Page 76 of Overtake
He shrugs. “Unclear. She accused me of playing head games.”
“What? Like over the championship?” He nods and she rolls her eyes, bless his sister. “That’s ridiculous and she knows it.” Nia frowns, but her brows almost immediately arch and her eyes pop wide. “Oh my God, Nico. She’s scared.” She glances down at the photo and nods. “Yeah. Wow.” She meets his gaze. “I didn’t think Petra Hayter was frightened by anything.”
“Creo que sí.”This same thought had occurred to him while he was showering this morning. “I think she’s afraid to let anyone close because Kelley made such a mess of things.”
“Ay, Dios. True. I bet she’s terrified of caring about someone who could use it against her. I mean, think about it. Petra’s the only woman on the grid. Every relationship becomes a story about whether she can handle the pressure, if she’s a distraction, if she belongs.” Nia’s voice softens. “And now this photo makes it look like you’re both completely gone for each other.”
He is, but he’s unsure about Petra, and that might be worse than never admitting his feelings to her at all. Nico despises having lost control of this situation. When she didn’t know, whenthe worlddidn’t know, he could regulate his feelings.
Because she’s Nia and she’s always been able to read his mind, his sister asks, “How do you feel about Petra and the world knowing about this?”
He stares at the image again. Petra’s face, soft and trusting. His own expression completely unguarded. “I feel like someone broke into my head and published my thoughts.”
“Because you’ve been hiding how you feel about her?”
The question hits too close to true. “Tortuga?—”
“C’mon,hermano. You’ve always looked at Petra Hayter like she’s everything you’ve ever wanted.”
But don’t deserve.He shoves aside that doubt and runs both hands through his hair. The vulnerability in that image terrifies him more than any racing incident ever has. “It doesn’t matter how I feel, Nia. It never has.”
She scowls. “Nico, that’s not true.”
He shrugs. “I spent eleven years controlling those feelings. I can put them right back in their box. But I’ll hate myself if this damages her in any way.”
“Dios mío.Don’t be such a damn martyr.”
He ignores that and tips his chin at the photo. “Who alerted you to this?”
“Victoria texted me, asking if I knew if you’d seen social media.” Her expression goes fierce. “Which means they’re all protecting you from this, just like always. But protection only works if you know what you’re being protected from. I called Papá and he told me about Graham’s meeting.”
Mierda.Race day protocol exists to eliminate distractions for the drivers, but walking into this shitstorm blind would be worse.
“Show me everything.”
She angles her phone so they can both see, then starts scrolling through the chaos. The hashtags alone tell the story: #SpeedDating, #HoneyBunnies, #PetraNico, #F1Romance.
“Hostia.” He stares at fan-made graphics depicting them in matching racing suits, fake wedding photos, shipping names he can’t pronounce.
“It gets weirder.” Nia clicks to a video compilation. “Someone took every interaction you two have had on camera for the past three years and set it to a love song. It’s been viewed forty-two thousand times since midnight.”
The video plays moments he barely remembers—shared laughs during press conferences, them watching each other’s qualifying laps, that time in Monaco when she helped him up after he tripped over a cable, radio calls about each other’s driving they had with their race engineers. All is edited together with dramatic music like they’re the stars of some romantic drama.
“I think some fans have been shipping you two for years.” She scrolls through comments. “They’re calling this the greatest slow burn in motorsports history.”
He leans back in the chair, processing. “And Graham?”
“Is probably losing his mind.” Her expression is calculating. “Or pretending to. The trending topics are all about how perfect you are together, that this proves F1 drivers are human, and how romantic it is. Graham hates genuine emotion, but he loves drama that makes him money.”
Nico nods. “That we all know from what he did to Maiken and Reece.” The man had been a monster to his own daughter-in-law.
Nia leans forward. “Think about it, Conejo. An anonymous leaked photo that must’ve been taken with a telephoto lens by someone who had access to the track after hours and knew yourmovements? Graham’s media team is always following you and Petra around. And now he gets to call an emergency meeting, create chaos, and distract you right before a crucial race? Who do we think this will benefit? Oh, I don’t know. Wyn?”
Graham set this up.
Nicolina shakes her head. “The timing’s awfully convenient. You have a private moment, it becomes global entertainment, and suddenly he’s positioned as the voice of reason trying to manage the crisis he probably created.” She checks her watch. “Watch him walk into that meeting acting outraged while secretly calculating how much money this controversy will generate.”
Nico’s phone buzzes. It’s a text from Esteban:
