18. Maddox
Maddox
From the way Mom and Grace look at me, they’d forgotten I was in the kitchen, and it’s like I walked into a conversation I wasn’t meant to hear. Mom excuses herself to call Patsy, leaving us alone.
Grace leans against the counter, arms crossed, chin tilted in that way she has when she’s bracing herself. “You survived dinner.”
“Barely.” I grab a towel, needing something to do with my hands. “Your friend talks a lot.”
“Not a friend.” Her response is quick and pointed. “And yeah. He’s a whole thing.”
My mouth curves despite myself. “You two ever date?”
Her eyes widen slightly. “That’s none of your business.”
She’s right, but I don’t back down. “That a yes?”
“Asked and answered. You’re deflecting.”
“Maybe.” I take a single step closer, enough for the air to shift between us. “But you didn’t say no.”
She opens her mouth then closes it before cutting me a look that could draw blood.
I grin. I can’t help it even though the triumph tastes bitter.
“I knew it.”
“Why does it even matter?”
“It doesn’t.” I shrug, hoping that sounds more convincing out loud than it does in my head. “Except maybe it does.”
Her breath stutters, slightly, enough. “You’re impossible.”
“So I’ve been told.”
The air between us pulls taut, incendiary and fragile. Her gaze flicks to my mouth—quick, instinctive, there and gone before she can stop it—and she looks away. She blushes like she’s given something away she didn’t mean to, like she’s hoping I missed it.
I didn’t miss it, and every inch of me knows it, and we shouldn’t be standing this close again.
My body remembers before my head catches up—steam, her breath against my mouth, the way she chased mine when I pulled back. That near-miss still lives under my skin, a low simmer I haven’t shaken since that night.
I’ve replayed it more times than I’ll admit, the brush of her lips, the sound she made when I stopped. I promised myself I wouldn’t do that again.
Grace lifts her eyes, and whatever resolve I had fractures. Her arms fall away from her chest, shoulders loosening as the line she’s been holding quietly gives way. She steps close enough that her warmth bleeds into mine.
The dishtowel hits the floor, and my hand rises slowly, stopping just short of her waist. A question. A warning. She answers by closing the distance.
Her mouth finds mine, and there's nothing tentative about it this time. Certain and warm, her lips part—she's done waiting, last night's fuse finally burning down to this.
I groan into her, low and helpless, hand gripping her hip hard enough to anchor us both as I deepen the kiss.
Grace melts into me, fingers curling into my shirt, body brushing mine.
I devour her mouth, claiming it as mine, slow and thorough, enough to make my head spin and my control quietly unravel.
She tastes like want and speed, the hit I used to chase on the track when everything turned feral and right. I always believed nothing would ever match it.
Until now.
We break apart fast at the sound of footsteps. My chest heaves, jaw rigid, every nerve still lit with her name.
The color drains from her face as Blane freezes inside the kitchen doorway, camera strap sliding off his shoulder, eyes bouncing between us. A slow, knowing grin spreads across his face, sharp and satisfied, like he’s confirmed a theory he’s been running since he arrived.
“Well.” He adjusts the strap with elaborate casualness, gaze sliding to Grace with something that sits on the wrong side of friendly.
“Interesting angle for a profile piece. Pretty sure Toby has opinions about reporters getting this close to their subjects.” He takes a beat, light as air, pointed as a blade.
“Guess who’s officially moved in.” He grins, clapping his hands together.
“Lucky us.” I open a cabinet I don’t need anything from to keep from saying what I’m thinking.
Because I clocked it—the threat wrapped in his too-big smile. What I can’t work out is whether Blane would go to her editor—I think that’s who Toby is—or whether it’s just leverage he’s filing away for later.
Either way, the fact he’s holding it over her head and timing the drop tells me everything I need to know about him. A man who’d use Grace’s career as a weapon isn’t someone who has her best interests at heart.
“Although there are still a few bags to haul up those stairs.” He grumbles, clearly looking for help. “On Monday, I’ll start getting footage at the school.” He drops into a chair, all loose limbs and manufactured ease. “Practice sessions, interviews, the works.”
“Fine.” I keep my tone even. “Just stay out of the kids’ way.”
“Of course.” He shoots Grace a wink. “I’ll stick close to Gracie. Always do.”
The nickname lands the same way it did at dinner—a clean spike of irritation I have no right to feel but can’t help. And Blane, who absolutely knows what he walked in on, is enjoying every second.
Grace produces a painful smile, the kind that costs her something. “Let’s get the rest of your stuff upstairs.”
She’s already moving toward the hallway, and he follows—too close, still grinning. Even from behind, I track the tension in the way she holds herself, the oversized sleeves of my sweatshirt swallowing her hands.
My guess is she’ll do damage control; after all, he threatened her career. While it makes sense, I don’t like it. A sharp burning sensation radiates from the center of my chest as I watch her go to clean up a mess he created.
I stay in the kitchen long after the house quiets, and when I finally head upstairs, sleep takes its time arriving. My mind keeps pulling me back to tonight.
Grace laughing softly into her napkin, tucking her hair behind her ear, leaning incrementally closer without seeming to notice. The way she’d fisted my shirt. The sound she made against my mouth. The scent of her still clinging to my hands.
Somewhere between the fire and tonight, I stopped seeing her as someone temporarily passing through my world, and that rattles me. Because wanting her—really wanting her—might be the biggest mistake I could make. And I’m starting to suspect I’m going to make it anyway.
Sunday morning comes too fast, and Blane is already at the kitchen table when I walk in. My mother hums at the stove, and his equipment and bags somehow take over half the kitchen.
“Good morning, Coach.” He’s insufferably bright, the kind of cheerful that comes from having something to smile about.
He glances at his watch as Grace comes in from what looks like a run, hair pulled back, a few damp strands escaping at her temples, cheeks flushed, chest rising with steady breaths.
She’s wearing a fitted long-sleeve shirt that hugs every line of her torso and leggings that leave absolutely nothing about the shape of her legs to the imagination. And I’m not sure if I prefer her in these skin-tight clothes or my sweatshirt.
The sight of her hits low and immediate, and I square my shoulders, ordering my hands to stay where they are.
I shouldn’t be feeling this way, where my chest tightens and I have to consciously draw a slower breath now that she’s here.
The traitorous part of my brain conjures an image of matching my stride to hers in the early morning quiet, just the two of us and the open road. No agenda. No feature. No Blane.
She gifts me a lopsided smile, and somehow it lands deeper and harder than a full grin.
Before I can say a word, Blane snaps his fingers. “I had an idea last night. Two, actually, but the first one’s gold.”
He slides his empty coffee cup to the edge of the table with the casual expectation of someone who’s never had to refill his own.
“Grace wants action shots. Our editor will demand it. The good stuff, authentic, high-energy.” He leans forward. “So, hear me out. The racetrack. There’s one around here you used to use, right?”
Grace drops into a chair. “Yes.”
He leans forward, animated, gaze landing on me. “We get Coach here behind the wheel. A few laps, maybe some drills. Capture that spark.”
Grace turns to me, eyes bright with something close to excitement. “Would you?”
That look—hopeful, unguarded—hits somewhere I’m not prepared for, and it takes everything in me to shut this down.
“I don’t really race anymore.” I casually scratch at my eyebrow, not able to fully look at her as I turn her down.
Blane’s snort cuts through the kitchen. “Come on. Once a driver, always a driver.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“Isn’t it? Because I pulled your old footage last night.
You were something else out there. Fans loved you, sponsors loved you.
” He leans back, comfortable in his smugness, and pauses for a beat, deliberate and pointed.
“Funny thing, though, Grace’s notes stop right where things get interesting.
About a year ago, you retired at twenty-seven, came home.
No explanation. That kind of gap doesn’t write itself. ”
The words needle my growing irritation.
Behind me, Mom quiets in the way she does when she has opinions she’s decided to keep to herself. For now.
I look at Grace, and her gaze flashes with annoyance aimed at Blane.
How much does she share with him? Am I not supposed to know that?
Notes were one thing—that’s the job, and though I didn’t like it, I understood. But this feels like something else, like I’ve been discussed, dissected, handed over in pieces I didn’t agree to give.
My nostrils flare, and my chest tightens, hot and uncomfortable. I’m too old for this and know all too well about what it costs to let someone close, too familiar with the wreckage it leaves behind. After Erica, I set a simple rule—anything that even smells like attachment, walk away.
Yet here I am, crossing lines with a particular blonde journalist lodged somewhere deep under my skin that I’m not sure I know how to reach.
And maybe Blane still has a claim on her. Maybe whatever was between them isn’t as finished as she made it sound.
She straightens, setting down her coffee cup with a quiet click. “What are you talking about? That’s the second time you’ve talked about reading my notes or materials, and I’ve never shown anything to you.”
Something alert and near hopeful skitters down my spine. What did this asshole do now?
He grimaces. “You, uh… you still had me on your shared drive. From the Mensah piece.” His expression turns sheepish. “I may have had a look.”
The silence that follows is pointed, and Grace’s expression does the work of telling him exactly how long that access will last.
He lifts both hands, clearly uncomfortable with her glare as well as mine.
“I’m just saying, the article needs depth, the footage needs punch. And what better punch than a former Formula One driver back on his old track?”
She stabs him a look that would have a better man flayed on the spot before she shifts her now more neutral gaze to me. “Maddox, is it even open today?”
It isn’t, but it can be since I own the place.
When I heard they were going to tear down the track and build houses on the land, I couldn’t let that happen.
The speedway holds a lot of good memories—amazing times with my father—and it’s my place, where I go to breathe.
But I also wanted it kept open for the kids, for the schools in the area to hold events, for the community.
And now, the small note of hope in Grace’s voice and the knowledge she hadn’t given Blane an all-access pass to my life—he’d just helped himself to it—pulls at something I’d rather it didn’t. She makes me want to please her, fulfill her every wish and need.
Fuck.
Blane senses my hesitation, and like a vulture descending on its prey, he moves in. “Something tells me you could make it work either way.”
Mom sets a plate in front of me and pats my shoulder. “Wouldn’t hurt to show them around, honey. Good for you to get out of your own head.”
I stare at the pancakes, contemplating how best to say no even as yes bubbles on my tongue. Every sensible part of me knows that not going there is the best response.
But then Grace smiles—small, uncertain, like she’s not quite sure she’s allowed to want this—and something in me gives way despite every warning bell going off in my head.
“Fine.” I grip the fork a little tighter than necessary. “We’ll go.”
Blane claps. “Amazing. Gracie, go get changed. Maddox, eat up.”
Grace laughs under her breath, bright and unguarded, and it does something to my chest I wasn’t prepared for.
Maybe this is a mistake. Maybe it’s the beginning of something I can’t stop. Maybe it’s both.
I do a few chores around the house first, basically stalling and hoping someone needs me somewhere. No such luck.
Then we pile into my truck. Grace sits in the passenger seat, window cracked, hair catching the afternoon light.
Blane’s in the back, holding court about shot lists and natural lighting and “capturing the essence of a fading legend,” which earns him a long shut-the-fuck-up look in the rearview mirror.
Grace scowls at him over her shoulder. “Stop poking the bear.”
“He likes it.” Blane hooks his thumb at me.
I absolutely do not.
But when Grace turns back to me, smiling like she’s trying to soften the edges, like she’s quietly on my side even when she has no reason to be, something shifts in my chest, tender and uninvited. It’s the kind of feeling I recognize too well and have spent years learning to speed on past.
Apparently, I’ve forgotten how.