Phase (Phoebe Reede: The Untold Story #1) (5 page)

Shoving my earbuds in again, I opened a book on my phone and started to read through a few pages of some romantic comedy. Just as the heroine found out about the secrets the hero was keeping, I had an epiphany.

Something had to change.

Soon.

I needed to figure out who I was—and who I wanted to be.

“HEY, PRINCESS.”

Before even attempting to open my eyes, I pushed my hair—now no doubt a brown and pink haystack—off my face. Then I blinked in the bright morning light and lifted my head off the pillow. “Dad?”

“You scared me, disappearing like that yesterday. Especially taking off on that damn bike.”

I closed my eyes and dropped my head back against my pillow. “Did you really fly a thousand k’s to lecture me?”

Instead of getting upset with my cheek like I expected him to, he chuckled. “God, you’re so much like me when I was your age.”

“So I’ve been told.”
Repeatedly.

He rested his hand on my arm. “Eden said you mentioned Nikki’s surgery yesterday.”

I shrugged, feeling like an arsehole for even bringing it up. Any stress I’d felt over her hospital visits and surgery was nothing compared to what Mum and Dad had gone through. They’d kept it hidden as best as they could, of course, but both the bags under Mum’s eyes and the weariness on Dad’s shoulders had grown exponentially as the weeks passed by. Watching their baby go in for open-heart surgery hadn’t been easy on either of them. Plus, it had to be dredging up a ton of memories for Mum.

Dad was quiet until I sat up. Then he ducked his head so that I had to meet his gaze. His eyes—the same odd turquoise as mine—filled with a swirl of emotions. He rested his hand on my knee and attempted a comforting smile. “I’m sorry if you felt like your mum and I have been putting too much pressure on you. I know it’s not right, but sometimes it’s easy for us to take you for granted because you’re always there for your brothers and sisters.”

“That’s not the reason I left.”

He levelled his stare at me, not trusting my words.

“I mean, it’s not really that. I don’t mind helping out. I just . . . Seeing the stress wearing Mum down. Hearing her cry in your arms. It’s a reminder that I did that to her as well.”

“Hey, kiddo, you didn’t
do
anything to her. You were born. That’s all you did, and I give thanks every day that you were. If it weren’t for you, Lys might have moved away and married someone else. Then where would I be? There aren’t too many people who would put up with me.” He winked at me.

I wiped my eyes with my sleeves as an involuntary chuckle left me despite my tears. “That’s true. You can be a handful.”

He indicated with his head that he wanted me to scoot over, so I did, moving closer to the wall. When I had, he moved next to me, wrapping me in his arms so I could rest against his chest. As soon as I did, I felt like a child again, being comforted over some fear that seemed insurmountable at first, but insignificant with the benefit of hindsight.

“You’re my miracle, and I don’t want to lose you. Why do you think I hate that damn bike of yours?”

I wrapped my arms around his waist. “You won’t lose me, Dad. I wouldn’t be on the bike if I couldn’t control it. You know that.”

“It’s not just about the bike though. My biggest fear is to lose you to indifference or hatred. There’s a reason I’ve never hidden my past from you, Pheebs, and it’s not just so that you don’t stumble across it by accident. I refuse to make the same mistakes my father did and end up with a chasm between us that’s too big to repair.”

“You don’t have to worry about making his mistakes. Mum would kill you if you even thought about it.”

It had been a while since I’d heard him give such a carefree laugh. Probably almost twelve months. I hadn’t heard him laugh properly since before the doctor had given him and Mum the news about Nikki’s condition during a routine ultrasound check-up while Mum was still pregnant. “You’re not wrong there,” he said as soon as the peal of laughter died in the air. “Plus I’d have Edie and Ruby on my case in a heartbeat, and those two are damn scary.” His eyes sparkled with mischief as he spoke of his best friend and sister-in-law.

Thinking about the shreds both of them would tear off Dad if he even thought about cheating on Mum made me laugh aloud.

“Not that I’d ever have to worry about that. I’m still as much in love with her as I was when you two crashed back into my life.”

“If I remember the stories correctly, it was you doing the crashing,” I teased.

His eyes narrowed at me for a second, as if warning me to watch it, before he chuckled. “So what’s this really about then? If not Nikki’s surgery.”

I sighed. “It’s about that. And it’s not. It’s about everything and nothing. I just feel like I’ve hit this age where I’m almost an adult and yet I don’t know who I am.”

“No one knows who they are at eighteen. God, I certainly didn’t.”

I picked at the polish on my nails again. “But I don’t even know if I’m heading in the right direction or whether I’m being led astray.”

“What do you mean?”

“Everyone has this expectation of me. I never know if people are being nice to be nice or because of who I am and the connections I have. Then there’s the boys.”

Dad grimaced, no doubt remembering what he was like at my age. “Do I want to know?”

“Not like that, Daddy.” I used the term specifically to put his mind at ease. Not that I’d go admitting it to him, but I was a long way off sharing that much of myself with anyone. The closest I’d come was second base with a friend in the back of a classmate’s VE Commodore. The opportunity had been there plenty of times, but I didn’t want to regret my first time. It had to be with someone I knew wanted me for me, and not for
Phoebe Reede.

“Then what is it?”

I decided not to raise the topic of my fear that I’d only hurt someone if I tried to care for them and talk about the other issue instead. “How am I supposed to know who to trust?”

“I thought I taught you that much at least,” Dad said, ruffling my hair.

I laughed as I fought him off. “Yeah, yeah, I know. When it comes to boys, trust no one because they all just want to get in your pants and will say and do anything necessary to achieve that goal,” I recited from a conversation we’d had when I turned sixteen.

He chuckled, the sound reverberating in my ear. As the subject turned more and more to growing up and sex, I felt less comfortable drawing solace from Dad. He seemed to feel the same way because he moved to lean against the small desk in the room. “Exactly.”

“But you know what I mean. How do I know who wants to be with me because of what’s up here”—I tapped my forehead—“instead of the fact that I’m apparently some pin-up chick in a hot car? And don’t get me started on the ones who seem to think bagging me will somehow give them a link to you.”

He screwed his nose up in disgust and opened his mouth ready to argue, before snapping it shut, no doubt understanding that I wasn’t just making up scenarios. There were actual instances that had occurred: boys who thought dating me would get them into the pits to watch a race at Queensland Raceway or a chance at an apprenticeship.

“I thought racing is what you wanted?”

“It is.”

“But?”

“But I don’t know
why
I want it anymore. How am I supposed to know that when I don’t know who I am?”

“You’re a big sister to four gorgeous kids if I do say so myself. You’re a rising star on the track. You’re a sweet and driven young lady.” He thought for a second and then smiled. “You’re my daughter.”

“Ugh, exactly!” I threw my hands up in resignation as I climbed off the bed and started to pace the small room.

“What?”

Spinning around to face Dad, I ran my hands through my hair, pulling it up into a makeshift ponytail before letting the strands slip through my fingers to fall back around my face. “I’m
your
daughter.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Dad, I love you, but your shadow is big enough to swallow the sun. I don’t know who I am away from that. Away from you.”

Once again, his mouth opened, as if he had a ready answer, but then he frowned and snapped it shut. That happened a couple more times. Each time his eyes grew just a little sadder and the frown a little deeper. “I didn’t realise having me as a father was such a bad thing.”

Tears welled in my eyes as I moved closer to him. “This is why I didn’t say anything, Dad. You take so much personally; accepting guilt long before it’s offered. This isn’t a
you
thing. I’m so proud of you, and everything you’ve built. Everything you’ve done. Coming from that background has made getting into racing that much easier for me. And that’s part of the problem.”

“What is?”

Unable to meet his gaze, I glanced down at my hands. “Do I even deserve to be out there?”

“Of course you do. You didn’t get a spot in our junior production cars three years ago because you’re my daughter. You got it because you were the best driver there.”

I threw my hands in the air and spun away from him, taking up my pacing again. “But how do you know that?”

“Because I wasn’t involved. I had independent people make the selection.”

“Independent people whose salaries you pay, you mean?”

“Well, yeah, but they can’t exactly fake times. You beat everyone else hands down.”

“Because I’ve been doing this for as long as I can remember.” I sank back onto the bed and buried my head in my hands.

“But that’s nothing to do with Emmanuel Racing. Even if I’d never climbed into another ProV8 after reuniting with your mum, I probably would have had you out on the track. And I think you’d have paved the way anyway. It’s in our blood.”

“Maybe. It doesn’t really matter though, does it? That’s all hypothetical. You did get back in the car. You did start Emmanuel Racing. And I don’t know me away from all that. Or away from being a big sister.”

“What do you need?”

“Space.”

“Oh.” He frowned.

I brushed my fingertips through the ends of my hair repeatedly, trying to undo the tangles left from sleep—wishing it was as easy to untangle the knots in my stomach and around my heart. “I just want to go somewhere where people don’t know me. Not forever. Just for a while.”

“Don’t know you, or don’t know me?”

I smirked at his perception and gave a small shrug. “Both.”

“I can have a chat with Danny if you like? I think he’s still got his flat in London.”

I shook my head. “No, you don’t understand. I want to do something that’s just me. All me.
Only
me.”

“Like what?”

“I don’t know, just jump on—” The words “a bike” were on the tip of my tongue, but I swallowed them because they wouldn’t help my case. “—uh, in a car and just drive somewhere.”

“I don’t see how that will help. Most people in Australia will recognise you.” He looked thoughtful. “Your manager has done a stellar job at getting you in front of the public and the sponsors, after all,” he added, talking about the work Mum had done ever since I’d expressed an interest in driving professionally.

“I was thinking of maybe heading to the States.” The idea wasn’t entirely new. In fact, it was something I’d been daydreaming about for a while, but it wasn’t until that moment that I understood how desperately I wanted it.

“I’m not sur—”

“I can use my savings,” I said to cut him off. “That way it won’t cost you a cent.”

His brow dipped before he looked away. “It’s not the cost I’m worried about.”

“What is it then?” I challenged, certain there wasn’t much he could say that I hadn’t thought of before.

“You aren’t even eighteen yet.”

“I will be soon.”

“How are you going to hire a car? Most places will need you to be twenty-five.”

“So I’ll use public transport, or go to a place that does rent to younger people. Or better yet, I’ll find a beater online and drive it around.” He didn’t need to know that it would likely be a bike, not a car.

He raised a brow. “You’ve thought about this a lot, haven’t you? You’ve got an answer for everything.”

“Daddy, you’ve taught me to take care of myself. To live as much as I can in the time that I have. I can do this. Please?”

His lips stretched into a grin. “I’ll tell you what, let’s run it by your mum. If it’s okay with her, then I guess it’s okay with me.”