Chapter thirty five
Riven
The mountain looked like death tonight. Waiting patiently to claim more souls.
Watching. It always watched us. Headlights cut through the dark in violent streaks while engines screamed loud enough to shake the ground beneath my feet.
Dozens of people crowded near the starting line, gathering around boosted speaker systems inside trunks and concrete barriers, cigarettes and blunts glowing like embers in the dark.
The Daredevil. Stonebridge’s most infamous race.
Nadia’s race. The one she built. The one I stole from her after she left.
And tonight, the three of us were racing for the title of King.
Would I retain it, or would the crown sit atop a new head?
My hands flex at my sides as I watch her across the crowd.
Black racing jacket. Dark eyes alight in the neon light. Sharp jaw tilted stubbornly upward while Deck talked beside her. Beautiful and untouchable. And somehow still my fucking wife. I wonder if she knew I’d tossed the shredded divorce papers out the window of my car the night I took her title?
The fucking audacity of her to send me those. The thought makes my chest ache. Ever since the clocktower, my head had been fucked beyond repair. Because I was angry. Still angry. But every time I look at her now, all I can think about is Vegas.
Her leaving to protect me. Her carrying that alone for two years while I hated her for it.
And the worst fucking part? I understood why she did it.
That was what ruined me. Understanding her always ruined me.
I fucking despised her for leaving, but I can’t say I wouldn’t have done the same in her shoes.
If it was me, getting cryptic messages and pictures, seeing her get hurt because I refused to give in to these threats?
I would’ve left too. How terrified she must’ve been.
Knowing they had her brother, knowing they had me.
Didn’t make anything about our situation better, though.
She still left, and I crumbled. Someone shoves past my shoulder, snapping me from my thoughts. Shane hands me a cigarette.
“You look homicidal.”
“I always look homicidal,” I reply, taking a drag.
“More than usual.” He lights his own cigarette before glancing toward Nadia.
“You two finally done tryna to psychologically destroy each other?” He asks.
“No.”
“Shocking.”
My eyes find her again automatically. Like they always fucking did. She chose that exact moment to look up and caught me staring. For a second, neither of us moved. Then, she starts walking toward me. The crowd instinctively parts for her.
Nadia Slade had that effect on people. Fear. Respect. Awe. She stops directly in front of me. Close enough that I can smell gasoline and smoke clinging to her skin.
“You got a minute?” She asks quietly. Shane immediately vanishes. Smart man.
I stare down at her for a long moment before jerking my head toward the tree line away from the crowd.
We walk in silence until the noise from the race fades slightly behind us.
Wind tears through the mountain pass hard enough to bite.
Nadia pushes her hands into her jacket pockets.
That’s how I knew she was nervous. Because Nadia Slade was always in control of every part of herself.
She never let anyone but me see her true feelings. So, her hiding her hands spoke volumes.
“What?” I ask when we finally come to a stop. She exhales slowly.
“I was wrong.” The words hit me harder than they should’ve. Because she was rarely wrong. And if she was, she never said that shit. Ever.
“I thought leaving was the only way to keep you alive.” She quietly explains.
“I thought if I stayed, they’d destroy you.”
“They did anyway.” The words come out rougher than I intended. Pain flickers across her face instantly. Fuck, this isn’t how I wanted this to go. The cold night air bit as silence stretched between us.
“I’m sorry.”
That one nearly takes me to my fucking knees. Because Nadia doesn’t apologize either. Not really. Not unless she meant it with every piece of herself. I look away toward the dirt trail twisting into darkness below us.
“You disappeared,” I say hoarsely.
“Do you have any idea what that did to me?”
“Yes.” The immediate answer catches me off guard. She steps closer slowly.
“I do now.” God, there it was again. That unbearable thing between us. Love mixed with damage until neither of us knew where one ended, and the other began.
“I hated you. I tried so fucking hard to hate you.” My head falls back, eyes closed.
“I know.” She solemnly responds.
“But every time somethin’ happened-” I laugh bitterly.
“Every fight. Every race. Every shitty thing in my life, you were still the first person I wanted to tell.” Nadia’s throat bobbed hard.
“You still are,”
I confess to the land, the air, and the sky. To the darkness that consumes us and, most importantly, her. The wind howls through the trees overhead. But then, her hand touches mine. Carefully. Not possessive or demanding. Just there. Choosing me.
“I’m tired of us hurting each other.” She confesses now, making my chest tighten painfully.
Because so was I. Without a warning, I grab her wrist and draw her into me hard enough to make her gasp. My forehead presses against hers.
“You can’t leave me again.”
The words came out wrecked. Raw. More vulnerable than I intended.
A plea from my soul to hers, begging her to fix this, to never hurt me, to never leave me again.
Because I would sooner die than ever live without her again.
I could take whatever life threw at us; I was strong enough.
But without her, I was weak. Without her, I saw death and walked the line between this life and the next.
Never again. Nadia’s hands slide up my chest slowly.
“I know.”
“You swear to me.” My eyes were burning.
“I swear.” Her eyes were glassy.
I search her face desperately for any sign she was lying. I can’t find one. Not a single one. Just exhaustion. Fear. And love. The kind that destroys people. A horn blares from the starting line in the distance.
Race time.
“We should go.” Nadia pulls back first, albeit reluctantly.
I don’t let go immediately. I didn’t want to. Eventually, my hands loosen from around her waist. But not before I kiss her once. Hard and furious. Like I needed the reminder she was real.
Then, she was gone, and I immediately felt the absence of her like a missing limb. But this time, there was a tiny sliver of something that felt like hope blooming in the wasteland that was my heart. Because I knew she would cross that finish line. And I knew she would come back to me.
_____
The crowd erupts as engines roar to life at the starting line. Three cars, three racers. One mountain. The Daredevil wasn’t just a race; it was survival. Sharp cliffs. Blind turns. No guardrails. One mistake meant a brutal death.
Nadia climbed into her Viper without looking at anyone else. The engine purred beneath her hands like something alive, something familiar. On her left, Dion slid into his Mazda, headlights cutting through the mountain fog.
And then on her right, there was me. Exactly where she left me two years ago. King of the Daredevil. The title should’ve felt earned. Instead, it always felt stolen. Because this was her track. Her race, her legacy. I only inherited the crown because she vanished.
The crowd surges around us violently, screams echoing through the mountainside while flames from bonfires danced against chrome, carbon fiber, and neon. Everybody in Stonebridge knew what tonight meant. This wasn’t just another race. This was history.
The return of the queen. The king defending his throne. And Dion somewhere in the middle trying to prove he belonged beside us.
I slide into my NSX leisurely, fingers tightening around the steering wheel.
My pulse was already wrong. Too fast. Too loud.
Because of her. Because not even ten minutes ago, Nadia stood in the trees and promised she wouldn’t leave me again.
Now every thought in my head was tangled around that confession.
That apology. That fucking look in her eyes when she said,
I’m tired of us hurting each other.
I hate how badly I want to believe her. The flag girl tonight was Hatchie, who swaggers to the center of the road swinging his shirt over his head and holding the flare gun high.
The onlookers fell silent. For one impossible second, I can feel Nadia looking directly at me through the tinted window.
Not at the crowd. Not at the racers. Me.
And suddenly I wasn’t thinking about winning anymore. I was thinking about mornings at the clubhouse. Oil stains on her fingers. Her legs tangled with mine in bed. Wedding rings. Promises. Home.
The flare explodes into the sky, and chaos erupts instantly.
All three cars launch forward wildly, tires screaming against pavement as engines thunder loud enough to shake the mountain itself.
The first stretch was pure speed. Long winding roads cut through Greyveil Summit before narrowing into deadly curves near the cliffsides.
I shift hard into fourth gear, adrenaline ripping through my bloodstream as Dion surges ahead beside me. Nadia stays close behind at first before slipping between both of us with frightening precision. A grin almost breaks across my face despite everything. There she fucking was. Daredevil.
Nobody drove like Nadia Slade. Not reckless.
Not flashy. She controlled chaos. As the mountain belonged to her and her alone, everybody else was just borrowing it.
The crowd checkpoints blur past in flashes of firelight and screaming bodies.
Radios crackle constantly through the mounted speakers near the course.
“Slade takes first at Widow’s Curve!”
“Devereaux right behind her!”
“Holy shit, did you see that pass?”