Then, reality comes crashing down on me, hitting me with the force of a tsunami, and I realize what I’m doing.
Wishing for things I can’t have.
The crash back to earth leaves me feeling breathless, like my chest is cracking under the pressure.
Carrick presses a soft kiss to my lips, jolting my attention back to him.
“Stay with me.” His lips move in soft, tender kisses over my cheek toward my ear, his hand curling around the back of my neck. “I’ll get us a room.”
“Where? Next to the one you have with Sienna.” It’s a shitty thing to say, and I instantly regret it.
Pulling back, he gives me a harsh look, and it makes me feel even worse than I already do.
I can barely meet his eyes. “I can’t stay with you.” I can feel the fear growing in me like a monster, readying to come out of the closet.
I let myself be selfish with Carrick, taking what I wanted with no thought for him or the consequences. I shouldn’t have. It was wrong of me. I know I can’t have him, yet I had sex with him again.
I’m leading him on. I’m not the type of person who does this. I don’t get involved with someone who I can’t give myself to even if just for a short time.
And I can’t give Carrick any of my time. I’m not the right person for him.
I don’t want to hurt him—that’s the last thing I would ever want—but I don’t know what else to do.
God, I hate how weak I am when it comes to him.
And knowing all of this, knowing how much I’ve screwed up with him, makes my panic climb to the highest level, and the worst thing about me when I panic is the person I become, the person I’m not.
“Don’t do this, Andressa…”
He tries to cup my cheek, bring my face back to his, but I do what I do best when I don’t know how to deal, especially with Carrick. I push him away—literally.
He moves back, slipping out of me, and I immensely feel his loss. Almost like he’s taking a part of me with him as he goes.
He yanks up his trousers, fastening them. His movements are rough with suppressed anger.
Ashamed, I move away, pushing my skirt down over my hips, smoothing it out. Bending, I pick up my ruined knickers from off the floor, closing my hand around them.
“I can’t believe you’re doing this again,” he says it so low, so harsh, that I freeze.
I lift my eyes to his, and I hate what I see there. “I’m not doing anything.”
Denial—it’s my best friend and my worst enemy.
“Just fucking don’t.” He stops me with his hand, his lip curling in disdain. “You’re doing exactly what you did in Barcelona, except I’m awake to see it this time.”
Shame lowers my eyes. “I’m…sorry. I just…” I hesitate, stuck on the words that are tearing me to pieces. The words that are going to hurt him. “I’m so sorry…” I whisper. “But…I can’t do this…with you.”
“Can’t do what exactly?” he snaps angrily.
I lift my eyes to his. I owe him that at least. “I can’t…” I pull in a strengthening breath. “I can’t give you any more than what just happened.”
He lets out a short bark of harsh laughter, but I can see the hurt in his eyes, and it’s shredding me to pieces.
“Fucking unbelievable!”
Out of nowhere, a shot of anger bursts through me. “What is it that you want from me?” I cry.
Fury flashes through his eyes. He takes an angry step toward me, backing me up. “Isn’t that already clear? I want you!” Lowering his eyes, he lets out a ragged breath. “I just want…you.”
So many thoughts and feelings hit me at once—fear, exaltation, panic, want, confusion, need.
But the overriding, dominating feeling, as it always is when it comes to Carrick, is fear. Deep-rooted dark fear.
And as always, with my fear comes panic, and panic is in my driving seat.
“I’m sorry…” My lips tremble. “I can’t be with you. You’re just…too big a risk for me to take.”
The look on his face. I never want to see that look on another human being for as long as I live.
He lets out a solemn, bitter laugh. “You know, I really wish I knew what that meant.”
His eyes meet with mine, and the anguish I see in them crushes me to pieces.
“From the moment I met you, Andressa, I thought you were strong, maybe the strongest person I’d ever met, and I admired that about you.” He lets out a staggered breath. “But I’ve come to realize something.” He leans in to me, his face close to mine.
I suck in a breath at the absolute blackness in his eyes, feeling it closing in all around me.
“You’re not strong. You’re a fucking coward. And I’m done.”
Moving me aside, he yanks the door open, and he’s gone, leaving me with only the resounding bang of the door as it echoes in the stairwell and deep inside my mind.
You’re a fucking coward.
Coward.
He’s right. I am.
I fall back against the wall, feeling like I’ve been shot.
The pain is unbearable. It feels like my heart is actually breaking, shattering into unforgiving icy shards inside of my chest.
Ironic, I guess, how I’ve always been so afraid of Carrick, of wanting him, afraid of the way I feel about him, and staying away for the fear of getting my heart broken.
But as it turns out, I’ve broken it all on my own.
And I have a feeling there’s no fixing it now.
WHEN CARRICK SAID HE WAS DONE, he meant it.
Andressa Amaro no longer exists to him. If she’s in a room, he leaves it.
She’s invisible to him.
Andi, his mechanic…well, she just barely exists.
At the track, he barks orders at her when he has to and ignores her the rest of the time.
I’m pretty sure it’s obvious to everyone, but they’re saying nothing, and I appreciate it. I’m guessing that’s due to Petra putting a gag order on them. Uncle John did notice Carrick being shitty to me the other day, and I got the raised eyebrow, which means his questioning will come sometime soon. I’m not looking forward to when it does.
I know people will draw their own conclusions as to why Carrick hates me. They’ll probably have the right conclusions. But for now, I just choose to live in my state of denial that everything is okay when it couldn’t be further from it.
In the first week while we were in Canada, Carrick was barely around, but when he was…it was horrific.
The first time I saw him after that night in Monaco, he looked at me like he hated me. It was painful. Actually, that’s putting it mildly. It was excruciating.
I have no one to blame but myself, but that doesn’t make it hurt any less.
I miss him with a physical ache. He was the best friend I ever had. That’s gone now, and I don’t know how to deal.
But I do know, feeling as badly as I do at the moment, how much worse it would have been if I had taken that step forward with Carrick and then lost him in the future.
I know I made the right decision—for him and me.
So, for now, I’m just living in a perpetual state of agony, waiting for things to get better.
Only…they don’t seem to be getting better.
If anything, it’s gotten worse—well, for me anyway. This past week in Austria, Carrick’s gone from being angry with me to nothing.
It was like the flip of a switch.
So, instead of being mad with me all the time, he just seems indifferent, like he no longer cares enough to be angry.
Now, when he’s forced to acknowledge me, I don’t get hate stares. I get apathetic looks.
And they’re heartbreaking.
At least when he was angry with me, I knew it was because a part of him still cared, and I had that to hold on to. Even though I don’t deserve anything, I had that, and I clung to it to get me by.
But now, that’s gone, and I’m just left empty, waiting for the hurt
to subside.
I can’t tell you how many times the words have been on the tip of my tongue, standing there before Uncle John, wanting to hand in my notice. But the cruel, sadistic side of me won’t let me because I can’t bear to leave Carrick.
Yes, I know how screwed up that is, but it is what it is, and I’m stuck with it until either Carrick fires me or I have a nervous breakdown, the latter looking quite likely at the moment.
If neither of those things happen, then, I’m doomed to ride the misery train I’ve created until the season is over in five months, and I’m forced to leave him behind, unless I decided to torture myself further and come back for the next season.
I’m sad, pathetic, and weak. I do know that. I just can’t seem to change who I am or the way I feel at the moment.
I know Petra is getting frustrated with me over the Carrick-and-me thing—or the lack thereof, as the case may be. She doesn’t understand why I won’t be with him. She’s still being the same awesome friend, supporting me, but I can see it in her eyes that she doesn’t get it. For her, it’s simple—you care about someone, then you’re with that person.
I know she tried to understand me and my situation, but she can’t fully grasp the reality of what I feel unless she’s lived through what I have. So, with her, I now put on the full act that I’m okay with everything, that I’m past everything. And I leave my tears for those moments alone when I’m in the shower, and it’s all just gotten a little too much for me to contend with.
When I got back to my room that night after Carrick and I had sex, Petra was awake, waiting on me. I took one look at her and burst into tears. After she let me cry on her shoulder, she said she thought that I should tell him, about everything—my dad, how I feel, and why I won’t be with him.
But I can’t. Because if I do, I know he’ll talk me around. And it’d be great for a while…but it’d only be a matter of time before something happened out on the track while I watched him race. That would set me off. I’d freak out and only end up hurting him worse than I have now. I know, in the long run, I’m not strong enough to stay.
I am a coward. Just like he said.
That is one of the reasons I’m where I am right now. Well, only a small part of the reason, the main being that I can’t miss the chance to be close to him again—and when I say him, I mean, my dad.
I heard about a vintage car show here, hosted by some rich guy, and my dad’s car will be at the show with a bunch of other vintage racing cars and cars of dead celebrities.
It worked well as an excuse to get me out of going to a dinner tonight. Uncle John asked me to attend as his plus-one, but I know Carrick is going also. He wouldn’t want me there, and I’m trying to make things as easy as possible on him.
I wonder who Carrick’s plus-one will be.
There’s been no more Sienna. I did see she’d sold her story to one of the dailies about her heartbreak over Carrick dumping her. But since her—or I should say, me—I haven’t heard of him being with anyone else. Doesn’t mean he hasn’t. From past experience, I know that nothing keeps Carrick down for long.
So, here I am, wandering through the big glass doors of the showing. I hand my ticket to the woman at the entryway. She gives me a pamphlet that details the layout of the show, and I make my way inside.
As I walk through the main door, I see the room is already buzzing with people. A waiter in a suit, standing by the door, hands me a complimentary glass of bubbly, which I take gratefully. A bit of liquid courage.
I know it sounds a bit crazy for me to be so nervous about seeing a car, but this car represents and holds most of my best memories with my dad. So the thought of seeing it leaves me feeling a little shaky.
I haven’t seen his car since my mum sold it at the charity auction, right before we left England to move to Brazil. I was so angry with her at the time. The others, I could let go of, but this one, this was our car. In this car, he took her out on their first date, he drove them away from the church after they’d gotten married, he took me to my first day of school. He always took me out in that car every chance he could, just for a drive.
He loved that car. He’d bought it as a wreck and restored it. That car was an extension of him, our family, everything that he represented.
It took me a long time to realize why my mum had gotten rid of it. Having it would have been a constant reminder of everything she had lost.
And after meeting Carrick and having him in my life, even for a small portion, I understand it even more.
I look down at the pamphlet, looking for my dad’s car. I want to see the others, but I need to see his first.
It’s in the center showing. Looks to be one of the main attractions here.
I fold the pamphlet and put it in my bag. Then, I down the bubbly. I give my empty glass back to the waiter, thanking him. I take a deep breath and make my way to my dad’s car.
I glance at other cars as I pass, noting which ones I’m going to come back and pay more attention to, but my focus is on the black Jaguar XK120 M Roadster that I can see on the podium up ahead.
My heart starts to beat faster with each step I take.
It hasn’t changed. It looks exactly the same, and it’s as pristine as ever. The wheel trims are still painted bright red to match the red interior lining and red leather seats.
It looks like it hasn’t been touched since the day it left my family.
As I move near it, I press my hand to my beating heart.
There’s a placard in front of the podium, asking people not to touch the car. Then, another one is beside it, detailing the car’s history with my father’s name right at the top. It briefly talks about how he restored the car and how he had it up until his death in 1991. Then, it was bought at an auction and has remained in this collection ever since.
I take a step closer to the car. I can smell the fresh wax coming from the paintwork. I quickly glance around to see if anyone is watching, and then I gently touch my fingers to the car. The memory of the last time I was in it with him comes back to me like it was only yesterday.
“Come on, Dad. Drive faster!” I said over the sound of the breeze whipping through my hair. “You’re driving like an old-aged pensioner!”
“I’m doing seventy.” He laughed.
“Like I said, driving like a pensioner. How can the world’s number one racing driver go this slow? Seriously, how do you win your races again?” I was winding him up to get my own way. I knew just how to play him to get what I wanted. He was so easy, my dad.
He slid me a glance and grinned.
I loved his smile. There was just something about it that always told me just how much he loved me.
“Fine.” He gave a little huff. “Just don’t tell your mother I was speeding again with you in the car because she’ll have my arse—head,” he quickly corrected. “She’ll have my head if she finds out.”
I giggled at his slip up. “My lips are sealed.”
I did the lock-and-key action and pretended to toss the key out of the car, making him chuckle.
“Seriously, I just don’t get why Mum hates you driving fast, why she worries so much. It’s your job, for God’s sake.”
“And that’s why she doesn’t like it.”
I gave him a funny look.
He cast me a look and smiled. “She worries because she loves me.”
“I don’t worry.”
He gave a soft laugh before looking back to the road. “It’s different for your mother. One day, when you’re a grown woman and you have a man of your own—preferably when I’m senile, blind, and deaf—then you’ll understand.”
“Ugh! God, Dad!” I squealed, shoving him in the arm, causing him to laugh loudly. “I’m never going to have a boyfriend,” I told him huffily, folding my arms over my chest. “Boys are idiots.”
He looked at me again, tension in his brow. “That kid Patrick still giving you a hard time?”
Ugh, Patrick Webber, the bane of my existence. Seriously
, the guy wound me up all the time. Constantly going on about how tall I was, calling me lanky and saying I was like a boy just because I was into cars. Honestly, one of these days, I was going to punch him right in his perfect nose.
“Nothing I can’t handle.” I shrugged.
“Well, if it gets to be too much to handle, you tell me, and I’ll sort him, okay?” My dad chucked my chin with his finger.
I smiled back at him. “Okay, Daddy.”
He looked back to the road.
“Dad?”
“Hmm?”
“I just…I want you to know that I don’t worry like Mum does when you drive ’cause I know you’re the best driver in the whole world. Not because I don’t love you.”
He stared at me for a long moment. Then, he reached over and put his arm around my shoulder, pulling me to him. He kissed the top of my head. “I know, kiddo. I love you, too. And you’re right. I am the best driver in the world.” I could hear the grin in his voice. “So, are we taking this baby up to maximum speed or what?” he said, releasing me as he turned onto a stretch of clear country lane.
“Maximum speed!” I yelled, laughing, putting my arms up in the air like I was on a roller coaster.
He let out a rumble of laughter, his foot pressing down on the accelerator. “Scream if you wanna go faster, Andi.”
“You know you’re not supposed to actually touch the cars.”
I’m jolted out of my memory at the sound of Carrick’s voice. My hand recoiling from the car, I swing around to him.
As I stare into his face, my heart thumping wildly. I see concern cross Carrick’s brow, and I realize that my cheeks are wet with tears.
Turning my face away, I quickly brush them gone with my hands.
“Hey, are you okay?” His voice is soft, caring. He takes a step toward me, his hand reaching out, but then he stops before he touches me, as if catching himself.
“I’m fine.” I force a bright smile onto my face.
“You don’t look fine.”
“Well am I. I’m great.” I lift my voice. I know it sounds unnatural, but I don’t know what else to do.
Because I won’t explain to him why I was just crying while standing before William Wolfe’s car.