‘Was it my magic kisses?’ he teases.
I’m horrified by the heat that rises in my cheeks and the way my body betrays me. He always seems to know exactly what buttons to push to get me off-balance.
‘Fucking hell! Maybe I should go round kissing all the competition if it’s gonna have this kind of effect.’
‘Fuck off,’ is all I manage to say before our conversation is no longer private.
As we arrive at the team meeting, I am wound up so tightly that I can barely speak. Harper James is living rent-free in my head right now, and he knows it.
The little fucker knows it.
He goes around doing whatever the hell he wants, kissing whoever he wants, shagging whoever he wants, and he’s still killing it on the track!
He only has to look at me the wrong way and I fall apart.
I can’t believe I convinced myself yesterday that the answer was to sleep with him, to scratch the itch so I could stop letting the intrusive thoughts win.
Maybe I really am getting old.
He doesn’t have magic kisses, but he is a distraction and I can’t take that right now.
I just need to stay away from Harper. That’s what this comes down to.
ChapterTwelve
Harper
Never did I think one kiss could have the power to reduce a grown man to a jittery mess. Miami was a technical issue, but there’s no doubt it affected Kian’s performance in Monaco and Spain, placing him P2 in both. There was some chat in the garage aboutongoingproblems with his car, but we both know that’s not what his problem is.
At first, I thought we’d get past it quickly, but he takes everything so damn seriously. You’d think he’d never had a one-night stand before. Not that we even got that far before he freaked out. He really could do with loosening up a little.
He’s gone from scowling at me constantly to now going out of his way to avoid me entirely. Unless we’re surrounded by the Hendersohm team or out in public, he’s a ghost. He’s obviously tweaked his routine to be wherever I am not at any given moment. Andhecallsmeimmature!
I thought maybe he’d cut himself off from everything except driving, press and working out. But then I stumble across a realisation that while he’s been dodging my company as though I’m carrying some kind of infectious plague that might tempt him away from being a boring bastard, he seems to have become pally with Anders’s son, Jackson.
Jackson was raised on motor racing. He eats, sleeps and breathes it. He started out with a blog that turned into a popular podcast with expert guests, and he’s regularly called upon as an industry expert to comment on everything from chassis design to track safety to driver stats. He’s a nepo baby, for sure, but he knows his stuff.
He hasn’t been working the media circuit quite so heavily this season, which seemed strange to me at first. Instead, he’s been travelling with us a lot, working closely with his father and being invited to senior leadership meetings about strategy and finance. If I didn’t know better, I’d think Anders was grooming him to take over.
I don’t know how long Jackson is going to be hanging around, but he’s certainly making the most of the opportunity to work out with golden-boy Kian while he’s with us. I’m not sure who’s sucking up to who, but they can have their little bromance. It makes no difference to me.
Working yourself up about shit like that – getting ahead of yourself and worrying about the future – is for people like Kian. I deal with what’s right in front of me – in life and on the track – and so far it’s served me well. Overthinking is the best way to get left behind by younger, hungrier, faster people who’ll take risks that you’re not brave enough to. If Elijah comes back next year, someone else will want me and I’ll win for them instead. In any case, the best thing for me to do is win and hope Anders isn’t stupid enough to let me go.
Having said that, it does seem like lately, whenever I enter a room, Kian’s always mid-conversation with Jackson. They’ve always got their heads bent towards each other or they’re on the way to the gym together. I’m not jealous – it just seems like mighty convenient timing. A paranoid person might worry that Kian’s persuading Jackson to drop a word in his dad’s ear about kicking me off the team, but that’s not me. And why would Anders do that when my results speak for themselves?
If Kian asks I’ll tell him to his face that he’s being childish. So what if we kissed? That was weeks ago, he needs to move on. And yes, maybe it enthralled me to the point I haven’t looked at another man for the last four weeks.
Never in my life would I have thought I’d finish in P3 at the Monaco Grand Prix and not hit the town hard afterwards with at least one hot gazillionaire. I made it to the casino and didn’t even scout the talent that was there. I know there was more than one blue blood gambling away the family jewels who couldn’t keep his eyes off mine, but I wasn’t interested.
I shiver at the thought.
It was definitely just exhaustion though. The step up from lower-category racing was obvious as we navigated deeper into the season. Plus, Johannes hadn’t been going out at all really, so I’ve lost my usual wingman. That’s the explanation I’ll be using if anyone asks.
Now we’re in Montreal, one of my favourite places in the world, and I feel more like myself again. Settled. Ready to put any thoughts of that night in Miami to the back of my mind permanently.
Until Johannes asks me if I hooked up with anyone in Monaco.
We’re in a café in Montreal, doing some people-watching and catching up – I haven’t seen him much recently, his time has been occupied with someone or something he’s not telling me about – when Jackson and Kian step inside.
