Page 5 of Handle Me

The Rolls Royce that had driven me into Northhamptonshire waited by the curb. The door opened as soon as the driver saw me, and he jumped out to open my door.

“Miss Bishop,” he greeted me as I slipped into the plush backseat. He got back into the driver’s seat and turned to me. “Do you want me to take you to your cottage?”

The palace arranged everything for me before my arrival. A place to live. A driver. I even thought I’d caught a security detail keeping an eye on me at the track. The only person they didn’t prepare was Anders himself. My sister Clara had told me she liked him. I had no idea why. The guy was a total asshole.

“Actually…” I shook my head as I dug a driving permit from Anders’ wallet. “I need you to take me somewhere else.”

He didn’t question me as I rattled off the address on the card. He pulled away about the same time Anders came running out of the building, wearing nothing but a worn pair of jeans.

“Should I stop?” the driver asked slowly.

“No,” I said cheerfully. He nodded and turned out of the racing complex. Swiveling in my seat, I waved as Anders chased after the car in his bare feet. He flipped me off. I blew him a kiss.

Anders might not want my help, but I’d just delivered my first lesson.

Don’t fuck with the boss.

CHAPTER THREE

ANDERS

“What the hell happened to you?” Wilkes asked when I stalked back inside. He scanned me from top to bottom, his eyebrows knitting together when he saw my bare feet.

“Nothing,” I bit out. I wanted to scream ‘Lola Bishop happened to me’, but I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction.

“Okay.” He didn’t sound convinced, but he didn’t press me for more details.

A few guys from the crew threw looks in my direction. I glared back, but they only grinned. I couldn’t blame them. If it was one of them in my situation, I’d find this brilliant. But it wasn’t one of my guys. Hell had delivered a beautiful angel straight to my racetrack to torture me. I had no doubt the crew would be placing bets on which one of us would win this war at the pub later. Right now, I had to admit she’d won this round. I just needed to get home and plan my attack. There was no time to waste, not with a woman like her around. I got a few steps toward the locker room when I realized that without my keys or my wallet, I was shit out of luck.

I groaned and turned to call behind me. “Hey, Wilkes! Can I get a ride?”

“Sure,” he said, stopping. “Do you need a shirt, too?”

“Give me two minutes.” I ignored his question and headed into the locker room. Lola had left me my clothes. At least, everything but my socks. I rooted around for them before finally giving up. I pulled a clean T-shirt over my head and tried to tug my motorcycle boots on. Without socks, I was forced to jam them over my bare feet. I had to hand it to her. It was a clever fuck off. Taking all my clothes would have been juvenile, but my socks? That was just irritating enough to make me simmer.

“Took you long enough,” Wilkes grumbled when I finally came out of the locker room. “Does it take you a long time to get pretty?”

“Ask your new best friend. You sounded like you were about to braid her hair earlier.”

“There’s no harm in being polite.” He shrugged, but his head hung sheepishly.

“That’s why you went from screaming at her to kissing her feet?” I’d never seen my coach fall all over himself like he had in her presence.

But Wilkes didn’t seem as affected by Lola outside of her presence. “Don’t be jealous, Your Highness. Do you need me to kiss your ass and make it feel better?”

“For fuck’s sake, will you stop calling me that?” When they’d started using the nickname, it had felt like a way to make an awkward situation into a joke. Except I couldn’t change who my father or my family was, so now it didn’t feel like good-natured ribbing. It felt like being stabbed repeatedly with a sharp stick. It didn’t hurt exactly, but I still wanted it to stop.

“I think it’s catchy.” Wilkes whistled a tone-deaf tune as we headed out to his G-wagon. “Where to? Need a pint?”

“She took my wallet.” I slumped into the passenger seat. What the hell was I going to do about Lola?

“Did you provoke her?” Wilkes asked as he started the Mercedes.

“You could say that.” I wasn’t about to tell him what I’d said to her in the showers. Although he was only fifteen years older than me, I thought of Wilkes as something like a dad. I’d never known my father. My real father. My mother had given me the name of the husband she lost in the Gulf War and I’d worn it proudly, even though I’d always known the math didn’t add up. He’d been dead before I was conceived, which meant I was another man’s son, but I’d respected her wishes to honor Todd Stone with the title. In my eyes, he was a hero. I’d looked up to him every day of my life. When I finally discovered who had fathered me, it had been a punch in the gut. Not only because I lived a life so far from the privilege the rest of my biological family experienced, but also because, like Todd, my true father was dead. Maybe that was why I’d relied so heavily on Wilkes during my early days when I transitioned from motorcycles to Formula One. He seemed to feel the same way, or maybe he just thought someone had to keep me in line.

But I’d never been one to stay inside the lines. I’d made a career out of pushing myself as close to the edge as possible.

“I’ll buy you a pint,” he said with a sigh.