Kicked Out My Cheating Boyfriend and Chose the Champion

I had left the Veyra swimwear launch two hours early with silver glitter still dusted over my collarbones and a bottle of Blake's favorite bourbon tucked under my arm. At twenty-four, I was finally getting booked for campaigns people recognized. Blake had won second place at the Pacific Crown race that afternoon, and I wanted to surprise him at the team party.

Tessa Reed, my best friend and Falcon Motorsport's operations manager, had introduced us eight months earlier. She had said a famous driver and an upcoming model would make a dangerous couple.

She had been right about the danger. Just not the reason.

The private room door at Halcyon Bar stood open by an inch. Blake's voice reached me before my hand touched the brass handle.

“Sienna in that black campaign?” one of his teammates said. “I'd blow an engine for one hour with her.”

Laughter rolled through the room.

Heat climbed my throat. I waited for Blake to shut him down.

Instead, he laughed too. “One hour? You'd need electrolytes. She never gets enough.”

Someone whistled. “Mercer, you lucky bastard.”

“Lucky?” Blake said. “Try getting sleep before qualifying when she's climbing on you at three in the morning. The body is incredible. The maintenance is brutal.”

The bourbon bottle became slippery in my hand.

Our sex life had been intense, playful, private—or so I had believed. I had trusted him with every needy sound and reckless confession. Now he was turning those moments into locker-room comedy.

Another voice cut in. “Send her to Adrian Vale before the final. One night with those legs around him and maybe the machine finally forgets how to win.”

A chair scraped. “Nothing makes Vale forget how to win.”

“Then make it a weekend.”

Blake chuckled. “If she helps me take the championship, I'll gift-wrap her myself.”

The room erupted.

Something inside me went perfectly still.

I stepped backward—and hit a solid chest.

A hand closed around my upper arm before my heel twisted. Warm. Firm. Controlled.

I turned and found Adrian Vale standing behind me.

Every racing fan knew that face: dark hair, gray eyes. He drove for Voss Racing with a precision commentators called inhuman. Three championships in five years. Twenty-nine years old. Untouchable on track, nearly invisible off it.

Tonight he wore a black button-down with the sleeves rolled to his forearms. His gaze moved from the unopened door to my face, then to the bottle trembling in my grip.

He had heard.

Humiliation burned hotter than anger. I yanked my arm free.

“Don't,” I whispered.

His jaw tightened. “Sienna—”

I did not remember ever telling him my name.

I shoved the bourbon at him. He caught it against his chest.

“Give that to the boys,” I said. “Apparently they've earned it.”

Then I ran.

I ignored three calls from Tessa, six from Blake, and the sensible voice telling me to go home. Instead, I crossed downtown and walked into a basement bar where nobody watched racing and the lighting was too red for anyone to recognize me from a billboard.

I ordered tequila.

Then another.

By the fourth, Blake's laughter no longer rang in my ears. By the fifth, I could almost pretend I had not spent months rearranging castings around his race schedule, icing his injured shoulder, and flying economy overnight because he claimed he could not sleep before a race without me.

“You alone?”

A man dropped onto the stool beside me. Midforties, wedding ring, sour breath.

“No.”

I turned away.

He leaned closer. “You look alone.”

His fingers slid onto my bare knee.

I knocked his hand off. “Touch me again and lose it.”

He laughed and caught my wrist.

A second hand closed around his.

The man's face changed.

Adrian stood behind him.

He did not raise his voice. “Let go.”

“Mind your business.”

“She is my business.”

Adrian twisted just enough. The man hissed and released me. A bouncer appeared, took one look at Adrian's expression, and dragged the protester toward the stairs.

I stared at the champion. “Did you follow me?”

“Yes.”

“That is creepy.”

“Probably.” He took the shot from my hand before I could drink it. “You were crying so hard you walked into traffic.”

“I looked both ways.”

“You looked at neither.”

The hard line of his mouth should have annoyed me. I noticed the pulse beating in his throat and the way his shirt stretched across his shoulders.

Blake's friends had joked that I could ruin Adrian Vale.

A savage, drunken idea took root.

I slid off my stool and stepped between his knees. “They think you're impossible to distract.”

His eyes sharpened. “You are drunk.”

“They think I could do it.” I put both hands on his chest. Muscle tightened beneath my palms. “Want to prove them right?”

“Sienna.”

I kissed him.

For one electric second, he did nothing. Then his hand landed at my waist, spanning it almost completely, and his mouth opened under mine.

The contact detonated through me. He tasted like mint and restraint. I pressed closer, needing Blake's words erased, needing to be wanted by the one man Blake envied.

Adrian's breath broke. His body reacted against mine, unmistakably hard, and triumph flashed through my hurt.

Then he gripped my shoulders and set me back.

“No.” His voice was rough.

“You're attracted to me. Take me home.”

“I am taking you home, not for sex.”

I tried to kiss him again. He turned his face, and my mouth brushed the scar at his brow instead.

That tiny act of refusal hurt more than it should have.

“Am I only good enough when men are crazy about me?”

His gaze snapped to mine. “Never say that again.”

He paid my tab, wrapped his jacket around me, and guided me outside with one hand at the small of my back. Every time I stumbled, his fingers tightened. He put me in a dark sports car and fastened my seat belt when I failed twice.

“Address?” he asked.

“My apartment is being painted.”

“Then you're coming with me.”

The city blurred past. I watched his hands move over the wheel—steady hands, scarred knuckles, no wasted motion. At a red light, I touched one.

He went still.

“Do you ever lose control?” I asked.

“Not with someone who can't clearly choose it.”

The answer should have ended the game. Instead, it made desire curl low in me.

His townhouse was all stone, glass, and midnight quiet. He gave me water, found me a clean shirt, and turned his back while I changed. The fabric smelled like cedar and him.

When he came close to take the empty glass, I caught his collar.

“Make him sorry.”

“Sienna, you will be sorry tomorrow.”

“I already am.”

I pulled.

Buttons flew across the floor. His shirt opened, revealing a hard chest and a pale line of an old racing injury beneath his ribs. I pressed my palm over it. His muscles jumped. His hands closed around my waist, and for one breath he held me so tightly my feet nearly left the ground.

His forehead dropped to mine.

“You have no idea what you're asking me to survive,” he murmured.

I smiled, or tried to.

Then the room tilted.

Adrian swore and caught me before I hit the floor.

The last thing I felt was his arm beneath my knees and his mouth near my temple.

“You don't get to use yourself as a weapon,” he said. “Not even against him.”