“Now.”
He didn’t sound angry. He sounded… wary. And Mac didn’t do wary.
I pulled the rig to a halt, yanked off the headset, and stepped out into the hallway. He was waiting with his phone in hand, screen facing me and a bold headline taking up every square inch.
‘Gridlocked: Inside the Culture of Cheating at the Heart of Formula One – Elena Archer.’
My stomach dropped.
There was a photo of me climbing out of the car. Seoul sunlight catching the chrome edge of the Obsidian chassis. I looked triumphant. Unbothered.
Like a god heading for the podium.
The headline made it look like a crime scene.
I snatched the phone and started scrolling. The article was long. Detailed. Surgical.
Hartmann. Rotation patterns. Download logs. Statistical analysis of steward reports. She had everything. Laid out cleanly, clinically.
And then there was me.
Not accused. Not defended either. Just… questioned.
‘In a sport where milliseconds matter, transparency must matter more. Because if we cannot trust the system, then what do the titles mean?’
The words hit harder than if she’d flat-out accused me.
Mac hovered nearby, hands shoved in his pockets. “It’s going viral.”
I kept scrolling.
My name. Ross’s name. The phrase ‘preferential scrutineering’ repeated in bold. No quotes from me. No denial. No context.
Just silence.
“She published it,” I said flatly, handing Mac his phone.
He didn’t respond.
Because of course she did.
She’d tried to warn me. Tried to give me a way in. I’d slammed the door on her—literally.
And now the whole damn world was watching me through her lens.
I didn’t think. I moved.
Down the hall, past the engineering bays, past the analytics room, ignoring the curious glances and half-hearted greetings. Itook the stairs two at a time, pulse thudding like gunfire in my ears.
Ross’s office door was closed.
Good. That meant he was in there. Probably with PR. Legal. Or worse—celebrating another crisis averted.
Then I heard him.
Muffled but sharp. Angry.
I stopped just short of the door.
