Speed Demons Read Online Free PDF Page A

Second, we’re going to show everybody the truth.”
    “ We are?” Evie sat down at the other end of the couch and kicked her shoes off before pulling her legs up. “You sound awfully confident.”
    “You have a solid reputation among your peers. Your fans, especially your female fans, worship you. When it comes to them, you can walk on water.” Blythe spoke in the low tone Evie had already come to associate with her. “I have an equally solid reputation among my peers. I heard from the news desks that buy my pictures that their readers consider my pictures honest. I suppose I enjoy some kind of fame, within certain circles. Between us, we’ll get the truth out there, and we’ll tell the story of how you definitely aren’t a quitter.”
    “How can you be so sure of that?” Evie knew she was staring at Blythe like a wide-eyed kid. Did the woman have a damn crystal ball?
    “Your road to recovery was fast but can’t have been easy.” Blythe fiddled with the seam on the side of her shirtsleeve. “Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how you’ve pushed yourself to come back so fast. I’ve seen enough traumas to last several lifetimes, and what it takes to bounce back. Not just physically. Mentally too.”
    Evie relaxed marginally. Blythe’s face was lit by the candles, and her tousled, blond hair was backlit by the table lamps behind the couch; she looked so young and ethereal. She was clearly neither, and true to form, Evie spoke before thinking.
    “How old are you?”
    “Forty-two.”
    Impossible. Not that people of forty-two looked very old these days, which any of the “Desperate Housewives” would show you, but this woman had to be younger. “You’re kidding.” Evie snorted. “You have good genes, then.”
    “I suppose. Hasn’t always been beneficial to look too young.” Blythe shrugged. “My height, or lack thereof, combined with blond hair and freckles, works against me.”
    “Yeah, I can understand that. Still, the way you carry yourself and…I’m not sure, there’s something else that makes you look less like a kid.” Evie stopped talking. Blythe was shifting and averting her eyes, obviously beginning to feel even more ill at ease. “Sorry. I tend to speak before I think.”
    “It’s all right. I’m really not the person of interest here. You’re the star. I’m just the one doing the documenting. As long as we agree on that.”
    “I was a star, perhaps. As in past tense.” Evie wasn’t comfortable with the term, never had been. She just wanted to drive her Viper and win races.
    “My publisher said you had quite a few offers from other photographers before you said yes to me. I mean the first time around.” Blythe tilted her head. “Why did you end up choosing me and my idea for a project?”
    The answer was tricky. “You’re not pushy. I mean, invasive.”
    “My camera is.”
    “Yes.” Evie tugged at her hair, wrapping it around her hand, a comforting habit from her childhood. “That’s different, though.”
    “How so?”
    “So many journalists intrude in ways that make me super-defensive. They ask things that have nothing to do with racing, or even with me. My father enters the damn equation sooner or later, and then there are the gender-biased motorsport guys who have to insinuate that my success is nothing more than a fluke. I’ve been known to lose my temper.” Evie shook her head. “I’m just not cut out to be congenial and accommodating when someone pushes too hard. No matter who it is. You push, I push back. Harder.” Knowing that this revelation didn’t put her in a very good light, Evie yanked so hard on her hair that her scalp stung.
    “So, the fact that my camera works in silence makes it easier?”
    “A camera is objective, no pun intended, and as long as the photographer lets the camera do the work, that’s fine. Unless…” Evie grimaced.
    “Unless?”
    “Paparazzi. Hate ’em with a passion.”
    “Some would argue that they’re