Dangerous Curves (23 page)

“How did you recover from all that and then get it together enough to start winning races?”

“Luck.”

A cameraman focused on Rob Williams, showing the wry look he shot the viewers. “Bull,” he said.

“All right then, hard work. After what happened
in Atlanta we put everything behind us and moved on,” Blain said.

And for some reason, Cece didn’t think Blain was talking about his race team.

“But how?” the host asked.

Blain shrugged. “When bad things happen, it makes you see life in a different light. Makes you change. I think our whole team changed after that.”

The host nodded, then said, “Rumor has it that you loaned your home to one of the FBI agents injured in Atlanta, at least for a short while. Is that true?”

Cece’s hands flexed. So did Blain’s. She could see his knuckles whiten for a second as he rested his fists atop a checkerboard counter.

“It’s true. She was there for nearly two months.”

Rob Williams’s blond brows rose. “That was a pretty cool thing to do.”

“It was the least I could do, Rob. I was in love with the woman.”

Silence. And though she had a feeling it wasn’t easy to do, the host looked blown away.

“In love with her?” And then you could practically see the cogs of the host’s mind turn. “What’s this? Do I sense a story?”

Pain sliced into her palms. Her nails. She’d clenched her fists too hard.

“There’s no story to tell except I was an ass and I let her go.”

“You sure were an ass,” Lance said. The camera zoomed in the driver’s face. “Blain was a total jerk.”

“I was.”

“I almost quit driving for him,” Lance said.

Because of her? Cece hadn’t known about that.

“I would have understood,” Blain said.

“Cece deserved better,” Lance insisted.

“Cece—is that her name?” the host asked.

And Cece couldn’t believe it. She was having one of those out-of-body experiences. It was some other Cece they were talking about on national television.

“That’s her name,” Lance was saying. “She was an old high school flame of Blain’s.”

“She was never a flame,” Blain corrected. “But in hindsight, I would have been smart to snap her up.”

“What’s the story here, guys?”

Blain looked at Rob, and as calm as you please, relayed the details of how they’d met. Cece sat in her chair, dumbstruck, as he regaled the studio and the viewing audience with everything. The fact that they’d strayed completely off the topic of racing didn’t seem to matter to anyone.

“And then she got hurt,” the host said when Blain talked about Atlanta.

“And it was my fault,” Blain admitted.

“That couldn’t have been easy to deal with.”

Blain shook his head. “It wasn’t. She was so vibrant, so full of life—and then she wasn’t anymore.”

Vibrant? Full of life? She sounded like a shampoo commercial.

“But the worst of it was,” Blain was saying, “I never told a soul about us. A few people guessed, but after Atlanta, I let everyone think we were strangers.”

Was that true? Cece had been in such a void in the months following the accident, she hadn’t paid a lick of attention to the press. Had he played their relationship off like it was nothing more than a friendship? Apparently so.

“And she deserved better than that. She’s an amazing woman.”

“Man,” Rob said. “I feel like Jerry Springer.”

“Can I be the one who hits him?” Lance asked, waving a fist at Blain. Laughter off-camera. Cece hardly heard it. Blain stared into the camera, stared at
her.

“Well, Blain, since we’ve regressed to trash TV, I may as well ask. If Cece’s watching, is there anything you want to say?”

It felt as if every organ in her body stopped working. She couldn’t move—well, she couldn’t really, anyway, but that was nothing compared to how she felt now.

“I’d tell her I was sorry,” Blain said at last. “And that I love her. And that she’s the sexiest woman in the world to me. I’ve always thought that, even when I was too scared to touch her. And that’s why I let her go—fear. I was afraid things would be different, and I didn’t want to face that.” He blinked a few times as he stared into her eyes.

There was silence in the studio. Not even the host moved for a couple of seconds. Then he grabbed a stack of papers in front of him, tapped the edges and said, “Well, okay then. Cece, if you’re watching, and you’re in a position to call back the hit man you sent after Blain Sanders, you better get in touch with this guy.”

“What about me?” Lance complained. “Don’t I get to say something to her?”

“No one wants to hear what you’ve got to say,” Rob quipped back.

The silence in the studio was once again broken by laughter. But Blain didn’t laugh. He never once looked away, never once cracked a smile as he stared into the camera, into her eyes….

Will you forgive me?

God help her, Cece wanted to.

B
LAIN FELT THE ODD LOOKS
the whole way to the garage. It wasn’t so much that people were laughing at him, it was more like they watched him.

Watching for what?

Granted, word had probably spread about his botched interview. The president of the Fortune 500 company that now sponsored his car even called to say he’d been watching. But to Blain’s shock, instead of reading him the riot act, the man had wished him luck.

Maybe that’s why everyone was looking at him so strangely, Blain thought as he headed toward his
hauler parked along the edge of the garage. The race was scheduled to start in less than an hour. Race fans already swelled the stands, the pre-race entertainment already under way. Blain glimpsed some dignitary being driven around the mile oval.

He was late. Normally he liked to be at the track first thing on race day, but today his heart hadn’t been in it.

She hadn’t called.

Granted, he didn’t even know if she’d been watching. It was ridiculous to assume she kept track of him. But there’d still been that hope.

“Gonna be a good day,” his crew chief, Mike Johnson, said with an optimistic smile. Blain was surprised to see him at the hauler instead of at their pit stall. “I can feel it in me bones.”

“Let’s hope so,” Blain said, looking down the long aisle of the big rig. “Lance at the driver’s meeting?”

“Actually, he’s in the lounge. Told me to tell you he needs to speak with you if you should happen to show up.”

What now? The kid had been pretty easy to work with lately, but drivers were a fickle bunch, prone to drastic personality changes the higher their stars climbed. Lance’s had been launched into deep space. Still, Blain liked the kid and appreciated the fact that he hadn’t given him grief after yesterday’s show.

But when he reached the step that led to the lounge, Blain happened to look to his right, and the sight of the wheelchair sitting there nearly brought
him to his knees. It lay against the side door, the aluminum frame gouged with wear marks, the tires dotted with tiny pebbles and grains of sand.

Cece.

He shoved the door open, hardly daring to hope, hardly daring to believe….

And there she sat, her beautiful green eyes wide. The sight of her sitting at the black Formica table, her hands resting calmly on its surface, didn’t seem real. How could it be, when the only times he’d seen her in recent months had been in his dreams? When the image of her face had been so overpowering at times that he’d had to physically restrain himself from picking up the phone and calling her?

Bob and Lorna had told him she was fine.

By the look of her, they hadn’t been lying. She looked better than good. She looked fabulous. And as he took in her stunning green eyes, her long, blond hair loose over her shoulders, he realized he was on the verge of tears. Again.

“You came,” he said.

“I came,” she echoed.

“You look good,” he said, because he didn’t really know what to say to her. One of the drawbacks of having asked for absolution on national TV.

“You, too,” she replied.

They stared. Neither of them moved. Of course, only one of them could.

“Jeesh,” a disgusted voice said from behind him. “Do I have to kiss her
for
you?”

“Lance,” Blain said over his shoulder, “get out of here.”

“I will,” his driver said. “But you better get a move on. We’ve got a race to run.”

Blain reached behind him and closed the door in the kid’s face.

Cece laughed that familiar, wonderful laugh of hers he’d fallen in love with, and suddenly everything was all right.

“Cece,” he said, tears stinging his eyes. “Oh, God, Cece, I’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you, too,” she said, answering tears in her own eyes.

And then he went to her and pulled her gently into his arms, reached down and kissed her, and as he did, he wondered how the hell he could have ever been afraid to touch her. She was the miracle in his life. The woman who’d showed him the meaning of courage. Who’d fought for her independence in a way that filled him with awe. Who’d proved to him that love wasn’t about physical intimacy, it was about the heart. She owned his heart, and he couldn’t believe he’d let her go.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his arms tightening around her so much that he worried he might hurt her. “I’m so sorry.”

He felt her head move, but not away from him. No, she nestled closer, the smell of her hair a sweet essence that he’d missed in recent weeks.

“I don’t know what happened.”

“You behaved like a jerk,” she said in her forthright way.

“I did,” he admitted, drawing back. “I did, and I’m sorry.” He swiped a lock of hair away from her face. “I’m so, so sorry.”

“But I behaved like a coward long before you behaved like a jerk.”

“Nah,” he said, suddenly feeling magnanimous.

“Yes, Blain, I did. I was afraid of falling in love with you. Afraid of laying it all on the line. But someone recently told me that she never regretted marrying the man she loved, even though she lost him. He was an FBI agent, and she knew that going in, but she wasn’t afraid to love him like I was afraid to love you. I’m sorry for that.”

“You don’t have to be sorry. You’re here now.”

He waited for her to acknowledge his words. But she didn’t move, and for a second fear rose in his throat.

“Cece?” he asked.

“I need to know that this isn’t about guilt, Blain. I need to know you aren’t saying this stuff out of pity.”

“Pity,” he said, touching her face, dragging a thumb down her cheek. “You think this is pity?”

And then he kissed her, kissed her in a way that only a man who desired a woman could kiss, touched her as he touched her in his fantasies. Only this fantasy woman was real, breathed her essence into him, sighed when their tongues met.

“If this is pity, Cece,” he said against her lips, “than I hope I go on feeling sorry for you the rest of our lives.”

And that was the moment Cece lost control. God, she’d told herself she wouldn’t cry. But when she looked up and saw the passion in Blain’s eyes, when she felt the echo of his rapid heartbeat against her chest, when she saw that his hands shook as he swiped at a lock of her hair, she did so, anyway. But it was a good kind of crying, the kind that erased old wounds, that brought peace, and contentment.

Blain held her.

The world was all right.

“Will you marry me, Cece?” he asked, his own voice hoarse, as if he’d been silently crying along with her in that odd way men had, as if by making noise they would be considered less masculine.

Will you marry me?

“Before I answer, I have something to show you.”

And watching how his expression turned from curiosity to sudden concern as she shifted her legs off the edge of the couch, to a look of unmistakable hope, nearly made Cece cry all over again.

“Watch,” she said, pushing him away.

Blain stood up and Cece scooted to the edge. Using the table and the back of the couch, she pushed herself up just as she’d practiced a hundred times before. Slowly, ever so slowly, she straightened, then gently let go.

There were tears in her eyes again as she said, “A
month ago I started to get some feeling back in my legs. At first I was afraid to hope. But the doctors, they confirmed….”

And they were both crying as she swayed there. But she didn’t stand by herself for long. She swayed toward Blain, who looked only too happy to pull her into the shelter of his arms.

“So, yes, I’ll marry you, Blain Sanders,” she said, tears making her vision blur. “But not before I can walk down the aisle on my own.”

He smiled, sheltering in her in his arms. “I have no doubt that you will, Cece. No doubt at all.”

And one year later…she did.

O
NE HUNDRED THOUSAND FANS
came to their feet at Phoenix International Raceway as the thirty-five car field made the final lap.

Actually, they watched only the front two cars.

Lance Cooper, Cup racing’s brightest star, raced side by side with the number thirty-two car, Lance’s brightly painted red-and-orange front bumper barely in front of the other.

“Careful,” the spotter’s voice said in his ear.

I am, I am,
Lance thought as he gripped the steering wheel, trying hard to maintain control. Tires were old. Too much scuff on the top line. Might have been a bad move…

His back end pitched.

“Son of a bitch.”

The crowd roared. Odd as it seemed, Lance could hear them, could feel their energy and excitement as he fought to maintain control.

He let his car drift down…in front of the thirty-two car.

The flagman waved the checker.

Quarter mile to go.

An eighth.

A tenth.

Finish line.

“Whoo whoo!” AllenMike said, the sound of his crew yelling in the background. “We
did
it!”

Yeah, they had.

He’d just won his first championship.

“Blain there?” Lance asked, the track in front of him suddenly shimmering.

“Here,” came his boss’s familiar voice.

“This is for you and Cece,” he said, feeling the tears hit the edge of his asbestos fire mask. The bitch of it was, he couldn’t wipe them away. But, hell, he didn’t care.

“We know, Lance,” Blain said. “We know.”

And in the pits, Blain looked over at Cece, who stared out at the track in between hugs from his crew, awe on her face as she looked up at the screaming fans.

“We did it,” he telegraphed to her.

Oddly, she seemed to hear him. She met his gaze and mouthed back. “We did it.”

And never, not once, had Blain believed this could happen. Two years ago he’d been struggling to put his team back together after Randy’s murder, with no sponsor, a new driver and a fiancée who refused to marry him until she could walk. And then this year…Blain swallowed as he looked up at the sky. Cece had married him. She’d walked down the
aisle, smiled into his eyes and said, “I do,” in front of racing’s finest and half the FBI, people who had become good friends.

He felt her arms wrap around him, arms that just a year before wouldn’t have been able to reach him without the help of her wheelchair. Now she was walking again, working, even undercover…although she’d been recently offered a job heading up the stock car association’s security, a job he was pretty certain she was going to take.

“Cece,” he murmured. And even though they both wore headsets, even though she probably couldn’t hear him, he heard her answer back, felt the rumble of her voice against his chest.

“Blain…”

Just then a reporter came up to them and a TV camera was shoved in their faces. Blain removed his headset, though he kept one arm firmly around Cece.

“Blain Sanders, what an incredible year,” the commentator said.

“Got that right, Dick.”

“Did you ever think at the beginning of the season that this is where you’d end up?”

“It was always a possibility,” Blain said, looking down at Cece, who’d removed her own headset. They caught each other’s eyes and smiled.

“This is a pretty neat wedding present,” Dick said to Cece. “Wouldn’t you say?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” she replied, giving the reporter
a mysterious smile. “I might have a wedding present that’s even better.”

“Oh, yeah? What’s that?” he asked.

But Cece didn’t answer. Instead, she looked into Blain’s eyes.

And he knew.

“Cece?” he asked, in front of a million viewers.

“If it’s a boy, I think we’ll name him Randy,” she said softly, the tears that had been in her eyes since Lance crossed the finish line rolling down her cheeks.

“Am I understanding this right?” Dick asked. “Are you two expecting?”

Cece’s smile was suddenly blinding as she answered, “We are.”

Blain barely heard the reporter; he was too busy pulling his wife toward him.

“Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“Maybe I’m not the only Sanders who likes to announce things on television.”

He hugged her as tightly as he dared without crushing her, and then he laughed. His crew slapped him on the back, word having spread of their good news. Someone showered them with something—water, champagne, Blain didn’t know. He didn’t care. He was too busy kissing his wife, too busy getting lost in the taste of her.

“Happy?” she asked when they drew apart.

“Happy,” he answered back with a soft smile.

“Good,” she said, snuggling into his arms.

And then he turned her to face their crew, face the people they loved…face their future.