@Leoraismansmomgo go go JJR!
@harryhowdidhedoitDid IMS repave the track? Looks smooth as buttah.
@jokrokcalling it now, this chick will wreck out one of these dudes
@calebpinkstaff4countycouncilwhy is he banging this skinny dogface? She’s ugly.
@beautyfrominsideShe’s pretty if you’re into that natural look. But she needs to use a sun damage serum.@mackwilliamsracingI’m a SkinCouncil rep and would love to tell you about our organic, non-GMO, sulfate-free products. Sent you a DM!
Chapter 18
9 days until the Indianapolis 500
Across the infield, hospitality kiosks stretched across the concrete, the bright colors of their tents standing out against the gray pavement. Motorsports sponsorship was big business, with most teams relying heavily on funding from corporate entities to support the cost of running a million-dollar car. Mack watched as people in logoed polo shirts scuttled between tents, schmoozing with sponsors, taking photos, and otherwise charming the executives who put money in their pockets. With Laurie’s help, she’d purchased simple black trousers, a silky black button-down, and low black heels, and she’d let Laurie give her eyeliner and lip liner and everything in between. Her blond hair was shoved into a painfully tight twist, and she stood outside a royal purple tent emblazoned with Hartley Harvester Manufacturing’s well-known logo, hoping she looked professional enough to get more sponsorship dollars.
“Rookie!” From behind her, Leo shouted over the din of whirring golf carts and loud conversations spilling from the hospitality tents. “Ready to unzip the corporate purse?”
She scowled at him, both because she dreaded the coming hour of schmoozing and because he looked so good dressed up in dark trousers and a pale blue button-down that made the dark brown of his eyes richer. It was obnoxious that he could pull off polished and laid backat the same time. He must have been surveying her as she checked him out because he said, low and soft, “You clean up nice, Mack.”
She should snap at him to cut it out but couldn’t get the words out of her mouth. The way he looked at her—with awe and heat and want—was potent medicine, healing a part of her she hadn’t known was hurt. After everything with Kelley, she’d stopped feeling desirable. Everything about her felt hard and weathered, but Leo made her feel like the redbud trees in bloom, new and tender and lovely.
“You too, Leo.” She cleared her throat. “Thank you for yesterday, for helping me communicate with Janet and the team. And for all the help you’ve offered this week. For listening to me. For hearing me. Especially after I’ve been ... not nice.”
Leo studied her, a half smile on his face, like he’d flipped over his cards in a poker game to find an ace. He leaned in ever so slightly, those intense eyes connected with her own. “I don’t scare easily.” He stepped back and gestured toward the tent. “C’mon, let’s do this.”
Mack plastered on her best smile-for-strangers grin and walked inside the tent alongside Leo. He immediately started glad-handing, talking to random Hartley employees as if they were old friends. From across the tent, Janet caught her eye and made a slight gesture toward the opposite side where a cluster of people in royal purple polo shirts sipped twenty-ounce beers. Mack understood the message—Leo would work one side of the tent, Mack the other. Striding up to the group, Mack introduced herself and asked a few inane questions.How are y’all enjoying the practices so far? What’s your favorite place to eat in Indianapolis?For all her attitude about the event, she was good with strangers. All those years of traveling around the country and then running the track had made her good at chitchat.
A woman wearing head-to-toe purple asked, “How long have you been in IndyCar? I’m sorry, I’m not familiar with your name.”
Mack glanced at her watch. “Oh, not even three weeks.”
The woman choked on a mouthful of food and her companions laughed nervously. “Wait, seriously?”
Mack smiled with a lightness she didn’t feel and recalled her dad’s bee-charming ways. Wes Williams had a folksy wit that made reporters and fans adore him. “Seriously. Janet and I wanted to really go for broke in the Rookie of the Year contest.”
The circle of purple shirts laughed politely. Another person asked, “What were you doing before IndyCar?”
No point in lying. “My family and I own a small dirt track in southern Indiana. I’ve been running that and raising my daughter. But I used to—”
“Oh my god, you have a kid?” the woman in all purple blurted. “Isn’t that dangerous? Racing these cars and knowing that your child is watching?”
All the hairs on Mack’s arms and neck lifted. She made her voice calm even though she wanted to shout. “No more dangerous than all the men out here racing.”
“But you’re the mom!”
In racing, there were two kinds of collisions: those the driver saw coming and could brace for impact, and the kind that came from the blind side and slammed the car into the wall before the driver even knew she was in trouble. The purple woman’s careless words rammed into Mack without warning.
You’re the mom.
She was still reeling, the silence in the little cluster of people becoming awkward, when Leo appeared at her side, oblivious to the emotional shunt she’d just experienced. “Fortunately for all of us, breakfast is about to be served, but unfortunately, Mack and I have to sit elsewhere. Trust me, you want Mack to sign your gear later. You thought Sarah Fisher was tough?” He quirked his thumb at Mack. “This woman once won a race with a broken elbow.”
Mack mumbled some niceties and followed Leo toward a round table, the sound of the purple-clad woman stuck in her ears.
But you’re the mom.
At the head table, Janet sat flanked by three men. One of the men, extremely large from his height to the girth of his belly, held out a hand to Leo. “Raisman! Good to see you running in the top ten.” His rheumy eyes flicked to Mack. “And who’s this lovely date you’ve brought?”
Mack was too stunned to speak. Every woman in racing heard insults on any given day of the week—she’d been on the receiving end of countless crude put-downs—but the assumption, at this level of racing, that she was Leo’sdatehurt more than all the others combined.
