Page 36 of Faster

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Jocelyn was on a tear today. She’d insisted on walking into the paddock with Cece to make sure there would be cameras on her after complaining for an hour and a half at dinner last night about how she’d been behind the fold in the Vogue Italia piece featuring the wives and girlfriends of the fastest growing sport in the world.

And the dinner—oh God! Ethan’s parents had invited her and Heka, neglected to invite Luca, and treated Jocelyn like the daughter-in-law they truly wanted.

Jocelyn came from the same type of family—old, moneyed, somewhat inbred—that only occasionally spat out half-functioning adults.

More often than not, the results of their careful mating selections were rude, xenophobic, and appeared to be perpetually constipated.

Cece had always thought both Ethan and Jocelyn were in the normal camp, but she was beginning to have her doubts about her longtime friend.

“I think I can convince him to stay another year.” Jocelyn clung to Cece’s arm. To outside observers, it would seem they were just having a kiki, but this felt more like an interrogation. “Do you think I can get him to stay for another year?”

Heka had seemed thoroughly done with her antics at dinner. A few times, Cece had caught his gaze. He just raised his eyebrows and ate his food, muttering a few things to Ethan’s brother about the track and the car he drove this year when asked.

“I think they’ve already lined up a junior driver for that seat.” The team seemed to have moved on. Maybe they would have fired the other driver if Heka had wanted to stay earlier on in the season, but they’d signed a long-term deal right after Heka had announced his retirement.

“You’re so negative,” Jocelyn said. “It doesn’t have to be with his current team. Maybe it could be with Lupo.”

That made Cece stop short. “Lupo has two very competent drivers.” The thought of Ethan or Luca leaving the team right now was laughable. They were winning most of the races and both on the podium in virtually all of them since Suzuka, and they were also getting along.

All three of them having sex, even though not one of them would put a name to what that meant to their relationships with each other, really seemed to help the harmony within the team.

“Don’t you want to get rid of Luca?” The thought made Cece want to vomit, but Jocelyn didn’t need to know that.

Cece was beginning to think her instinct to avoid sharing Ethan’s infidelity with her was spot on.

Jocelyn would use anything she could to stay in her WAG job as long as she could, even if it meant throwing someone she called a friend under the bus.

“No. He and Ethan have mended fences.” Cece hoped she didn’t sound dreamy about the fact that they’d made up.

Every time she thought of them—together—something inside her softened.

It was beyond the heat and chemistry that had always been there.

“They’re winning races. A team is not going to be looking for a driver—especially one who’s ambivalent about being there—when their current lineup is number one and number three in the championship. ”

The reporters and photographers were now paying attention to the eight-time world champion who had entered the paddock. His team was currently fighting to stay out of the midfield and were already out of contention for the constructor’s championship, but the guy had flair.

He was also the only driver on the grid with any dress sense that didn’t come from the careful work, over years, of a wife or girlfriend.

But the diverted attention meant Jocelyn let her mask fall. “I don’t get why you’re defending Luca. You were the one who came to lunch so distressed at the beginning of the season. Wouldn’t you rather spend your time with me than have your husband’s teammate leering at you all the time.”

Cece was taken aback. She didn’t know how to respond.

If she defended Luca, Jocelyn would know something was up.

But she’d thought they’d been so careful.

There were cameras and ears everywhere, though.

The nature of the sport made information one of the most valuable commodities.

The entire paddock was a conflict of interest, and teams tried to capitalize on that, with varying degrees of success.

“I’m just trying to be real with you. Lupo is not going to replace one of their drivers when he’s at the top of the time sheets.

” Cece shrugged, hoping for nonchalance.

“How he looks at me, or doesn’t, has nothing to do with their business decisions.

I’m just the wife of the other driver, and it’s still a boys club. We don’t matter all that much.”

Jocelyn tugged on her hand, and they started walking again.

Cece couldn’t wait until she could drop her off at the hospitality trailer for her husband’s team.

“You know that Heka would have been out years ago without me. People really should know that we’re the backbone.

We make everything run, on time, according to plan.

And we make sure it all looks effortless. ”

Jocelyn spoke for herself. One thing Cece had always appreciated about Ethan—even when their marriage had been rocky—was that he took care of himself.

He did his own laundry and hired an assistant to make his appointments, instead of relying solely on his wife.

Maybe because his parents hadn’t really paid much attention and shipped him off to boarding school and then the karting circuit, but Ethan had never needed her to mother him.

Maybe they would have been more connected if he had.

“That’s not what I got married for.” Cece thought that statement was neutral enough until Jocelyn sniffed.

“So, your marriage is going better, then?” Jocelyn’s question made her wonder when she’d become such a sarcastic bitch, but maybe she’d always been that? Except, until recently, it hadn’t been directed at Cece.

“Yes.” She wasn’t going to share anything else. Nothing about how or why her marriage had improved. How they’d opened up their marriage to precisely one person. How they were happy, but it felt so fragile that talking about it any more than strictly necessary for logistical purposes might break it.

They reached Heka’s team’s trailer and Jocelyn sighed as though she dreaded entering. Probably because there were fewer cameras in there. “Those pictures of you both with Luca seemed pretty tense.”

Cece smiled at her friend, even though she didn’t feel any positive sentiment toward her at all. “The pictures were tense because the cameras were all over us. We asked for a private table. Everyone is friends again.” The not-quite-lies slipped off of her tongue easily.

In that moment, she realized if they made a go of an actual relationship between the three of them, she would constantly have to lie.

They could never be together out in the open.

The sport was too steeped in machismo. The sponsors were too conservative.

What they were doing was illegal in several countries where Ethan and Luca raced.

She’d been looking forward to this weekend. Having to spend time with Jocelyn this morning had seemed to be an unpleasant blip. But now, it had ruined her entire day.

“You did a very good job during that interview.” Brent had the feeling that Paola had been reading some pop psychology book about how to talk to men to get them to do what you wanted them to in the workplace.

Since that moment in his trailer at Imola, she’d been scrupulously professional toward him. And she’d made sure not to be alone with him. He stopped in the middle of the corridor they were walking through and turned to her. “I didn’t make you uncomfortable asking you out, did I?”

He was trying not to be as much of a little shit.

His tantrum when Micaela had joined the team was something of a wake-up call for him.

He didn’t want to spend his life proving he was just as good as his father.

He knew he never would, because he had so many advantages and privileges due to his father’s greatness.

But he could be a great man in his own way.

And he didn’t know why he needed Paola to think of him as a good and decent person. There were plenty of women who wouldn’t care about anything but his job, his looks, and his money.

But Paola’s opinion of him mattered more than virtually anyone else’s.

“No, but I just don’t think we should bring any—chemistry—between us into the office.” She looked around to make sure no one could see how close they were to each other. “It doesn’t look good for the team.”

Brent stepped even closer to remind her of the chemistry she spoke of. The way she smelled made him a little bit hungrier for risk than he normally was off the track. “So, you admit we have chemistry?”

“I’m not admitting anything.” The way her breaths came faster, and her lips parted when they were close belied her flaccid denial. “I just think the appearance that we have something could harm the team. This is work. Work is work. Anything else—we don’t have time for it anyway.”

Brent turned and walked toward his room. Paola kept pace, probably thinking he was going to drop it. “I couldn’t disagree more, Paola.”

She sighed. “I agreed to go out with you over the summer, when we’re not working—and only if you behave.”

“You agreed to go out with me, but I don’t think you’re actually planning on giving me a chance.”

“A chance for what?”