Page 114 of Flat Out
“Je t’aime,” I said softly.
He was quiet for a long moment, just breathing against me like he needed those words to keep him alive. Then he hummed,low and sure, flattening his palm over my stomach. “I love you, Aurélie.”
For one fragile moment, I let myself sink into the warmth of his hand, into the steady weight that felt like protection, not pressure. I let myself choose faith—that my broken womb wouldn’t be the reason we couldn’t work, not after everything we’d already survived.
With his hand there and his breath steady behind me, I finally let my eyes fall closed. The world slipped away, and we fell asleep together.
Rain tappedsoft against the glass, steady and relentless, like the world hadn’t slept while we had. The curtains were still drawn, only the edges letting the morning gray light and shadows spill across the bed. The room was cool enough to make us shiver when it hit our bare skin, but under the duvet everything felt softer, muted. The sheets still smelled faintly of detergent, clean and crisp, but beneath them was justus.
Aurélie was draped over me, unbruised cheek resting against my shoulder, one leg tangled between mine. Her palm splayed low on my ribs, thumb brushing over the healed laceration that would be a permanent scar. Her hair tickled my collarbone every time she breathed. My hand curved over the slope of her back, sliding idly up and down the dip of her spine, tracing the faint rise of each vertebra. I couldn’t move if I wanted to. Not that I would ever dare break this moment.
The bed cradled us like a cloud. Soft, weightless, the kind of comforting that made the world outside fade away. Every shift sunk us deeper, swallowing us whole. It felt like a place designed to keep us hidden from prying eyes.
If the FIA wanted us, they could bloody well come and drag us out of this bed.
I pressed my lips into her hair, breathing her in. She still smelled faintly like the hotel shampoo, like rain, like herself. God, I could’ve stayed here forever.
“Don’t wanna get up,” I muttered, voice low, rough with sleep. My arm tightened around her waist. “Not yet. Not ever.”
She stirred against me, her breath warm against my chest. “We can’t hide forever,” she mumbled, but there wasn't any conviction behind it. By the sounds of it, she was also on the edge of consciousness.
“Don’t care,” I rasped. I tilted my chin until my lips brushed her forehead. “We can make them wait.”
For a while, we did. Just breathing together, listening to the rain, hearts knocking slow and steady as if the last twenty-four hours hadn’t whittled us down.
But the silence was heavy.Tooheavy. I felt the weight of everything we hadn’t said pressing in, and before I could stop myself, the words slipped out.
“I keep thinking about the fight on the trails.”
Her body tensed faintly, and I knew she was also remembering the way we’d walked away from each other.
My thumb brushed her spine, coaxing her eyes open so I could see her. “I was cruel to you that day. I said things I didn’t mean. I implied that you weren’t strong enough. Tried to take your choice away from you by telling you not to drive the car. I fucking hate myself for it.”
Her lashes fluttered, hazel eyes finding mine. She shifted just enough so she was propped on my chest, hair falling across herface. “You were angry,” she murmured. “So was I. I said things too. Things I regret.” She dragged her teeth over her bottom lip, and my gaze followed.
“Nothing you said was wrong, Auri. You were right, and it’s been eating me alive, because of all this distance between us and everything that’s happened since.”
Her palm slid up to cup my jaw, fingers brushing the stubble there. “You’re wrong, baby,” she said softly, andJesus, I fucking died a little every time she called me that in her sweet little accent. “Yesterday, you proved me wrong. You defended me when I couldn’t defend myself. You didn’t let him win. You’ve never let me fight alone, even when I thought I wanted to.”
My eyes burned. My throat ached. The storm outside rattled the glass, but here, in this bed, I felt the words sink into me like absolution. I tightened my hold on her, pressing my lips to the crown of her head, letting the storm outside swallow the silence between us.
For a long beat, we just breathed. Her cheek against my chest, my hand on her spine, the rhythm syncing like it always did, steady and unbreakable. But I felt it—the shift in her breathing, the way her body curled closer and then hesitated.
Aurélie lifted her head slowly, bracing herself on my chest so she could look right at me. Hazel eyes, swollen from yesterday’s tears, locked on mine with a fierceness that made my heart palpitate. She didn’t move away, just held me there, as if the next words would only come if I couldn’t look anywhere else.
“Callum,” she said just above a whisper. “There’s something else. It’s… what I wanted to wait to tell you, but I need to get it out now.” She licked her lips nervously, and for a second I thought she’d change her mind. Then she blurted it out so fast, it was as if it had been clawing at her throat for years.
“I can’t have kids.”
The world stilled. My heart squeezed so tight I almost forgot to breathe.
She didn’t see me freeze, because she was already spiraling. “Je ne peux pas—” Her voice splintered between a whisper and a cry, switching languages without thinking. “My body is broken, Callum. It’s already broken. I can’t give you that, the one thing—” her hands curled into fists on my chest, “—the one thing everyone says matters most.”
“Auri—”
“I was so fucking scared to tell you.” Her words tumbled over mine, faster, jagged, as if she had to spit them out before she drowned in them. I felt her body stiffening, as if bracing for the worst. “Because I knew. I knew if you found out, if you knew the truth, you’d leave. C’est non négociable, pour tellement de gens.”It’s non-negotiable, for so many people.“It’s easier to walk away before it gets too deep than to sign up for a life without children. And if it wasn’t Morel, or the cars, or the goddamn press tearing us apart, it would be this. It would beme.” A sob tore free, turning her face red as it wracked her small frame.
“Baby, look at me.” I squeezed her for emphasis.
