“Right.” He grins. “But I have an offer for a seat on another team. Leone Racing. Italian. The dream. Best in the world.” There are a few more adjectives I miss as I try to remember where I just saw that name—Leone. That was the team he used to drive for,before his headline-making party days. The fancy one. “I have to get out of my contract with Ignition by the end of the season so I can drive for them next year, and I can’t be seen as loyal to Ignition or do any over-the-top media until then. Leone will want to tell my story, to relaunch my career. That’s why I’ve been trying to get out of this documentary.”
“But wouldn’t Leone like the attention a film gets you?” I ask, trying to keep up.
His grin curls higher, clearly satisfied by my question-asking. “F1 already associates me with Ignition, since my dear old uncle decided to become our team principal after I’d signed my contract. If some idiotic film comes out about me and his team, it’ll be all the media talks about for months. Years, if Holmes has his way. Ignition wants this to be the proper F1 blockbuster that finally breaks through the American market. Merchandise, sponsors, hospitality packages—the transition to Leone would be a mess.”
I hadn’t considered the timeline on his end; Max and I were supposed to film through September 1, and then it’d have taken us months to edit the project. If Arthur is trying to get out of his contract by the end of the season—in December, I think—then the documentary would’ve launched at the worst possible time. “Have you told Ignition that you want out of your contract?”
“Told my uncle?” Arthur cocks a brow at me. “No. And you’re not going to, either. Do you know how many seats are available in Formula 1?”
“No?”
“Twenty,” he replies. “This is my one-in-twenty shot in getting to race again for the team I need to race for. One of their driver’s contracts is up. It’s now or never.”
“Seriously?” I squint at him, not totally buying his sob story. “I would think your fancy uncle would give you a seat at Ignition.”
Something passes over Arthur’s face, a cloud over the sun. Then the emotion is gone, filed away, and trapped beneath his bouncy smile. “You’d think that.”
He’s hiding something. That, or Ignition is. I swallow as the thought comes to me, direct, determined, forever surprised by my own instincts. Max always had to hold me back from being a bloodhound, as he called it. When I catch wind that a subject is squirming in front of my camera, hiding the truth from me, I want to distract them from the cut and press the wound when they’re not watching, circle like a vulture they don’t even spot. Learning things nobody wants you to know is addictive.
And Max isn’t here anymore.
“But Ignition stalling my career won’t matter if I have you,” Arthur continues. “If we ruin this documentary, I’ll get to drive with Leone, and you’ll get your revenge.”
Revenge.
The word makes me scrunch my nose. My glasses slip down a bit, so I scoot them up, and Arthur’s excitement suspends as he watches my fingers. Then that moment ends, and his determined expression is back like there was never a distraction.
“I don’t know…” I lean farther away from him and sneak a sip of coffee. “Feels like a bad idea.”
“Why? Don’t you want to keep Max from getting away with this?”
“Yes. But first, I don’t like to be around you. I feel like I can say that now that I’m, you know, fired.”
“And you covered it up so well yesterday,” he jokes. “Don’t worry. The feeling is mutual.”
“Because I don’t like Formula 1?”
“Because you’re a documentarian.” Arthur’s tone is surprisingly even. “And if it wasn’t for this little ex of yours pissing you off, youwouldn’t have spoken to me here. You’d have turned your nose up, remained superior, and walked into work all fake smiles or iron fist, as if you’re the first person who’s thought to make money off me by forcing me to play the same role I’ve been playing my entire life.”
Oh. “But our dislike for each other works to our advantage,” he continues. “Ignition knows I hate the media, and they think you love your career. Nobody will think we’re working together.”
“Fair,” I say, thrown off by everything he just said. But—no time to unpack it. Shock and denial are kind of nice, actually. They keep you moving right along. “I don’t really want revenge, though. I only want to make sure Max can’t keep operating as Black & Graywood.”
“That’s why this is genius,” Arthur rebuts. “If this whole Black & Graywood documentary tanks during production, then that takes care of your problem. People in F1 talk. People insportstalk. He wouldn’t get another offer like this again.”
That’s… intriguing. I cross my arms, looking at a bedraggled dartboard so I can think. I really don’t like this man, and I definitely don’t trust him. But I don’t have anyone else, and in a way, I could at least count on a rich egomaniac to do what he wants. The enemy of my enemy is a Formula 1 reserve driver trying to break his contract, as the saying goes.
I look at him from over the rim of my glasses. “What’s in it for me, career-wise?”
“You’d get to see the inside of Formula 1.”
“Wow, neat. Pass.”
“I thought you worked in politics.”
Did I mention that yesterday? “I do.”
Arthur smiles, a realgotchamoment. “And how did American politics make you feel?”
