Chapter Twenty-Three #3
Because somewhere in the middle of all this chaos, three men showed me what it feels like to be wanted without having to earn it first. What it feels like to belong somewhere, to take up space, to stop dimming myself just to make everyone else comfortable.
And yeah, one of them took a piece of my light with him.
A pretty fucking big one.
But whatever’s left is still mine.
And I’m done hiding it.
****
The tribute ends and the paddock starts moving again almost immediately, which feels wrong in a way I don’t have time to sit with.
One second Wolfe’s face is still up on the screen and the entire place is silent for him, and the next engines are firing, officials are calling riders forward, tire warmers are coming off, helmets are being fastened and the TT is carrying on like it always does.
Maybe that’s the only way any of us get through today.
Keep moving before the grief has time to catch up.
By the time I’m called toward the start, my heart is hammering hard enough that I can feel it against the inside of my leathers, but my hands have stopped shaking.
I don’t know when that happened. Somewhere between checking the bike for the last time and pulling my helmet on, the panic narrowed into something I understand better.
Focus.
The bike beneath me feels familiar now.
Not mine, but close enough, even though it technically belongs to the sponsor team.
I know the lever position, the way the clutch bites, exactly how much pressure it takes to settle the front under braking and how the rear responds when I get greedy with the throttle.
I know every adjustment because I made most of them myself, and after spending two days wondering if I could ever trust my own hands again, there is something weirdly comforting about putting my life directly on top of my work.
Andre’s voice comes through my headset as I roll forward.
“Ride your race, Echo. Don’t chase anybody, don’t get clever because you see a number ahead of you, and trust the bike.”
“I know.”
“I know you know. I’m saying it anyway.”
The corner of my mouth twitches inside my helmet. “Very inspiring.”
“Shut up and ride.”
That sounds more like him.
I settle into position as the rider ahead of me launches, the sound of the bike disappearing down the road leaving a few seconds of silence before the marshal looks toward me.
For one stupid moment, everything comes rushing back.
Wolfe’s empty bay.
His mom telling me how much he loved us. Thorne’s hand in mine during the tribute. The fear in my faces eyes when I told him I wanted to race, even though he’d only just met me.
The number three on the front of my bike.
Three men who somehow taught me what it feels like to be loved without making me earn every fucking inch of it first.
Then the marshal signals, and I go. At first, the acceleration hits hard enough to rip everything unnecessary straight out of my head.
There is no room for grief once the speed builds.
No room for guilt either.
The course demands too much from me to let my brain wander, and for the first time since Wolfe’s crash, I’m grateful for something that doesn’t give me a choice about where my attention goes.
Every braking point arrives fast, every corner forces a decision, and every stretch of road asks me to trust myself before I have time to second-guess it.
So I do.
The bike feels fucking incredible.
The front stays composed when I brake hard, the rear moves just enough on corner exit to tell me I’m working it without ever feeling loose, and the controls sit exactly where my hands expect them to be.
I push through the first section carefully, almost too carefully, because some part of me is waiting for the bike to punish me for believing in it.
It doesn’t.
By the next sector, I stop riding like something is about to go wrong and I start riding like me.
And somehow, that changes everything.
The road comes faster, but so does my confidence.
I let the bike run where it wants to, stop overthinking every little movement underneath me and trust the setup I spent hours building.
Houses and stone walls blur at the edge of my vision, the road rises and drops beneath me, and every exposed section gives me another reminder that the TT is completely fucking insane.
I love it anyway.
That realization almost pisses me off.
After what this place took from us, I want to hate every mile of it.
But I can’t.
Maybe that’s part of what makes all of this so hard.
Andre feeds me updates when he can, keeping the comms clean enough that I’m not trying to process six different conversations while flying down a public road at a speed no sensible person would ever consider reasonable.
“Talon’s through clean.”
Relief flashes through me, quick but sharp.
“Sayshen?”
“Through.”
I breathe a little easier.
“Reign and Revel are both good, Draygon’s moving well, and Thorne is through the previous sector.”
“Copy.”
“And you’re quick.”
I almost laugh.
“Not gonna lie, coach, you sounded surprised just sound. I am a Shaw after all.”
“I’m trying to keep your ego manageable.”
“Well, it’s a little to late for that.”
I hear what might be a breath of amusement before the line quiets again.
I don’t ask where I’m running.
That becomes important very quickly because I know myself well enough to know what will happen if Andre tells me I’m anywhere remotely competitive.
I’ll start chasing, and he specifically told me not to get clever.
Unfortunately, clever is one of my favorite bad ideas.
So I keep my mouth shut and ride.
The further I get, the better it feels.
My body stops fighting the bike and starts moving with it, every shift and braking point becoming instinctive enough that the terror loosens its grip.
At some point, I catch another rider ahead.
That is when my restraint nearly goes to shit.
I see him through the next section and immediately start calculating where I’m stronger, whether I can close the gap and how much time I might make up before the next timing point.
Andre’s voice cuts into my helmet like he can read my mind.
“Don’t.”
I blink. “Don’t what?”
“Whatever you’re currently considering.”
“You are very annoying.”
“I’ve known you long enough now.”
I exhale through my nose and hold my pace rather than throwing away a clean race trying to prove something that doesn’t need proving.
Annoyingly, he’s right.
Again.
When I finally cross the finish line, I don’t even know where I placed.
All I know is that I finished.
The second I back off the throttle, adrenaline crashes through me hard enough to make my entire body shake.
My arms ache, my legs feel like I’ve spent hours clamping them around a fucking earthquake, and the first proper breath I take once I slow down feels almost too big for my lungs.
I bring the bike into the paddock and barely get both feet down before mechanics have hands on it.
I pull my helmet off, suck in a breath and immediately look toward the timing screens.
Andre is walking toward me.
There’s something on his face.
I narrow my eyes.
“What?”
He shakes his head once, almost like he can’t quite believe whatever he’s looking at.
“Andre.”
“You came fourth.”
For a second, I genuinely don’t understand the sentence.
“Fourth what?”
His eyebrows lift. “What do you think?”
I stare at him.
Then I look toward the board.
My number is sitting there.
Three.
Fourth overall.
My mouth drops open.
“No fucking way.”
Andre finally lets himself smile. “Way.”
My eyes scan the names below mine, and then I see it.
Talon.
I beat Talon.
A laugh bursts out of me so suddenly it hurts.
“Oh my fucking God.”
Andre already knows exactly what I’ve spotted. “Well shit, I don’t recommend rubbing that one in,”
I’m looking across the paddock before he finishes.
Talon is pulling off one glove, talking to Sayshen near the barrier.
“HEY!”
He turns.
I point violently at the timing screen.
His eyes narrow before he looks.
There is a beautiful, glorious second where I get to watch him find my number, then his own.
His head slowly turns back toward me.
I grin so hard my cheeks hurt. “I beat you.”
He looks deeply unimpressed.
Which makes it ten times better.
“By fuck all,” he calls back.
“Still counts!”
“You’re going to be fucking annoying about this, aren’t you?”
“For the rest of our natural lives, big brother.”
Sayshen laughs beside him, and Talon gives him a look that says betrayal apparently runs in the family.
For a few seconds, something inside me lifts.
It doesn’t erase Wolfe.
Nothing could.