“Hmm, I’ll hold you to that.”
Lucas was currently being perused by two very tall, very bottle blonde girls. They stood beside him and laughed a little too loudly. I wasn’t sure if he knew them or if the other members of Lucas’s group had already turned them down so they were moving on. I got that cool cars were hot and hot guys with cool cars were double hot but I was not going to sleep with them to get a ride. But then again I slept with people to be numb so who was I to judge.
Turning to Danny, I ignored the Barbie sisters’ play for Lucas. It wasn’t bothering me. We weren’t together and even if we were I wasn’t the overly jealous, psycho girlfriend type.
“So, who bought you the car?” I asked. He couldn’t be more than twenty-one, unless he’d won the lottery my money was on Daddy.
Cocking his head to the side, he replied, “What you’re thinking is exactly how I got it. My parents are so rich they wipe their arse with fifties. They bought me the car last year. Gotta keep up appearances.”
He sounded bitter about his folks but I had a feeling the Lambo softened the blow of not having their attention somewhat.
Lucas walked away from his female fans and stood beside me.
“Who’s she?” Barbie number one asked, nodding in my direction.
“This is Tegan. Tegan, this is Sadie,” he said.
“Hi, Sadie.”
“Seriously, Lucas? How old is she? I can’t fucking even…” She held her hand up, glaring at Luke and then stormed off.
“She seems nice,” I said sarcastically. “She an ex?”
“Sort of. We went out for about an hour when we were eight and everyone else was playing relationships at school,” he replied.
“I think she still might like you.”
Lucas rolled his eyes at me.
“So, what’s her deal then?”
“Luke, if you’re not gonna get on Sadie, do you mind if I have a go? She’s all upset and I haven’t been laid in weeks,” Zack asked.
“You’re sick, Zack, but go for it.”
“Hey, Zack,” I shouted after him. He turned around and raised a rusty brown eyebrow at me. “Be careful, she might go all Fatal Attraction on you too.”
He shook his head chuckling and walked off. Lucas, Danny and Leon laughed from behind me.
“I like this one, Luke,” Danny said.
“So do I,” Lucas replied. I bit my lip and looked away. Let’s not do this.
“We need to get the car ready, Danny,” Leon said, nodding his head towards what must be his car. They bounded off, excited about something.
“Ready for what?”
“Racing.” His eyes widened. “Shit, Tegan, I’m sorry. Jesus, I’m such an idiot to bring you here.”
“No,” I said, holding my hand up. “I used to go to races and shows all the time, this is good. Granted, the ones I went to were legal but this is definitely better. Don’t feel bad, I’m fine. Is it safe, though?”
He nodded confidently. “I know what I’m doing.”
My eyes widened. Well, that changed things. “You’re racing?” I started to panic. My stomach felt like it had been tipped upside down. Damn it, I cared for him.
“Yeah, I race.”
I fought the urge to beg him not to. Deep down I knew that I had no right to demand he didn’t go anywhere but I wanted to. My dad died behind the wheel of a car and he wasn’t racing.
“You don’t want me to?”
“I don’t want you to get hurt,” I admitted.
He bent his knees so he was level with me and smiled. His pale blue eyes told me how he felt and I wasn’t at all ready to see it. “I won’t get hurt, I swear.”
“You don’t know that. Do you race often?”
“Most weeks. If you don’t want me to, Tegan, I won’t. I understand why you wouldn’t want me to,” he said.
“I don’t know what I want.” Lie. I wanted him to take me home right now so he wouldn’t be tempted to race.
“It’s fine, really. I won’t do anything stupid.”
“Promise?”
“I promise,” he said.
We walked through the crowd to Leon and Danny who were looking over Luke’s car. I felt nauseous and a little bit excited. I loved being around cars and watching the races at the car shows my dad took me to. Granted, those races were controlled and legal but I was still looking forward to watching. Well, watching other people’s races, I was pretty sure I’d be closing my eyes for Luke’s.
The first two races taught me street racing was so far away from track racing it wasn’t even funny. They were fucking insane and I lost count of the amount of times I sucked my breath in and my heart leapt as someone narrowly missed the edge of a building or the crowd. Apparently, it was normal, no one else seemed to have a mini heart attack every time.
Leon finally hollered for Lucas so he gave me a smile over his shoulder and walked off, leaving me with Danny. That was fine by me; I liked him, mostly because he wasn’t a huge pervert like Zach.