Georgie tilts her matching hat a tiny bit to wipe sweat off her forehead. Her afro curly hair means it’s precariously balanced on top. I saw her smoothing a whole can of mousse on this morning but it doesn’t look like it’s made her life much easier. ‘Watch your braking point here.’
‘Yes, I know,’ I mutter.
‘You fucked it up last year and let Étienne Blanchet bag P1.’
‘Iknow.’ Like I could forget. In my defence, it was one of only three races I didn’t win.
‘Think about your racing line here,’ chimes in my race engineer obliviously.
‘Yup, cheers!’
Georgie huffs a laugh as we continue downhill. ‘DoesMinnie Robertsneed a pregnancy test?’
‘Course not! I just… I think I overshared, George.’
Now she’s taking me seriously. Deadly serious. ‘What did you tell her?’
‘Nothing about the team, don’t worry. I’m not that thick. I… brought up Luca.’
She baulks and blows out a low whistle. ‘Why?’
‘We were sharing shit. I don’t know.’
‘Did you tell her about Ted too?’
I give her a shove. ‘Get off it.’ Minnie would have to be my wife before I opened up about Ted. What a thought. ‘It’s just…I’ll probably see her doing press later and I’m freaking out a little. Just a little. I told her about my grandad too.’
‘How good was the sex?!’
‘We didn’t—’ I nod at the ground. ‘New sausage kerb.’
‘Ha! Fitting.’ Her grin annoys me.
‘Not fitting! We didn’t even have sex.’ A lightbulb goes off in my head. ‘But maybe if we did, I’d feel better.’
Georgie’s staring up at me like I’ve grown a third eye. ‘Honestly I despair. You’re such aguysometimes.’
‘Er…’
‘Why any woman would choose a man is beyond me, and I count you as a pretty emotionally intelligent one.’
‘Thank you?’
She drops her head to the side. ‘Wouldn’t sleeping with her break your one-night rule?’
‘I haven’t properly slept with her so it doesn’t count.’
‘Sure.’ Her eyes narrow and I don’t like what she’s implying.
‘If you want to run this kerb, we’ll need that roll bar,’ calls my race engineer and I nod.
‘Are you worried she’ll tell the press?’ Georgie asks.
‘Not at all; she would’ve done it already. It happened two weeks ago.’
‘What are you worried about then?’
‘What if she… thinks it meant something. What if she becomes clingy? What if she wants?—’
