Collided (Dirty Air Series Book 2)

People describe heartbreak as this instantaneous feeling where a heart breaks into a million irreparable pieces, scattering in different directions. Some pieces go missing while others stab you in the foot as you clean up the mess. Heartbreak is a ruthless fucker like that, kicking you while you’re already down.

I think those people who describe heartbreak are liars. Every single one of them who talk about a shattering experience, like you can fix a heart with superglue and willpower.

I can safely say heartbreak feels dull and hollow, leaving behind nothing but a husk of an organ. A broken, mangled weight inside of me, clenching and unclenching at the words Liam shares throughout the night. The glances he takes at my body, the feeling of his hands touching me, the way he sets me on fire from a single caress. His actions cut out parts of my heart with a rusty serrated knife.

Hearts don’t shatter because that’d be too easy. Hearts get ejected from an airplane, left to fall hard sans parachute.

Liam hiding the issue of his contract with McCoy is a surface-level problem. I know he has pure intentions. The real issue is his love for McCoy and his uneasiness at accepting his contract deal despite a problematic ex, a negative work environment, and the potential sacrifice he’d make giving me up. And for what? Friends with benefits? In the end, we’re a shinier upgrade from what he typically prefers.

The black sky with radiant stars brings me comfort amidst my sadness. Liam knocked out hours ago, too content and satiated to stay awake. Despite my grief, I loved every single second of the night.

I should be happy and thrilled with how he cares about me the way he does. And I am. But also I’m not. Selfish, I get it. People can blame the only child in me for wanting my cake and eating it too. The thing is, being an only child meant I had lots of leftovers, so I never had to share my cake, let alone decide between eating it and saving it.

But when Liam wakes up to the desert’s sunrise, it’s obvious what I have to do. I’ve thought about it for hours. For the sake of him and his future, I need to make a sacrifice because he won’t do it. My test earlier failed, proving to us both how much he wants to continue with McCoy. Somehow I pretended his words didn’t faze me when he pulled the trigger, stating his wish to stay with his team while blowing my heart to pieces.

His wish is my command.

Lucky for me, I know the way to get to Liam. Over the months, I’ve learned everything about him, from the way he preps for races to his preference for cuddling with me on rainy days while he reads a book. What I’ve learned most of all is how he has very few triggers. With people like him, all I need is one spark to bring his demon to the surface, challenging his life built on illusions and half-truths.

I’m about to blow this shit up like World War III.

“Morning.” He looks at me with groggy eyes and a lazy smile. The knife digs deeper inside of me, a clusterfuck of ripped-up tendons, veins, and arteries. A slow bleed invisible to the naked eye.

I sit up and take a few deep gulps of air to gain courage. “I’ve had a lot of fun. I really can’t thank you enough for helping me with the list.” I take a breath to steady my voice, the sharp inhale feeling like a thousand piercing needles against my lungs. “But with the end of the race season, we need to call it quits. Friends with benefits has been fun and all—great even—but you have to race, and I need to go back to school.”

I wish I could shut my eyes and erase the pain in his eyes. To take the words back and swallow them whole, pretending I don’t know about his deal.

“Fun? Fuck fun. What the hell are you even talking about?” The roughness of his voice scrapes against my eardrums. He sits up to meet my eyes, his blue ones hitting me with a reflection of the rising sun behind me.

“We both know feelings aren’t your thing. Not to mention we won’t see each other after next week. I’m going back home and you’re going somewhere.”

“Feelings aren’t my thing?” Liam says the words with disbelief.

I stare at my hands to avoid his hurt gaze. He makes me weak yet strong because I need to do this for him and his future. “I love you. I have for months but you’ve been too blind to see it, unable to acknowledge me and my feelings. To see me.” My eyes meet his. “I can’t do this to myself anymore. The season is almost over, the list is finished, so we’re done. I’m sorry I broke your rule, but we can’t be friends anymore. So, let’s cut our losses before things get complicated. Before things happen that we both can’t take back, no matter how much we may want to.” My voice chokes on the last words, my airflow constricted.

“Like this conversation?”

I suck in a breath. The woundedness in his voice makes me want to stop. But he can’t give up his career for me—for this weird blend of friendship, sex, and one-sided emotions. My heart thrums against my chest like it wants to tell me it still beats strong for Liam.

Sorry, heart, I apologize in advance for the explosion.

I stand, brushing my shaky palms across the leggings I put on to avoid the desert chill. My legs wobble before I gain control.

He gets up too, closing the distance between us, staring me down. “I don’t know why you’re ending our friendship. Just get over your feelings and let’s go back to normal.”

Tears prick at the corner of my eyes. “There’s no going back. I can’t expect you to understand, seeing as you’ve never been in a relationship with someone…let alone in love. You have no idea what it takes. Let’s be real—you can’t even get over your past, let alone look toward your future. We both know I’m not part of it.” My vile words disgust me.

His eyebrows scrunch together and his eyes become glassy. I hate myself. I hate myself so fucking much I want to scream at him and myself all at the same time. But I don’t. I take a few steps back, my toes curling under the sand, grounding me from floating off into a mental space filled with pain and contempt.

“I can’t believe you’re really going to end our friendship over something temporary.”

My lungs burn from the hot air and imminent tears. “Love shouldn’t be temporary. At least not to me. That’s exactly why our little imaginary life needs to come to an end. Today. Now. I don’t want to love someone who views everything as fleeting.” I walk toward the truck. My hand grips the handle, the door creaking open before Liam slams it shut.

He turns me and pushes me against the cool metal. His hand gently—ever so fucking gently it hurts my heart—tips my head up to look him in the eyes.

“I don’t want to hurt you.” His lips brush against mine, leaving behind a soft kiss. It’s comical how the same lips that helped seal my fate still make my insides heat. Just another screwed-up part of Liam and me.

I let out a bitter laugh. “You know, I’m a fool. Thinking you could love someone besides yourself. For believing we could hook up and stay friends while neither one of us gets hurt in the process. I’m an idiot.”

“Then stop making things weird. We promised not to fall for one another,” he growls.

“No, you promised. And I’m not making things weird, I’m making them honest. Can you tell me you love me? That all the words you whisper in my ear at night mean something more? Go ahead, admit how you feel.”

Silence greets me, the dull throb in my chest increasing as Liam stands there, his wild eyes roaming over my face. I prepped myself for this moment all night long, knowing he would never confess to something he can’t recognize.

To be honest, no preparation could’ve helped me handle this.

“Don’t do this to us and our arrangement,” he rasps.

“That’s your problem. For someone so keen on living life to the fullest, you sure trick everyone, including yourself. You throw my rules back in my face when you’re the most rigid one of us all, holding on to lies you tell yourself to protect you from the unknown. Funny how you taught me the most important lesson of all. There are some things you can’t plan for, no matter how hard you try.”

“But we’re friends. You can’t leave and forget about us.”

My eyes narrow. “Yeah, Liam, well this friendship sucks right now.”

He takes a deep breath, stepping away from me and turning his back. “I can’t give you anything more than what we have. I travel as my job for fuck’s sake. You’re going to go back home, and I’ll keep racing. It’s not the right moment. Maybe if it were under different circumstances, at another time.”

I drop my head against the car door and laugh, the noise grating against my ears. If heartbreak had a sound, that would be it. “Laughable how you told me that almost four years ago when you met me. Yet here we are, years later, with you following the same pathetic lines.”

“Please, Sophie. I really like you. Don’t ruin something between us for something like love.” His eyes plead with mine.

“What does that even mean? There is nothing wrong with love.” It takes everything in me to not yell.

Fuck Peter and Rick. Screw Formula 1 and the sucky men who bully women into submission through manipulation and money. I’m so done with it all. Like Dorothy, I want to click my red Nikes together and get the hell home.

“I thought we were on the same page.” His look of pity adds to my distress.

“Forget the same page. We’re not even reading the same book.” Everything hurts inside of me. My body can’t cope with Liam’s inability to recognize his feelings for me. His wounded face pulls an ounce of pity from me, tugging at my aching heart.

I may be stupid enough to have fallen in love with him, but I’m not blind to the way he looks at me, or how he fucks me, staring into my eyes like he wants to hold on to the moment.

Looks like Liam got his wish because he gets to keep his contract. All at my sacrifice, blowing my friendship to hell, with me along with it.

Liam turns back toward our abandoned campsite. He shakes his head at my offer to help as he grabs everything and shoves it in the trunk. The empty plot of sand mocks me, not a single shred of evidence lingering where I broke my own heart. No bloodshed or shattered pieces are visible to the naked eye.

Absolutely nothing.

A perfect symbolism of the emptiness inside of me.