Total pages in book: 162
Estimated words: 153946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 153946 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 770(@200wpm)___ 616(@250wpm)___ 513(@300wpm)
Kingston gave Wade a wide Cheshire Cat smile.
“Rick feels that we’ve been rope-a-doped,” Lucy began tactfully.
Since Rick was merely staring at us with suspicion, either Lucy was psychic or they’d talked about their issues beforehand.
“We were here to nail down the car for the race, and now we’re…what? Adding team members? Starring in a reality show?” Lucy hesitated and then smoothed out his neatly trimmed beard. “On the other hand, we do look good on camera. Fine, we’ll be in your documentary, Haywood. I won’t memorize lines though. I tell Gene all the time, I’m all about organic moments and improv comedy.”
“As long as you don’t aim your camera at August,” Chick teased, his knee bumping mine under the table.
I gave him A Look for throwing me under the bus, my already tense shoulders somewhere up around my ears. “I’m not afraid of cameras.”
“She used to run from them at book signings like they’d actually steal her soul,” he confided to all his new besties. “Evaded every video interview her publisher ever set up for her and rudely deleted candids from other people’s phones like she was on the run from the law.”
“She’s always been like that,” Bernie confided right back. “Her mother had more photo albums than I’ve ever seen in one place, but finding her in them after the age of ten is a Where’s Waldo situation. And getting her to stand still for a picture with me has always been next to impossible.”
“I take pictures,” I defended. “I like those Snapchat filters because they put makeup on for me.” And give me back the defined chin of a twenty-year-old. And sometimes kitten ears.
No one was listening.
“But she did that movie with us when you were kids.” Kingston sounded skeptical. “She was the star, if I remember correctly.”
“She wore a wrinkled-old-lady mask for that,” Bernie reminded him.
“You’re all snitches, this is slander and it’s not that big a deal,” I said, louder than I meant to. “I don’t take good pictures, that’s all. I never have.”
Unlike my mother, who’d looked like a fairy in every candid, and my photogenic sibling, who’d actually had a modeling job when she was fourteen, I was forever caught blinking or chewing or posing in a way that mysteriously created two extra chins with the occasional unibrow.
“That’s not true. I’ve got a good one right here.”
Every head slowly turned in Wade’s direction as he pulled out his faded leather wallet.
“One what?” Chick asked.
He looked disgruntled by the attention, but it didn’t stop him from passing a worn photo over to Chick. I tried to grab it and destroy the evidence out of habit, but they were both too fast for me.
My throat tightened. “Is that Mom’s wedding?”
I was on the beach, a long skirt flying behind me in the breeze, my hair down and my head thrown back in laughter.
“It’s an older one, I know. I have one of you with Phoebe too, from that housewarming party a few years back, but it’s on my computer.”
Wade had a picture of me in his wallet? He’d had it for years?
Suddenly breathless, I glanced around, hoping no one could see the flush surging into my cheeks. The guys were all looking between us and each other with varying degrees of speculation. Gene seemed the most startled, though he covered it more quickly than I could.
It’s not only of you, I chided myself. Morgan and Bernie are both in the background.
Still, I was the focus of the image. And I didn’t remember it being in Mom’s wedding album. Had he taken it?
“Why don’t we get to August’s caveats?” Kingston said smoothly, unexpectedly saving the day.
“Everyone’s saying it now,” I joked, but I was game. The truth was, I only had one. But I was willing to make up a few to stop thinking about that photo and how it made me feel. “My main condition is that both Bernie and I will be driving in Jiminy for the race. And it won’t be for one or two pity laps either. We will be equal members of the team and involved in everything. Oh, and Chick will be an honorary, non-driving member.”
“No way,” Rick said immediately, and even from here, I could feel Bernie stiffen in her seat. She’d totally called that one. “August, I get, but we only have one car this time and the judges can make our lives miserable if we break the rules or let a reckless driver on the track. Think about the penalties Dave made us endure. Or any of the others we’ve seen over the years.”
“Penalties?” Chick asked with a worried glance in Bernie’s bristling direction.
Lucy immediately started counting them off. “They can stick you to the hood of your car with Saran Wrap and send you around the paddock, apologizing to every other team for being an asshole driver. Have you mime your crime, like Marcel Marceau. Put you in a Bob Ross wig and make you paint ‘happy trees’ on the hood of your own car.”