Rebel With A Cause (3 page)

“
Eleven
grand
,
”
Carter replied.

Kaitlyn gasped.
“
Eleven?!
”

Carter shrugged, like it was no big deal.
“
Yeah, eleven G’s.
Might throw in some cars or girls again, spice it up a bit.
”

“
Isn’t eleven G’s already spicy enough?
”

Carter laughed.
“
No way.
Where’s
the risk in that
? Eleven
grand
is tame as! Twenty, now that is spicy. Fifty is even spicier.
Might go for fifty if you’re so set against the girls and cars ideas.
”

Kaitlyn sighed. Carter was playing with her, yet again.
He knew she wasn’t keen on him betting large sums of his money, especially against Marcus.

“
Ok, girl
s it is,” she conceded.

Carter grinned and kissed her cheek.
“
Love you, Katie.
”

Kaitlyn just rolled her eyes. It really wasn’t worth commenting on.
She’d said it all already, and he’d never paid any attention to her before.

“
Ok, guys,
”
the race marshal
said.
“
Hand over your money and your girls. This isn’t a winner chooses lottery. This is all or nothing.
”

Kaitlyn watched as Carter handed over his eleven grand. That was money that he could have saved, or added to his sixty grand house deposit stash.

The marshal looked at her.
“
Kaitlyn, do the honours?
”
he asked her.

Kaitlyn nodded curtly and got into position. She watched as the racers got into their cars and started their engines. She saw Marcus wink at her, and Carter’s look of fierce determination.

Maybe it wasn’t just the money that made him do this. Maybe it was the pride of being the best.

Or maybe it was just the attention.

Pulling her hair out of its high ponytail, she shook it out and fluffed it up with her fingers. Carter didn’t even notice, but that wasn’t the point. She wanted to distract the
other
racers.

Raising her arms above her head, the newbies revved their engines.
It was a common newbie mistake, and chances were high that they would have a bad start.

Carter’s car blew steam out from the undercarriage,
a modification that Kaitlyn had watched him install.
Marcus switched on his flashing party lights.
Now
those
were kind of tacky.

“
Ready…
”
Kaitlyn
yelled. She paused for effect.
“
GO!
”
she screamed.

The boys floored it, streaming past Kaitlyn and making a hell of a
roar
. She turned around and smirked. Carter and Marcus were nowhere to be seen, and one of the new guys had just blown
out
his engine. Another was just about to lose control of his car.

Such were
the perils of street racing.

“
So, Carter bet you again?
”
the marshal, Arthur, a.k.a T-Man, asked her.

“
Yeah,
”
Kaitlyn replied nonchalantly
, acting like it was no big deal
.
“
But I really don’t care. I’m getting sick of him anyway.
”

T-Man chuckled.
“
I should think so. He thinks he’s God’s gift to women.
”

“
Not bloody likely,
”
she scoffed.
“
Girls only like him because of his rep.
”

“
And you don’t?
”

“
He was nicer when he was a newbie.
”

“
Yeah,
”
T-Man said
quietly
after a pause.
“
They all are.
”
He grabbed her hand and dragged her over to the sidelines, where they waited with the other girls, his arm never leaving her shoulders.

What Kaitlyn didn’t know was that
Carter was having an internal dilemma.

He was really into Kaitlyn, and anyone who wanted to
hurt her needed the
lights punched out of them, but he was getting sick of her. She never left his place, although he knew her house was way nicer.

Although
she put up with his hot and cold moments.

But he wanted a night off from their relationship. Was that so wrong?

For years, he’d been a player. Since he was fourteen, it had been a different girl every night.
That was four long years of sleeping around.
Kaitlyn was his first serious relationship.

And he didn’t know how to handle it.

So, selfishly, he considered losing on purpose. There was one girl in his neighbourhood who had been eyeing him up
recently, and he quite liked the look of her. If he lost Kaitlyn, that w
ould get rid of her for a night, and allow him to hook up with that girl.

Only,
Kaitlyn would belong to someone else for a night, and he couldn’t trust that someone not to hurt her. There was also the fact that
he would lose eleven grand, too. What was a guy to do?

Fifteen minutes later, Kaitlyn watched Marcus and Carter slide around the corner.
Their tyres squealed on the road.
She watched as they drifted and revved their engines, mentally blocking out the sound of the crowd. She saw the grin on Marcus’ face, and the scowl on Carter’s.

They were less than one hundred meters from the finishing line, and time seemed to slow as she watched them come to the finish. She held her breath nervously, waiting for someone to cross the finish line.

She couldn’t breathe. She felt nauseous. Whoever won the race determined who she went home with tonight.

Please,
 
she prayed silently.
 
Please, let him win
.