The Challenge

Home : Stories by Mick : The Lion and the Lamb : The Challenge

Summary: It's always been fun and games. Until now.

AUTHOR: Mick
EMAIL: mick@cryptoffic.com
RATING: PG-13
SERIES: The Lion and the Lamb
CHARACTER: Dale Earnhardt Jr, Landon Cassill, Kevin Harvick, Dale POV
WORD COUNT: 1,311
COMPLETED: September 19, 2008
DISCLAIMER: If I owned them I’d be too busy to write this stuff. Just fiction, folks. I own NOTHING and am affiliated with NO ONE mentioned here. Not the drivers, not the teams, no one. This is all fiction and fun. In other words...NOT REAL, NOT REAL, NOT REAL. ;-)
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Charlotte, NC

For as long as I can remember, we’ve been competing. Not just on the track, either. That’s the tip of the iceberg. No, our competition goes all the way to the bedroom. While we’ve never fucked each other, we’ve shared plenty. Our conquests have been passed back and forth for years. We’ve kept track of numbers and names, quality and quantity. Male or female, it didn’t matter. And God forbid one of us found someone we really liked. With the exception of his wife, we’ve stolen each other’s partners away at least a dozen times. It’s fun for us. We’ve always taken pride in our little game.

Until now.

Now, Harvick’s gone too far. It’s one thing to go after a guy or girl I’ve been fucking, but to go after a kid…an innocent fucking kid? I won’t allow it, won’t stand for it, not for a second. I won’t let him corrupt Landon. I won’t let him pull Landon into our corrupted little world of sex games. The kid’s barely more than a baby. He’s barely nineteen; he’s never even had a real girlfriend, for fuck’s sake! I will not let Kevin have him. I just won’t. I’ve got a soft spot for the kid and Kevin knows it. He’s been throwing it in my face for weeks. I just never knew he’d go this far. I never realized he was this spiteful.

The worst part is that Landon has no idea what’s going on. He’s so innocent that he’s oblivious to every advance Kevin makes on him. Every lingering glance, every well thought out touch, every calculated remark; it all goes right over the kid’s head. It all makes my blood boil. I hate letting him out of my sight on weekends. I hate knowing that Kevin’s lurking, waiting to pounce like a panther stalking some defenseless little animal. If I could, I’d put the kid on a leash, drag him everywhere with me. I’ve never felt so protective, so responsible for someone who wasn’t my blood before. I’ve made it my mission to protect him, to keep him under my wing as long as possible. I refuse to let Kevin make a pawn out of him.

It made my gut knot up last weekend when I came off my coach and saw them walking together. Kevin had an arm around Landon’s shoulders, acting like they were good ol’ buddies. Laughing and joking, Landon was oblivious to the dangerous flickers of gold in Kevin’s eyes; flickers that meant he was up to no good. I could see them from nearly fifty feet away and it made me sick. I knew Kevin had picked up on my fondness for the kid, but I had no idea he’d act on it. I’d bolted to them, tried to pull the kid away with some bogus excuse, but Kevin knew I was full of it. He tightened his arm a fraction, so carefully that no one else would notice, and smirked that Harvick smirk –the fox in the hen house. It’d taken all my strength not to haul off and sock him. Smug bastard.

Landon’s eyes had lit up when he saw me, looking up at me from under his shaggy mop of dirty blonde hair, “Junior, Kevin invited me to come race at Deer Creek with him this week! Isn’t that great? I haven’t been able to get in much dirt time lately, it’ll be awesome.”

Awesome. Right. My kid alone in Minnesota with him. I was livid. I’d tried to convince him it was a bad idea. Used every excuse I could think of. Sponsor obligations, Nationwide events, team responsibilities, his grandmother’s birthday. Nothing worked. Kevin had thought up every loophole, and besides, Landon argued, his Grams’ birthday was in May. I was screwed. Short of going to Spring Valley to play chaperone, I had nothing. My heart relocated to my throat for a good fifteen minutes. There was no way I could go without raising flags. Landon was dead set on going, and Kevin was gloating. He knew he had him.

“Junior? Earth to Junior! Ground control to space cadet!” Fingers snapping an inch from my nose jolt me back to reality and I look up at Kelley, grinning sheepishly. She rolls her eyes and shuffles some papers on the desk in front of us, “Look, boy, if you’d rather I sign all these checks over to my instead of the team, just let me know. Hate to think I’m boring you with payroll when you’ve obviously got more important things on your mind.”

I sigh heavily, rubbing my face with both hands, “Sorry, Kelley. Just…preoccupied.”

“I’ll say,” she gives me a sideways glance that reminds me far too much of our daddy, “The hell’s got you so damn spacey, Junior? Last time I saw that look on your face, you were tellin’ Teresa to take her contract and shove it.”

Laugh softly at the memory and shrug in response. I tell my sister a lot, but mine and Kevin’s game isn’t something I’ll ever share with her. She knows damn well I got a thing for both sexes, but I don’t want her knowing that I also enjoy competing with Kevin for slut of the year. Far as she knows, I’ve only ever been with a handful of guys, and that’s how I want to keep it. A glance at the clock tells me it’s barely noon and I sigh again. Landon’s flying out to the track with Kevin at 12:45. Little under an hour to smash Kevin’s plans to the ground.

Suddenly, a light bulb goes off in my head and I perk up, “Kelley! Is Mark runnin’ that charity event in Minnesota tonight?”

Kelley’s face flushes at the mention of my former driver. She and McFarland have been more than friendly the past couple months. Her marriage on the rocks, again, sent her spiraling into a whirlwind romance with the guy. His only saving grace was that he asked my permission first. Anyone else went after my sister, I’da broken their jaws. After the shitty marriage she got herself into, I’ve been insanely protective of her and the girls.

“No, not that I know of…why? You want to go out there or something?” She stares hard at me and for a moment it’s my daddy across the desk from me, “What’s going on Junior?”

“Nothing, Kel. Just bored, was gonna see what he was up to tonight…” Fidget in my seat and pick at my nails, looking anywhere but her face. I’m full of shit and she knows it. I ain’t ever been any good at lying to my sister. Even as a kid, she could pick up on every lie I threw at her. Guess it’s part of what makes us so close. Hard to keep secrets from the one person who can see right through you.

“Uh huh,” she goes back to her papers and I know I won’t be off the hook for long, so I excuse myself and bolt out of the office. I need to find a way to keep Kevin’s claws out of the kid, and FAST.

“Junior! Just the man I was looking for!”

Fuck! Can this day get any worse? I plaster on a grin and wave to Steve, but keep on walking down the hall of offices, “Hey Crispy! Kinda busy man!”

“Aw, hell, Junebug, I only need a second!” He comes out of his office and catches stride with me, rambling on about sponsors for the late models. I listen for a minute and give him a quick response before bolting down the emergency access stairs. I need to get to Deer Creek, now.  My gut’s in knots and every minute that ticks by makes me sicker. I need to get to the kid before Kevin does.

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Mick - mick@cryptoffic.com