up and waving his hand toward the driver’s seat. “Are you driving?”
My eyes bug out of my head and I instantly retreat, shaking my head as the dread sinks heavily into my gut. “No. No, no, no, no. You don’t want me to drive.”
His brows furrow as he watches me with a strange curiosity. “Why the hell not?”
“Because you guys have been going to the ends of the earth to keep me alive and I wouldn’t want to put all your hard work to waste by throwing myself behind the wheel of a car.”
King just stares a moment longer, a grin slowly stretching across his face. “You can’t drive.”
I shake my head. “Nope, and I’ll deny it if you were to tell anybody, but the whole driving a car thing kinda scares the crap out of me.”
“But …” he trails off, unable to comprehend a word I’m saying. “How is that possible? You drive that Ducati as though you need it to breathe. How could you not know how to drive a car?”
I give him a tight smile, watching him over the top of the Mustang as I walk around to the passenger’s side. “I had to force myself to learn how to drive that Ducati, and it was shit scary, but a car … when would I have ever had a chance to learn that? I don’t have a driver’s license and I’ve been in shitty foster homes since, well … forever. None of them gave a shit about teaching me, and it’s not like I have a car to learn in.”
“Holy shit,” he breathes in astonishment, dropping into the driver’s seat and pulling the door closed behind him. “I’ve got to tell the boys.”
“No,” I rush out. “You can’t tell them that.”
He hits the gas and we take off down the road as he looks across at me. “Dare I ask why not?”
I glance out the window, not wanting him to see the embarrassment written across my face. “Because everyone my age knows how to drive. I’m probably the only chick around here who’s never even sat in the driver’s seat, but I’m too fucking scared to even try. The whole thing … I don’t know, it’s daunting. I don’t want to drive.”
“No, that’s not happening,” he says. “You’re honestly the toughest chick I’ve ever met, and tough chicks need badass cars. Do you like this one? We could take it home. It’ll take Cruz less than twenty minutes to get everything changed into your name.”
My jaw drops as I stare at him. “We’re not stealing this car … I mean, for good. After this, we need to ditch it somewhere the owner can find it, but it doesn’t matter anyway. I don’t need a car, there’s a whole garage of my father’s cars at home.”
“Those cars aren’t you,” he tells me. “You need something that screams ‘get out of my fucking way.’ Besides, those cars are fucking expensive. You need to learn in something cheap that you can fuck with.”
I shake my head. “I’m not learning.”
King scoffs. “Just wait until Grayson hears that your ass can’t drive. He’ll have you speeding down highways and drifting around corners in no time.”
I groan, watching as he expertly shifts through the gears and unintentionally turns me the fuck on. “You’re really going to tell them, aren’t you?”
He laughs and the sound grates on my nerves. “Just try and stop me, babe.”
A heavy sigh pulls from between my lips as I relax back into the car and scan my gaze over the impressive dashboard. Maybe he has a point about keeping this car. I’m not going to lie, it’s nice. Very nice. “Fine,” I grumble. “But do me a favor and leave out the whole ‘scared’ thing. I don’t care if Grayson and Carver hear that, but Cruz … he thinks the sun shines out of my ass. I kinda like how he thinks that I’m some kind of superhero who can do anything she puts her mind to.”
His eyes soften and it somehow eases the pain that lives within my chest, helping me to forget just how shitty my night has been. He doesn’t say another word, just drives through the silent streets with my eyes glued to his body. What is it about a guy who can drive a stick shift? Fuck me, it’s the hottest thing I’ve ever seen, but just when I think it couldn’t get any better, his hand finds mine and he uses his knee