CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER thirty-three
Whenever David watched the nature channel, he often wondered why animals stopped fighting the second a predator closed its jaws around its neck. A gazelle had sharp hooves, a deer had antlers, and even a rabbit had claws and strong legs for kicking. They simply gave up and let the predator rip them limb from limb.
He understood now. Fear locked him in place as he listened to the ping, pong, ping of the baseball bat bouncing on each stone step as Klaus descended toward him. David kept his eyes on the ocean. He should have made Noah go to the beach. He should have shared those pink frosted donuts and licked the icing from his lips after. He should have quit racing to run away with him—away from this.
David’s fingers twitched as he chased the ghost of Noah’s hand in his, often his sole source of comfort. The past two weeks had been full of Noah doing his best to care for him—Noah did way more than he should have for a pathetic waste of a person like him. David was pretty sure he drooled all over the sheets during some of his seizures. Noah had seen all of those embarrassing moments when he should have been in Milan or Paris, wining and dining fashion people or working on the Cobalt car to take his racing career back.
Instead, David had forced him to sever his contract with Cobalt and didn’t even bother to ask Noah how he was feeling about it. Once again, he’d been too focused on himself.
Cold steel touched his neck. David let out a cry of pure terror but silenced it a second later as Klaus merely nudged him with the end of the bat.
“Face me like a man,” Klaus hissed.
The waves seethed at the shore beyond. David thought about running, but he’d already walked more today than he had all week, and his legs were still burning from it. He would never be able to outrun his father.
I’m sorry, Noah , he thought as he turned.
Klaus was wearing a plastic jumpsuit, and his eyes were so dark they looked like a window into Hell itself. He was going to kill him. His own father was really going to kill him.
“Dad,” David squeaked out.
“On your knees,” Klaus commanded. “Now.”
David couldn’t move. Even though he’d known what his father meant to do, seeing the evidence of his preparation made it real. David had always considered the possibility that one of his father’s beatings would be fatal, but it would still be an accident. Klaus would never truly mean to kill the family breadwinner—and David had always secretly thought his father loved him too much to really want to murder him.
Not anymore. Klaus was clearly prepared to kill him here and hide the evidence. He probably had a flight booked to some foreign country to hide in, and maybe he had some way of covering his tracks to prove he didn’t do it.
David dropped to his knees. Pain shot up his thighs on impact, but he didn’t make a sound. Sand wasn’t supposed to hurt, but he was weak. One hit to the skull would kill him, he hoped. It would at least knock him out so he didn’t feel the rest.
He squeezed his eyes shut when he heard plasticky fabric rustle as his father prepared the bat.
“Open your eyes,” Klaus said.
David shook his head. He couldn’t. Tears stung his eyes, and when his father prodded his cheekbone with the bat, he let out a ragged sob. His heart pumped so wildly that he figured he might pass out from that alone.
“I’m not going to kill you,” Klaus said in a softer tone.
David opened his eyes instantly, a stupid child chasing that shred of comfort in his father’s voice. Klaus loomed over him, turning the bat in his hands.
“I am going to make it so you never drive again,” Klaus said. “A few breaks to your spine ought to do it, don’t you think? Much better than death. Watching you stuck in your body, unable to beat the slower drivers who will take your place.”
David burst into tears. He dug his fingers into the sand and sobbed, broken by the thought of going through all of this just to be kept alive.
“You took racing away from me, so I think it is only fair to do the same to you,” Klaus said. “Don’t you agree that I’m being fair, David?”
David hung his head, unable to stop his crying long enough to respond.
Crack! Pain exploded in David’s right arm. He landed sideways in the sand, getting a mouthful and an eyeful as he screamed in agony, clutching for his arm.
“Don’t you think?” Klaus shouted, readying the bat again.
“Yes! Yes!” David scrambled to say with a tongue covered in sand. He tried to lift his arm to protect himself, but it hung limp at his side.
“Sit up, then!”
David pushed himself up with his left arm. Klaus grabbed his right shoulder, hauling him the rest of the way up. David feebly clutched at his hand to fend off the pain, but he couldn’t reach.
“You think I would make this easy for you?” Klaus seethed. “After you humiliated our family? After you humiliated your own mother in Paris?”
“I’m sorry,” David said. Drool spilled out from his bottom lip, and he spat more sand out of his mouth, his insides twisting at the horrible texture and taste. “I didn’t mean to.”
“You didn’t mean to,” Klaus repeated in a sarcastic drawl. “Did you not mean to file a restraining order, either? Did you not mean to accuse me of those things? You know why I had to punish you, David. Or should I remind you?”
David shook his head. His left eye was on fire from all the sand, and his vision was so blurry that he couldn’t see.
“I think you need reminding,” Klaus snapped. “You’ve been acting so ungrateful. You haven’t once thanked me for everything I did for you. Slaving to make you a champion—you have no idea what it took to get you there.”
David kept shaking his head. His right arm had gone completely numb. “M’sorry.”
“Sorry is not enough,” Klaus said. He shoved the end of the bat into David’s sternum, knocking him flat on his back in the sand. Klaus blocked out the sun as he stepped over him, his face contorted with rage. “Should I show you how much I would do for you? Do you want to die quickly?”
David nodded. Klaus kicked sand in his face, covering him with it. David coughed, struggling to breathe past the silt, but Klaus stepped on his sternum so he couldn’t try to sit up.
“You don’t deserve it,” Klaus snarled. “You ruined my career with your lies. Then you tried to go behind my back to your mother and sister? You really think they would ever choose you over me?”
David gasped for air, but only inhaled sand. It tore up the back of his throat, and the tears in his eyes turned acidic from pain. He scraped at Klaus’s boot with his left hand, trying to breathe.
For a moment, he was sitting on the edge of Noah’s bed in the Oxbow motorhome, looking down at the photo of Noah, Finlay, and Robbie that Noah still kept on his nightstand. He stared down at Noah’s face, flushed and exhilarated, then turned to see the real Noah glaring at him from the threshold. David had wanted to kiss him right then. It had taken every ounce of restraint not to pull him into bed for a proper fuck right then and there, actually.
He blinked, and Malibu sunshine seared his eyes as his father lifted his boot. He could still see Noah’s face in perfect detail from that night—the way the low light washed his tan features in gold flecks, like looking at ocean water up close. If he tried hard enough, he could even taste Noah’s lips, hoppy and light from beer.
Klaus stomped on his thigh. David barked out a noise of anguish as Noah’s face slipped from his mind, replaced by too-bright sky and clumps of sand still in his eyes.
“Don’t you dare,” Klaus growled, stepping off him again. “You’ll be awake for this. I told you—we will be even after this, but only if you hold up your end of the bargain.”
David rolled up into a seated position. His head spun, and shadows moved in his peripheral vision, ghosts of cars in his mirrors. The sky flickered from day to night, and his whole body seemed to waver between reality and something else.
Klaus cranked the bat back like a golfer preparing for a drive. David hated golfing, but Jacob loved it, and Hugh tried to rub it in David’s face when he and Jacob went out to the course. David never understood why anyone wanted to run around a giant patch of grass to hit a ball a few times.
The sand in his eyes blocked a good portion of his vision, but David noticed when Klaus’s arms went slack. His head snapped up, and David sluggishly followed his gaze to a blurry shape standing at the top of the stairs.
“Put down the weapon!” a man shouted.
Oh no. They weren’t alone anymore.
“Did you call the police?” Klaus roared, wheeling on him.
The words came through David’s skull in mismatched pieces that he had to put together. He opened his mouth to respond, but only drool and sand came out.
Klaus stepped toward him, and David heard his own bones breaking—two distinct pops, but no pain.
No pain?
Suddenly, Klaus tackled him to the ground. David’s skull slammed against a mound of sand, and all the air shot out of his lungs. He struggled under his father’s weight, trying to breathe, but couldn’t. Klaus was too heavy.
“Dad,” he choked out. “Dad!”
Klaus let out a garbled noise halfway between German and English but didn’t move. David’s vision turned black at the edges, creeping along until Noah’s face reappeared, this time stunned into silence.
David had never felt more alive than after their first kiss. All those months of preseason training, watching but never touching, never even talking to Noah, and he’d kissed him.
The weight lifted from his chest, and David smiled.
You’re drunk, mate , Noah said that night.
Yes, he’d been drunk. Drunk on Noah Caparelli, drunk on what he eventually discovered was love, drunk on the happiness he never found at home. David missed him so much. He missed that version of himself, too. The one who made flirty jokes that actually worked, the one who fought for closeness even though teammates were supposed to keep distance from each other.
“David,” Noah said. “David, look at me.”
“I’m not drunk,” David said. “You weren’t either.”
Waking up in bed with Noah the next morning had been better than David’s wildest dreams, until Noah panicked, thinking he’d somehow forced himself on him. David had almost laughed outright—he’d been fantasizing about Noah touching him since he first saw him.
Sandpaper grazed his cheek. David winced, turning away from the rasping pain. The harsh light of the motorhome was so annoying. Weren’t people supposed to live in them?
“Come back, baby,” Noah murmured. His voice shook with audible terror.
David let out a noise of surprise as the harsh motorhome lighting turned to sunshine. He twisted his head and heard someone swear. Blobs of darkness obscured his vision, but he would know Noah’s face anywhere.
“Noah,” David breathed, taking in his face. This was the real Noah, older and sexier and his .
“It’s me,” Noah confirmed with eyes full of tears. “I’m with you. Your arm is broken, but we’ll get that fixed, okay? First, we have to go to the hospital. You get to go in a helicopter this time, like I did last year.”
David furrowed his brow. “No—my dad.”
Noah’s lips brushed his cheek. David gasped in surprise at the softness of his lips. He tried to turn his head but couldn’t.
“Your dad’s never coming near you again,” Noah said, soft but firm.
“S’he dead?” David asked, suddenly remembering the weight.
“No,” Noah said. “But he’s not going anywhere for awhile.”
David hated how the relief coursed through him. “Thank you,” he said stupidly. “You love me?”
Noah let out a startled laugh. “Yes, I love you. I love you so, so, so much.”
David grinned. “Okay. Will you come in the helicopter with me?”
Noah nodded, though he was mostly a blur now. “Absolutely. I was knocked out for my own helicopter ride, so I’m not missing this one. You’re in shock right now, but you might start feeling pain really soon. Don’t be scared, okay?”
He couldn’t feel scared with Noah next to him. “Okay. I’ve never been in a helicopter before.”
“I know,” Noah soothed. “This EMT here is going to wash your eyes with some water, okay? You’ve got a lot of sand in there.”
“Okay,” David said. Cold water shot into his eyes, and he sputtered. He heard people talking in words he couldn’t understand past the fucking stream of water straight into his eye sockets. “Fuck!”
“All done,” Noah said calmly once the onslaught ended. “Can you see better now?”
David continued blinking and sputtering for a moment. His right arm hummed. It reminded him of oncoming thunder. He blinked a few more times until he could see again. Things were still a little blurry, but nothing like before.
“My arm’s broken,” he told Noah. “Do they know that?”
“Yes,” Noah said. “You’re safe now, though. We’re going to get you fixed up.”
The sunlight showed off Noah’s freckles, usually only visible from very close. The lines of his jaw looked so kissable.
“You’re really handsome,” David said. “Have I said that before?”
Noah smiled down at him. “A few times, I think. And I think you’re really handsome, too.”
David’s heart did a kickflip in his chest. “Really?”
Noah leaned down and kissed his cheek. “Our ride’s here. I’ll be right with you, okay? Just say my name, and I’ll show you I’m right by you, even if you can’t see me.”
David heard the whirring blades of a helicopter in the distance. His right arm began to throb. He took in Noah’s face, trying to remember every inch of it. His mind swam, and suddenly the sky started moving. He closed his eyes to stop himself from getting dizzy.
“Noah?” he tried.
“Right here, Champ,” Noah replied, just like he’d promised.