Page 120 of The Champion
So there I was, walking behind them when Nathan, a rookiedriver this year and the same guy who cost me that chase, popped off with, “Didyou see Riley out there? He was driving like an asshole.”
“Yeah I saw,” Colin mumbled. “That’s what he does best.”
My anger for the night soared.
“You know,” I said darkly. They both spun on their heelsto face me. We were in between the motor coaches now out of sight of everyone.“If you two want to question my reasoning on the track...ask me. Don’t smart off behind my back.”
“It’s was nothing Riley, just relax.” Colin snorted andleaned against the side of my motor coach.
Ignoring Nathan’s wide eyes, I stepped closer to Colin.“I race you the same as I race any other guy out there. You don’t like it, tellme to my face.”
Colin smiled. “I don’t like the way you race.”
I laughed one hard laugh. “And I don’t like the way yourace. You don’t think out there.”
Colin knew this was a battle he wasn’t going to win. Wedidn’t agree on the track, never had, and probably never would. But we bothknew that’s as far as it went. Off the track, I could tolerate him. At times hereminded me of Darrin but the difference was that Darrin was psychotic. Colinwas just a hotheaded kid.
Neither one of them said any more, just gaped at me insilence.
As you can imagine, my mood when I arrived home thatnight was not good. Colin and Nathan had pissed me off. I missed the chase andI knew Simplex wouldn’t be happy and on top of that, I missed my family.
Sway had stayed home with the kids because Casten wassick with a cold.
Around two in the morning when I walked in the house, Iwas greeted with Sway and all three of the kids sleeping in the living room inmakeshift fort of blankets, chairs and pillows from all over the house.
My mood improved significantly as I sat down on the floornext to Arie and watched them sleep. My little girl when sleeping was nearlyidentical to Sway at times.
Axel had stirred slightly when I set my bag down andeventually opened his eyes, rubbing them once he realized I was sitting there.Placing my index finger to my lips for him to be quiet, he grabbed his blanketand came to sit on my lap next to the couch I had leaned against.
“I missed you daddy.” He whispered snuggling into myarms.
“Mmm...I missedyou too little buddy.”
“Sorry you didn’t win.”
“It’s all right. You can’t win them all.” Axel had seenme win a lot but I wanted him to understand you couldn’t win them all, not withthe competition these days.
I spent the rest of the night out there in the fort theyhad made and woke up to eight month old Casten drooling on my face andgiggling. The kid never stopped laughing.
Rolling over, I began tickling his chubby little rolls.He belly laughed squirming for me to stop. Arie got in on the tickle-fest asdid Axel.
Soon we woke up Sway.
“You’re home.” She said blinking as though I wasn’t real.
“Yes, I am.” I winked as our little flailing spaz childrenbounced around the room.
Sway crawled over to me from her place inside the fort,her crawling distracting me.
“Don’t do that.” I groaned adverting my eyes.
“Do what?”
“Crawl. I miss you andcrawlingis not helping.”
“Oh—sorry,” She wasn’t sorry. She knew damn well what shewas doing.
The rest of the morning was spent making blueberrywaffles and playing with the kids in the fort. Arie’s birthday was Tuesday withthe party planned for that night. Today, we planned to do whatever she wanted.
