Page 37 of Raced (Driven 3.50)
And I know she’s exhausted. She misses the boys desperately despite being on the phone with them every chance she gets. Add to that the nightmares she’s been having every night that wake me, allowing me to be the silent witness to the fucking agony I’m inflicting upon her. She shouts out Max’s name. My name. Begs for us to live. Begs to take our place so she can die instead. Begs for me not to race again. Screams for a car to stop and let me out. And I know this because I lie awake holding her while she trembles in her sleep. Holding her—holding on to her as I breathe in everything I can—so that I can live with the ghost of her when I finally bring myself to do what I need to do.
Be selfless for the first time in my life.
And the time has come.
Way too soon—forever would be too fucking soon—but it has come.
And the thought has every single fucking part of me protesting over the gut-wrenching hurt that’s to come. That I’ll be inflicting on myself. Pain I’m sure that will be a thousand times worse than these ear-splitting headaches that come and go on a fucking whim, because this kind will be from tearing myself apart, not from trying to put myself back together.
Humpty fuckin’ Dumpty.
She sighs softly, shifting in her sleep, and a curl falls over her cheek. I give into the need—the one that is so inherent now that I’m fucking scared to death of how I’ll be able to lessen it in the coming days—reach out and move it off of her face. I curse my fucking fingers as they tremble from the after effects of what we still hope is just swelling. They stop shaking and so I let them linger, enjoying the feel of her skin against my fingertips.
What the fuck is going on with me? How is it I fought my whole life to not need, to not feel … and now that I do, I’ll gladly take the pain so she doesn’t have to?
But the thought I can’t shake keeps tumbling through my obviously screwed-up head. If she’s my fucking pleasure, how in the hell am I going to bury the pain when I push her away? From pushing her away? I shake my head, unsure, and welcome the stab of pain from the action because it’s got nothing on what’s going to happen to my heart.
But there’s no other option. Especially after overhearing her on the phone with Haddie last night when she thought I was asleep. Hysterical hiccupping sobs. Denials of how she's ever going to watch me get in a car again. Hearing the brutal reality of what she went through killed me, fucking ripped me to shreds as I lie with my back to her, remorse hardening my heart, tears burning my eyes, and guilt submerging my soul. Learning that her abrupt trips out of my hospital room are so she can throw up because she’s so sick with worry over it. How she’s eating Tums like candy to lessen the constant acid eating through her stomach from my need to return to the track. How she’ll support me, urge me, help me get back in the car, but will have to sneak out before the pace car is off the lead lap. How she won’t be able to hear the sounds and see the sights without replaying the images that
are etched in her mind. Won’t be able to look me in the eyes and wish me luck without thinking she’s sending me to my death.
A shiver of recourse revolts through my body.
And then there’s the other hint that I’m getting from her—that I can see in her eyes when she shifts them away—that tells me she knows something I don’t. She has one of my memories and is holding it hostage. But which fucking one?
The hints swirl of what I’ve lost in the black abyss of my mind. Ghosts of memories converge, overlapping and all shouting for attention at once. They scream at me like fans asking for autographs—all begging for attention—faceless, nameless people all wanting something—yelling at the tops of their lungs—and yet all I hear is white noise.
All I see is a blur of mixed color.
Why is it I can still remember the shit that stains my soul but I can’t seem to remember the bleach I’ve found that washes it away? And I have a feeling that whatever Rylee is guarding is that important. That monumental. She wouldn’t be keeping it from me unless she was trying to protect me. Or her.
But from what?
In my dreams I hear her saying she can’t do this anymore. Is that it? Is she going to end this? Is she going to walk away and never look back? Break me into a million fucking pieces?
What the fuck, Donavan? You’re going to do it to her. Walk away to save her from yourself. And you think it’s going to be any easier just because you’re doing it? Think that the acid-laced knife that’s going to barb through your heart is going to hurt any less because it’s by your own hand?
Fucking crash.
Goddamn prescriptions that I swear are messing up my head.
Fucking voodoo pussy.
My fucking Rylee.
I watch her. Can’t move my eyes away from those thick lashes on cream-colored skin. Over her all-consuming lips and down over the swell of her tits. She’s arms’ length away but I still know how she smells. How she tastes and sounds and feels. It will forever be embedded in my mind.
Irremovable.
Irreplaceable.
Yeah, my dick stirs to life—it’s Rylee, isn’t it? But so much more stirs and swells and hopes that I don’t even fight the tears welling in my eyes. For the second time in more years than I can count, I let the tears fall. Silent tracks of impending devastation staining my face.
Who knew that doing what was right for someone else could feel so incredibly wrong? Could break the strongest man by weakening his heart?
Will reduce me to nothing?
I know she can give me what I need—quiet the demons in my head that torment my soul and parasitic heart—like the adrenaline of losing myself in the blur at the track, but I can’t do that to her. I can’t in good conscience hold on to her so tightly in order to lose my demons when it’s causing hers to invade her sleep. I can’t take the pleasure when it’s causing her all of the pain.
