Chapter 37
Colin
A little bit of pressure – from myself – was a good motivator.
I had half of the Tour still ahead of me, if I was lucky and my injuries didn’t fight back.
Ten stages until Paris – to show Leesa I would do anything to keep her in my life and try to make up for all the weird stunts I’d pulled before I started believing we could really be together.
It should have felt like a distraction, planning ways to convince Leesa we had to stay together after the Tour, but my two goals coalesced seamlessly into everything I was fighting for.
Both would show her what I was made of, that I was serious about my life and her place in it, regardless of whether I brought home any silverware.
Although it would be a fuck of a lot easier if I did win something. I reckoned she’d like it too.
I had to improvise on the first morning.
My body creaked and groaned as I hauled myself out of bed, but the compression bandage on my arm appeared to have done a good job and I didn’t notice any swelling.
My reflection in the mirror startled me.
I was black and blue as though I’d been in a bar brawl – not just my face, but all over my torso dark spots were coming up.
But I had too much to achieve that day to linger, so I slung on tracksuit pants and a loose T-shirt and padded down to the breakfast room in my slides.
Thankfully I’d beaten almost everyone else up, so all I had to do was take aside a member of hotel staff to enact the first stage of my plan.
When Leesa emerged through the doors an hour later, I stood and approached her with a smile, slipping my hand into hers. She peered questioningly up at me, but I was determined to do all of this perfectly, so she’d have no doubts left by the time I told her everything.
‘I’m sorry for the sock thing,’ I said softly into her hair as I pressed a whisper of a kiss there.
She scowled. ‘That is the worst kind of prank: a prank that’s not actually a prank.’ Of course I hadn’t put anything in her socks, but I knew just mentioning the possibility would have had her checking every pair.
I let go of her hand. ‘Enjoy your breakfast.’
Still glancing warily at me, she headed for the buffet and I held my breath, waiting to see if my plan would actually work. When she went straight for the little container of cornflakes, a stubborn look on her face, I couldn’t stifle my grin.
I saw the exact moment the little object plopped into her bowl. It would have been impossible to miss, because she yelped, dropping the container to the table with a thud. A hand on her chest, she peered at me again with narrowed eyes.
But when she picked through the flakes to fish out the object, she studied it curiously. It was a wrapped local chocolate – les Pyrénéens, little bite-sized bars of filled dark chocolate – with six legs, two feelers and some beetle wings drawn onto it with permanent marker.
My first goal of the day – making Leesa smile at me – achieved, I went to find the chief mechanic to bend him into my service for the most important part of my plan, which would take some time – hopefully not so much that I missed my shot and she left for America before I could sort it out.
I also called our cleaner back home in Lourdes and requested a favour.
There was an embarrassing object in the back of my cupboard I needed her to post to our hotel in Paris in preparation for the moment I would place my pride on the line for a chance to make it all real with Leesa.
Only then did I turn my attention to the mammoth climbs that awaited me on stage 12. It was a miserable stage – not the weather, because the July sun was still sending its cruel rays to peel up the back of my neck, but the relentless pace of the peloton made no allowances for my recovery.
I was two minutes down on the white jersey, back in 16th place overall. It was a miracle it wasn’t more, but two minutes was probably insurmountable at this point, unless I had great luck – or the others had rotten luck.
The aim for the day was just to survive.
Amir and Nellie stayed close in support, but I’d insisted we send Derek out and the kid had a great time in the breakaway, although he was caught again with 10 k to go.
Staying with the peloton to the end lost me another 30 seconds on GC and I had to spend another hour letting Angie test everything under the sun, but I was cleared to continue, which was enough for now.
One day at a time…
I got some supplies shipped to the hotel in Gap for the rest day that I was holding out for, so I had to improvise again on the morning of stage 13.
Waiting until Leesa was in the breakfast room, I prepared my prank and then strode in, stretching out my time at the buffet as long as I could without arousing suspicion and then sashaying past where she was sitting with Wil.
I was afraid for a moment she wouldn’t bite, but then Wil called after me, ‘Uh, you’ve got a… something on your back.’ She stood and plucked off the sticky note, inclining her head to read it. ‘It says: “Hug me”. I didn’t know you needed a hug. Come here!’
With an inward groan, I submitted to a hug from Wil, but Leesa laughed at me over her coffee cup as I leaned down to squeeze our diminutive marketing officer. Mission sort of accomplished.
Two hilly stages and a flat one rounded off the time until the rest day, with views of the fantasy-castle city of Carcassonne and glimpses of the Med.
I still didn’t trust my body very far, but the strange thing about endurance was that the harder the race got, the stronger I felt.
The grazes were healing and I imagined they would heal up tougher than before – kind of like my heart.
When we piled into the hotel in Gap at the end of stage 15, I was so upbeat Amir was grumpy with me, although he still hung around to see what was in the box of supplies I’d ordered for my win-Leesa-back-and-maybe-also-a-stage-of-the-Tour-de-France plan.
For the rest day, after our recovery ride, I pulled on my brand-new T-shirt and a pair of shorts and went down to lunch with my chest puffed out like a male duck. I had a lot of practice with swagger that came in handy that day as I wore the shirt with pride, waiting to see how she’d react.
Leesa
I knew something was up as soon as I walked into the dining room for lunch – not only because Colin had already pranked me with nice things nearly every morning, but also because my gaze was drawn straight to him and he was obviously holding something in.
He sat up straight when I saw him and I froze, my mouth swinging open.
A flush of embarrassment rose up my chest when I saw what was printed on his T-shirt, but it was already mixed with a shot of gratification.
I hadn’t seen that photo in months. I looked rather good with my mouth open in a shout of triumph, one hand above my head in a fist as I crossed the line on my bike in Geelong.
But it wasn’t quite the angle I remembered from the press shot published after I won the Great Ocean Road Race. It was slightly to one side, as though—
When my gaze snapped up to his, I found him looking at me as earnestly as he ever had, brows raised. He gave me a little nod which I took to mean that what I was thinking was correct: he’d taken that picture himself. The flush over my skin became something else entirely.
After lunch, he dragged me into the paved streets of the town, ringed by forested slopes and rocky peaks.
With the yellow and ochre render on the houses and the colourful shutters, Gap had a Mediterranean flair, even though it was tucked in the mountains.
There were a couple of really nice patisseries where Colin demanded I share my treats and proceeded to devour half of my French custard tart.
Then he was so guilty he blew a small fortune on handmade chocolates and thrust them at me.
He took my hand occasionally, his face a study in casual that I didn’t quite believe, but I wouldn’t dare make a comment in case he let go. Arriving back at the hotel, he stopped me before we entered the foyer.
‘Tomorrow or the next day,’ he began, thrumming with familiar energy, ‘I’m going to go for it. Not just a nice, safe attack 20 k from the finish line. I have to go early if I’m going to make up serious time. It could backfire.’
My hair stood on end and I nodded, not entirely sure why he was telling me, but understanding something on a non-verbal level from the way he took my other hand as well, threading his fingers restlessly into mine.
‘Will you scrape me off the road if I don’t make it?’ His eyes glinted with humour and I’d never had any chance of resisting the sparks he sent racing over my skin – and under it.
‘Do you mean physically or mentally?’ I asked.
‘Maybe both.’
‘I think you’re looking forward to it,’ I mused, drawing a grin from him.
‘What, the scraping? Yeah, you can put me back together any day.’
I nudged him with my shoulder, since he had both of my hands and I couldn’t poke him. ‘You know what I mean.’
He gave a thoughtful nod. ‘Yeah, I am. Maybe it’s the underdog thing, but yeah. Maybe it’s your eyes.’
That earned him a stronger shove. ‘It’s your character, not my eyes.’
‘I dunno,’ he disagreed with a cheeky smile. Then he hesitated before peering at me uncertainly and saying, ‘Just don’t go anywhere, okay?’
I stilled. Where would I go when I was following the Tour for my job? Did he mean don’t go back home? That was something I had not prepared a response to.
‘I mean after the Tour,’ he rushed on. ‘No, I mean— Don’t go without saying—’ He blanched and seemed to reconsider. ‘Don’t go without letting me say—’
‘Goodbye?’ I prompted when he seemed incapable of finishing the sentence. Given the sour taste of that word, I understood why he didn’t want to.
‘I hope not,’ he said under his breath. Grasping my hands more tightly, he managed to say, ‘I’ve got some ideas I want to run by you.’
‘Uh, okay.’ I didn’t know what to make of his heavy hints that could be anything from glue in my hair to jellyfish holding hands – or my wildest idea: that he wanted to carve a place for me in his life.
He looked relieved and lifted a hand into my hair, tugging me gruffly to him for a hug. I fisted the back of his shirt and held on, soaking in the warmth of his body and the mineral scent of him, the dynamism in his muscles and the push and pull of the way he held me.
‘You feel good,’ he said in a gravelly tone.
Then Amir’s voice interrupted. ‘Is that some kind of slow dance and I can’t hear the music?’
Damn this constant audience. I eased back at the disapproving rumble in Colin’s chest. Tipping my face up, I eyeballed him and whispered, ‘Go make your mark on the Tour.’ Then I pressed a quick, light kiss to his lips and slipped inside.