Author's Note: Thanks for hanging in there with this story everyone. There's one more chapter to go for this one. I know this story reads much better as a whole so my apologies (as always) for the fits and starts. I hope these little additions serve as a nice epilogue of sorts and I really do intend to visit this universe more as my free time for writing allows. Enjoy!
Chapter 12
Five years later...
Ride or Die
by L.C. Jones
Foreword by Letty Ortiz and Dominic Toretto
We've been a part of this life since birth. We're still doing the things that our parents taught us from when we were barely tall enough to see into the engine of a car. There's also the things we taught each other as our team came together and we ripped up the streets while never forgetting to have each other's back. It's cool as hell to pass some of this on so that none of these things that we love ever stop. The races, the parties and, of course, the cars - that life is forever.
"Is that what I think it is?" Letty asked when Dom walked in with a large envelope and a small bundle.
She was standing over her desk looking through some large drawings and schematics that were spread across the entire surface. There was a big project scheduled for the following month and a lot of decisions needed to be made before they were ready to do the test runs necessary for the final phase. Letty was very particular about the details and safety. Just like when she had been running her pit crew, she wasn't about anyone screwing anything up on her watch. Or as she more commonly put it, 'fuck up on your own time.'
Dom had been busy across town dealing with a long list of suppliers for the shop so he had barely seen her in the past few days. He wasn't sure if it was the absence talking, but watching her working so intensely, she looked amazing to him at the moment. The view from behind as she had her back to him was particularly bangin'. Gone were her professional clothes for meeting with her partners or clients. Instead, she wore a pair of worn but nicely tight jeans and a plain tank top with her company's logo across the front. Her hair was as shiny and lustrous as he had become accustomed to since her days as a semi-celebrity but it was currently in a loose, messy ponytail with a few strands hanging in slight disarray around her face. She must have been down at the garage for the day or maybe the test track. He much preferred this look because it meant that she had spent the day getting her hands dirty. And there was nothing hotter to him than the idea of Letty getting dirty even if it was over a car and not him.
Dom watched her glance up at him and then across the room before again turning back to the papers in front of her. His grin widened the longer he stared until he remembered the bundle in his hands and the question she had directed at him before he got distracted. "Yeah, babe. You wanna take a look?"
"In a sec," she responded, barely glancing across the room again before returning her focus to the papers scattered on her desk. Dom walked over to the area she had been monitoring as she worked and found their son Christian sleeping soundly on the oversized couch in the corner. There were toys neatly piled in the small play area and some empty plates and cups on the table a few feet away. He smiled down at the little boy realizing that he probably had a big dinner before wearing himself out. He should sleep pretty well tonight even through the trip back to the house.
He ran his hand over the little boy's soft, chubby cheek and kissed him gently on the forehead, hearing the beautiful sounds of his tiny inhales and exhales. He sincerely doubted he would ever get tired of touching and cuddling his son like this as he looked down at the perfect person that he and Letty had created. Knowing their kid, he'd probably grow out of being coddled pretty quickly. So in the meantime, he was going to get as much as he could out of it before the inevitable parental embarrassment set in. Fatherhood was nothing like he expected and neither was their little guy. Yet it was still better than anything he had ever experienced in his life, car-related or no.
Even before Letty was pregnant, Dom had wondered occasionally what their children would be like. Looking at Chris sometimes reminded him of those days before everything got fucked up with the heists and losing Letty for all those years. Life had been relatively simple - or as simple as things could be for an ex-con and his rowdy team of gearheads. Dom would stare at Letty so comfortable in his garage or get a glimpse of her doing something uncharacteristically domestic at the fort. And then there were those times she was dressed like his hottest fantasy at the races, ignoring the leers of the horny fools around her and driving him crazy with her passionate talk of engines and upgrades. Better still was when they would quietly work on his dad's car. Besides Mia, she was the only person he would let lay a finger on it. He would look over at her deep in concentration and think about how long she had been a part of his family and how satisfied he was for it. In those moments, he imagined a mini-Letty or mini-Dom causing trouble before they were big enough to walk on their own, even joining them in the garage when they were older.
The reality turned out to be true at times but for the most part, Chris was a quiet, serious child that loved cars like his parents but also loved books just as much. He was more like his Aunt Mia than either Dom or Letty which Mia was always eager to rub in their noses. They loved him too much to put unreasonable expectations onto him so the only thing that mattered to them was that he was happy. And he really did seem to be a content little boy. Letty was so good with him from the moment she first held him at the hospital. As Chris got older, Dom was enjoying the special bond that they were building as well, full of secret boy adventures and fun ways to playfully aggravate his mommy. It was also a way to honor the relationship he had with his father in addition to remaining close with his son.
When Dom heard the rustling of papers signifying that Letty was wrapping things up, he turned from the sleeping child and crossed the room back to where she stood. Although reflecting on his son was always a pleasure, the thought of getting his hands on Letty was the number one thing on his mind at the moment. By the time he reached her, she had put the papers back in one pile to take them with her to her meeting the next day. She had barely turned towards him when, to her delight, he enveloped her from behind and began planting sensual kisses along her neck. If Chris was going to sleep through the night, he was going to have a little fun with her starting right now.
So lost in tasting her, he didn't sense her gain leverage against the desk before grabbing him and turning him around. God, he loves when she does that; he suspected she knew it too and used it to torture him. She attacked his mouth, wasting no time teasing his lips with her teeth and tongue before diving in for a deep kiss. Her hands caressed his chest no doubt warmed by the heat she was building in him and aroused by how hard he was against her. It had been too damn long since they had done this. To both of them, it felt like the most action they'd had time for in days.
Not one to back down, Dom clung to her body, consuming her with his tongue and hands alike. When he heard her moan and taper off from their kiss, he pulled her roughly to him again and nipped at her lip to chastise her. By no means was he done with her yet.
She smiled against his lips but pushed him back against the desk so that she could reluctantly escape his embrace. After all, it was very late and they had a three year old sleeping across the room. Escalating the situation wasn't the best of options at the moment.
"Dom," she said with a smirk, drawing out his name in warning. But the way she was trailing her hand slowly down his chest went against all of the caution in her voice. He felt his lust for her start to simmer once again. Letty being Letty, she only laughed at his horniness before walking over to the couch to check on Christian.
Dom blew out a calming breath but followed the view of her retreating form with a grin. "Letty," he replied just as testily. He could hear her quiet chuckle of amusement at his delayed and frustrated response. She was going to pay for that one.
The two of us can look back with a laugh on the first time we met, the first of many times we fought, the first time we fell in love (it really did happen a few times but that's another story). And all of it is wrapped up in family and cars and speed.
He picked up the bundle that he had come in with and laid it on her desk before their impromptu make-out session. Letty was packing up her and Christian's things but looked over her shoulder to eye the item in his hands. "Well, are you going to share or are you just going to fondle that thing all night?"
He laughed at her knowing choice of words. After the last few minutes, there was no doubt about what he was interested in fondling for the evening. "Why don't you come back over here and you can check out what I plan to get my hands on tonight."
Letty set aside a large bag stuffed with toys and books before she quietly sat on the couch next to Chris. "I don't think so; then we'll never get out of here. And if Little Man here wakes up to us going at it on my desk he's definitely going to be traumatized for life." She gently took Christian's little foot and slid one of his shoes on for the trip home.
"It looks like he's sleeping pretty good. Besides, we haven't done it on your desk in a while. It's due for a little action." Not one to give up easily, Dom ran his hand back and forth along the surface of her desk in invitation.
Letty smiled a little at the memory. That had been one of his better ideas. It had been a late night like this one. They had had the entire floor to themselves and Christian was conveniently with Mia for the evening. They meant to only stop in to pick up some paperwork but a not-so-innocent kiss led to Dom's hands exploring underneath Letty's shirt and her hands creeping into his pants. Despite the perfectly good couch in the corner, before long, he had her leaned back across the desk while they made love to the sweet sounds of her satisfied pleasure and his primal passion. It wasn't the first or last time they had sex in her office but it was certainly the most wild, head-banging, scream-filled encounter that made it her favorite.
"You are still such a cocky asshole sometimes," she replied with a grin but ignored any further temptation of responding to his provocations. Instead she pointed at what he was holding. "Don't leave me hanging. How's it look? Is it ridiculous."
Dom rolled his eyes and ran his fingers over the book in his hands. "It was never ridiculous. You know that. Besides, it's done so we're going to have to live with it." Having gotten Chris' shoes on, Letty stood up and walked over to where Dom was leafing through the pages of the book. She flipped to the front of the book to see the title and Jones' name written in bold lettering on the front.
Let us tell you a little something about the woman who put together these stories of the people we grew up with, worked with and will always ride with in some way. She's come a long way since those first days of meeting her when she didn't know shit about cars. But we got her up to speed, and then some, so now she owes us. Big time.
Letty smiled seeing the finished product of their friend's hard work. She couldn't have imagined when they had first met that they'd work together on something like this. Of course, she and Dom had read drafts of the book throughout the process. While neither of them were big readers, it was kind of cool that they contributed to a whole book about their lives and the lives of their friends in the racing world. Jones hadn't sensationalized it with some whack-ass description of skanks and punks and chaos in the streets. Instead, it was like sitting down and hearing stories of the hundreds of people they had met, not only in L.A. but also around the world. It was about putting all your effort into the perfection of a vehicle both on the inside and the outside. It was about people who loved driving their cars and loved going fast, preferably at the same time; the same people that took pride in the performance of the machines that allowed them to defy human speed. Jones had always got that as hard as it was to believe knowing her as they did.
Jones had done right by them and their team. She had been discreet and knew what questions to ask and what not to ask. And she never brought up what remained unsaid. They had plenty of reasons to leave a lot of the past behind them and Jones left well enough alone despite what it could have done for her book. The way she put together her stories hadn't been about the drama, even when she was just starting out. As far as the racing scene went, she said she'd leave that to the people who had bought the movie rights to the book. She was sure Hollywood would find a way to turn it into some kind of action-packed popcorn franchise once they got a hold of it.
"At least she changed the title," Dom noted. "What was that she came up with before? 'Fast and Furious' or something like that?" He pulled a face and shook his head in disdain. "Who'd buy that?"
Letty laughed at his disgust. "Somebody must have thought it worked since it turned out to be some old, crappy movie with the same title. But it's better than her first idea. What the fuck does 'Allegro' even mean? Probably some smart, artsy shit of hers. You know how she is."
"Yeah, but we set her straight so it's all good now." Dom turned the first few pages at the beginning of the book and read the words out loud. "'Foreword by former Castillo Group pit crew leader Letty Ortiz, now an internationally renown media consultant and Dominic Toretto, owner of the most exclusive custom detailer and auto body shop in Southern California.'" He couldn't help laughing actually seeing those words in print. It was hard to believe that it was one of Jones' first racing articles that made him rethink everything. Those few hundred words she wrote sparked something subconsciously inside of him that hoped his story with Letty wasn't over. It warmed him to think how many obstacles they'd overcome, much of it coming from themselves.
"Can you believe this Let'? We're published and shit now. Running multiple businesses, going all Hollywood, raising a family? It's like we've turned into respectable people." They'd even cleaned up their language not wanting Christian repeating the profanity-sprinkled exchanges for which their entire team was known.
"Don't worry, I don't think anyone would actually believe that about us. Wasn't it just last month that you scared the shit out of that guy at Race Wars for accidentally spilling beer on Chris? Screaming at someone about the various ways you're going to fuck them up is not what I'd call respectable."
"I wasn't really going to beat his ass but he didn't need to know that. That punk should have watched where he was going." Just thinking about it still made him a little angry. Nobody messed with his kid without feeling some consequences for it.
Letty rolled her eyes and went back to silently reading the words that she and Dominic had labored over with a little help from their more capable writer friend. But at the end of the day, she told them to write what they knew in whatever way they knew how. People would respond to the authenticity of that, not that anyone cared about keeping it real. It was about doing right by the subject of the book and doing right by their continued partnership. Together they had done a lot to show the world what it meant to love having control of the open road through the power of a car you put your heart and trust into. No matter if it's racing for money or slips or just driving faster then the wind down an empty road, the quarter mile was everything. Even now that they were settled down, Dom and Letty remembered to take things one step at a time. They had overcome too much to look too deeply into the future.
We did our best getting Jones ready for this, teaching her about cars and showing her what it means to live life a quarter mile at a time. And in a way, she helped us figure a few things out when it mattered. Maybe we still owed you a little bit too, Lucille Chantilly.
Dom looked over to his girl leaning against him, eyes moving across the page with each word. His name appeared here and there in the book but there was a whole section about Letty. She had been laughing about that for months when they got the final cut. Everyone joked that his big ego of once being the King of the Streets would make him pissy about getting upstaged by his woman. But given that he had technically been working for his girl for the better part of two years, not to mention following her around all over the world to woo her back in the first place, he was now used to taking a backseat to her.
After Letty had started The Quarter Mile, Inc. and they committed to being a family, it seemed only natural that they would combine their businesses. DT was now a part of the fold and while separately run, they collaborated regularly on projects in addition to their usual garage grunt work, as Leon and Jesse liked to call it. They oversaw each arm on their own but jointly ran the company as a team for the most part. And they made damn good money. They weren't trying to take over the world but they were pretty happy with the little slice of prosperity they'd worked for. Their happiness had been a long time coming and well earned.
Seemingly satisfied with what she had seen in the first pages of the book, Letty moved away and grabbed the bags she needed for them to head home. Dom closed the book and stared at the title on the cover for a long moment before setting it on her desk.
"It's kind of cool though, right?"
She motioned him towards their sleeping son, knowing that he'd enjoy the few moments of holding him, having been away from him most of the day. "Hell yeah it's cool. We're fucking legends now. It says so in the book so it must be true."
Dom laughed quietly and carefully picked up Chris, arranging his son's relaxed body against his own massive one. "This is Lucille Chantilly we're talking about. That girl still drives a fucking Prius so she damn sure can't be trusted." He smiled at the running joke with their friend remembering how pissed she always got when they called her by her full name. Some things would never change and right now that was a good thing. Seeing Letty with such love in her eyes as she subconsciously rubbed their son's back, he felt just how true that was. Before she could step away, he took her hand and pulled her to him for a soft kiss. They had come pretty far from the two confused, lost kids that they were before but what they had now was worth all the mistakes and detours along the way.
Those were crazy times growing up and even after living through a lot of madness, life is still sometimes crazy. Things will probably always be crazy for us until we're old and wrinkled and racing our motorized wheelchairs around the block. That's just who we are. Now you'll know who we are too; who we all are that love this life.
TBC...
