as we hit one-eighty.

  When this girl comes out of her shell, she really comes out of her shell.

  The turn’s coming up in about a mile, though, so I start slowing down again.

  We make the turn doing about forty and I keep it slow for a minute.

  “All right,” I tell her. “The first thing you need to do when you see lights behind you is not panic. You panic and you’re going to make a mistake. It’d be better to just pull over at that point.”

  “How do I not panic?” she asks. “What’s the trick?”

  “It’s just something you’ve got to get used to,” I tell her. “Are you ready for some company?”

  She nods.

  When we come around the corner and see the building with eight or nine patrol cars in the lot, though, her fingers curl back around her harness. I hadn’t told her we’d be driving past the highway patrol’s station.