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father and grandfather to me. I’m past the age where I’m considered an orphan. Anyway—” she tapped his hand playfully “—we’re going to win this season and—”
    “Even if we win you know something has to change.”
    There was no fighting the truth. He was right and she didn’t want to be stupidly stubborn. But was Mick Churchill the answer?
    “Okay, Ernie, if money and sponsorship are at the heart of this, I swear to you that I’ll make getting more my top priority this year. Or I can go looking for capital. I can get more loans. We don’t need some outsider in here just because you think his world fame will bring sponsorship.” She squeezed his hand again. “Please. Let me do it my way.”
    Ernie drew back. “You know what I think?”
    “I’m about to find out.”
    “I think you’re scared of him.”
    She scowled at him. “You’re wrong. I’m scared of losing what my father and my grandfather built from nothing all those years ago.”
    “You know, I was, too, but then this opportunity landed in my lap.”
    “I thought you approached him.”
    “We found each other.” He punched her lightly in the arm, but his eyes were dead serious. “Use your head, woman. If we don’t do something—something creative and ballsy—then we’re gonna get sideswiped right off the track. There are forty-three slots and we want two of them now. We got to fight harder and smarter and better.”
    She sighed, unable to argue with the obvious. “Are you open to any other options?”
    He shrugged. “If you got ’em.”
    She didn’t, not yet anyway.
    The lounge door opened and Mick walked right in.
    “Since you’re learning your way around NASCAR,” she said drily, “you ought to know that you always knock on the lounge door when it’s in use.”
    “Apologies,” he said, that British accent making the word sound damn near poetic. Then he knocked on the open door. “May I?”
    May he what? Annoy, irritate, distract, destroy and look good enough to eat all at the same time? “Yes,” she answered.
    “So,” Mick said. “The guy who drives the hauler is also the over-the-wall gas man on race day?”
    Ernie laughed. “That’s the nature of a small team.”
    “Maybe we can change that,” Mick said brightly.
    Shelby stood and gave Ernie a quick I-told-you-so glance, then slipped out of the lounge, leaving the door open behind her. As she stepped into the hallway, she could have sworn she heard them both laugh, and that just made her blood five degrees hotter.
    She turned around to tell them that when Mick’s comment froze her in her spot. “You forgot to mention your granddaughter was gorgeous, Ernie.”
    “Same as I forgot to mention she was opinionated, bossy, controlling and cautious. But she’s got a good heart and it’s in the right place.”
    “But she’s gorgeous. You might have warned me.”
    She cursed the heat that comment sent through her. So now he was going to try to take the company and hit on her at the same time?
    “Uh, did I not make this clear yet?” Ernie had his voice of authority on full force now. “She ain’t part of the package, son. Don’t you go there.”
    She closed her eyes in mock exasperation. She’d still be waiting for her first kiss if Ernie had anything to say about it.
    “We have a deal, son. You need me and I need you. I’m all for this deal because I want to leave Shelby with a healthy team and a bright future. But you so much as kiss her, you kiss this deal goodbye.”
    Shelby drew back with a surprised smile, but Mick’s laugh was half disbelief. “Are you serious?” he asked.
    “As hell. You break her heart, I’ll break your neck.”
    God bless him. As if Ernie could take on a six-foot-two athlete made of granite and steel.
    “Don’t think I don’t know all about your track record with them underwear models, Mick.”
    Mick laughed self-consciously. “That’s all PR.”
    “Not hardly. But those women, they’re different from Shelby.