stood straight and tall and glared at him. She knew where she stood with him. Where she would always stand.
“You told me that I didn’t trust people, and you were right. But you’re a hypocrite, you know that? You don’t trust anyone, either. You refuse to let anyone get close to you. You keep everyone at a distance. You cycle through relationships like you cycle through racing leathers. I knew it,” she said angrily. “And I was still dumb enough to fall for you.”
“We are lovers, not soul mates,” he said coolly. “If you expected this from me, I am sorry.”
“You aren’t,” she snapped. “You’re only sorry you didn’t get the chance to throw me out before I walked away.”
He took a step toward her, stopped. Faith’s heart was breaking. She’d gone much further over the edge than she’d intended, but it was too late to stop now.
“We’ll go to bed,” he told her. “Sleep. Tomorrow, everything will look different.”
She shook her head. “It won’t. Nothing will change the facts. You are injured and you won’t admit it, and you intend to kill yourself on the track. I can’t stand by and watch you, Renzo. I won’t.”
“Are you threatening to quit, Faith?”
She snorted. “Quit? Is that how you see this? That I’m quitting my job?”
His jaw tightened. “You can’t abandon me right before the season starts. I need you.”
Those three words punctured her heart. He didn’t need her. He only needed the efficient PA by his side, nothing more. They’d had sex and he’d enjoyed her, but he didn’t love her. And he never would.
“My God, my stupidity never ends,” she said, half to herself. “I didn’t learn my lesson with Jason. I’m just as gullible and needy as I was then. And I want to believe that the man asking me to give him a piece of myself cares for me when I know he doesn’t.”
“We’re good together,” he said. “This doesn’t need to end.”
She laughed, the sound broken and bitter. “Doesn’t it? I won’t watch you crash and burn, Renzo. I won’t be there waiting for something to happen, waiting for them to haul you away in an ambulance because you’re too proud to admit you can’t do this any longer.” She reached for her wrap, shrugged into it blindly. “I’m done. I can’t do this.”
She fled toward the door, intending to escape into the Florentine night, to get as far away as she could, but he caught her before she could, turned her with rough hands.
His face was livid. “You aren’t leaving me, Faith. I won’t let you leave me.”
“Then tell me you’ll quit,” she begged. “Tell me you’ll stop this insanity and let someone else race the Viper.”
He let her go abruptly and she shot a hand out to steady herself against the wall.
“I won’t play this game with you,” he said harshly.
“It’s not a game,” she cried. “I love you, and I don’t want to lose you—” She stopped speaking when she realized what she’d said. What she’d revealed.
Renzo stood there before her, looking so cold and cruel. So removed, as if he’d already detached himself from the situation. Which, of course, he had. He’d had a lot of practice, hadn’t he?
“I won’t stop, Faith.” His eyes glittered hot. “If you truly loved me, you wouldn’t ask me to.”
She could feel the tears trickling down her cheeks. She’d just told him she loved him, and he didn’t say anything. Or, he did say something, but something designed to use that love against her.
She wiped the tears away with the back of her hand. “Jason said the same thing, did you know that? He said that if I loved him, I would do what he wanted me to do.”
She hadn’t had sex with him because she’d been young and scared, but she’d felt the pressure of those words. Felt them so deeply that she made the stupid decision to take that picture for him. To try and appease him.
She would never allow herself to cave in to that kind of pressure again, no matter the cost.
Renzo looked furious. “You can’t compare this to what happened eight years ago. I’ve never asked you to do anything you didn’t want to do. I’ve never threatened you if you didn’t. You’ve made your own choices.”
“And I have to keep making them,” she said. “I can’t stay and watch you go on that track and worry every time that it will be the last.”
He shoved his hands in his pockets. “Think carefully, cara. If you are asking me to choose between you and riding the Viper, you will lose.”
She shook her head sadly. “Don’t you think I already know that?”
THEY raced at night in Qatar because it was too hot during the day. Renzo stood in the paddock in full leathers, wearing a baseball cap until it was time to put on the helmet and climb onto the shining red-and-white Viper, and talked with the press. Paddock girls pranced around in tight dresses and heels, carrying big umbrellas, but he barely noticed them even when one or two of them purposely came near and shot him coy smiles.
They were sexy and alluring, but they were not Faith. Dio, how he missed her. It had been a week since she’d left him, and he’d been miserable just about every moment since then.
She’d told him she loved him, but she’d lied. If she had truly loved him, she wouldn’t have left him. And she wouldn’t have given him an ultimatum.
His leg ached today, but it ached every day. She was right that he’d kept that from her, just like he’d kept it from everyone. But he was used to the aching. Aching was nothing. Muscle cramps, on the other hand, were a bit more problematic.
He’d been training hard, working the muscles, and he hadn’t had an issue in any of the test runs. He would not have an issue today, either.
Faith did not understand that he had to do this. He appreciated that she’d been concerned for him, but if she’d truly loved him, she would have supported him. She would be here with him instead of back in New York, working for one of the other officers in D’Angeli Motors. She’d said she would leave the company and find another job, but he wouldn’t let her do it. He’d sent her back with a glowing recommendation, and had heard that she’d been put to work in one of the senior vice president’s offices.
He would see her again someday, when he returned to New York to oversee the U.S. operations, but that day would not be anytime soon. Perhaps she would have found someone else by then, a man who could appreciate her and love her for the remarkable woman she was.
His gut twisted hard at the thought of another man loving her. Loving his Faith. He held up his hand to signal the end of the interview and turned and walked away.
He had to get his head into the game
