Invisible Strings

Chapter Thirty-Two

Brantley's POV:

"You two are the real Ricky and Cal of the nascar word." I said with a laugh as Ryan, Chase, and I sat around the small fire pit that they had set up between their buses. The two of them were having a celebratory beer on qualifying in place one and two –Chase in first, Ryan in second, while the girls were inside getting Gannon and Maisie down for bed. Layla had already put Rayna to bed, leaving Ryan with the baby monitor and Chloe and Colton were with their father.

Chase and Ryan's positions on the track was a running joke with Chase and I since lately it seemed like the two of them were just swapping pole positions at whatever race they were at this week. But even as the three of us joked about it, I couldn't deny that it spoke volumes about the talent they both had and the crews that gave them cars that could sit at the front of the pack every week.

"Yeah, but we look better." said Ryan cockily as he ran his fingers through his wavy dark hair.

"Well, you definitely have Cal's hair." retorted Chase, earning a flipping of the bird from Ryan.

"You're just jealous because your mom loves my curls."

"And your mom loves my championship," said Chase.

"Alright, let's leave the mama's out of this." I said, chiming in. There was a smile on my face as I looked at Chase and Ryan, loving the fact that they could roast one another so ruthlessly and still be the best of friends. In all honesty, they reminded me of the way Kolby and I would roast one another; they really did act more like brothers than friends.

Before either of them could say anything, the girls came down off Chase's bus. There was a looseness in the way that Delaney walked, one that I hadn't seen on her before. Whether that was from the ease she felt from being around her closest friends, the fact that she was comfortable around them and didn't have to be anyone but herself, or what, I didn't know. But when she plopped down onto my lap and placed her lips over mine in a searing kiss, I knew why. On her lips was the all-too-familiar burn of a good tequila. It wasn't strong, but it was just enough to tell me that she had had a shot or two on the bus while Amanda had been putting the kids to sleep.

"Tell me that tequila makes your clothes fall off." I said when I broke the kiss, keeping my voice low so that only she could hear what I was saying.

Or that had been my hope. Evidently my desire for her was evident in my voice making it come out louder than I'd thought since It was Amanda that answered instead of Delaney.

"Oh it absolutely does." she said with a smile as she snuggled into Chase's body. "Pretty sure when ol' Joe wrote that song, he was talking about that night from when she was in college." I watched as she plastered a smile on her face and looked directly at Delaney before adding "Of course, I wasn't there since I'm the damn baby of this group but I seem to remember hearing a rather titillating tale of tequila, bar-top dancing, and thinking she was in Coyote Ugly."

Layla and Ryan started to howl with laughter, obviously in the know on what Amanda was talking about. And I would be lying if I said I wasn't just a little more curious than usual about what Amanda was referring to since she had added extra emphasis on 'tit' in titillating. Wrapping one arm around Delaney while the other gripped the back of her neck and held her so that she was forced to look me in the eyes, I said in my best Desi Arnaz voice "Laney, you got some 'splainin' to do."

A deep blush crept up over her skin as she fidgeted in my lap. Her eyes broke their hold with mine and she looked everywhere but directly at me as she started telling the story. "Well umm... some friends and I–"

"She got tequila drunk, took her top off and did the 'Devil went down to Georgia' dance in the middle of a crowded bar in Charlotte." said squealed Amanda, cutting Laney off.