Gambling It All

Prologue/Chapter One

Nicky Gamble knew the crash was going to happen long before the bike hit the concrete, skidded out from under him and dropped him onto the asphalt like a rag doll.

De Costa was riding his rear tire, and Nicky knew he was too, too close going into the chicane.

He could feel the pack shift, hear the change of the screaming engines, see the air shimmer... and knew there wasn't a damn thing he could do to stop it.

He felt the bump on his tire from the back, he felt the bike under him jitter and jam, trying to buck him off, and then a nanosecond later, succeeding.

Nicky's last thought as he flew through the air, the earth and sky blurring dizzily outside his helmet, was...

Oh shit... this one's gonna hurt.

********

Nicky groggily opened his eyes, blinking against the florescent lights above him, taking several moments to register that he was laying in a hospital bed, tubes and wires connected to various parts of his body and a machine beeping steadily hear his ear.

He tilted his head slightly, his gaze falling onto the slack jawed visage of his crew chief and closest friend, Cade Craigston. Cade's eyes were shut and his even breathing told Nicky his friend was deeply asleep.

He swallowed thickly and shifted slightly against the pillows, wincing as pain zinged across his right foot. He hissed, and then lay back.

"I survive a nasty surgery, and the first thing I have to see when I come back from going towards the light is your ugly face?" Nicky says to the silent room, his eyes drifting closed again.

"You had foot surgery, you jackass. You weren't donating vital organs in there or anything," Cade shot back, not missing a beat, his blue eyes flickering open the moment he heard his rider's voice.

"Feels like I did," Nicky said slowly, assessing the tubes feeding into his arm warily. "Tell me it went good, at least. Tell me I'm racing next year."

"It went good. Go to sleep, Gamble," Cade said, biting back a yawn. "Everything looks real good."

**

"Do you know who that is?"

Nicky's eyes flickered open as he heard women's voices echoing in the hallway outside his hospital room. Still too weary to do more than glance around the room, his closed his eyes again, listening to the exchange between two nurses.

"I know he's a guy who got into a motorcycle wreck. Should I know who he is?"

"That's Nicky Gamble." After a beat of silence, the same voice continued. "You know, the motorcycle racer from Laramie? He's one of the top racers in the world, apparently. He's, like, rich and famous. At least in Europe he is. I don't think most of America even knows about him."

"Oh yeah... I remember hearing about him on the radio a while back. What does he race?"

"He's in that MotoGP series – the top racing league for motorycycle guys. Like NASCAR for motorcycles... you know, those guys who practically lay the bikes down going around the track and use hockey pucks on their knees not to fall over. I guess he's one of the only Americans, and he's supposed to be really good. Before we moved to Denver, people in Wyoming treated him like the second coming. Then again, Wyoming isn't exactly known as a training ground for major athletes."

The second nurse laughed, and then grew serious again. "Did he wreck in a race?"

"Apparently. They flew him back from Spain after the wreck to have surgery on his foot here in Denver. After he's released, I guess he'll go back to Laramie."