Racing to Love: Eli's Honor (2 page)

Though she had an office with a closed door, Molly had a picture window and could see everything that went on. Out of the corner of his eye, Eli saw her lean back in her chair and cross her arms over her chest. He bought himself another few minutes by stopping at the coffee maker, taking his time to pick out the caramel flavor he preferred then setting the machine up to brew the single cup. He tapped his foot like he was in a hurry. In actuality, he was hoping someone would interrupt and call him aside, postponing the lecture that was waiting on him.

For over two years, Molly tried to get him to look into alternative therapies to manage the pain, but it was a wasted effort. There was nothing they could do. That night in
Salt Lake City changed his life forever.

The season had been so close to being over, and he was battling with Jesse for first place. The two men were tighter than blood-related brothers, racing neck-and-neck, enjoying the challenge and the camaraderie. Three laps to go in the main event, and not even a bike’s length separated them. It had been one of the closest races of the season. Carter had retired by then, leaving the two to duke it out week after week, and the crowds loved it. It was one thing to watch two rivals go at it, but it was an entirely different experience watching two friends race. There was never anything dirty, and no one knew from week to week which man would come out on top. It had been a thrill for every lap of the entire season.

Then it was over.

A lapper in the way. A guy so far out of the race he was running eighteenth out of twenty, and Eli and Jesse both had two full laps on him, already. The guy hadn’t paid attention to the blue flags alerting him to move to the outside and get out of the leaders’ way. Pure arrogance and ass on his part.

Jesse rounded the tight corner with Eli’s front wheel even with his own back wheel, only to come up on the lapper with nowhere to go. Jesse barely hung onto his handlebars, and after hitting the deep ruts wrong, finally righted himself and kept going. Eli hadn’t been so lucky. His front tire hit the lapper’s back tire, and instantly both men were thrown from their bikes.

The lapper was able to shake it off, dazed but aware enough to make it to the side of the track on his own. Eli was run over twice before the flaggers diverted the traffic coming up behind him into the tight corner.

He woke up two days later in the ICU with a laundry list of medical problems, the broken back he suffered being the worst of them. His friends had surrounded him in a constant vigil until he woke. They were there when he learned he would never race again. They were there when he was told he might never walk again.

But he did.

Pulling on all the years of rigorous training and discipline he was accustomed to, and the support of his friends and family, he healed. Proving the doctors wrong, he even made it back onto his bike just a year after the accident. He wouldn’t ever race again, but he could ride well enough to teach the future racers of the sport at the riding academy.

The academy.
Their
academy. Combined with his friends, the school was the main thing that kept Eli afloat that first year. Lucky for him, he had that lifeline to latch onto, otherwise he could have very easily spiraled into a deep depression like so many athletes do once their professional careers are over. Especially when it is taken away due to injury.

The coffee machine gurgled, and Eli let out a sigh. Molly’s eyes were still fixed on him, and no one had come to his rescue with even the stupidest of questions. He stirred in a little extra sugar because even the way the coffee came wasn’t quite sweet enough for him. Eli slowly licked the stir stick and threw it in the
trash can beside the small counter. Turning on his heel, he finally faced her raised eyebrow. Molly didn’t say a word as he slowly lowered himself into the leather side chair in front of her desk, but the frown as he gingerly tried to find a comfortable position was unmistakable.

In the old days, before the crash, he’d chased Molly around the pits, given her piggyback rides, and ganged up with Carter and Jesse to wrestle her to the ground just to torment her. That was back before she and Carter had kids, and back when he could walk without looking like a seventy-year-old man. Back when he would have plopped his ass in the chair, tipped it back with his feet resting on her desk and crossed at the ankles while he made himself at home. He could pretend his manners were kicking in since he would turn thirty in a few weeks, but they both knew otherwise.

“So, what is the big news?” Eli blew across his coffee mug, trying to appear aloof.

“You’re hurting.”

It wasn’t a question, so he dared to take a sip of the hot coffee in his hands instead of looking up.

“Damn it, Eli. You have to go back to the doctor. I’ll take you. I know you don’t want to hear what they have to say, but I’ll be there.” Her voice was loving but desperate.

“Honey, you going with me isn’t going to change anything. It’s not that I don’t want to hear what they have to say. It’s that, this is as good as it gets. There’s nothing else they can do.”

“But Eli—“

“D, we both know in our world, every time you get on the bike it could be the last. That
was my last. That wreck was
the
wreck. I’m lucky I can walk. I know that, I’m grateful. It’s a damn miracle I can help with the kids as much as I can. But the pain, they can’t make it any better than it is right now.” He shook his head. His voice was never edgy or frustrated, just matter-of-fact.

Eli knew where Molly was coming from, her concern was sincere and from her heart. That was one of the many things he loved about her.

He tilted his head and let the corners of his mouth turn up. “Now how many times are we going to have this same damn conversation? It’s like déjà vu, or Groundhog Day or something.”

“E, I just hate seeing you hurt. It breaks my heart.”

“Mol, trust me, I understand. Some days are just worse than others. Today is one of those days. I’m fine. Now, what did you want to see me about anyway? I’m sure you didn’t drag my ass out of my nice warm, cozy bed and make me come all the way over here to the school to lecture me.” He winked.

The grin and wink were twofold. She would know he loved her, and she would realize the conversation was once again over. At least until her next attempt.

She lowered her head and let out a defeated sigh. After a long pause, she raised her head, ran her fingers through her side-sweeping bangs, and rested her head in her palm. The smile she gave him was one of understanding, but he knew she still held out hope.

“So, you gonna keep me in suspense? What was so important you couldn’t let a guy sleep in a little?” He raised his eyebrow, but the smile spread wider.

He knew she felt bad for waking him after she saw him in pain, so he was going to rub it in, just a little. As he opened his mouth to speak again, the squeal stopped him. He turned as the little blur came running straight for him, arms out and giggling the entire way.

“Uncle E, Uncle E.”

“There’s my girl, how are you, baby?” As Eli set his coffee mug on Molly’s desk and turned with his arms outstretched, he grimaced, but continued to twist toward the little girl.

Molly stopped her before the little pixie could put her arms all the way up. “Alexandra Noland Sterling.” Her voice was calm but sharp. Carter’s little replica froze in her spot several inches away from Eli’s chair. “Don’t climb on Uncle E, sweetie. His back hurts today.”

“Oh, D, it’s fine. She doesn’t weigh twenty-five pounds. She’s a little bitty nothing of a three-year-old.” Eli grabbed for Alex and let her scramble up onto his lap. “And you’re my heart, aren’t you, sugar?”

The little blue-eyed angel grinned big, her sandy blonde, waist-length curls falling down around her. She started to laugh with his tickling.

“I’m almost four, Uncle E. I tell you and tell you, you
never
‘member.” Her little head tilted with her mother’s genetic sass, and then she giggled again.

Eli bit his cheek to keep from laughing. “I know you are, baby girl. You and your brother are getting so big on me. I’m going to have to go out and find some bricks to stick on your heads to stop you.”

Alex rolled her eyes, a trait she had inadvertently learned from her Aunt Emery.

Molly shook her head and closed her eyes, resting her forehead in her palms in defeat as Eli grinned.

Alexandra Sterling was going to be their challenge. The old proverb “It takes a village,” definitely rang true—it was going to take them all. She was absolutely beautiful, and her china doll face won over every heart she met. She and her twin brother, Jackson, were sweet children, kind and funny. They had taken over the academy and everything else on the Noland property the moment they were born.

She and Jack wandered around the shop, school, and track as if they owned the place. They did, but they were only three and didn’t realize that yet. They spent their days talking to teenagers and adults, treated like equals. They were never dismissed with a pat to the head. At almost four, they were more knowledgeable about bikes and racing than some adults Eli had encountered. He snickered proudly at the truth.

Alex was a petite little girl. That, combined with her long curls and big blue eyes, made it impossible for anyone to say no to her. While Jack was quiet, Alex was bubbly and full of spunk. Where Jack’s penetrating, light blue eyes were always taking in everything around him, Alex’s deeper blues sparkled with a hint of mischief. Their list of differences went on and on, their looks and personalities completely their own, but they were bonded tighter than any two siblings Eli had ever known.

A twin thing—fraternal, but definitely twins. Jack looked like his mother, but had the quiet steadiness of his father. Alex looked like her father, but possessed her mother’s spitfire determination and attitude. A combination they had all sat around the shop, track, or table discussing many times, along with the need to buy a lock for her door once she was a teenager.

A nice, big, strong one with no key.

“Hey Alex, where’s brother, honey?” Molly asked smiling.

“Jack’s with Grandma.”

“Up at the house?”

“Yep.” Her eyes went wide as Eli’s pointer finger made circles, threatening to tickle her again.

“Why don’t you go see if Grandma has some cookies or something? Tell her your Uncle E didn’t eat breakfast.”

“’Kay, Mommy.” Alex wrapped her tiny arms around Eli and laid her head against the hard plane of his chest. “Be right back, Uncle E. I promise.”

He rested his cheek on top of her head as he rubbed her back. “You know me and my sweets, don’t you, baby Alex? You better hurry. I don’t want Uncle Jesse to steal ’em all from me. He and Aunt Emery will probably be up here soon. And tell Grandma that it was Mommy’s fault I didn’t get breakfast.”

“Um, Grandma’s gonna be mean at you, Mommy,” Alex snickered. “You don’t mess with her kids.”

Molly and Eli both lost control of the laughter they were trying desperately to contain. Karen’s statement, repeated by the three-year-old, was just too much for them to hide their amusement and something they’d come to regret later when she continued to repeat it for fun.

Alex wiggled down out of Eli’s lap, scooting out of the shop, and skipped up the stone path to the back patio of the main house. Her curls bounced behind her in the morning breeze, and the gold in them glinted in the sun as she happily sang what Eli thought was supposed to be a current pop song from the radio. The three-year-old version, with missing and made-up words. The farther away she got, the harder it was to hear and decipher.

“You know that little girl adores you, right?” Molly asked, her voice full of love.

Eli beamed watching Alex disappear through the French doors of the house. “Yeah. I love those kids like they’re my own.”

Molly tilted her head. “You also know they’re spoiled rotten, and you’re partly to blame, right?”

“Yep!”

“You sound downright proud of that fact, Elijah Tate Hunter.” Molly raised an eyebrow, feigning anger.

“Damn.” Eli started laughing. “Pulling out my full name and the mom voice. Geez, D.”

“What can I say? It works on you all.” Molly shrugged her shoulder then snickered, the smug smirk dancing across her face.

“Oh you think, huh?” Eli winked. “And you wonder where Alex gets it from.” He shook his head, chuckling.

“Oh, no…I know. That’s what scares the hell out of me. She acts just like her grandpa.”

“Her grandpa? What the hell are you smoking? Look in the mirror, baby—that’s where she gets it from.” Eli drank the last bit of his coffee and set the empty mug on Molly’s desk.

Leaning forward, his cocky smirk challenged Molly to argue what they both knew was the truth as he used her desk top as a set of drums, the three taps cueing the end of his joke. When her cheeks flushed and she rolled her eyes, he sat back in his chair in victory.

“So, before my dolly comes back. Really…what was so important you had to talk to me in person?”

Molly’s blush faded, the joking was done and the mood somber. “Well.” She bit her lip hesitantly, an outward sign to him that she was nervous. “I’ve got a possible scholarship, kiddo.”

Eli’s brow scrunched, questioning her statement. “Okay…? I thought that when the possibility of granting a scholarship came up we were going to decide those on a case-by-case basis, and we would have those discussions at our Friday meetings, so we would all
be there. Why wouldn’t you wait?”