by Nell Stark
Thalia felt as though she had been given permission to feel the magnitude of her own pain and fatigue, both physical and emotional. But before she could agree, she needed to spell out her expectations. “I do trust you. And I’ll stay here for the night, as long as I can call Alistair after the tests and get out tomorrow morning.”
“Getting out tomorrow depends on the test results,” Alix said. But when Thalia tensed to argue, Alix slipped one hand beneath the flimsy gown to caress her stomach. “Shhh. Let me finish. Based on my exam, I can’t see any reason why they would hold you.”
“Then we have a deal,” Thalia whispered, comforted by the warm pressure of Alix’s palm. The world was in chaos, but Alix’s touch anchored her.
“You’re a formidable negotiator.” Alix kissed the nape of her neck. “Now, before I call back the doctor, will you tell me what happened today?”
Part of Thalia wanted to refuse, even as another, more logical part knew that she needed to process it. “I will. But just…just stay like you are, okay?” She swallowed down a fresh surge of bile. “It helps.”
“I’ll stay just like this,” Alix said, smoothing her palm in circles against Thalia’s abdomen.
Secure in her embrace, Thalia dared to close her eyes and let the memories take her.
Chapter Twenty
Thalia sat in the same chair as she had six months ago when Alistair Campbell and Lord Rufford had offered her the chance of a lifetime. But today, the magnificent view from his office window was obscured by the creeping mist that had accompanied a drizzling rain coming in from the Irish Sea. Bad weather wasn’t out of character for this part of the country, but today, it felt like the world was weeping.
Across from her, Roderick Mathelay lounged in his chair, long legs crossed at the ankles, looking bored. Thalia hated him already. She had lobbied for Alistair to choose one of Petrol Macedonia’s test drivers to replace the irreplaceable Peter, but he had instead brought in a disgraced hotshot whose Superlicense had only recently been cleared of suspension. Last year, Mathelay had shown incredible promise in the first half of the season while driving for McLaren, only to fall from grace when a random blood test revealed his use of performance enhancing drugs. But he was eligible again now, and Alistair apparently saw something in him beyond his arrogance and disdain for regulations.
At the head of the table, Lord Rufford sighed through his mustache. He had delivered an eloquent eulogy for Peter two days previously. Mathelay hadn’t shown up, and Thalia held it against him. Peter had been a legend in the sport—reason enough to attend. But when you were the one picked to fill, in some small way, the hole he had left on his team, why not make the effort to see him buried?
“We have found ourselves in both a tragic and unfortunate situation,” Rufford began. “Peter was one of the greatest racers ever to have graced the sport, and we must find a way to soldier on without him.” He looked between them, then to Alistair. “I trust you will work together to make the rest of this season as successful as possible, in order to honor him.”
“Of course,” Thalia said. Alistair nodded, and after a moment, Roderick did too.
“I must step into a meeting,” Rufford continued, “but I leave it to you three to hammer out your strategy.”
As soon as the door closed behind him, Roderick opened his mouth. “Given Thalia’s inconsistent performance, it makes the most sense to regard me as the number one driver.”
Thalia was on her feet without consciously intending to be. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Sit down.” Alistair’s voice was a whip, and she reluctantly obeyed. But when Roderick smirked at her, she was gratified to see Alistair turn his attention to him.
“And you. You just got here. Try to show some respect—not only for your teammate, but also for the dead. Or so help me God, I will drop you as fast as I picked you up.”
Judging from the shocked expression on Roderick’s face, he had never been spoken to before in such a manner. Thalia almost smiled, but found she couldn’t quite manage it. She would smile again, she knew, someday—that was the way of life. But for now, it was just too soon.
*
The tone of Franz Mueller’s box was uncharacteristically somber. Death had not touched Formula One for a long time, but its specter was haunting the Russian Grand Prix. Seated at a small table on the balcony overlooking the grid, Alix felt the heaviness in the air as each driver stood by their car, watching as the flags snapping in a light breeze were lowered to half-mast. She watched Thalia bow her head as the marshal announced a moment of silence in memory of Peter Taggart.
The past two weeks had put a strain on them both. Thalia was struggling with grief in all its stages while also trying to recover physically. Her injuries might be minor, but they were still holding her back. Going through the motions of normal, everyday life with bruised ribs was one thing. Enduring the pain of forces five times that of gravity pushing repeatedly against those bruised ribs for two hours on end—that was something else entirely. She hadn’t done as well in qualifying as expected, and would have to start from P6.
But the psychological and emotional toll of Peter’s death dramatically overshadowed the physical. Thalia’s patience had all but disappeared, and her temper flared often and unexpectedly. Under the pretext of business meetings, Alix had been able to join her in Russia for several days, but not a single night passed that she didn’t wake from the same nightmare, gasping for breath and drenched in sweat. Alix had tried to cajole her into seeing a professional, but Thalia remained insistent that she didn’t need to talk. She had asked for a prescription for sleeping pills, but Alix had refused to oblige until Thalia spoke with someone. Alix had stopped pushing in the days leading up to the race, but once it was over, she planned to present Thalia with a list of London-based therapists specializing in PTSD.
The roar of the engines drowned out her introspection. As Thalia’s car sped off for her reconnaissance lap, Alix found herself wishing she believed in some kind of deity—someone or something she could appeal to other than Chance. Thalia was highly skilled, of course, but anything could happen. The commentators kept referring to Peter’s accident as a “perfect storm” and a “fluke,” but that only underscored the stakes of the uncertainty in this sport.
Once the race was under way, she returned to the box in order to reap the full benefit of the announcers’ perspectives on the race. Thalia had made a decent start but was still in P6. Almost immediately, however, she began to fight for a higher position. As the race unfolded, Alix got the sense that Thalia was running even more aggressively than usual, and pushing the envelope in ways that opened her up to additional risk.
The more she heard, the more frustrated Alix became. Why, if your mentor and teammate had just been killed, would you respond that way? Wasn’t it logical to be more cautious, not less? Thalia was sad and angry and grieving—she understood that. But to hear the announcers talk, her driving was borderline self-destructive, and it frightened Alix more than she wanted to admit. Should she insist that Thalia see a professional? If she continued to refuse—what then? Was it time for some kind of ultimatum?
And if so, did Thalia care enough about their relationship to make an ultimatum effective?
Chapter Twenty-one
Thalia pulled into P2 for the formation lap of the Hungarian Grand Prix, preset her clutch paddles, looked up at the lights…and froze. There was nothing in front of her but the track, snaking away into the distance, framed by the low hills of Budapest.
“I could get used to this,” she said, trying to freeze the moment in her mind. When the race was over, she would ask Peter whether he had ever—
Grief crashed down like a wave, threatening to suffocate her.
Deep breaths, sweetheart. She heard Alix’s voice in her mind and automatically obeyed. Furiously blinking away the tears that now obscured her view, she tried to regain her focus. She couldn’t allow grief to distract her. He would be the first one to demand she ge
t her head on straight and think only of winning.
The lights counted down, and when Lucas pulled out to lead the lap, she slid into place behind him. Between bouts of swerving back and forth across the track to heat up her tires, Thalia watched Lucas and visualized overtaking him—if not on the first corner, then perhaps on the hairpin farther down the track. The day was warmer than had originally been expected, and Alistair had been uncharacteristically uncertain about whether they would need one pit stop or two.
“We’ll assume two and start on the conservative side,” he had told them at their meeting this morning, “and reevaluate after a few laps.” Neither she nor Roderick had been happy to hear that, and she suspected they were both planning to push the envelope more than Alistair would like.
As Thalia crossed the finish line, she was already visualizing—as she had a thousand times since yesterday—a strong start that would allow her to pull in front of Lucas immediately. But when she put the car into neutral, her engine suddenly died.
Panic struck like a rattlesnake, but her instincts were stronger. This had happened before and she knew what to try first. With a practiced motion, she initiated the restart sequence.
Nothing.
Fear and rage began to take hold. She jammed her finger against the mic button. “What the fuck is going on?”
“Seems to be electrical issues,” Carl’s syllables vibrated with tensions.
The first light went out.
“No,” she muttered. “No, no, no, no!”
“Try again!” Carl said.
Nothing. Still nothing. The second light went out.
“You have to signal them, Thalia,” Alistair’s voice, too calm, flooded her ears. The third light went out.
Gritting her teeth, she raised her arms above her head and waved. The fourth light went out, but a heartbeat later, the marshal waved the yellow flag wildly and the LEDs illuminated in the red pattern that signaled an aborted start.
“They’ve called for an extra formation lap,” Carl said a moment later—unnecessarily, since she could see the goddamn board herself. “We’ll come and get you.”
Seething, Thalia watched as the field of cars pulled around her to flash off into the distance. As soon as they were gone, her engineers descended en masse, rolling the car into the pit lane and finally backing it into the garage. Hunching her shoulders, she vibrated with rage as they hooked the car back into the computer system and swarmed around it. If they could fix the problem before the start of the race, she would be allowed to join it from the pit lane. The motherfucking pit lane, when she had been P2!
One minute had already passed. By the end of the second minute, she knew it was hopeless. She was out of this race. From second place with a strong chance of capturing first, to DNF. As the cars roared off the grid for the start, her engineers stopped their frenetic activity.
“I’m so sorry, Thalia,” Carl said, unable to meet her eyes.
She wanted to scream at him. At all of them. She wanted to curse how unfair it was that Roderick, whose sniping she had tried to endure without retaliation, was now flying around the track despite his inferior start, while she was confined to the garage. She wanted to weep for the lost points and for Peter’s death and for how exhausting it was to have to prove yourself at every turn just because you had been born female. She wanted to lie down and sleep without dreams of fire. She wanted Alix’s soothing touch and calming words.
But Thalia knew herself. If she didn’t get away from other people this instant—Alix included—she would explode just as surely as Peter’s car had done. She took off her HANS, laid it on the table, and walked toward the rear exit of their garage.
“Thalia?” Carl called after her. “Where are you—”
“Let her go,” she heard Alistair say, before the door shut behind her.
*
Alix found her, as expected, alone in the gym. This time, instead of pounding against a punching bag, she was pounding out miles on a treadmill. Alix paused inside the door to watch her run—arms pumping in perfect synchronicity with her strides, skin gleaming golden under the harsh fluorescent lights. Desire welled up, swift and powerful like a flash flood. But in the balance hung fear: fear of Thalia’s chosen profession, fear for her life, fear of an anger so powerful it had driven her from showing solidarity with her team. Fear of her own feelings, and fear of what would happen if she fully surrendered to them.
When she stepped into Thalia’s line of sight, the obvious clench to her jaw was a clear indicator that her workout had not yet been sufficient to boil off her rage. In a moment of doubt, Alix wondered if she had made the wrong decision.
Thalia slowed the machine to a walking speed. “I’m not in a good head space right now,” she said.
“Okay,” Alix said, feeling like she was tiptoeing through a minefield. “What can I do to help?”
Thalia stared at her for a moment before shaking her head. She stopped the treadmill and reached for the towel hanging on its frame. The dismissiveness of her behavior stung, but Alix wasn’t about to give up that easily.
“Does that mean you don’t think I can help? Or that you don’t want me to?”
Thalia slung the towel around her neck. “I don’t know. I don’t know, okay? All I do know is that it feels like my skin is…is peeling off, I’m so fucking angry.” She stepped down from the treadmill. “I left the garage to make this feeling go away and now it’s even worse!”
Alix crossed her arms beneath her breasts, recognizing the defensiveness of the posture even as she adopted it. Coming here had been a mistake, she realized. But if she couldn’t help Thalia when she felt this way, then what did that say about their relationship?
“What?” Thalia asked belligerently.
Alix shook her head. “Nothing.”
“No, there’s something. Just say it, okay? Clear the damn air.”
Her tone was accusatory. Thalia was trying to bully her, and she wasn’t going to stand for that.
“I hate it when you’re like this.” The words tumbled out in a rush. “Being angry and frustrated and disappointed about what happened today—that’s understandable. But right now, you’re completely irrational, and it’s terrifying.”
“Terrifying?”
“I have no idea what you might do. In this state, you’re capable of actions that would normally be inconceivable. Like punching another driver in the face.”
Thalia rounded on her. “You’re always going to hold that against me, aren’t you?”
Looming over her, Thalia was menacing in her anger, but Alix refused to back down. “I’m not holding it against you. I’m holding it up as an example of what you’re capable of.”
“What I’m capable of? You make me sound like some kind of psycho! Or a criminal!”
Alix could recognize baiting when she heard it, and so she kept her mouth shut. But she wasn’t willing to stay and endure this kind of treatment, especially since she didn’t deserve it. Sympathy had gotten her nowhere. She had an early flight in the morning to make it to an important meeting with a potential investor in Germany, and she wasn’t about to spend the rest of the night in an argument. Thalia would have to sort out her issues alone.
“What are you doing?” Thalia demanded when Alix began to move toward the door.
“Going to my room.”
“Why?”
“Because you want to have a fight, but I need a good night’s sleep.”
“I want to have a fight?” Thalia’s voice rose an octave. “Do you think I wanted my car not to start? Do you think I wanted not to finish?”
“I’m glad you didn’t have to race!” Alix fired back, instantly regretting it. All day, she had tried so hard to keep her calm. Thalia had every right to be upset, but she didn’t have any right at all to take it out on her. Except now, despite her efforts at equanimity, Alix had sunk to Thalia’s level.
“Excuse me?”
En route to the door, Alix paused. Fine. If Thalia wanted to ha
ve this out now, then she would play along. “Every time you leave for a race, I have to accept the fact that you might not return. I have to ignore the instincts that scream at me to run after you and beg you not to get in your car. Do you have any idea how exhausting that is?” Alix could tell by Thalia’s narrowed eyes that her words weren’t having any kind of positive effect, but she had to finish. “You’ve been suffering since Peter’s death but refuse to get help. And you’ve been driving like you want to join him in the grave. So, yes. I was happy when your car wouldn’t start, because that meant you wouldn’t have to put your life on the line today. Okay?”
“No.” Thalia shook her head vehemently. “Not okay. I can be in a relationship with someone who worries about me—the same way I would worry about you if you were to visit Uganda. But I can’t be in a relationship with someone who wants to change me.” She balled her hands into fists. “I’m a racecar driver. My job is dangerous. That’s always going to be true. So if you can’t accept that, leave now and don’t come back.”
Alix couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “That’s your solution? I tell you that I’m worried about your life, and you give me an ultimatum about our relationship?”
Thalia crossed her arms over her chest. “I am what I am, and I meant what I said.”
Alix felt as though the earth was shifting beneath her feet, pain spilling out from the cracks like magma. “You’re an adrenaline addict and a bully,” she said. “That’s what you are.”
Forcing herself not to look back, she left the gym. Claude was waiting outside, of course. How much had he heard? Probably every word. She didn’t dare meet his eyes, in case censure or judgment was waiting. Or worse: pity.
A chasm was opening inside her mind, threatening to engulf her with despair. All the hours she had spent worrying about Thalia’s well-being crashed down on her. All the research, all the lost sleep, all the frantic hours spent watching her drive and praying she would make it through each race unscathed. She should have delivered her own ultimatum before Thalia could beat her to the punch.