8 8Team Blu convoyed east across North Dakota, heading for Fargo and the Friday night races at Red River Valley Speedway. On the way, they did promo stops in Bismarck and Jamestown; the crowds were bigger each time. In Jamestown, Trace signed T-shirts and leaned in for pictures as three Blu beverage guys handed out free stuff.
“It’s the power of television,” Harlan remarked as Trace worked to shorten up the never-ending line.
“Nothing to do with me?” Trace asked, scribbling his name on another driver card. After an hour, his signature had turned into a chicken scratch, but nobody seemed to mind.
“Nope,” Harlan said. “With TV ads and free stuff, we could put Jimmy in the car and still draw a crowd.”
“Yeah, thanks, Pops!” Jimmy called from over by the car.
At this point in the afternoon, they didn’t care what people heard them say. The line moved forward like an assembly line; Trace scrawled his name like a factory worker ratcheting down the same nut again and again. He signed for two full hours, making sure to get to everyone, after which he dragged himself inside the trailer. His wrist hurt.
“I think we’ve gone viral,” Jimmy said.
Trace headed up to his cabin and took a shower. He let the hot water run over him until it turned cool, but as he toweled off he still felt greasy. Gritty. Something. Signing autographs was like a sugar high—fun at the moment, but afterward it left him feeling edgy and empty. He was happy when the big diesel engine rattled alive and the hauler began to move. He flopped onto his bed, closed his eyes, and counted the Allison nine-speed gear shifts. When they were rolling down the highway, he always slept like a baby, but never until Harlan reached freeway speed. It had something to do with the silky flow of the transmission, the rocking motion of the trailer . . .
He woke up much later to silence. It was very early morning, and they were parked at a rest stop somewhere in the middle of North Dakota. He got up, pulled on a sweatshirt. The trailer was quiet below. He stepped outside into low, pink sunlight and the fresh, wet scent of prairie. It had rained during the night; flat spring wheat fields stretched far away south. Closer in, a black-and-white magpie fluttered in the thin grove of trees; a blue jay sat perched on a Dumpster, looking expectantly at Trace for a handout.
He was stiff from sleeping, and took a walk to stretch his legs. Behind the rest stop was a shallow drainage ditch with a narrow ridge on the other side. He leaped across, then began to walk along the field. The weeds and grass were silvery with dew. A hen pheasant flushed—startling him—and he paused to watch it flutter and glide, flutter and glide, to where it touched down in a patch of tall grass. He swung his own arms wide to loosen his shoulder muscles, and breathed deeply. If he closed his eyes, it felt like he was ten years old, and back on the farm. He walked on, glancing occasionally behind at the silent, shiny blue hauler—if its engine fired up, he would have to hustle back—but the only sounds were the intermittent whir of freeway traffic, and the sudden call of a meadowlark. That was a sound from when he was kid; meadowlarks were mostly gone from Minnesota, and he walked carefully forward until he saw it, perched on the stub of an ancient gray fence post. The bird had a yellow throat with a black tie. It sang and sang; no other meadowlark answered.
At that moment a door clacked back by the hauler. Trace turned. Harlan walked to Smoky’s motor home and rapped sharply on the slide-out; Smoky handed out a pack of cigarettes. Trace took a last look at the meadowlark and the glistening blue-green fields, then turned back.
After a short walk he came across the ditch and through the trees—just as Harlan headed toward the men’s john.
“Boo!”
“Jesus!” Harlan shouted, and jumped sideways. “Don’t scare me like that.”
“Sorry,” Trace said.
“Where you been?” Harlan said. His eyes went to the wet cuffs of Trace’s jeans.
“Took a little walk,” Trace said, nodding over his shoulder toward the prairie.
“Don’t do that, either,” Harlan said. “You might get lost.”
They pulled into West Fargo on Thursday evening, and ate at the Speedway Restaurant on Main Avenue West.
“Anybody from Minnesota coming over to the races tomorrow night?” Harlan asked.
“My dad, I think,” Trace said, glancing at his phone text messages, which kept coming. “Some of my friends, maybe.”
“You better make sure,” Harlan said. “Don’t want to get your fence bunnies mixed up.”
“I don’t have any fence bunnies,” Trace shot back.
“At least not like Smoky, back in the day,” Harlan said.
Smoky shrugged. “I had my fun. Glad I did, as it turned out.”
They fell silent. Harlan shrugged. “Hey, you never know,” he said.
During dinner Jimmy and Smoky went around and around about the rear-end setup. The Red River track was a half-mile oval—most speedways were a quarter or a third mile—which required a different gear ratio. The lower the ratio, the better the power out of the corners. But lower gearing was a drag on the top-end speed down the straightaways—plus it forced the engine to run at higher rpm.
“What do you like?” Harlan asked Trace.
“Thought you’d never ask,” Trace replied.
“Sorry,” Jimmy said. It was like he and Smoky suddenly remembered they had a driver—and not just a car.
“I like torque, and I like speed,” Trace said. “But if I have to choose, I’ll take torque any day.”
“Exactly,” Jimmy said, with a grin for Smoky.
“Okay,” Smoky said. “But by the time you hit the corners, you’re going to be red-lining.”
“Your motors can handle it,” Harlan said.
“We’re running a 360 Chevy,” Smoky muttered, “not an Indy car.”
“That’s why Laura pays you the big money,” Harlan said.
“Right,” Smoky said.
Their waitress came to inquire about dessert; she didn’t look twice at Smoky, which got her a big tip.
As they walked out of the restaurant, Trace said to Harlan, “You mind if I disappear for a while?”
“With who, and what’s ‘a while’?”
“A local driver I know.”
Harlan shrugged. “Sure. Why not? It’s good to have buddies. It’s not like you need to hang out with us 24-7.”
“Thanks, Dad,” Trace said.
“Mind if Jimmy goes along?” Harlan asked.
Trace hesitated.
“I can’t—I’ve got stuff to do,” Jimmy said quickly.
At that moment, Sara Bishop drove up fast in a 1970 Chevelle, silver with black rally stripes.
“What the—?” Harlan began, ready to leap to safety.
“Don’t worry, I’ll have him back before ten!” Sara called to Team Blu.
Trace jumped inside, and Sara smoked the tires in first gear as they left.
“Just had to do that,” she said.
“Great ride!” Trace said, looking around the Chevy. It had a bench seat, original four-speed shifter, round gauges—all of it stock.
“My dad’s,” she said. “I get to drive it once a month. I saved it up for tonight.” At the first stoplight, she leaned over for a hug. She smelled girly and fresh—not like rubber and race fuel—and her hair was longer. “Hey, Mr. Television Star,” she said.
He had forgotten what a cute mouth she had. “At least I’m not selling dog food,” Trace said.
“Or used cars,” she said.
“Or laxatives.”
She was easy to be with, and Trace relaxed as they cruised toward Fargo.
“Where do you want to go?” she asked.
“Anywhere,” Trace said.
As she braked for a stoplight, a late-model Mustang, all paint and no engine, pulled close alongside. The driver was a comb-over artist who had watched too many Elvis movies. He kept staring at Sara and her Chevelle.
“Okay, okay,” she said, glancing his way; she brought up the rpm. Adding a half clutch and lot of brake, she hunched up the Chevelle’s rear end. The Mustang guy did the same. At green, Sara hole-shot him big-time—several car lengths with a lot of blue smoke—then let him go. She laughed as he raced on by himself.
“That was mean,” Trace said.
“That was fun,” she said, turning north into a neighborhood. “Want to see our shop?”
Fargo was short on trees, but Sara’s parents’ home had two big elms in the backyard and a metal-sided shop tucked between them. They parked in the alley; she unlocked a side door, and they went inside.
“Wow!” Trace said. The shop was bright, immaculate, and totally filled with old-school memorabilia: gas pumps with the glass jars on top, old filling station signs, skinny tires on the wall, even displays of original quarts of oil in paper cans with tin tops.
“My dad’s a collector,” she said. “He and my mom travel all over on weekends, looking for gas station stuff.”
In contrast to the automotive antiques, the Bishop Super Stock looked like a battered spaceship from another planet. Trace walked over to it. “Are you racing tomorrow night?”
Sara followed him, and touched the roof of the Super Stock. “ ’Fraid not. We don’t have enough motor for the half mile,” she said. “I do best on short tracks, like Grand Forks and Buffalo River.”
“But you’re coming?”
“Wouldn’t miss it,” she said. They were standing close now.
Their eyes met for a long moment; he could not stop himself from reaching out and touching her hair.
She closed her eyes but didn’t pull away. “How’s Mel?” she asked.
He traced a finger around her ear, then touched her lips. “She’s . . . busy. The racetrack, school.”
“Amber told me about prom,” Sara said, opening her eyes. They were alive and shiny. “You really screwed that up.”
“Yes. For sure!” Trace said. He pulled back his hand and leaned against her car. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
She stepped close in front of him. “If there’s ever a line that a girl likes to hear, it’s that one.”
“Which one?”
“ ‘I don’t know what I was thinking.’ ”
Trace looped his arms around her waist. They were back to one of those in-between moments: friends or a whole lot more.
“I bet I know a boy’s favorite line to hear,” she murmured.
“What would that be?” Trace asked.
“ ‘I’m not busy at all tonight.’ ”
He pulled her sharply forward and kissed her. She felt nothing at all like Mel, but if he closed his eyes . . .
“Mmmmm,” she breathed, and pressed back even harder. She was hard-bodied, like a gymnast, a dancer.
“What about your parents?” Trace said.
“They’re up in Rolla at some auction,” she said. “My brother—he’s fourteen—ditched me to stay overnight with a friend. So it’s just me.”
“Whoa,” Trace breathed.
“ ‘Whoa’ like with horses, when they’re supposed to stop?” she asked. “Or more like ‘Whoa, I can’t believe my good luck?’ ”
Trace kissed her again.
Sara dropped him off at two a.m. beside the silent hauler in the shadowy parking lot. He didn’t get out immediately. They sat in silence.
“I know that you really love Mel,” she said. “So this was . . . nothing, all right?”
Trace didn’t know what to say. He touched her hair again.
She looked through the windshield toward the dark back of the speedway bleachers.
“It’s true. But tonight was not ‘nothing,’ ” Trace said.
When she turned back to him, her eyes glistened with tears.
“What?” Trace asked.
“I finally meet a guy I can talk with, and who seems to think I’m pretty—but he’s taken.”
“Please,” Trace began.
“Don’t lie to me about Mel,” Sara said. “I’ll only feel worse.”
At the pit entrance to the Red River Valley Speedway, a guy in a green safety vest came alongside. “Are you together?” he asked, glancing behind at Smoky’s motor home.
“That’s right,” Harlan said.
“Only one hauler per race car in the pits,” the man said.
“If there’s an extra fee, we’ll pay,” Harlan said.
“Sorry. Read our rule book,” the guy said. “We try to give our fans an unobstructed view.”
“Hang on a second,” Harlan said. He climbed out and went back to Smoky’s motor home. In the mirror, Trace watched them; Smoky gestured once, then twice. Harlan shrugged, then nodded.
“We’re gonna drop off the car,” he said, “then take the motor home into the pits.”
“That’ll work. Park your tall hauler over in the Schatz Lot,” the guy said, and pointed. Then he waved them forward.
“Why we doing it that way?” Jimmy asked. “I need my stuff.”
“Smoky wants it that way,” Harlan said.
“I thought you were the crew chief,” Jimmy muttered.
Red River had a prerace inspection lane, which was always the sign of a top-notch speedway. Jimmy and Harlan rolled the Blu Super Stock forward, then waited while the tech guys measured the car: tip of the nose spoiler to the front wheel hub, overall wheelbase, roof height, height of the deck lid in relation to the rear quarter panel, and more—anything that had to do with airflow.
Trace and Harlan watched. “Back in the day, Smoky once built a car to 15/16 scale,” Harlan said. “It kept beating everybody. Cut through the air like a bird. The track officials tore it apart after every race, but they could never find anything wrong. He finally got caught when another car came up and parked alongside him. You could tell that Smoky’s car was way smaller.”
“Okay, Blu, you’re good to go,” the tech guy called. “See you after the races—especially if you win.”
Harlan gave him a look. “You say that to everybody?”
“Yup,” the man said.
The stands began to fill well before the time trials. Trace took a call from his father. “We were going to get pit passes,” he said, “but then Linda thought we could see better from the stands.” His voice was overly cheerful, and Linda giggled in the background.
You mean, they serve alcohol in the stands but not in the pits? “Okay, no problem,” Trace said.
“So we’ll see you after the races, right?”
“Later,” Trace said.
Harlan looked at him. “That sounded like bad news.”
“No, good news, actually,” he said, and left it at that. With some time on his hands, he wandered down pit row to look at the Late Models and the sprint cars. A Late Model looked much like a Super Stock but had a slightly shorter front end, plus a rear spoiler. The spoiler, tilted up to create downforce on the rear tires, was the giveaway—that, and the sweet smell of the methanol fuel they used. New Late Model engines out of the crate cost as much as brand-new, turn-key Super Stocks.
But in racing, there was always another level. A Late Model was a kiddie car compared with a sprint, where the top class had a 410-cubic-inch, 700-horsepower motor driving a much lighter car on a much shorter wheelbase. The main thing that kept a sprint car from lifting off the track like a fighter jet was the big downdraft wing on top—that and the two rear tires, which were as wide and fat as state fair hogs. It took guts to drive a sprint car.
Trace paused beside a local sprint car team sponsored by Moffett Farms, who were potato growers near Fargo. The pit crew ignored Trace, who was not yet in his racing suit. The No. 82 car was clean and new, but the team had a vibe of new money and not enough experience. Trace walked on. The big sponsors—Pennzoil, National Guard, Snap-on tools, Quaker State, and others—were not here tonight. Instead it was all teams with regional sponsors: cement contractors, heavy-equipment rentals, beer distributors, and potato growers.
“How ya doing, kid?” said an older fellow by a battered sprint car.
“Good,” Trace said.
“Want to look at the car?”
“Sure,” Trace said.
“We can use all the fans we can get,” he said, and gave Trace a walkaround. The red sprint car’s tires were worn, its wing had a serious wrinkle, and the dented but freshly painted sides were covered in smaller decals, all local sponsors; they ranged from an insurance agent to a whole foods store.
“My daughter’s place,” the man said of the whole foods decal. “It’s on Broadway, downtown Fargo. She can’t afford to pay anything, but she packs us lunch for the races. You should stop there.”
“You must eat healthy,” Trace said.
“I sneak off and eat speedway chicken, myself,” the man said. His eyes returned to the car. “But we get by,” he said. “And that’s the good thing about a mostly independent car like ours—it puts the focus back on the driver. Anybody can win if you’ve got an unlimited budget.”
Trace was silent. Then he said, “Who’s your driver?”
“My son,” the man said proudly. “He’s thirty now. Been racing since he was hardly big enough to fit into a go-kart. Doing great. One of these years, somebody’s going to take notice and give him a real ride.”
“Good luck tonight,” Trace said, and walked on. A couple of rows over was the orange Super Stock of Jason Nelson; Trace thought of walking past, but didn’t.
Back in the central pit area, Team Blu—except for Smoky—sat in lawn chairs underneath the awning of Smoky’s Gulf Stream. A stack of fresh tires, a floor jack, a generator, and Jimmy’s giant toolbox on wheels sat beside the blue Super Stock.
“All we need is a barbecue kettle and some weenies, and we’d be back to Flintstone Speedway—where you came from,” Harlan said as Trace approached.
“Nothing wrong with that,” Trace said.
“Makes me nervous,” Jimmy said; he meant being away from the big hauler.
“I told you: if we need some work done between heats and the feature, Trace drives back to the hauler,” Harlan said.
“Still . . .” Jimmy said, and trailed off.
“You boys worry too much,” Smoky said from behind his window screen. From inside the Gulf Stream came the sounds of NASCAR on television. Smoky’s satellite dish was cupped to the sky.
Time trials were another sign of a professional speedway. Each car took two fast laps, with the best time used for heat race placement. On his first lap Trace got squirrelly in turn 2, but on his second lap he hit his marks and knocked off a full three seconds.
“That first lap was me—my fault—don’t change a thing!” Trace said as he came into the pits.
“That’s what we like to hear,” Harlan said.
Super Stocks ran second of four classes, right after Street Stocks and before Late Models; Trace’s time trials numbers put him in the second row, inside, for the heat race. Jason Nelson—who else?—lined up two rows back.
On the second lap the lead Super Stock threw a right front tire—pitching the car sideways, where he was T-boned by the following car. Both left for the pits and could not make the three-slow-laps window to return. That put Trace in second place. He had good power—not great, but enough to gradually reel in the lead car and complete the pass on the eighth lap. From then on it was a question of hitting his spots in the corners. He avoided mistakes, and took the checkered flag by two car lengths.
Back in the pits, Harlan and Jimmy each pretended to be reading a newspaper as Trace rumbled in. Except that they held the newspapers upside down.
“Very funny!” Trace said as he killed the motor.
Harlan caught his helmet, and Jimmy almost tipped his chair over, laughing. “That’s the way to do it!” Harlan said.
Smoky was actually outside, in daylight, though he wore long sleeves, gloves, and a wide, floppy fishing hat for maximum sun protection.
“Motor feel all right?” he rasped.
“Decent,” Trace said, exiting backward from the cockpit, “but no real sweet spot.”
Smoky nodded to Jimmy, who quickly hooked up the hauler cable. As Jimmy stood uncertainly by the car, Smoky said to Trace, “Would you go over to the food shack and get me a cola?” He fished a twenty-dollar bill from his shirt pocket.
“Why don’t you go with him, Jimmy?” Harlan said. “Trace might run into those cowboys from Nebraska and need some muscle.”
“Sure,” Jimmy said.
“Yeah, what do we know about engines?” Trace added.
When Trace and Jimmy returned, Smoky was all done working on the car.
In the feature, Trace ended up in the pole position—his least favorite starting slot. The inside, first-row spot was overrated. All the pressure was on the lead driver; there was no car ahead to draft or to learn from. A good part of racing strategy was watching the cars in front—how they handled the turns, where they rocked and rolled over a hole or a soft spot. Having the pole position was like being point man on a combat patrol: get out there and draw fire while everybody else hangs back.
After leading for three laps, Trace got overly aggressive and missed his spot in turn 4—doing a loop-de-loop right in front of the grandstand. The worst part was hearing the cheers as he was waved to the rear for the restart. There were very few times on the racetrack when anger was helpful, but this was one of them. Starting in the rear after beginning in the pole position was a driver’s ultimate humiliation; Trace fixed his eyes on the lead car—red No. 47, already a half lap ahead at the green flag—and stepped down hard with his right foot.
He made up two or three spots quickly, then ground it out through the middle laps. As the laps counted down on the scoreboard, his car got faster and faster; it wasn’t like down in South Dakota, where his engine surged. This time it grew in rpm, slowly, lap by lap. With more engine, he had a better feel for the track, for the suspension, for the turns; as with riding a bicycle or planing across a lake on water skis, the more speed, the sharper the turns. With huge torque out of the corners, and red-line rpm down the stretch, he began to eat up cars like an alligator swimming behind a line of ducks.
By lap 17 of the twenty-lap feature, he was in fourth place. Jason Nelson, in third, tried to block him right and left, but Trace had too much car for Nelson and got by him. Some races belong to a driver from lap 1, and Trace felt ashamed that he had—even briefly—let go of that feeling.
He kept playing the lead two cars, probing for daylight. When he found a crack, he slipped between and challenged them three-wide. The triplicate of Super Stocks roared deep into turn 4, drifting sideways like three fish in the same school, but it was Trace who nosed stronger out of the turn. The other two tucked in behind him, and Trace surged the last two laps to take the checkered.
He pounded the wheel and pumped his fist all the way to the scale. After a moment on the scale, he was waved toward the winner’s circle for a quick photo. Emerging from the car, he waved to the crowd. Sara—he was sure it was her—jumped up and down and waved. There was cheering, but more than a few boos and jeers.
“You and Kasey Kahne,” the trophy girl said as she leaned against Trace for the photo. “People love to hate you.”
“I’m a tough guy,” Trace said.
“You sure look like one,” she murmured. “I love those Blu TV ads—how you get in and out of the car—but you really need a chick in them.”
“Like who?” Trace said, keeping his smile fixed for the cameras. There was some commotion in the stands, but Trace could not see well after the flash from the camera.
“Like me, sweetheart,” the girl said. She kept her face toward the camera.
Then it was off to tech lane.
“Nice work, kid!” Harlan shouted as Trace pulled in behind the other top-four finishers.
Jimmy hustled over to spray the radiator, aiming his hose and disappearing in a hissing cloud of steam.
“Don’t thank me!” Trace said, watching the temp slowly fall. “I was red-lining every lap. I can’t believe this motor!”
“Neither can a lot of people,” said Jason Nelson’s father. He was standing just ahead, by Jason, who had finished fourth.
“Maybe it’s your driver—ever thought of that?” Harlan threw back.
The older Nelson swore and came forward.
A tech guy in a green safety vest hustled over. “Please stay with your car,” he said to Nelson. Then he turned to Trace. “Please drive forward to the tech shack.”
“What did I tell you?” the older Nelson said.
Harlan ignored him, and followed Trace forward.
Inside the tech shack, the crew was quick and efficient; two guys worked on the top end, while another pair worked underneath the car, dropping the oil pan in order to get a look at the crankshaft. Within twenty minutes they were done.
“Have a nice day,” the lead tech guy said, like a cop after a traffic stop.
“You can bet on it,” Harlan said.
Jimmy put the oil pan back on to keep out the dust (they would need fresh oil and a new pan gasket), after which a speedway ATV bumped up behind, and pushed the Blu car back toward their pit slot.
Steering the silent Super Stock down pit row, Trace kept his eyes forward. In his peripheral vision, he saw other drivers and their crews turn to look. And it was Trace’s forward focus that made him see it: Smoky’s Gulf Stream, and the satellite dish on top. It was pointed not skyward but toward the track.
Worse, waiting by the little motor home was Laura Williams, Team Blu’s big boss; Carlos, the photographer; and Tasha.
“We’ve got visitors,” called Harlan, who had caught a ride on the back of the ATV. “Didn’t tell you earlier because I didn’t want to make you nervous.”
“Thanks a lot,” Trace muttered.
Laura was dressed in her usual power business suit—black short skirt and pale silk blouse—with her signature flaming red lipstick. Carlos had his artsy look going, with tight black pants and a lime-green Hawaiian shirt; a big digital camera covered his face as he snapped away.
“Did we pass inspection?” Laura asked. She was not big on greetings.
“Always do,” Harlan said with a big smile.
“What was that all about over in the stands?” Laura said. She was not smiling.
“You mean, fans not happy that we won?” Harlan asked.
“Yes,” Laura said. “And there was a fight of some kind. I didn’t like that booing, that ‘checkered flag cheater’ stuff.”
“Redneck locals,” Harlan said dismissively. “Like I told Tasha down in South Dakota—people root for the home-town boys.”
“But why would so many of them not like us?” Laura asked.
“Because we’re winning,” Harlan boomed. He threw a beefy arm around Trace. “People hate winners, and we’re winners because Team Blu has the real deal for a driver—did you see him come from last to first?”
“Yes. Pretty swift,” Laura said. “Literally.”
“Glad you caught the race,” Trace said, unzipping his suit partway as he wiped his sweaty, dusty face. “Didn’t know you were coming.”
“Hold that!” Carlos called.
“We like to check up on our people from time to time,” Laura said to Trace. “Especially since we missed you down in Iowa.”
“Trace and I had our talk,” Tasha said.
Laura pursed her narrow, bright lips. “Actually, we all need to have a little talk—a team meeting,” she said.
“Uh-oh,” Harlan said, trying to make a joke.
“Now?” Laura asked, turning to Tasha.
“Why not?” Tasha said.
“Somewhere out of the dust?” Laura said as a car on an open trailer rumbled by. She waved dust away from her pale face.
“Let’s meet back at the office,” Harlan said, nodding across toward the Blu hauler.
“Uh, Laura?” Carlos interrupted. “Can I shoot Trace outside while he’s still sweaty?”
“Sure,” Laura said.
“I need a bunch of new shots by the car,” Carlos said, taking Trace’s arm and steering him into position. “The light is fabulous right now—still some sun, but the overhead track lights are working great as fill-in.”
Tasha and the others watched.
“Can you unzip your suit a little more?” Carlos asked as he fired away.
Expressionless, Trace obeyed. Tasha looked away.
“Your hair’s getting long,” Carlos said with a pained look. “You’re starting to look Italian playboy.”
“I noticed that, too,” Laura said.
“I told him he was looking like a hippie,” Harlan said.
“You thrash the car, I’ll worry about my hair,” Trace muttered.
“No, we’ll worry about your hair,” Laura countered.
Trace set his jaw and said nothing.
“Fabulous—love the angry look!” Carlos exclaimed. “Hold please!”
Laura turned to Tasha. “Be sure to find Trace a good stylist before our next photo shoot.”
“Sure,” Tasha said flatly.
They headed back to the Freightliner, where Jimmy quickly clattered together some chairs. Team Blu, with Laura and Tasha, and Carlos shooting away, assembled inside the brightly lit trailer.
“I’m here with good news,” Laura said.
“Better than winning a feature?” Harlan said, with a nudge to Jimmy.
“Yes, actually,” Laura said. “You might have noticed some ‘movement,’ we’ll call it, in your promo appearances?”
“No kidding,” Jimmy said.
“That’s because our Blu ad campaign has been successful beyond anyone’s expectations,” Laura said.
“Yahoo!” Jimmy said.
“Pipe down,” Harlan whispered.
“In the corporate and financial world, there’s always a but that follows good news,” Laura continued. “But in our case”—she laughed at her own joke—“there is none. In its first three months, Blu energy drink has achieved a five percent share of the national energy drink market.”
“Is that good?” Harlan asked.
“It means that Red Bull and all the other drinks had better be looking over their shoulders,” Laura said.
Jimmy and Harlan high-fived.
Laura went on. “Our marketing strategy of authenticity, grassroots, heartland appeal—”
“And a very hot driver,” Carlos added as he fired away.
“Yes, that, too,” Laura said, stepping over to fluff up Trace’s sweaty hair. “All of it has been on the money in every way. In the big world of Karchers and Ladwin Agribusiness, Blu energy drink is a rising star. And everybody at headquarters loves Team Blu.”
There was silence in the trailer. Laura looked at the group with a smile, and kept her hand on Trace’s shoulder. He stared across the trailer without expression.
“Somewhere there’s gotta be a but or a however,” Harlan said.
“We can’t think of any,” Tasha said. “Trace has even been taking care of his homework.”
“So this means we can keep racing?” Jimmy asked, with a wink to Trace.
“Remember when we launched this program?” Laura said, looking down at Trace. “How I said that we didn’t need to win every race? That we just needed to compete?”
Trace nodded.
“Well, corporate has changed its mind. We like winning—winning is fun,” she said. She pushed back a lock of hair from Trace’s forehead.
“We like it, too,” Harlan said. There were grins all around—except for Trace.
“But to answer Jimmy’s question: yes, Team Blu can keep racing,” Laura said. “In fact, our budget has been increased. Assuming the rest of this year goes as well as it is now, we have plans to expand Team Blu racing.”
“Expand?” Harlan asked.
“How so?” Jimmy said quickly.
“We are considering moving you up to a more national car class,” Laura said.
Harlan looked puzzled.
“Such as Late Models or sprint cars,” Laura said.
There was stunned silence in the trailer.
“Sprints?” Trace breathed. He got goose bumps on his forearms.
“Yes. I prefer them over Late Models, actually,” Laura said. “Sprint cars offer a fan base that has more money to spend—plus they have those pretty wings on top with all that advertising space.”
For once, Harlan and Jimmy were speechless.
“Unless you think you couldn’t handle a sprint car,” Laura said to Team Blu.
“You just watch us!” Harlan said.
Trace glanced at Tasha, then looked up at Laura. “This is for sure?”
Laura shrugged. “Nothing in business is for sure, but it’s highly likely. We have a winning team and a winning product. The nature of business is to keep expanding—to get to the top.”
“The top for me would be a Blu NASCAR ride,” Harlan said. He was joking, as always.
“If we keeping winning and growing, in a couple of years that’s not impossible,” Laura said.
Jimmy rocked back in his chair as if hit by a Taser. His mouth hung open—and Harlan, too, was speechless.
Laura turned to Trace and smiled. “Any questions, Mr. Driver?”
Trace swallowed. “No. Not really. Just one for Tasha, but we can do that later.”
Tasha gave him a quizzical look.
“Must be about his homework,” Harlan said.
“You don’t look all that happy,” Laura said, tilting her head to look at Trace.
Trace was silent.
“That’s his normal look,” Harlan said. “Ice Man. That’s what we should call him.”
“I guess if you’re a driver, that’s a good thing,” Laura said. She turned to the group. “We’ll meet up later for dinner and celebrate this properly, all right?”
“Yahoo!” Jimmy crowed again.
After the meeting ended, Tasha hung around the trailer. Finally Harlan and Jimmy stepped outside.
“What?” Tasha asked. She kept her voice down.
Trace took a deep breath. “We’re cheating,” he said.
“Huh? What are you talking about?” Tasha asked.
“Our motor. Our team. We’re winning because we’re cheating.”
“How do you know this?” she whispered.
“I can’t prove it, but I’m nearly a hundred percent sure we are.”
“How?” Tasha asked.
“It’s a motor thing. It’s complicated,” Trace said.
Tasha swore briefly. She looked around the trailer. “I always wondered why we hired those Southern boys. There were plenty of car builders in the Midwest.”
Trace was silent. Then he said, “So what do we do?”
Tasha gave him a long look. “Nothing right now.”
Harlan poked his head back into the trailer. “Driver needed. Your fans are here!”
Trace stepped outside to clapping. A group of people—including Trace’s father and his girlfriend, Linda—had clustered by the door. His father had a scuffed red cheek, a black-crusty nostril, plus some drops of blood on his 18x T-shirt.
“What happened to you?” Trace asked.
“There were these idiots in front of us,” Linda said quickly. She had high hair and a tight sweater. “They kept ragging on you and Team Blu. They were really drunk and—”
“And I asked them to lay off,” Don Bonham said. “I said, ‘Hey, that’s my kid out there.’ ”
“It sort of went downhill from there,” Linda said, and giggled.
“Don’t tell me you got into a fight!” Trace said.
“Not really a fight fight,” Linda began, and leaned closer to Trace—she was unsteady on her feet—which was when Harlan stepped up.
“Thanks, honey, for sticking up for Team Blu,” he said, taking Linda by the elbow and steering her to the side, “but Trace has some people to see right now.”
“Great race, Son,” Don said, and gave Trace a clumsy hug.
Trace glanced at a cluster of parents waiting with their kids, boys and girls, who held Trace Bonham T-shirts. To the side was Sara Bishop; she was talking with Tasha. “Thanks,” he said. “I gotta go.”
Trace worked the crowd, pausing to watch his father and Linda walk away—then headed over to Sara and Tasha.
“You remember Sara?” Tasha asked.
“Sure,” Trace said. “We’ve been in touch.”
Sara blushed and looked away.
“Oh, God. Don’t tell me,” Tasha said.
Neither Sara nor Trace said anything.
“Anyway, I guess we’re all friends here,” Tasha said. “So I might as well tell you something. Sara was the runner-up for the Team Blu ride.”
“I was?” Sara asked. She blinked rapidly.
“For sure,” Tasha said. “You had that cute girl-in-a-man’s-world thing going. The freckles, the mouth, the short hair. We liked you a lot.”
“Thanks,” Sara said flatly. “But all I got was this generic rejection letter.”
“That’s the corporate way—sorry,” Tasha replied. “But you definitely were our second choice.”
Sara looked sideways at the big, shiny Team Blu hauler. When she looked back to Trace, he knew something had changed—she was suddenly a step farther away from him. Receding. Then out of reach.
“Jason Nelson was our third choice,” Tasha continued. “He has a lot to offer, too. It was a tough call for us, choosing among the three of you.”
There was silence. “I should go,” Sara said.
“Wait,” Trace called, but Sara was already heading off.
“What are you trying to do?” Trace said to Tasha. In the harsh light of the parking lot, she looked like a stranger.
“Do?” Tasha said. “I’m only sharing information that I thought you’d like to know. We’re all adults here, right?”
Trace was silent.
“And about that cheating thing,” Tasha said, stepping closer. Her voice was low and flat. “I’ve thought about the whole thing, and it didn’t take me long to decide. If I were you, I’d let it go. Business is based on facts. We race, we go through the tech inspections, we pass those inspections. Those are the facts.”
“Yeah, but—”
“But nothing,” she said, cutting him off. “Right now, the only one who says we’re cheating is you.”
Trace looked toward the track.
Tasha moved even closer. “Here’s my deal,” she said, lowering her voice further. “I’ve worked my ass off to get into advertising, and this Team Blu gig on my résumé is like having aces in a poker game. Same thing for you as a driver, I would think.”
Trace met her gaze; her dark eyes were no longer sexy, but flat and cold.
“So until someone proves we’re cheating, we’re not cheating. And if you want to make a fuss about it, we’ve got other drivers who would be happy to take your ride.”