He’d had a choice: to curl up into a ball, to fade away or to make them notice him. He’d chosen the latter. When he was sixteen, he’d begged his father to send him to the right racing academies, and his persistence eventually paid off. Luckily, he was talented, and when his father didn’t give him a position on the De Rossi F3 racing team, he was quickly snapped up by another team. It didn’t take him long before he’d made his way to F1, joined another racing team, and when the press questioned why he wasn’t on the family team, his father smoothly replied that he didn’t believe in nepotism. Taz had to earn his spot on the De Rossi team. It couldn’t have been further from the truth. His father hadn’t wanted him on the team full stop.
That had only fuelled the fire of his ambition. While driving for a rival team, he became a top driver, a contender and Alex’s rival. Then Ben was killed at Imola, and his father, hampered by his words about only employing the best, reluctantly offered Taz a place next to Alex. He nearly refused, but the De Rossi team was the pinnacle of racing. And like his father, he never settled for second best.
Nothing about their family dynamics changed, and he kept his distance, never reacting to his father’s and brother’s gaslighting, understanding that they needed to find a chink in his armour to exploit. He became…stoic. Unimpressed. Unemotional.
Appearing impassive and detached became a habit, and eventually, after years of training, he became the way he acted.
Until tonight when he kissed Millie. Maybe it had started on Thursday when he realised she could see past his cold façade to the storm brewing under his layer of ice. Or maybe it started weeks ago when he’d first looked into her purple-blue eyes and felt himself tumbling.
Bottom line, he’d boxed himself into a corner. He didn’t like the way she made him feel, and his first impulse, and the easiest option, was to be shot of her. But if he demoted her back to being his press liaison officer, he’d still have to work with her, which defeated the objective. And he didn’t have any cause to fire her. Either action would make him look like indecisive.
Besides, firing Millie a day after promoting her would also be grossly unfair. He’d raised her expectations by telling her she was promoted, and ripping the opportunity away would be a cheap shot. Or was he grabbing onto any excuse to keep her around? He shoved the idea away, uncomfortable with its many implications. He’d promoted her: He would stick by his decision and make it work. And pray that in the morning, everything would be back under control.
CHAPTER FOUR
LATER THE NEXT MORNING, Millie walked into the penthouse suite of the team’s hotel, her eyes widening as she took in the skyline views of the Pudong district, Shanghai’s Bund and Huangpu River, and the Oriental Pearl Tower from Taz’s high-in-the-sky hotel suite. It wasn’t just the views outside, it was the suite itself too, the luxurious furniture, the baby grand piano and the bank of floor-to-ceiling windows. The white, black and grey colour scheme was interrupted by splashes of tangerine. The décor was stark, hard, severe…just like her boss.
Talking of, where was he? He’d been discharged from the hospital earlier this morning, and he knew she was here to see him. The only place he could be was the suite’s bedroom. After their kiss last night, she wasn’t going anywhere near where he slept, so she dropped her bag onto the couch and walked over to the telescope standing in the corner of the room.
She’d lain awake for most of the night, her thoughts bouncing around her brain. Ben’s death, Taz’s kiss, how she viewed herself, how her parents viewed her. Why she was here, how she was going to save Taz’s reputation, if that was even possible. Why had he kissed her? Promoted her? What did it all mean? And why was life gettingmorecomplicated, not less?
‘Millie.’
Millie turned, and Taz stepped into the room to her right. Behind him, she saw a brief glimpse of a massive free-standing bed in the middle of a huge room. But it was Taz’s appearance that caught her off guard. He was a stylish dresser and usually favoured designer suits with open-neck shirts and expensive shoes, or business casual outfits that screamedstyle and sophistication. Today he wore a loose T-shirt over straight-legged track pants, his big feet bare. His hair was unbrushed and his scruff was thicker than before. He looked disreputable and dangerous and so, so sexy.
She dropped her head and cleared her throat, cursing her attraction. Maybe it was because he was the polar opposite of the men she’d dated over the past few years. They’d been bland, uninspiring and so very uninteresting, all the things her parents accused her of being. When she finally took time to work out why she sat through the interminable meals and boring weekends, why she tolerated bad or mediocre sex, she realised it was because she believed she didn’t deserve any better. Tired of wasting her time, she’d distanced herself from men completely.
Sabotaging herself had to stop, and she decided she needed to find a new way to navigate life, to figure out how to view herself going forward. That was why she’d upended her life to join the F1 circus, to take on a new challenge. And if part of her life lesson was dealing with her attraction to this charismatic man, then so be it.
Had life thrown Taz into her path to challenge her habit of second-guessing herself?
Millie cleared her throat and nodded to his cast. ‘How are you feeling?’ she asked, sitting on one of the two bucket chairs opposite the enormous boxy couch.
‘Like they shoved a pin into my finger to stabilise the bone,’ he retorted. Sarcastic as always. Millie watched him, but nothing in his eyes or his expression suggested he was going to mention what had transpired between them last night.
He was back to being her grumpy, detached, frequently annoying boss. This was what she wanted, right? For them to go back to normal, and Taz being sarcastic and difficult was normal.
Taz dragged his free hand down his face. ‘Sorry.’
Damn, just when the earth had stopped moving under her feet. Taz apologising wasnotcommon, but Millie didn’t know how to handle him doing it, so she ignored his snappy, one-word apology.
‘Being indisposed makes me tetchy. Showering was a bitch, dressing wasn’t easy. I’ve been in a foul mood all morning,’ he added.
She could imagine his frustration at only having one working hand. Millie waved her phone at him. ‘I got your message to meet you here, and here I am. Can we talk about you promoting me now?’
He frowned at her. ‘Why is that such an issue? Most people would have thanked me a thousand times over by now.’
God, he was arrogant.
‘Because I’m not sure I want the promotion, and more importantly, I don’t know if I can do it!’ she half shouted, surprised she’d raised her voice. She’d trained herself not to react emotionally. In her family, it wasn’t safe to lose her grip on her emotions, to let them see that what they said bothered her. It only made it worse. Why was she losing that tight grip now? What was it about Taz that pushed her to the limit?
He brushed her words aside with the swipe of his hand, unfazed by her reaction. ‘Of course you can.’
His conviction was contagious, and for a few seconds, she believed him. Then reality strolled back in, and she shook her head. ‘You don’t understand. I haven’t worked on a big campaign.’
‘It’s the same principle, isn’t it? To build and maintain a positive image, right?’
Essentially. ‘Well, yes, at the most basic level,’ she admitted.
