Blindsided - A Stepbrother Romance Novel (3 page)

“I want to go.”

“No, you have school tomorrow.”

“And I’m not in third grade.”

“No, but you’re also not passing more than half of your classes. Do your homework and get to bed at a decent time. When your grades are up we’ll talk about you going to the track with me.”

“You do know that you’re not my mother, right?” Aaron said that in a snarky tone with a smirk on his face that reminded her of Darren. In a rare moment of uncontrolled rage Sam grabbed her brother by the front of his shirt and slammed him back into the counter. He was bigger than her and if he wanted to he could probably kick her ass. Partially, it was the shock of her putting her hands on him that stopped him from fighting back, and partially it was what he’d been taught his whole life. “What the hell, Sam?”

“Listen to me and listen well. You have two choices here. You can continue on with life the way you’ve been going, using drugs, drinking and stealing from people who work for a living and you can watch as you turn into your fucking father. Or, you can listen to me, do your homework, stay clean and sober, stay out of trouble and actually spit in that son of a bitch’s eye someday when you make something of yourself.” She let go of his shirt slapped the steak onto a pan and shoved it into the oven. “I’m going to get changed for the track. Start your homework or leave and start down the path to becoming Darren Stark. I’m too tired tonight to fucking care.”

Aaron watched wide-eyed as his sister left the room. Sam hoped like hell he’d choose to do his homework because she knew if he left the house she’d go out looking for him and miss her race. She talked a good game and usually she didn’t say anything that she didn’t mean, but she wasn’t losing Aaron without a fight.

Clouds of dirt floated across the track as Samantha revved the engine of her 1966 Mustang. Her best friend and racing buddy Troy tried to get her to sit this one out. She thought he was worried about her state of mind because of everything that had happened with her mom and Darren, but what he told her he was worried about was the puddle of oil in the garage underneath the Mustang when they left the house.

“I can’t find where it’s coming from right now, Sam. I need to tear into it.”

“Tomorrow,” she’d told him. “I need to win this race.”

“You won’t win if your oil pressure bottoms out.”

“True story, but that’s a possibility. It’s a definite loss if I don’t run the race. I’m doing this.”

He rolled his eyes but he knew better than to argue with her. Sam and Troy had been hanging out since she was five years old. Troy lived next door and he loves cars as much as Sam loves racing. Troy taught her most of what she knew about engines and together they’ve turned the classic Mustang her father left for her when he took off into an awesome racing machine. She stepped on the gas again while waiting for the flag. The engine revved and she looked at the oil gauge. It didn’t move. It stayed right in the center where it belonged. Troy was catastrophizing things, he does that sometimes. Sam prefers to tackle problems as they arose. If she went around worrying about what could happen all the time she’d never get anything else done.

Sam watched the green flag drop and the foot that had been hovering over the accelerator dropped with it. She slammed the transmission into drive and a trail of smoke and dust stood where the Mustang had only seconds before. Sam and Troy belong to an underground race circuit in Phoenix. They pay monthly dues and that money plus the money collected from those fortunate enough to receive an invitation to attend a race is used to pay out the winners. Sam rarely lost. If she did it was usually due to mechanical failure. She had no fear when she was behind the wheel and she’d amassed a pretty decent nest egg. She knew it wouldn’t last forever once she and Aaron were on their own and she was paying the rent, but it was all they had for now.

She shook off everything else on her mind and focused on the dirt track in front of her. Sometimes they raced on pavement and other times on a makeshift track in the middle of the desert. Troy changed her tires out depending on the turf they were running on and tonight she could feel her tires gripping the dirt like her tires were molded to it. The race tonight is around a circular track and they were going ten laps. Sam took the tight curve going into her third one like she was flying. Being behind the wheel of her car doing ninety or better was one of the few times in her life when she could say she was truly happy.

The dust was so thick that she didn’t see the red GMC rise up out of it until it was right on her bumper. She mashed down on the accelerator and took the speedometer up to 110. She was going into another turn when she heard a sound under the hood that disturbed her. She hardly had time to think about that though before the red GMC clipped the left rear bumper of the Mustang, trying to force her to the outside. Sam never gave up the inside without a fight. Inside lanes won races and this son of a bitch behind her was going down. She pulled the wheel to the left so that her wheels were hugging the inside edge of the track. The GMC pulled right and she thought that he was going to try and pass her on the outside. He pulled back suddenly though, clipping her again, this time hard enough to send her spinning off into the center divider of soft mounds of dirt. Sam felt her wheels digging in and trying to bury her. She didn’t back off the accelerator instead she pushed it even harder, causing her wheels to turn so quickly there was no way the dirt could bury them. She was back on the track in a cloud of thick dust and she could barely see the back end of the SOB that had pushed her off. She pulled to the right and did the exact same thing he’d just done to her. As he spun out into the dirt she realized that he must not have seen her coming. He didn’t gun his engine hard enough and within seconds he was practically entombed in the dirt. Sam laughed out loud and slapped the steering wheel. As she did her eyes fell on the oil gauge…it was sitting firmly in the red.
Shit!

Sam knew she should stop. The needle wasn’t just hitting the red it was raising…fast. The temperature gauge was rising as well and she could smell the engine burning. She completed her fourth lap…only six to go. Tapping the dash she said out loud,

“We can do this, right girl?” She always talked to her car. She told Troy it would only be crazy if the car ever started talking back. So far, she hadn’t said a word. Sam took that as consent and as she flew past the red Camaro that was only coming into his third lap she saw Troy’s face just above the line of dust. She saw his hand too. He was telling her to stop. Some of what she thought was dust was actually smoke billowing out from underneath the hood of the Mustang.
Shit!

Another pat to the dash, “Five and a half laps to go girl. You got this.” She didn’t let up on the accelerator as she passed the green Dodge on the inside. She couldn’t see the driver but she knew it was a guy named James that thought girls should be home painting their toenails or at the very least in a crop top and shorts waving the flags while the men did the racing. Sam spent one long night having some of the wildest sex she’d ever had with him. When she refused to see him again after that, his calls and texts got nasty. She blocked him on her cell phone but that didn’t stop him from running a pretty good smear campaign on social media. It was a good thing she didn’t give a shit what anyone thought of her. She smiled now at the fact that he was probably choking on her dust and smoke. It was the least he deserved.

The next two times she passed where Troy was standing she avoided looking in his direction. Three and a half laps to go. She practically had that four grand in her pocket, most of which she would have to spend on a new engine by the looks of all the lights on her dash. She flew past the lap marker again and that’s when she saw the smoke beginning to curl up underneath the dash. She cracked the window but then it was just a fight between the nasty blue smoke and the dust coming in through the window. She choked and gasped her way through the next lap…two to go…Maybe the engine wouldn’t be completely shot.

She avoided Troy’s face again. She knew he was cussing her by now just thinking of all the work they would have to do to the car and all of her winnings that she’d have to sink back into it. The smoke and dust inside the car helped her avoid looking at the gauges, and it also reduced her vision to the point of driving strictly by memory and instinct and hoping none of the fools that were still a lap behind her got in her way. Her heart was racing as fast as the Mustang’s engine and her body was burning up by the time she saw a flash of white. They were waving the white flag at her…one more lap.

“Almost there girl! We’ve got this!”

The bottoms of her feet were burning. She had on her racing boots and the soles where thick but she could still feel the heat. The thought that there was a fire underneath the hood crossed her mind but she tried to squash it. She was almost there, she couldn’t give up now. She tried not to think about what all of that heat was doing to her engine. She could almost picture the metal and rubber melting and fusing together under the hood as the engine began to sputter harder and she felt the car losing power. The red Camaro zipped past. He was on his way into his last lap. Sam was on her way to the finish line. “Come on baby, we’re so close!” She could hear her engine falling apart as she saw the checkered flag drop in front of her. She pulled her foot off the accelerator and shifted into neutral. The car coasted for about twelve feet before she finally pulled the wheel had to the left and let the piles of dirt stop her and hopefully if there’s a fire, put it out. She sat there and waited until the three other cars still in the race finished and came to a stop. When she heard them kill their engines she climbed out of her car to the sounds of people clapping and yelling. It was only seconds before Troy was by her side.

“What the hell, Sam? You should have stopped five laps ago; I know you saw the smoke.”

“I was breathing the smoke,” Sam told him, “Choking on it.”

“Then what the hell were you thinking?”

She grinned. “That I was winning,” she said. Troy rolled his eyes.

“And now you’ll have to use most of that money if not all of it to replace the engine and whatever else burned up under there.”

Sam knew he was right, but she still couldn’t stop smiling. Tonight was the first time since her mother died that she felt alive herself. That buoyant feeling lasted until they got the car towed home and she walked inside and saw her brother’s face. His eye was turning black and his lips were swollen and bleeding. He shifted his good eye toward the hall and without saying a word he told Sam that Darren was home.

Sam stood there still covered in dirt taking in slow, deep breaths. Normally in this situation she’d get Aaron out of there until Darren cooled down or sobered up and by the time they came back all would be forgotten until the next time. She had a feeling though that this time it wouldn’t be quite that easy. She brought a finger to her lips as she looked back at her brother. Leaning slightly to the left so she could see down the hallway she motioned to him with her hand. Aaron winced as he pushed himself up off the couch. Sam could see the blood on his t-shirt and the bruises on his arms now. It made her stomach roll. She put her eyes back on the hallway and watched for Darren until Aaron was at her side. When he was close enough she grabbed his hand and quietly led him toward the back door. They were halfway across the kitchen when they heard Darren’s drunken, booming voice.

“Where the fuck did you go, boy? I told you to stay put you stupid little shit. You’re just like your mother, well not just like,” he said with a laugh, “She’s dead.” Sam clamped down harder on Aaron’s hand, pushed open the back door and in a whisper she told him,

“Run! Wait for me in the park near the playground.”

“I don’t want to leave you here with him. He’s worse than I’ve ever seen him tonight.”

“Go!” Sam knew they didn’t have time to argue. She heard Darren stumbling towards the back door. She gave Aaron a little push and with a look that said he didn’t know whether to run or cry he finally took off. Sam reached for a rake she’d seen by the backdoor as she went in the house earlier. She barely had time to turn and swing it before Darren burst out the door. It connected with the side of his head and knocked him back into the house. She stood far enough back that he couldn’t grab her and watched him slide to the ground. He was still conscious but he was dazed and not trying to move. She took out her phone and found the number the detective she’d spoken to the funeral had given her. He answered it on the first ring,

“Detective Brandt.”

“This is Samantha Glass. I just hit my step-father in the head with a garden tool and if someone doesn’t get here fast I’m going to kill him with it.” She didn’t wait for his response before she hung up. She knew that would get them here faster than if she’d called and said he was attacking her. They had all rarely called the cops on Darren over the years, but the handful of times one of them had, Sam and Aaron had watched in horror as he did as much damage as he could before they got there.

Darren was beginning to cuss now and call her vulgar names so she knew he was coming out of it. She held the rake up with the metal spikes pointing toward his face and said,

“The next time you put your hands on me or my brother, I’m going to kill you.”

“Bitch!” Darren grabbed hold of the steps that led into the house and started pushing up to his feet. Sam stood her ground, hoping that the police were on their way. It took Darren a long time to stand up straight. He was still holding onto the railing with one hand when he reached out for her with the other. Sam swung the rake again and she heard bones crunch and Darren scream when it made contact with his hand. The sirens in the background drowned out the names he was calling her. That was okay, she’d heard them all before.