Except, I’d caught the flickers of interest. The way her breath hitched when our fingers brushed passing the bottle, the way her eyes lingered on me a second too long when she thought I wasn’t looking.
Not that it mattered right now. Tonight, I had bigger problems.
“Radio silent unless it’s critical,” I snapped, tightening my grip as I flicked through the gears.
My race engineer, bless him, sighed like a man who was debating walking into traffic.
Singapore was a bastard of a track. Tight walls, humidity thick enough to suffocate, bumps that rattled your teeth loose lap after lap, the lurking risk of dehydration, and a layout that punished hesitation.
If you didn’t respect it, it chewed you up and spat you out. I’d had my share of close calls here, but tonight, I couldn’t afford mistakes.
Not if I wanted to improve on Azerbaijan.
An impossible fucking ask, considering Baku had been an entirely different beast. The kind of circuit that let you stretch your legs with long straights where I could hit top speeds, plentyof room to go wheel-to-wheel. But it was still a street track. Still had that brutal, no-margin-for-error quality that made every race feel like threading a needle at 200 mph. The walls were close, the braking zones tight, and the castle section? A single mistake there and you were in the barriers, race over.
Singapore didn’t even give you the luxury of a mistake.
It was relentless. Stop-start, bumpy as hell, and suffocating under the floodlights and humidity so oppressive it drained you lap by lap. Sweat soaking through the fireproofs, muscles screaming from the constant wrestling of the car.
By the time the checkered flag dropped, most drivers would be a few kilos lighter, every drop of water wrung out of them like they’d just done twelve rounds in a sauna.
Aedris didn’t care.
And right now? I wasn’t delivering.
I swung into the final sector, arms burning, sweat stinging my eyes even through the balaclava. Races here were brutal. Even quali left you wrung out.
I braked late into the chicane, the car twitched under me, rear tires biting too hard, then slipping just as quick. My heart jolted.
Shit.
I caught the slide, hands instinctively correcting, but the damage was done. The time bled away, a tenth here, another tenth there, and suddenly, the checkered flag was waving and my name lit up on the leaderboard:
P9.
Fuck.
Silence filled the radio for a beat before Al finally exhaled. “P9, Griff.”
I slumped against the seat, sweat slick on my back, chest heaving as I stared at the screen. Ninth. Stuck in the midfield. Singapore wasn’t a track you wanted to start low.
I forced a slow breath. “Understood.”
By the time I’d peeled myself out of the car and dragged through the debrief, the media pen was the last place I wanted to be. But PR didn’t give a shit if I was in the mood or not.
Cameras clicked, lights blared. I rolled my shoulders, shifting the Aedris cap lower, already cycling through the generic answers I could give without handing the press anything juicy.
The first few questions were easy. How was the car feeling? Shit, thanks for asking. What’s the plan for tomorrow? Try not to bin it into the wall, mate.
The next question came from one of the bigger outlets. “Griffin, tough session for you tonight. You looked frustrated in the cockpit. Do you think external factors are affecting your performance?”
“Like what? The humidity?”
The reporter chuckled, but his gaze remained laser-focused on me. “I was thinking more personal life issues. Anything off-track weighing on you?”
I tipped my chin, somehow keeping my usual cocky smile in place. “Nothing that’d make the car any faster.”
A few reporters laughed, the tension easing just enough for me to move on. Another question came about race strategy. Another about tire degradation. Both easy to handle.
