Page 14

Thomas

“Your parents are shitting themselves.”

My best mate’s voice carries through my hotel room as I set my phone down on the bedside table. I don’t doubt that my parents are currently panicking over the breaking news, but I wouldn’t know for certain, considering I blocked their numbers—along with Figgy’s and my siblings’.

Joshua, however, was saved from a similar fate because he knew I’d call him when I was ready to unload. It’s how our friendship has worked since we met in primary school, with me bottling everything up and him simply waiting for the moment when the cap pops off.

“I’ll call them soon and explain everything.” I kick off my shoes before pulling at the knot of my tie. “Or at least the parts of it that I can.”

Not that Stella and I have had time to discuss what parts that will entail. I invited her up so we could talk more, but she insisted we could do that tomorrow, then practically threw herself out of the car when we pulled up to her hotel. I called Joshua immediately after and confessed everything.

Considering Janelle knows the truth about us, Stella can’t be upset that I’ve told someone in my circle. Sure, Joshua’s not blood related—I, sadly, am not Nigerian—but he’s unquestionably my family.

“You’re really going to go through with this?” Joshua asks for what must be the dozenth time. “It’s pretty dramatic.”

“It’s a fucking movie plot!” his wife calls out in the background. Obviously, I couldn’t have told Joshua anything without Amara knowing it as well. “I can’t wait to see how this one ends!”

“It ends with us happily divorced in a year,” I say, a little louder so she can hear me. “And yes, I know it’s ridiculous, but you have to admit it’s a genius way to make the best of a bad situation.”

Joshua heaves a sigh that says more than enough on its own, but he still follows it up with, “I can think of far better ways to handle a situation like this.”

“Yeah? Do any of them involve getting my parents and Figgy off my back while making me look like a kindly family man to the public? A public that, mind you, thinks I’m some hateful, death-wishing monster?”

His silence gives me my answer.

“Exactly,” I say as I toss my tie aside and unbutton my waistcoat, shrugging out of it and my jacket. “It’ll be worth it to finally have some peace. Plus, this helps Stella out too. It’s a win for both of us.”

“I’m not saying it’s a terrible plan,” Joshua hedges, even though he might as well be saying as much. “But you’re acting like this is going to be so simple. Do you actually think people will believe this is a real relationship? Or that this woman will keep her word and not screw you over somehow?”

His concerns aren’t misplaced, and I share them for the most part, but I’m bristling anyway. “We’re going to have a postnuptial agreement drawn up and go about this carefully. I’m not completely mad.”

There’s a loud snort from Amara, and I know Joshua is shooting her a glare to quietly defend me. But I get her doubts. I haven’t made the best decisions in the past, and as my other and longest-standing best friend, she’s been witness to many of my less-than-clever moments. Case in point: trying to adopt a pack of feral cats when I was five; snowboarding blindfolded at eleven; breaking into my grandfather’s wine cellar to steal a bottle that turned out to be centuries old at fourteen; and “accidentally” setting part of my ancestral home on fire on my seventeenth birthday. She was there trying to talk me out of it all while simultaneously egging me on.

I wouldn’t say I’m reckless, but I don’t always think things all the way through. It’s why Joshua is my voice of reason, gently pulling me back from the edge, and Amara is…Well, Amara’s there to pat me on the shoulder after I’ve jumped off the cliff and say, “I told you so.”

“While I don’t love the fact that you got drunkenly married to a stranger,” she says, “I have to admit…you could have done a lot worse than Stella Margaux. Her macarons are to die for. Ooh, can you ask her when she plans to open a shop in London? I don’t want to have to fly to Paris every time I need a fix.”

“Amara, come on,” Joshua scolds. “Let’s get back on topic.”

“What?” she shoots back. “That’s his wife now! He should know all about her career and aspirations…which hopefully include opening a location five minutes from our flat.”

I may not care much about the macaron shop part of it all, but Amara’s right. Stella is my wife—and there’s a lot I need to learn about her if any of this is going to work.

There’s a knock at nine a.m. sharp.

Padding out of the bathroom with a towel in hand to dry my hair, I open the door to Stella and step back so she can enter. She messaged late last night to say she’d be over in the morning to keep talking, but she’s staring at me like she’s surprised to find me here.

“Good morning.” The greeting is cautious as her eyes flick to my bare chest. When they rise again, I swear I see a spark of attraction there, but I’m distracted when she lifts a cardboard drink tray in front of her face. “I brought the beverage of your people: tea.”

“Oh.” I don’t know how to break it to her that I’m actually a flat-white man. I have a feeling she’d have a field day with that combination of words. “Thank you, that was very kind.”

She snorts and shoves the tray into my chest. “I’m just kidding, they’re both quadruple-shot lattes.” She skirts around me and steps into the suite, careful not to let any parts of us brush. “I have a feeling we’re going to need the caffeine.”

She strides toward the living room, leaving me surrounded by her sweet scent. I should probably feel ashamed of how my eyes travel down her back to her swaying hips, but her ass looks too good in that slinky chocolate-brown skirt. She’s paired it with a cream-colored jumper, and even though she’s covered from knees to neck, it clings to her figure in all the right places.

It’s a perfectly professional outfit. I bet she wears this to her office on a regular basis. But that doesn’t stop me from wanting to reach out and bunch the skirt around her hips so I can see exactly what’s underneath.

I still can’t wrap my head around the fact that we didn’t have sex. It’s where everything was headed, and yet we somehow got so distracted that we passed out with all our clothes on after reciting binding marriage vows.

Now that she’s my wife, though…Well, maybe we’ll get to consummate that union soon. It’s what we both wanted in the first place. We’re just going to get to it a little later than planned.

Closing the suite door, I stop by the bedroom to ditch my towel and grab a T-shirt, then join her in the living room. She’s already set up at the small dining table by the floor-to-ceiling windows, sorting through the expensive leather handbag she had slung over her shoulder. I set the lattes down in front of her before tugging on my shirt. When my head pops out, I find her staring at me—or, really, at my abs. I can’t resist flexing before tugging the shirt over them, breaking her concentration. She blinks once, then again, before her flustered gaze finds mine.

“Sorry to cut the show short,” I tease as I drop into a chair across from her. “Figured we didn’t want to waste any time.”

She clears her throat and shakes out her hair, forcing a coolness back into her expression. The woman across from me is different from the one I met Friday night. That one was hunting, looking to take me down and add me to her trophy case. This is a businesswoman who’s in no mood to entertain my jokes.

“No, we don’t,” she agrees. “We have a lot to discuss, including ground rules for this relationship.”

My brow shoots up. “Ground rules? You’re certainly taking this seriously.”

“Considering it’s my reputation and livelihood on the line, I’d say I am, yeah.”

I offer an apologetic smile. It would be nice if I could stop fucking up. “Understood. Well.” I spread my hands, offering up the floor of discussion to her. “Let’s get started. What are your rules?”

She wets her lips, and my eyes drop to them, lingering just a moment too long to be an innocent glance. Based on the way a corner of her mouth ticks up, she’s noticed. That’s fine. We’re on even ground with our admiration of each other.

“Rule one,” she begins grandly. “No secrets. We tell each other everything, no matter how big or small. This won’t work if we’re hiding anything from each other. I don’t want to be caught out if I’m asked something about you that I should know the answer to.”

That’s reasonable, and it’s not like I have anything to hide. Most of my life is out there for anyone to find. “As long as we can agree that certain details stay between us,” I add. “I’m sure we both have things that need to remain confidential.”

She nods. “We’ll make that clear up front.”

Works for me. Might be nice to have someone else to dump all the stuff going on in my life on other than Joshua and Amara.

I motion for Stella to continue.

“Rule two: This is an equal partnership.” She levels me with a hardened stare, as if she expects me to reject that. “Neither one of us should have to give up or give more than the other. Our respective careers are important and obviously come before anything, but one isn’t more important.”

I shrug. Don’t see why that needs to be a rule. It’s common sense. “Okay, got it.”

Stella stares at me for a beat, like she can’t believe I’m agreeing so easily. Or maybe she thinks I’m going along with whatever she wants just to get through this now and ignore it later. I’m not and I won’t, but I guess she doesn’t know that.

“Great,” she says slowly. “I only have one more rule.”

Again, I eagerly await her next sensible mandate. It’ll probably be something along the lines of let’s keep our bank accounts separate or let’s split spending holidays evenly between our families .

“Number three: No sex.”

I freeze, and then I’m metaphorically stumbling, leaning back in my chair as the words hit. “Excuse me?”

“We’re obviously attracted to each other,” she goes on, like she expected this reaction. She’s stated an undeniable fact considering how she’s been eyeing me and how I can’t get the idea of bending her over this table and finishing what we started the other night out of my head. “But I don’t want to make this more complicated when we eventually walk away from each other.”

“And you think sex would do that?” I push, trying not to sound like an entitled prick who expects his wife to sleep with him. But…I did expect that, especially since wanting to fuck each other got us into this in the first place. “Could we have a no-strings situation?”

She shakes her head. “Better safe than sorry. And to add on to that, we should keep all physical intimacy—like touching and kissing—for PDA purposes only. It’s exclusively for selling our relationship to others.”

Someone’s knocked the air right out of my lungs. Was I really that wrong to think this arrangement would be more along the lines of friends with benefits instead of wife I only get to touch when other people are watching ?

“Are you planning to be celibate the entire time we’re together?” I challenge. Because this is going to be a year of our lives.

She clenches her jaw before relaxing again. “Not necessarily.”

“So you’re going to cheat on me?” I sound outraged because I am . This relationship might not be real to us, but it’s supposed to be to nearly everyone else in the world. Pursuing someone else would ruin that image and put everything at risk. She can’t be serious. She can’t want to make us look worse .

It’s Stella’s turn to lean back, eyes widening and full lips turning down. “It’s not cheating if we’re not really together. And you’d also be allowed to do whatever or whoever you wanted, as long as you kept it on the down-low.”

“Are you having a fucking laugh?”

It seems like she’s literally about to laugh, because the way her face pinches tells me she’s trying not to crack. “You are so British,” she finally says.

I throw my hands up.

“Okay, okay!” She holds her own hands out in front of her, stopping me from shoving away from the table. “We can put that part on the back burner for now and reassess later, but I really do think the no sex rule is for the best.”

I force myself to blow out a breath and see where she’s coming from. I’m able to separate sex from feelings, but maybe it’s harder for her, and maybe she doesn’t want to risk it after just getting out of a relationship. I can understand that. And I can respect it.

But fuck, it’s going to be a long, complicated year.

“Fine,” I grit out. “No sex. And if we do want to seek out other people, we talk about it first.”

She nods enthusiastically, glad to have me on board. “Exactly. It’s all about communication.”

I say nothing as she toys with her stack of delicate gold necklaces, though before either of us can break the tense silence, her phone buzzes on the table. I catch a glimpse of a calendar notification among dozens of other banners on the screen. My wife is clearly a busy, much-in-demand woman.

“We should merge our calendars,” I suggest, because otherwise, I don’t know how I’ll keep up with her schedule on top of mine.

She looks up from the screen, grimacing. “Oh Jesus, we really are married.”

That drags a laugh out of me, and Stella’s shoulders lower from where they’ve been practically jammed up to her ears. “A true family unit.”

She gags dramatically as she grabs her coffee cup, though it’s clearly to hide a smile, and I spot a hint of it as she goes to take a sip.

“Anyway,” she says after lowering the cup again. “Now that I’ve gotten my rules out there, do you have anything you want to add?”

“I think you covered it all.” More than I would have, at least. “Now what do we do?”

I’m more than happy to let her take the lead on all of this, and judging from how she brightens, she’s pleased with it too. But I’m less happy when she pulls out a sheet of paper from her purse with the headline “100 Questions to Ask Your Future Spouse.” Feels a little late for that considering we’re already married, but I guess we skipped a few important steps. Or a hundred.

Stella levels me with a determined stare. “It’s time to get to know each other.”

If I never have to talk about myself again, it’ll be too soon. Unfortunately, it’s media day—the one day during race week when we sit down for interviews with the press and make social media content for our teams—and that’s essentially all I’m expected to do for the next several hours.

Stella’s version of getting to know each other consisted of me answering hard-hitting questions like What’s your love language? and How do you react to stressful situations? for several hours straight. A lot of my answers were along the lines of Am I supposed to know what that is? and clueless shrugging until she got so fed up that she claimed she had a work call she desperately had to take. Considering it was a Sunday, I was almost certain she made it up to get away from me.

We didn’t see each other on Monday. I had to meet with my assistant, manager, and performance coach, who’d all just arrived in town, in order to start prepping for the week ahead. Stella was busy putting out her own work fires remotely, including talking to her board, which was all made harder by being stuck in Vegas with me. She could have flown back to DC, but I can’t imagine that would have been convenient. So far, I don’t think we’re doing justice to rule two.

Tuesday was more of the same, but we managed to squeeze in a call to update each other, rule one in action. I told her how my assistant nearly cried laughing when I told her the news of our marriage. In return, she shared that her own assistant sent her a list of the best divorce lawyers in Nevada. Are we off to the best start convincing people our relationship is genuine? Not so much.

Despite that, I spent hours picking out a ring for Stella. If no one believes our words, maybe they’ll be persuaded by an oversize diamond on her finger.

“I still can’t believe you’re married.”

Glancing up from the bowl of fruit I’m trying to choke down before heading off to the drivers’ press conference, I find my teammate sitting across from me, slowly shaking his head.

“I thought we were going to be bachelors together forever,” he bemoans, loud enough that I’m sure everyone else in the McMorris hospitality motorhome can hear. “How could you betray me like this?”

Arlo Wood is a twenty-year-old racing wunderkind, known for his backwards caps, gold chains, and a streaming career that he somehow has time for outside of Formula 1. McMorris signed the Mancunian two years ago, and he’s been hot on my trail in the points ever since. He’s an asshole, but the endearing kind—the little brother I never had. Most of the time, though, I wish he would shut his yapping little mouth.

“Unlike you, I don’t have a reputation as a teen heartthrob to uphold,” I reply, pushing my bowl away and checking my watch. I have ten minutes before I need to walk over to the interview room. Ten minutes until I have to stare down a bunch of reporters who hate me. I wish I could have swapped with Arlo, but we’re forced to take turns, and he did the press conference last race.

Arlo bats his lashes. He has the kind of big brown eyes that remind me of a baby cow, all wide and innocent, even though he’s anything but. “Now you’re just another old married man,” he says woefully before brightening. “Didn’t take you for the kind to get married in Vegas, though. Maybe you’re not as dull as I thought.”

I stifle a smile. “Piss off. I’m perfectly fun.”

“Says the posh arsehole wearing his shirt buttoned all the way up to his chin.”

I look down at my McMorris-branded collared shirt. “What’s so wrong with that?”

Arlo groans. “If you have to ask…”

Before I can retort, McMorris’s reserve driver drops down at our table and slaps hands with Arlo in greeting. As usual, Finley Clarke ignores me and launches into a conversation with Arlo about some internet thing that I’m completely oblivious to, leaving me to watch the former F2 teammates get on like a house on fire.

McMorris brought them both in at the same time, though only one got the desired position as a lead driver for the team alongside me. It’s no secret that Finley desperately wants my seat—every reserve driver wants a chance to be part of the main show, not the backup whose role exists to take our place if we’re ever unable to compete.

He’ll have to keep waiting, because I have no plans to leave. And let’s be honest, it’s definitely my seat he wants so he and Arlo can go back to being teammates. I’m the person standing in the way of his hopes and dreams.

And I’ll keep standing there, because one of McMorris’s biggest sponsors is A.P. Maxwell International, the logo for which is displayed proudly under the team badge on my shirt. I bring in way too much money for them to replace me with someone who would bring in less. But if they could find someone on my monetary level…Well, my seat wouldn’t be safe.

Neither of the boys notices when I stand from the table. A quick wave to my press officer at a table across the room gets her to join me by the door. She briefs me on what will likely be asked in today’s driver press conference—how I’m feeling going into the penultimate race of the season, if I think McMorris can take third in the Constructors’ Championship over D’Ambrosi, and so on. She’s hesitant when she mentions that they’ll probably focus on my impromptu wedding, but I already know it’s coming. Sometimes the off-track drama is way more entertaining than what’s happening on it.

And we’re both proved right when Steven Watters, our interviewer, homes in on me first, even though there are four far more interesting drivers sitting next to me on the couch.

“Thomas, all the paddock can talk about are the photos that came out over the weekend of your wedding right here in Las Vegas,” Steven says, practically salivating since he knows he’s the first to ask me about it. “What made you want to get married right before such an important race? As we all know, McMorris is trailing D’Ambrosi in the points and has a chance to pull ahead in the Constructors’ Championship. Has the wedding been a distraction?”

I try to ignore the camera flashes and the way the reporters in the audience are a little too eager to hear what I have to say.

Well, Steven , I wish I could tell him. I was shit-faced, and a very accomplished woman with a beautiful, filthy mouth seduced me. The last thing I was thinking about was my job.

Instead, I lift my microphone and say, “Stella and I figured there was no use in waiting. We wanted to get married as soon as possible, and with our crazy schedules—she’s a very successful business owner, you know—we thought there was no better time or place than right here in Las Vegas.” I flash my most charming smile to the crowd. “If anything, having our wedding so quickly has allowed me to focus exclusively on this weekend and what’s at stake.”

Steven obviously wants to press for details, but he’s cut off by Dev Anderson grabbing Reid Coleman’s hand and declaring that he’d also like to announce their marriage.

“We may race for different teams,” Dev says, grinning so widely that I’m amazed it fits on his face. “But our love is real.”

Reid rolls his eyes and removes his hand from Dev’s clutches, though he doesn’t seem particularly upset. We’re all used to Dev’s antics. He’s gotten a little more insufferable now that he’s moved from one of the worst teams on the grid to one of the best—if not the best—but at least he’s entertaining. The Mascort team is lucky to have him filling in for their number one driver, Zaid Yousef, while he recovers from the broken wrists he sustained in the Singapore crash.

“I don’t think your girlfriend would appreciate you saying that,” Reid remarks before turning his attention back to Steven. “Can we talk about racing now, please?”

Steven goes red in the face and clears his throat. “Right. Yes. Of course. As I mentioned, Reid, McMorris and D’Ambrosi are nearly neck and neck in the points. Do you think D’Ambrosi will be able to pull further ahead after this weekend?”

Reid, dressed in head-to-toe D’Ambrosi red, doesn’t glance my way as he answers. “We have a strong car that should perform well on this track. There’s a good chance we’ll be able to expand our lead, but we do have a rookie on our team who’s still learning the car. It certainly makes things tougher.”

What he’s not saying is that the man who’s supposed to be in that other D’Ambrosi car, Lorenzo Castellucci, will likely never drive again. And even though I had nothing to do with that crash, my harsh words hang over every mention of Lorenzo like a storm cloud. What’s worse, though, is that Reid hasn’t spoken to me directly since. It seems the Scuderia D’Ambrosi protocol is to shun me.

But that’s fine. This is the first time since Singapore that the first question asked of me wasn’t something related to Lorenzo or my rant. My wedding and whirlwind romance are the new hot topic.

And if talking about Stella is the key to getting the heat off me, then I’ll brag about my wife in every conversation from now until the day we part.