Page 47 of Faster

Chapter Thirty-Four

Liam was losing his mind. He’d made a mistake breaking things off with Micaela.

He’d thought he’d been doing it for her own good, but he’d been totally wrong.

He’d seen it even moments afterward—the light dimming in her eyes.

And now she wasn’t taking care of herself the way she should.

She was skinny and sad. And it was all his fault.

But he shouldn’t be the one to take care of her. He couldn’t be. It was inappropriate on both personal and professional levels. Completely unsustainable. But he was the only person she’d let in.

As he sat on the pit wall with his headphones on, he tried to listen to the race director and each of the driver’s engineers. They’d brought upgrades to the race, and they only had two chassis, so they had to make it work.

He’d nearly wrung the neck of the team member who’d drawn the short straw of telling him that their third upgraded chassis had been left half finished in the factory.

He’d been way too focused on his personal feelings for Micaela in the past few months and not nearly focused enough on the team.

That half-finished car and the pressure it put on everyone in the team to be perfect this weekend was evidence he’d done the right thing by ending their relationship.

But then, directly after stopping himself from killing anyone or throwing something, he’d walked into the engineering meeting and smelled Micaela’s shampoo.

She’d left a bottle of it at his house in England, but nowhere else.

After breaking up with her, he’d bought a bottle of it to take with him, so he could take pulls of the fragrance when he was alone.

He was still gone for her. Still addicted to her. Still desperately in love with her. He didn’t know if it would ever end. He didn’t know if he ever wanted it to.

He kept his eyes on the screen, watching the telemetry. He knew there might be cameras on him at any moment. Some content creator made regular edits of him looking “daddy,” whatever that meant. He’d had to ask Micaela, which was just more evidence that he was too old for her.

That didn’t mean he didn’t still love to watch her drive.

Under her hand, the car was performing extremely well in this practice session.

Monza was the fastest track on the calendar.

Most of the turns were harrowing. As he watched the screen as she did a fast lap, he could almost feel the g-force she was experiencing in his own body.

It was the only way he had left to feel close to her.

It was pathetic. He turned his attention to his son’s session.

He was quicker than he had been during the first fast lap, but he was still lagging behind Micaela.

He felt guilty that the healthy competition he’d intended to bring into the team was resulting in Brent falling out of the top five drivers.

He’d meant to drive his son forward, not hold him back.

But he also hadn’t intended to fall in love with his son’s ex. So, good intentions and all that.

Even now, he found it difficult to focus.

His mind wandered away from the telemetry numbers, and he lost track of which of his cars was where on the track.

He looked down and tried to rub the exhaustion out of his eyes.

When he saw the crash, he jerked in his seat.

He knew it was one of the Panther Yellow cars that hit the wall, but he didn’t realize which one it was at first. The car hit the wall at Ascari and then crossed the track and hit the other wall on the straight before the left rear wheel came off and the car rolled to its side.

If either of the drivers was hurt, he would never forgive himself.

He was responsible for keeping them both safe.

Then, he saw Micaela’s racing number and the smoke coming out of the gearbox. He wanted to run out onto the track and pull her out himself, and he barely kept himself from doing it.

His chest tightened, and he wasn’t sure if he was experiencing acute panic or a heart attack brought on by stress.

The radio was silent except for Micaela’s engineer asking her to confirm she was all right.

He kept one eye on the TV screen showing the crash in replay after replay, feeling as though someone had punched him in the stomach every time.

He didn’t know how long it was before her radio crackled to life. “I’m okay. I’m okay.”

Finally, he could breathe. The broadcast showed the marshals helping her out of the car. She took a few ginger steps away from the smoking chassis and toward the medical car before raising her arms and waving at the camera, so the fans would know she was fine as well.

In that moment, it didn’t matter that she was part of the upstart American team challenging their beloved Scuderia Lupo; everyone at the track cheered.

But until he could see she was unharmed, until he could hold her in his arms and know that she was okay, he wouldn’t be able to think of anything else.

Regardless of the fact that they still had one car on the track—it was coming into the garage, because they’d waved a red flag for the session—he had to make sure Micaela was okay.

He didn’t spare a second to consider how it might look for him to rush out of the garage and over to the medical facility. He didn’t think for a minute about how he might be fined for breaking one of a dozen rules against team staff interfering with anything having to do with an accident.

He had to see her.

An hour later, the mood in the garage was grim.

Everyone might have been acting like she was dead, but she was sitting on the pit wall, uninjured.

She would be ready to race and out on the track right now for the second practice session, but for the fact that she didn’t have a car to race in.

The chassis and gearbox had been a total loss, and Frankie had grimly informed her they didn’t have a spare this weekend, due to the upgrades.

Liam, for his part, still refused to look at her.

He’d come rushing into the medical center, wide-eyed and desperate looking.

As soon as the doctor had informed him she was fine and wouldn’t need to go to the hospital for additional checks, it was like he’d been unplugged from a light socket.

He was himself again. Unfortunately, that self seemed to be furious with her.

And he had every right to be. The crash was entirely her fault.

It was a grim reminder that she was a rookie, and she hadn’t driven the track in this series before.

Monza was the fastest track on the calendar, and the car had demonstrated significantly more power with the new upgrades.

She’d been caught out by the corner, and then everything became a blur.

She didn’t even have the time to be afraid until the car stopped rolling.

She hadn’t heard the voices over the radio asking if she was all right, and her only thought had been to get out of the car before it caught fire.

That’s when the fear had penetrated. The fastenings on her seat belt had seemed stuck for a few seconds that felt like an eternity as she attempted to extricate herself from the car.

As soon as she felt them loosen, she’d slithered out.

By that time, the marshals were at the car with fire extinguishers.

The whole thing felt embarrassing, and she wasn’t sure if she was intact for a few seconds after she stood and started moving away from the car.

She noticed the crowds, out for an uneventful day of practice with the picnic lunches, were eerily silent.

She looked over and raised her arms in a wave.

The cheer that went up bordered on humiliating.

She was the one who had crashed and wrecked a million euros’ worth of equipment, and they were cheering her on.

Sitting in the garage a few hours later, she shook her head. Even though her race weekend was ruined—her chance to win the championship gone—she was here for the team. And she would do whatever she could to help Brent get the team points.

Still, a little part of her died when all of the other drivers took the track and left her behind. It was a deep ache that told her one bad crash wasn’t going to keep her down for long.

She looked over at Liam, who still hadn’t so much as glanced her way. She was sure he regretted bringing her onto the team at this point. Hell, he’d probably regretted it for a long time, even before she’d kissed him and started their affair.

It would have been better had she ignored her attraction for him and focused on learning as much as she could from one of the most brilliant team leaders in motorsports.

The only thing that saved this weekend from being a total bust was that her father had flaked out on his planned trip.

He never missed Monza, but the prospect of seeing his daughter race there must have put him off the event.

He was probably delighted she’d crashed out.

He likely hadn’t spent a moment worrying she’d been hurt.

She was never enough to satisfy the men in her orbit.

In the past, Brent’d always had more experienced teammates, whose shadow he could linger in while he learned.

He’d never really been meant to be the driver that shone.

And while Micaela had spanked him at every race—saving this one, of course—she’d felt like more of an equal.

Because of their history and because they were the same age, it felt like they were more competitive than any other teammate.

And he’d grown accustomed to that pressure. It had pushed him to be better. It might only be practice, but he’d topped the time sheets in the second practice session. For once, he got out of the car exhilarated rather than exhausted.

But then, after he’d gotten cleaned up and changed, his father pulled him into the conference room.