Page 86 of Redline
As I pass Marco, I keep my head down. I feel the stray, single hot tear escape, tracking a slow, burning path through the dampness on my cheek. I don’t brush it away this time, or even try to keep it in. I don't have the energy for the anger or the prideit takes to hide it. I’m just tired—tired of holding onto this, tired of bracing for the crash, tired of trying to save someone who uses my concern as a weapon.
I let it fall. For the first time, I just let it go. There was no point in holding everything in when there was nothing left to save.
“Carter?” Marco asks softly, stepping into my path. “You okay?”
“Never better, Marco,” I say, my voice thick but flat. “Just realized I was wasting my time on a faulty circuit.”
I keep walking, but I feel Marco’s gaze linger on me before he turns it toward the person left behind me. I don't have to look back to know he’s shooting Dominic a look of pure, weary disappointment—the kind you give a star player who just threw the game for no reason.
“Carter.”
The voice calls from the darkness behind me. It’s low, stripped of the cruel armor, sounding almost like a plea.
For one devastating, torturous second, my heart betrays me. I want it to be him. I want it to be Dominic—voice soft, defenses gone, finally reaching for me in the way I knew he could.
But I know the cadence of that voice. I know the steady, heavy step splashing through the puddles behind me. It’s Marco.
Something inside me finally gives way—not loudly, not dramatically, but with the exhausted certainty of a dam finally starting to fracture. The realization settles into me slowly, sharp enough to carve something out.
And somehow, that’s worse. Because I love him. I love Dominic Valerio.
And the worst part is, after a lifetime of building walls to keep this world out, I didn't just let him in. I fell in love with the middle of the wreck.
If I didn’t, leaving would feel clean instead of catastrophic. But some choices leave damage behind no matter which direction you walk.
Chapter twenty-six
Carter
The roar of the fans in the grandstands is a physical weight, a rhythmic thumping that vibrates through the soles of my shoes long before the engines even cough to life. The sky is a mocking, brilliant blue—the kind of clear that makes yesterday’s torrential gray feel like a fever dream.
On Sunday morning, the garage isn't a workspace; it’s a theater.
I’m hunched over the rack on the left side of the garage, my fingers moving in a practiced, frantic dance. I’m deep in the gut of it, securing the connectors that feed Dominic’s every twitch, every brake-pressure spike, and every gear shift back to the pit wall.
A few feet away, Dominic is a statue of Nomex and carbon fiber. He’s already half-suited, the top of his fireproofs tiedaround his waist, exposing the tight, black cooling vest beneath. He’s waiting, watching a mechanic adjust the device on his helmet.
“Forgot the spare visor tear-offs,” the guy mutters, patting his pockets. “Don’t move. I’ll be thirty seconds.”
He jogs away, leaving a pocket of sudden, heavy silence between us. I don't look up. I pick up a microfiber cloth and start polishing a sensor that’s already spotless. I can feel him. Even without looking, the air in the bay seems to pull toward him, charged with the leftover static from yesterday’s fallout.
“You weren't at the team dinner last night,” Dominic says.
His voice isn't the gravelly mess it was yesterday. It’s smooth, leveled out, and terrifyingly calm.
My hand stays clamped over the sensor, the cloth gone still. I focus on a tiny scratch in the metal, counting the seconds before I answer.
“I wasn’t hungry,” I say. I keep my back to him, reaching for a zip-tie I don't actually need. I can hear the lie in my own voice—it’s thin and brittle.
“Liar.”
I hear the shift of his weight, the soft scuff of his boots on the concrete. “I looked for you.”
The air in the bay seems to stall. My fingers seize around the plastic tie, the sharp ridges digging into my skin.I looked for you.The words are a soft, blunt strike, and I can practically feel the intensity of his gaze boring into the space between my shoulder blades.
My mind stutters, trying to make the math work. Dominic doesn't "look" for people. He doesn't even look for his own race engineer half the time unless there’s a trophy involved. He’s the phantom of the paddock—a guy who treats team dinners like community service and mandatory sponsor events like a slow-speed technical failure. He’s made an art form out of being physically present but emotionally a thousand miles away.
“Landon said you weren’t feeling well,” he continues, his voice dropping into a lower, more territorial register.
