Page 28 of Overtake
“Fascinating.” I take a long drink of water, wishing I’d opted forsomething stronger. “Also irrelevant.”
“Is it?” She looks pointedly at my hand, still wrapped from its encounter with Wyn’s face. “Because he didn’t have to cover for you and risk his relationship with his team.”
“It wasn’t about me specifically.” The words sound false even as I say them. “He just... Nico hates bullies. Always has. You know that.”
“True.” She settles back, studying me with that too-perceptive gaze. “Remember what he said in Shanghai after your first F1 podium?”
Of course I remember. I’d finished second, behind Nico and ahead of Aigar. The champagne had been sweet, victory sweeter. But what I remember most is after, when the cameras had finally turned away. Nico had stopped me as we were leaving the podium and said, “Welcome to where you’ve always belonged.”
I shake my head. “That was just professional courtesy.”
“Was it? Because I remember watching him watch you during the anthem. The way he kept glancing over, like he couldn’t quite help himself.”
That earns her an eye-roll. “You’re reading too much into it.”
“Barcelona in parc fermé when he said there’s no one he’d ratheryieldto?”
“He was talking about racing.”
She turns sideways in her seat and looks at me from beneath her perfectly shaped brows. “When you took first in Monaco last year?”
I know what she’s talking about. In the cool-down room, waiting for Lynch, Nico had leaned close and murmured, “Today was just another step toward what we both know is coming, Petra.”
I cut my eyes at her, regretting telling my cousin about that. “He meant the championship.”
Didn’t he?
Cin isn’t giving me an inch of space. “Singapore? Sunday night?”
I close my eyes. “Definitely about racing.”
She makes a little snorting noise. “Keep telling yourself that, Tonka.” She stands, stretches, then leans close. “But also ask yourself why you’ve memorized his post-race press conferences. Or why you always know exactly where he is in a room. Or why?—”
“Shouldn’t you be planning my weekly workouts or something?”
Her soft laugh feels like surrender and victory all at once. “Sleep well, Petra. Dream ofracing.”
I flip her off, but there’s no heat in it. We both know she’s right, even if I can’t admit it.
Because doing so means acknowledging that somewhere between “he’s my rival” and “he’s got my back,” Nico Andrés Belmonte became something else entirely. Something that makes my chest tight and my pulse hammer in ways that have nothing to do with speed and everything to do with how he says my name when he thinks no one’s listening.
“Fuck.” This cannot happen. Not now. Not with him. Not wheneverythingI’ve worked for is finally within reach.
Nico is a distraction I can’t afford ortrust. I haven’t forgotten Reece’s warning. Nico Belmonte is a world champion and he didn’t get there by playing nice-nice with all the other drivers. He’s not above psychological warfare. None of us are, and I owe it to my team and myself to remember that.
Besides, I know what it’s like to think I was loved only to be left behind. I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of people I truly trust, and all three of them are aboard this plane.
Of course Graham Pritchard’s timed this perfectly. The mass of cameras and reporters waiting just inside COTA’s paddock entrance tells me everything before Claudia can even open her mouth.
“He’s live now.” Her fingers fly over her phone as our team car pulls up to the track. “Going full concerned father, worried about ‘dangerous rivalries’ and ‘unsportsmanlike conduct’.”
He should’ve held this at COTA’s media center, but Graham needseveryoneto see his show. Because that’s what this is, a performance. He’s assumed his “authority figure” stance, the one he uses for cameras that makes him look like he has a tire iron shoved up his arse. I loathe that the man treats racing like his personal reality show. I hate even more that everyone goes along with it.
Claudia pockets her phone. “Ready?”
I check my reflection in the window. Dark hair smooth, pink streaks perfect, media smile firmly in position. Nothing showing of the woman who spent half the flight thinking about grey eyes and hidden meanings.
“Always.”
