not what I meant. How much do you know about the riding, and why I stopped?”
“You retired. You said so. It’s a young man’s game.”
“Nothing else?”
“Is there more?”
“There’s always more.”
He moved toward the sidewalk. She kept pace with him.
“I ride at night because I don’t want anyone to know I’m still riding. If people see me, they’ll ask questions. They’ll want me to be in charity races or consider going back to it and I can’t.”
“Why not? Are you injured?”
“A kid crashed during my last race. He was a teammate. I was supposed to look out for him. He crashed and he died.”
“Do you blame yourself for that?”
“In part.”
“Was it your fault?”
He stopped walking and shoved his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. “You ever see a pack go down? One guy wobbles, bumps another and it’s all over for everyone. The only thing you can do is save yourself. I got out and Frank didn’t.”
Once again he saw his friend flying through the air. He heard the sickening sound of Frank’s body hitting the road.
She stared up at him, her brown eyes dark and questioning in the night. “But you didn’t have anything to do with the crash, right?”
“No.”
“And you didn’t cause him to go down.”
He shook his head.
“Then it’s not that you killed him.”
She made a statement rather than asking a question.
Impressive, he thought, surprised she’d already figured it out. A few of his buddies had come to talk to him, trying to get him to join them again. They told him it wasn’t his fault, that no one blamed him. They all thought it was about guilt.
In a way they were right—the guilt was there. Strong. Powerful. It chased him, doing its best to suck him down. But it wasn’t the real problem.
“I can’t ride with anyone else,” he said quietly, staring over her head, at the black sky. “I can’t be next to another rider without losing it. I panic, like a little girl. I can’t breathe, I shake.”
“Isn’t that just anxiety? Can’t you talk to someone or take something?”
“Probably, but you can’t ride professionally if you’re weak or drugged.”
“This isn’t about being weak.”
“Sure it is.” It was about being weak and broken and humiliated. It was about failing. “From what you see and know, this is a sport of individuals, right? But it’s not really that way. There are teams. We ride in groups, in a pack. I can’t do any of that. I couldn’t go riding with you without falling apart. The need, the fire, is still inside of me, but I can’t reach it or touch it. Whatever was there is buried in a pile of shit so deep, I’ll never be able to dig it out.”
He thought she would step back then. Turn away in disgust. That’s what Angelique had done. Curled her perfect lip at him and said she wasn’t interested in a coward for a husband. She wanted a real man. Then she’d walked out.
He’d bared his deepest flaw, had exposed his soul and she’d left. That’s what people did. They left when you were broken. His mother had taught him that.
Charity surprised him. She continued to stare at him, then she shook her head. “I don’t believe you. If that fire is there, it’ll find a way.”
If only, he thought grimly. “Want to tell me when? I have a life to get back to.”
“You mean you’re not content living as a small-town god?”
“Deity status aside, I don’t want to end my career like this.” A loser. Afraid.
“Not to get too metaphysical on you, but maybe there’s a reason this happened.”
“If that’s true, then so is that old saying. Payback’s a bitch.” He shrugged. “It’s okay, Charity. This isn’t your problem. Go ahead and tell me that I’ll figure it out and be fine.”
“That won’t solve anything.”
“But you’ll feel better.”
“I felt fine before.”
She started toward the hotel. He walked with her.
“You like that they think you’re out having sex with fifty different women a night,” she said.
“It beats the truth.” He jerked his head toward the buildings next to them. “I grew up here. The good people of Fool’s Gold have a lot invested in me. I don’t want them to know the truth.”
“There’s nothing bad here. You had a very natural reaction to a horrible circumstance.”
“I got spooked during a race. It’s not like I faced sniper fire in a war.”
“You’re too hard on yourself.”
“Not possible.”
“Oh, please. Don’t be such a guy.”
“If I wasn’t, my reputation would be even more interesting.”
She laughed. The sweet sound carried on the night.
She was easy to be with, he thought. Nice. Down to earth. She hadn’t bolted, which he appreciated and he believed she wouldn’t tell anyone what he’d told her.
When they were within sight of the hotel, he stopped. “You go on ahead.”
“Why?”
“Do you want people to think we were together?”
“We were just walking.”
“Come on, Charity. You’ve been in town what—three weeks? You really believe that’s what they’ll tell each other?”
“Probably not.”
He raised his eyebrows.
She smiled. “Definitely not. Okay. Point taken. I’ll go first.”
She took a step, then turned back. “They love you. They would understand.”
“They love the guy on the poster.”
“They might surprise you.”
“Not in a good way.”
“I
