“Ironic,” Patsy offered with a grimace.
“How do you mean?”
“One brother thinks he’s on the shelf, the other refuses to accept his own mortality.”
“You’d like Dean to retire?” Crystal guessed. The rumors had been flying fast and furious within the NASCAR world. Dean refused to admit this was his last season, but there was speculation none the less.
“I’ve begged him to retire,” said Patsy. “Wisdom and experience will only get you so far. It also takes strength and agility to stay out of the wall.”
Crystal privately acknowledged there was nothing in the world wrong with Larry’s strength and agility.
“What?” prompted Patsy.
“Huh?” Crystal asked in return, embarrassed by the wayward direction of her thoughts.
“Something made you smile.”
“It’s nothing.”
“Seems like a pretty entertaining nothing.”
“Just remembering something that happened this morning.”
“Fair enough,” said Patsy. “I’ll back off. I’m just grateful you’re making Larry so happy. He looks so relaxed. Almost as if…” Patsy’s eyes widened, and her mouth formed a perfect O.
Crystal felt her face heat up.
“You didn’t,” said Patsy, leaning in, in an obvious effort to keep the conversation private.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Crystal said.
“Never mind.” Patsy waved away her words. “Don’t tell me. None of my business.” Then her gaze strayed to Larry. “But, you did.”
“Patsy-”
“Well, thank goodness.”
Crystal’s brows shot up.
“The man needed something to get him back in the swing.”
“Oh, he’s back in the swing,” Crystal admitted.
Patsy’s grin grew wide.
“I can’t believe I said that.”
Patsy’s hand came down comfortingly on Crystal’s shoulder. “Your secret’s safe with me.”
“It just, kind of…” Crystal watched Larry joking in the midst of the chaos. “…happened,” Crystal finished, thinking Larry was, by far, the sexiest man at the race track.
Patsy was silent, and when Crystal glanced at her, she looked pensive. Maybe she wasn’t as supportive of the relationship as she pretended. In which case, Crystal might have done Larry a disservice by her admission.
“Something wrong?” she asked Patsy.
The woman gave her head a little shake and pasted on a smile. “Nothing at all.”
“Seriously,” said Crystal, looking closer, deciding it had to be something more serious than Patsy’s brother-in-law’s love life. It occurred to Crystal that Dean might have some kind of health problem. Maybe it was something that could compromise his ability to race. And maybe she should mind her own business. “I didn’t mean to pry,” she told Patsy apologetically.
But Patsy laughed. “Two minutes ago, we were discussing your sex life with my brother-in-law. I don’t know how it gets too personal after that.”
“Is Dean okay?”
A moment passed.
“There’s nothing worse than a twenty-five-year-old man in a forty-nine-year-old body.”
Just then, Dean emerged in Victory Lane, pulling his son into an enthusiastic hug.
“He obviously loves the sport,” said Crystal.
“And I’d love him just as much in any other career.”
Crystal’s heart went out to the woman. “You’re really worried, aren’t you?”
Patsy nodded. “Every single time he straps into that car and puts on his helmet.” She paused. “It didn’t used to be like this.”
“Have you talked to him about it?” asked Crystal.
“Until I’m blue in the face. I’m so-” Her voice broke. “Sorry.”
Crystal wrapped an arm around her shoulders, tipping her head close to Patsy’s. “Don’t be sorry. You love him.”
“I’m afraid,” Patsy confessed, “that his reflexes aren’t what they used to be. He thinks he’s immune to aging, and the win today supports that.”
“The sport is safer than ever,” Crystal tried.
“I know every safety feature, every precaution. But they’re still going 180 miles an hour.”
It was true. Even with harnesses, helmets, roll cages and fire protection, there were still risks.
“Experience doesn’t change the laws of physics,” Patsy finished on a bitter note.
“Mom,” came Kent’s shout of joy as he emerged from the Victory Lane crowd.
He rushed forward, lifting Patsy into a tight hug and spinning her around.
Her face instantly lit up. “Way to go, sweetheart.” She hugged him tight.
Crystal backed off a step or two, watching Dean join his family. Patsy saw him and immediately hugged him, all worrying pushed aside by love.
“Sorry I took so long,” came Larry’s deep voice next to Crystal’s ear.
Something inside her instantly relaxed. “No problem. They look pretty excited.”
“It was well earned.”
“What now?” asked Crystal as more team members joined Kent and his parents.
“Well, we only had the beach house for one night,” said Larry.
“So, that’s out,” Crystal agreed.
“A motel on the Interstate?” he playfully suggested, taking her hand and leading her through the crowd toward the exit.
“We’d miss our plane.”
“Good point. Your place when we get back?”
Crystal cringed. “My parents have a key, and they’ve been known to randomly drop in.”
“Ouch,” said Larry.
“Um-hmm,” Crystal agreed, shifting closer to him as the press of bodies closed in.
“This been a problem before?”
She nudged him in the ribs with her elbow. “None of your business. But no, it hasn’t been a problem before. I only moved into the apartment after Simon died.”
“Two years?”
“Got a problem with that?” She was willing to bet he hadn’t been sexually active since his wife’s death.
“No. But…” He eyed her up and down. “I know you don’t like hearing this, but you’re drop-dead gorgeous.”
“That means I should be promiscuous?”
“You’re an adult, Crystal. It’s not promiscuous to have a healthy sex life.”
“And there’s nothing wrong with being particular, either.”
Larry shifted her in front of him as they climbed the stairs to the walk over the bridge. At the top, he leaned forward to speak in her ear. “I have no idea why we’re having this argument. What I meant to say was, ‘good for you. You have every right to be particular, and I’m glad you were particular.’” A teasing note came into his voice. “Right up until me, of course.”
“Yeah,” she drawled. “I was obviously feeling charitable last night.”
He moved up beside her as the crowd on the other side of the bridge thinned out. “And what about now? How are you feeling now?”
“Charitable,” she confirmed with a nod. “Extremely and completely charitable. Your place?”
There was silence.
She glanced at his profile. “What?”
He breathed out a sigh. “Libby’s bed.”
Crystal squeezed her eyes shut for a second, regretting her stupidity.
“Maybe that’s silly,” he offered.
She wrapped her hand around his upper arm. “It’s not silly at all. It’s sweet and respectful.”
They passed the concessions, heading for Dean’s motor home to pick up Rufus.
Larry snaked an arm around her shoulders and tugged her close. “But I have another idea.”
“That’s what I love about a rocket scientist, always thinking.”
“Ever been to Myrtle Pond?”
CRYSTAL DIDN’T KNOW WHICH surprised her more, that Larry owned a ramshackle, old Victorian home at Myrtle Pond or that he piloted a plane. They’d picked up his Cessna at the Charlotte airport. Then, after flying twenty minutes and passing low over a small, picturesque lake, with the pattern of varying size homes on the eastern shore, Larry had landed the plane on a gravel airstrip about a mile from the general store and gas station.