Declare (Declan Reede: The Untold Story #4) (19 page)

I couldn’t help but smile at the knowledge that Hunter had committed the cardinal sin in racing—never fuck with anyone who has your safety in their hands. I wondered whether anyone would notice if I didn’t completely tighten the nut on his wheel when he came into the pit. Although maybe it was safer for me to convince one of the other boys to do it, considering any fuck-up on my part would be assumed to be intentional.

The cars had one final check-over then rolled out onto the grid. Morgan and Hunter waited by their cars, with Eden and Liam darting between them, while the official proceedings started at the start/finish line.

Despite my prime position in pit lane, I couldn’t hear anything that was said over the blood pumping loudly through my ears as I watched the slimy bastard posing for photos with the grid girls. I could see his hands wandering all over their bodies, and I couldn’t help picturing his hands roaming over Alyssa while she struggled to fight him off. I snapped the pen I had been holding in half, drawing my attention back to the sheet in front of me. I tossed the broken pen and the clipboard to one side.

Pull yourself together
.

Danny already wanted my arse because of what happened by the trailers. At least, I could only assume he was going to take it out on me. Regardless, I couldn’t make it worse for myself. No matter what anyone told him, he would likely assume that I was at fault. Despite the progress we’d made, I had no doubt this would put us back to square one. I would be the baddy and there was jack shit I could do about it. I wondered if that would ever change. I even began to wonder whether it was even worth it.

I looked up in time to see Eden come running into pit lane.

“Look sharp, guys,” she called. “It’s time.”

She nodded to me briefly. The look in her eyes confirmed that she knew precisely what had happened with Hunter. I tried to put it out of my mind and took my position with the rest of my crew, waiting for the first pit window to open.

We were all on tenterhooks as we waited for the call that our driver was hitting the pits. Every one of us knew that pit stops were where the races were really won or lost. I may have hated Hunter, I may have wanted him gone from the team, but I was still a Sinclair man through and through and wanted us up on the podium. The V8s roared past us at regular intervals and, although it was still early, everything looked on track for a Sinclair Racing one/two.

Finally, the call came in to ready the pits. Morgan was due to come in for his first pit stop in four laps. Two laps passed quickly and Morgan’s crew got ready to meet him, rolling his wheels and tyres into the pit area.

The lap before he was due to come in, Hunter’s voice squawked through the radio. “I’m coming in.”

“Hunter, no, we’re ready for Morgan—not you,” Eden said.

“Well,
get
ready for me,” Hunter snapped. “I’m coming in.”

“Fuck!” Eden exclaimed. She pulled her mic away from her mouth. “Everyone scramble!” she shouted before spending the next precious few seconds arranging with Morgan to stay away from the pits for another few laps.

“My tyres are wearing out,” Morgan growled. “I need to come in.”

“Hunter’s coming in this lap—give us two laps,” Eden said, exasperated. “Please?”

“Fine!” Morgan snapped. “What the hell is his game?”

I was wondering the same thing myself as I joined the rest of my crew getting everything we needed for Hunter’s car out onto pit lane, sidelining all of Morgan’s equipment. Hunter was already in the pits and waiting long before we were ready. Precious seconds had already slipped away before we even started.

I finished changing his front wheel and raised my hand to let everyone know I was finished and clear. I looked down through the netting and saw Hunter was giving me the finger. With a surge of anger rushing through me, I leaned forward to slap the car. At the same time, Hunter got the all-clear to go. He took off, almost taking my arm with him.

“Fucker!” I screamed.

“Reede!”

I snarled at the back of the car before turning around to look at Liam.

“What have I told you?” he snapped. “A thousand times. When you raise your hand, it means you’re clear. Once you’re clear, stay away from the damned car!”

“Yes, sir,” I said. I knew there was no point arguing, because I knew the safety rules well enough. No matter what happened once you’d given the all-clear, you stayed back. It was far too easy to lean back into the car and have your foot run over or your arm broken.

Or worse.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: RECKLESS

I WAS FUMING by the time I walked back into the pit garage.

“Take it easy,” Eden said, slapping me on the back. “Try to stay calm.”

“Fucker tries to hurt Alyssa and then has the nerve—”

Eden cut me off with a motion of her hand. It wasn’t the time or the place.

I cleared out of the way so she could direct Morgan in. Glancing past the pits, I watched as Hunter circled again. I didn’t know what the fucker’s plan was, but I knew he’d deliberately fucked Morgan over with the pit stop.

Morgan had ended up having to run at least three laps on old tyres, which would definitely have caused him some delays. Not to mention that it fucked with the whole race strategy Danny, Liam, and Eden would have worked out with Morgan before sending him out.

Thankfully, the race wore on without any further complication. Lap after lap the cars raced past, and just as I had every other race meet, I felt my fingers twitching with need and desire to be out there with them. I loved being in the pits and, through my experience, I understood how things worked better than I ever had before. But that didn’t mean I didn’t want to be out there.

The inner workings of the cars were no longer the mystery to me that they’d once been. I’d always known the theory of course, and I’d been more than able to service my own cars, but actually stripping an engine down and rebuilding it was a priceless experience. Still, nothing could ever compare to the thrill of chasing down a competitor or the ecstasy of being out there with six hundred horses at the mercy of my right foot.

Another pit stop for tyres and fuel came and went.

Once the dust had settled on the second pit window, Hunter and Morgan were first and second on the track, with Will Reid right behind them. Hunter was defending his position aggressively against Morgan, throwing his car around the track and driving hard into the corners.

I couldn’t understand why he wasn’t just using his lead to push himself further forward. That’s what I would have done. Leave second and third to battle it out while relishing the additional speed granted by the clean air. Instead, he was allowing himself to get mixed into the battle and slowing himself down. It was just all-around bad race strategy.

The defensive driving techniques of Hunter allowed Morgan to sneak up on him and slingshot around him coming out of turn thirteen. They were neck and neck as they hit the straight, with Morgan edging slowly in front.

“Go, you good thing,” I whispered. Similar sentiments were murmured all around me. Although everyone wanted a Sinclair Racing one/two combo, there wasn’t a single person in the pits who wouldn’t have preferred to see Morgan in front.

Just as they approached the small bend in the straight, Hunter twisted his wheel sharply, clipping the rear right-hand side of Morgan’s car. To anyone else watching, it may have just looked like Hunter had oversteered for the corner, but I knew him, and the car, well enough to know that it wasn’t an accident.

“Motherfucker,” I cursed under my breath.

He’d managed to hit Morgan’s car in exactly the right place to send him pirouetting down the straightaway at top speed. It left little doubt in my head that it was deliberate. Will slid past Morgan’s car harmlessly as soon as it started its fast spin. I heard Eden’s horrified gasp when she realised what was going to happen, almost at the exact time that I did. There was only one way it could go. Unless Morgan pulled some kind of fucking miracle out of his arse and wrestled control of the car, he was heading straight for the wall.

I turned to Eden and saw the colour drain out of her face. She chewed on her lips briefly before bringing her fingers into her mouth. The stress in the pits was palpable, despite the fact that only seconds had passed since Hunter’s deception. I wanted to shout out that it was all right and to explain that the cars were designed for safety—that it was rare for anyone to get seriously injured in them—but everyone around me knew that just as well as I did.

I, who had crashed so many times in the last six months of my career, had never experienced the level of fear that ran through the pits as they watched helplessly. Those who couldn’t see the track from their current position had their eyes firmly glued to the monitors.

I watched in horror as the rear of Morgan’s car barrelled into the concrete barrier. The force of the hit was so hard that a ripple ran down the fence all the way back to us in the pits. The car ricocheted back across the track before finally rolling to a stop in the middle of the track just around the loose bend. Everyone in the pits crowded around the monitors and held their breath as the car finally settled.

“He’s in the blind,” I whispered. I remembered the track from last year. It was a loose turn, you barely had to twist the steering wheel, but there was a small section of track that couldn’t be seen until you were committed to the line. Morgan’s car was currently resting in that exact spot.

“Fuck!” Liam cried. He jumped onto the radio with the track officials, quickly explaining the full situation with Morgan. We were monitoring his vitals, but he hadn’t left the car yet. We weren’t sure whether it was because of safety concerns or injury—he wasn’t answering any radio calls. Eden was practically a statue with nerves. I could see the tears behind her eyes and her lips were moving quickly as she muttered something indecipherable. No doubt a prayer for his safety.

Less than a second passed before the cars in fourth and fifth shot out of the hairpin and down the straight.

“No!” Eden cried from nearby me, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the monitor to see her new pain. “They’re going too fast,” she whispered. “They’re going too fast!”

The officials brought out the yellow flags and both cars started to slow, but it was too late. There wasn’t enough room for both of them to get around Morgan, especially when they didn’t even know he was there and hadn’t seen his car until the last second.

I closed my eyes as the sound of metal twisting against metal rent the air. The sound of the collision was bad enough; I didn’t need to see it too. Eden’s pained cry made my heart ache. I turned and watched as, for the first time since I’d known her, she went against every rule in the book. She ripped her headset off and ran down pit lane in the direction of the accident. I didn’t have time to consider just how out of character it was, though, because I was running right behind her.

I CAUGHT up with Eden just at the exit of pit lane. We couldn’t see the carnage, and without our headphones, there was no way of knowing what was happening. We did see the marshals change the flags from yellow—meaning caution on the track and advising that the safety car was in control—to red.

Red: the conditions were too unsafe to continue the session and all cars had to stop.

The impact ahead was bad.

I grabbed Eden seconds before she ran blindly onto the track. I snaked my arms around her waist and held on to her from behind. She pummelled my arms with her fists.

“Let me go!” she wailed. “I have to go to him.”

“We will, Edie,” I said to her as calmly as I could while pulling gently against her. “But there’s no point in getting yourself killed in the process. Come up along the inside of the barriers. At least until we know the track is clear and the cars are stopped.”

I tried not to look at the red flags waving ominously from the sides of the track as we jumped over the barrier and ran in the relatively safe zone to where Morgan’s car had finally come to rest. Whenever the flickering red material did catch my eye, I tried to remind myself that red flags meant nothing more than a total track blockage. It didn’t mean Morgan was injured or . . .
worse
.

I held Eden’s hand as we rounded the corner, partly out of a desire to comfort her in some way but mostly to ensure that I had a good hold so she didn’t go barrelling off again. She wasn’t thinking straight. Hell, I was barely thinking straight.

The scene wasn’t pretty. There were three cars stretched from one side of the track to the other; although, I wasn’t sure Morgan’s wreck would still classify as a car. It was upside down, no longer had four wheels, and the entire front end rested near the far boundary fence, having obviously been torn off by the impact with car number fifteen.

Eden froze. She shook her head in disbelief before closing her eyes.

“No,” she sobbed softly. “No, this isn’t happening.”

I watched as the drivers of the other cars pulled roughly on Morgan’s doors, trying to wrench them open.

“Stay here,” I commanded Eden. The last thing the scene needed was a hysterical woman, and even the most stoic professional was bound to become a little hysterical when confronted with a car accident featuring her fiancé. Regardless, I needed to help.

Despite there being five men on the track already, Morgan’s door still wasn’t open. Worse, from the little I could see through the netting, he wasn’t moving at all.

I started off for the track and felt Eden close by my side.

“Eden, please?” I begged. “Stay.”

“No! If . . .” She trailed off.

I could see the blind panic in her eyes. She closed her eyes and swallowed roughly. When she opened them again, her face was calmer and she was slightly more in control, but I knew from my own experience that her control would be tenuous at best.

“If anything happens, I want to be there.”

I looked over at the scene. More people were flooding in now—not just track officials and fire marshals, but TV and photo crews. Each one trying to get the perfect photo of Morgan’s broken car, or even better—in their newsworthy, jaded eyes—his broken body.

“Fucking vultures,” I muttered under my breath.

Just as we climbed over the barrier and back onto the track, the rescue crew finally wrestled Morgan’s door open and pulled him from the wreckage. He was on a stretcher and into the onsite ambulance in next to no time. Even as he was loaded onto the stretcher, he remained motionless.

At the sight of Morgan’s prostrate body, Eden collapsed. Luckily, I saw what was going to happen seconds before it did and was able to get my arms around her just as she fell.

Unable to control herself any longer, she sobbed against me as I held her tightly. I picked her up into my arms as gently as I was able and carried her back through the pits and toward the trailer. I knew Morgan would want her by his side as soon as possible, but for the moment I needed to take care of her for him. I would make sure she was there for him before he woke. And he
would
wake. I couldn’t even bear to imagine any other possibility.

By the time I got back to the trailer, all of the crew were outside waiting for news. The sight of Eden in agony sent a shockwave through them. She’d always been the strong one in the team, the one to rally the troops and give them hope when something went wrong.

Everyone parted before me as I walked toward the trailer, giving me space to take her through to the control centre. Each of the monitors was a reminder of Morgan’s current situation. His car’s in-car telemetry was ominously still, all of the on-track cameras were trained on the accident scene, and the in-car camera was cracked and showing an upside-down image.

After helping Eden onto a chair, freeing up my hands, I turned off all the monitors. Neither of us needed the harsh reminder of what we’d just witnessed firsthand.

I sat on one of the spare chairs and pulled Eden onto my lap. I cradled her against my chest like a child and gave her the opportunity to cry it all out so she could be strong when she went to see Morgan in the hospital. If she went in her current condition, she would be of little help to him.

My boys seemed to understand what I was doing and set themselves up as bodyguards at the door. They didn’t allow anyone to pass, except Alyssa. She was in tears as she burst into the small room. She pulled the other chair up to my side and held my hand as I supported Eden. The three of us sat in near silence, broken only by Eden’s heartbreaking sobs and Alyssa’s quick, whispered update. Apparently, Danny had left for the hospital, but nothing more was known.

I wanted to give Eden the time she needed to recover, but started to grow more anxious about the passing minutes. I had to ensure she was by Morgan’s side as soon as possible. I knew I would have wanted Alyssa beside me immediately if the situation was reversed. After a few minutes, Eden’s body stopped shaking as violently, and she climbed off my lap.

She took a few tentative steps as she wiped the remaining tears off her cheeks.

“I . . . I’m ready,” she whispered. “Can you . . .?” Her voice gave out.

I nodded. “We’ll take you to him.”

As soon as we hit the stairs to exit the trailer, the flash bulbs started. Although Eden and Morgan had never really gone public with their relationship—at least outside of our admission on New Year’s that had never made it to print—they had never hidden it either, so the speculation had always been rife in the media. Seeing her on-track reaction seemed to have confirmed many suspicions, so everyone wanted her take on the accident. As we stepped outside, I had Alyssa’s hand tightly held in one of mine, and my other arm was wrapped protectively around Eden.

Through the throng of reporters, I spotted Hunter out of the corner of my eye. He was leaning casually against the trailer parked alongside Sinclair Racing’s, looking smug as fuck. If my mind weren’t so preoccupied with getting Eden to Morgan, I might have taken the opportunity to pummel the living shit out of him.