Chapter Text
Chapter 1
Strip
Strip hated his job, and he hated his coworkers even more.
In eastern Texas, Strip had finished school and almost immediately found himself hired on an oil rig. For the past six years he had spent his days the same way—waking before the sun, grinding through endless shifts, and working his ass off just to scrape together enough money to pay the rental fees at the racetrack.
Every single day felt the same.
And he hated every minute of it.
What made it worse were the men around him. The older workers, the ones with sun-burned necks and hands so calloused they barely felt anything anymore, worked just as hard as he did. But the guys his own age were another story entirely. While Strip sweated through his clothes in the suffocating Texas heat in the middle of May, they were hiding out in the trucks or the office trailers, blasting the A.C. and complaining about how miserable the job was.
It made him sick.
Five out of seven days a week, Strip was covered head to toe in oil and dirt, the smell of it clinging to his skin no matter how hard he scrubbed. By the end of a shift his muscles burned and his back ached in a way that made him feel twice his age.
But Saturdays were different.
Saturdays were the only reason he kept showing up to the rig.
Because on Saturdays, Strip got to go to the track and do the one thing that made all of it worth it.
Race.
And if he was being honest with himself, Strip knew he was damn good at it.
His coach certainly had no problem reminding him.
“It’s to boost your ego, Strip,” Whiley liked to say with a grin. “Makes you take risks.”
Coach Whiley was a pudgy little guy with thinning hair and grease permanently stained under his fingernails. He had been around racing longer than he ever admitted, and Strip suspected the man knew more about engines than most mechanics would ever learn.
So every weekend, Strip climbed into Whiley’s pride and joy—a 1970 Plymouth Bluebird—and pushed that car harder than anyone thought possible.
Sure, newer cars had started flooding the market, shinier and flashier than the old Bluebird. But Strip had personally worked on the engine himself, night after night, tweaking and upgrading whatever he could get his hands on.
The result?
One of the fastest damn cars on the track.
Were the upgrades legal?
According to the racing manual, nothing Strip had done technically broke the rules.
Mostly because the officials hadn’t even thought to write rules for half the things he’d figured out.
Today, though… today was different.
Today scouts would be watching.
Real scouts.
The kind that worked for companies with deep pockets and bigger ambitions—corporations and oil tycoons looking for the next driver to put on the professional circuit.
Drivers who could make them millions.
Drivers who could become legends.
But Strip didn’t care about most of them.
There was only one name that mattered.
Dinoco.
Just thinking about it made something tighten in his chest.
This was his way out.
His way out of the oil rigs, the sweat, the endless Texas heat that never seemed to let a man breathe. This was his chance to stop barely scraping by and start making real money—more money than he had ever imagined growing up.
Money that could change everything.
Strip wanted out of East Texas more than anything in the world.
And tonight, he planned on taking the first step toward it.
Even if it meant running every other driver on that track into the dirt.
Determination hardened in his chest as he pulled into the gravel parking lot of Dusty Buns Racetrack. The familiar roar of engines echoed across the air, and the smell of burning rubber drifted through the open window of his truck.
He allowed himself a small smile.
Yeah.
He was going to win.
“Hey there, Strip!”
Whiley’s voice cut through the noise as Strip stepped out of the truck. The coach was already half buried inside the Bluebird’s engine, his legs sticking out from beneath the hood.
“Just giving her a little tune-up before she hits the track,” Whiley said, not even bothering to look up.
Strip walked over slowly, resting his hands on the edge of the hood as he stared down at the engine that had carried him through every race so far.
His ticket out of this life sat right in front of him.
And tonight, he wasn’t going to waste it.
Whiley was the only person Strip trusted to tune the car’s engine.
The only person he’d even consider letting drive it.
In Strip’s mind, that made perfect sense. After all, Whiley had been the Bluebird’s previous owner long before Strip ever got his hands on it. The car almost felt like a shared responsibility between them—something living, breathing, and temperamental that only the two of them really understood.
“Have the scouts arrived yet?” Strip asked.
He grabbed a microfiber cloth from the workbench and began wiping down the car’s body, careful strokes running along the old silver paint. He wanted it to shimmer under the harsh Texas sun, wanted it to look like something special the moment those scouts laid eyes on it.
“Now why would you be interested in a bunch of scouts, boy?”
Whiley slowly lifted himself out of the Bluebird’s engine bay, grease staining the front of his shirt. Through his aviator shades, he gave Strip a pointed look that felt almost too knowing.
“No reason.” Strip shrugged, keeping his attention on the car as he polished the metal. “Just hopin’ I get my big break out there today, you know?”
“Oh boy.”
Whiley made a small sound in the back of his throat—something between a sigh and a pout—before leaning back into the engine as if the conversation had already worn him out.
Strip didn’t miss the reaction.
Whiley Stoddard had once been on the same path Strip was chasing now.
At just eighteen years old, he’d been lined up to enter the professional circuit. His family—wealthy lawyers from New York who seemed to treat Texas like some exotic playground—had moved him down south when he was only nine years old, determined to mold him into something impressive.
He started with go-karts, then worked his way through the ranks, climbing higher and higher until he was racing the very Bluebird that now belonged to Strip.
From what Whiley had told him, his career had been flawless. He never finished lower than third place. Sponsors loved him. Scouts watched him.
Everything had been perfectly lined up.
Until the race that was supposed to launch him into the professional circuit.
He never showed.
Strip still didn’t know why.
And Whiley had never told him.
All Strip knew was what he’d heard during a drunken night the previous March.
Whiley had been sitting on the sagging porch of his trailer, half a bottle of cheap whiskey already gone. The Texas sun had been setting in long orange streaks across the horizon when Whiley finally started talking.
Not like he normally did.
Slow. Slurred. Honest.
“I just was never happy, boy,” Whiley had mumbled, his head rolling lazily to the side as he looked at Strip. His cheeks were flushed red, and his eyes had that glassy look people got when they’d had too much to drink but still had too much left to say.
“Do you know what that’s like?”
Strip had taken a long sip of his beer, staring out over the endless Texas fields.
“I do,” he’d said quietly.
“Every day.”
The memory still sat heavy somewhere in Strip’s chest.
“Hey.”
Strip blinked, the present snapping back into place as a voice called from the garage entrance.
A portly man stood in the open doorway, his bald head glowing bright red from the sunburn spreading across it. His button-up shirt strained around his stomach, and he fanned himself lazily with a clipboard.
“Strip Weathers, right?”
Strip felt something in his chest spark to life.
This was it.
He wiped his hands quickly on his worn work jeans before walking over, forcing himself to move slower than he felt. His heart was pounding now, louder than the distant rumble of engines on the track.
When he reached the man, he stuck out his hand.
The man’s grip was soft—far too soft for someone who’d ever done real work.
But Strip didn’t care.
Because this handshake might just be the first step out of the life he hated.
“Nice to meet ya,” Strip said with a smile—something he rarely did. “You here to watch the race?”
The man chuckled softly before lifting his sunglasses just enough to look Strip in the eye.
“No,” he said. “I’m here to watch you race.”
Strip held his gaze, refusing to look away.
“Aw shucks, I appreciate it, man,” he said, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly. “Is there anything you should let me know before I race? Always lookin’ for some advice.”
“Sure, buddy.”
The man casually draped an arm over Strip’s shoulder and began steering him toward the dirt track. The casual gesture felt almost too familiar, like a fisherman already certain the fish was hooked.
“You wanna get out of here, don’t ya?”
Strip’s eyes moved toward the track stretching out under the blazing Texas sun.
“Of course I do, sir,” he said quietly. “It’s a lifelong dream of mine.”
“Then don’t fuck it up.”
The words were delivered with such calm certainty that Strip almost missed their weight.
“I’ve been to seven tracks across the country in the past seven days,” the man continued. “Hundreds of young chaps like you. Every one of them thinkin’ they’re the next big thing come fall.”
Strip listened, the excitement in his chest tightening into something sharper.
“There ain’t a trick you can pull out there that I haven’t seen a hundred times before.”
Strip swallowed, the heat suddenly feeling heavier against his skin.
“Then how do I stand out from the rest?” he asked.
The man shrugged, already stepping away.
“I don’t know, kid. I can’t tell ya that.”
He pushed his sunglasses back into place.
“You just have to know.”
-.-
“Alright kid, you ready?” Whiley’s voice crackled through the microphone in Strip’s helmet.
“Yeah,” Strip wheezed.
The inside of the Bluebird felt like an oven. Heat pressed against him from every direction, trapped beneath the helmet and the heavy protective gear strapped tight around his chest. Sweat ran down the back of his neck, pooling between his shoulder blades.
The air smelled like hot rubber, gasoline, and dust.
It was perfect.
Due to last week’s placings, Strip had been positioned second in the lineup, directly behind Cage.
In Strip’s mind, the rest of the drivers barely mattered.
There was no one else here important enough to catch Dinoco’s attention.
It was down to two people.
Him.
And Cage.
The flag dropped.
The engines roared to life like a pack of wild animals being let loose, tires kicking dirt into the air as the cars surged forward. The Bluebird responded instantly beneath Strip’s hands, the engine humming like it had been waiting all week for this moment.
Whiley’s voice barked through the headset.
“Hold it steady, kid. Stay right on his tail.”
Strip did exactly that.
The wind rushed through the cracked window, blasting hot air against his face, but it still felt better than the suffocating heat inside the car. His hands gripped the wheel tight enough that his knuckles turned pale.
His nerves never settled.
Not even for a second.
The only things that mattered were keeping his hands steady… and listening to Whiley.
Five laps in, the leaders were clear.
Cage in first.
Strip right behind him.
And Leonard trailing in third, a driver Strip had barely spoken to beyond a few passing words in the pits.
“He’s drifting to the outside,” Whiley said through the mic. “Think you can squeeze into the inside, kid?”
Strip’s eyes flicked toward the gap.
There was barely more than a car’s width between Cage and the loose dirt lining the inside of the track.
It was tight.
Dangerously tight.
If Strip wanted first place, this might be the only opening he’d get.
Another opportunity might never come.
“He’s baiting me, Whiley,” Strip wheezed, his voice strained as he fought the wheel. “The moment I gas it for the inside he’s gonna cut me off.”
There was a brief pause in the headset.
“Yeah?” Whiley said calmly.
“So what are you gonna do about it?”
Strip didn’t answer.
Instead, he slammed the pedal to the floor.
The Bluebird responded instantly.
The turbo engine screamed to life, unleashing a high-pitched whistle as the car launched forward with brutal force. The acceleration shoved Strip back into the seat, the sudden burst of speed sending a jolt of adrenaline through his veins.
The sound of the engine—the power, the speed, the rush—
It hit him like a drug.
Like heroin.
And Strip knew he’d do anything to feel that again.
As expected, Cage noticed the move immediately.
The Mustang jerked left, cutting sharply toward the inside lane to block him.
Exactly what Strip had predicted.
But Strip had never planned to stay there.
Without lifting his foot from the gas, he yanked the wheel right, swinging wide toward the outside of the track instead.
Dirt sprayed from beneath the tires as the Bluebird surged forward.
Now it wasn’t just a race.
It was a fight.
Cage’s Ford Mustang SVO was newer, sleeker, built with a more athletic engine that most drivers would’ve trusted in a straight fight.
But the Bluebird was different.
Strip had rebuilt that engine piece by piece.
He knew every vibration, every shift, every scream it made.
The engine wailed under the strain, but the car never shook.
She held steady.
Like she wanted the win just as badly as he did.
Lap after lap, Strip kept the pressure on Cage, refusing to give him even the smallest opening.
Every time Cage tried to push past him, Strip shut the door.
Every turn.
Every straightaway.
Every inch of track.
By the final lap, the Mustang began to fall behind.
And when Strip crossed the finish line, he did it two full car lengths ahead.
The Bluebird roared past the checkered flag like it had something to prove.
Strip finally lifted his foot from the gas, his chest heaving as the adrenaline slowly began to fade.
For a moment, all he could hear was the engine ticking beneath him… and the sound of his own heartbeat pounding in his ears.