Page 150 of Off the Grid

We don’t speak more than anything basic. Hell, Riggs doesn’t even know she’s here, but we hold on to each other for emotional support in the private suite I had set up for her.

Each lap down her grip lessens slightly.

Just like with each lap down, I take another bite of my candy floss knowing I’m going to finish the game Riggs never got to finish with his dad and is seventeen years in the making.

There were a few close calls that had me on the edge of my seat. A challenge from Grimladi on lap nineteen when they went two wide into a turn, but Riggs was able to fend him off.

A near miss of a flying tire when Bustos and Finnegan connected and spun off into the gravel.

But he finishes strong. With grit and determination and a little luck, the crowd roars as Spencer Riggs crosses the finish line in P2.

Clara Riggs yelps in relief and wipes tears off her cheeks.

And I smile because I have one piece of blue zucchero filato—or as Riggs calls it, candy floss—left.

Chaos ensues upon the finish. The media is clamoring over the story of the son finishing the final race his father never could. The stands breathe a collective sigh.

I want to run to him and hug him like his mom does, but I stand back. I shake his hand like an owner would a driver. I act like a proud parent rather than a woman in love with a man.

But the waiting is so worth it when Riggs finds me in a side alley of the paddock. My grin is wide and my heart is so full—of love and relief—that I fear it might burst.

What I want is to jump into his arms and kiss him senseless. What I do instead is hold the remaining piece of blue cotton candy out for him.

Time slows.

It’s just him.

It’s just me.

Despite the noise around us, everything seems to simply hush.

It’s like the world around us has faded away.

His eyes shock open and then well with tears. He tries to sniff them away, but one slips over as he takes the piece I hold out for him. He stares at it with the most bittersweet of smiles and then whispers, “Victory is sweet.”

My own tear slips over, the moment so poignant, so powerful. The love I feel for him prompting me to reach out, frame his face, and wipe his tear off with my thumb.

He’s just about to put the candy floss in his mouth when the snort at the end of the alley has us both jumping.

I freeze when I notice Brandon standing there.

“She’s all yours, man. I mean, if cold-fish cunts are your thing.”

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CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

Riggs

I see red.

Murderous red.

The candy floss is disregarded.

Camilla’s gesture is forgotten.

All I can see is the bastard who hurt her.