I smile and sigh in mock relief. “I’m so glad you aren’t dead set on re-signing with us. The repeated battery issues has meant a massive reduction in power for some of our races. Sure, you fixed it, but it cost us. Imagine what Billy James could do with a better engine. I’m just itching to find out.”
I leave him in the hallway, walking straight through the party and onto one of the balconies, which is blissfully free of people. Until Billy James shows up. I don’t see him, but as I lean on the railing and look out at the beautiful Basque city before me, I can smell him. That’s how I know he’s there. The wind is blowing from behind me and picked up his scent. Billy has been wearing the same cologne since he was seventeen, it’s this mix of something zesty like bergamot and something darker like leather and something light like honeysuckle. Yes, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about this. Mixed with his pheromones, which must be stronger than Thanos, my body has never stopped reacting to … that traitorous whore.
“What?” I say sharply without turning around.
“Just wanted to say thank you,” Billy replies, his tone low and soft but tinged with his perpetual amusement. Billy loves playing the carefree, daredevil. The dangerous jester.
I feel like this is some set up. Like he’s about to tease me again and after that altercation with Don, I amsonot in the mood. So I turn around, ready to tell him to go to hell, but the look on his face stops the words from coming out of my mouth. He looks sincere. He steps closer. He was already close, but now we’re a couple inches apart and I have to tilt my head to look him in the eye. He smiles again, and this time, that jester-vibe is gone and it’s all cockiness now. “I heard what you said to McDougal. I was in the men’s room, and I have to say, you owned that douchebag.”
“Thanks,” I say, feeling off kilter by his kindness.
“McDougal tries to blame the drivers every time his engines fail,” Billy shifts his weight more to his left and tilts his head down a little, moving it closer to mine. He lowers his voice to an octave above a whisper. “It’s comforting you realize that.”
I take a breath. It’s shaky. I hate the way he always makes me feel...not uneasy, just off-balance. I hate it because it brings me back to being that naive teenager. Billy inches closer to me, or I inch closer to him, I don’t even know. He’s always been my bonfire, warm, mesmerizing, and enticing, and I’ve always been his moth. I avoid him like the plague because of that. But now I can feel his open suit jacket brush my arms and the wind blows my hair forward, and he reaches up and pushes it back over my shoulder before I can. His fingers linger by my ear. “And it was hot as hell too.”
“Frankie,” Nick’s voice is hard and firm and causes both Billy and me to take a step away from each other. “You okay?”
“Yes.” I reply and nod because my voice feels soft and I’m scared he didn’t hear it.
He looks like he doesn’t believe me. “Okay, well Bash has been looking for you.”
“Thanks.”
Billy’s tongue slips across his bottom lip. Damn that asshole and his perfect face with his perfect lips attached to his perfect body with his perfect, annoyingly sweet tenderness wrapped in sexy arrogance. I brush past him, and I swear his fingers graze my wrist on purpose. Can a heart swoon? Because judging by the flutter in my chest mine just did.
Nick holds the door open and sticks by my side, a hand on my lower back, as he guides me towards my father. It’s a good thing he’s doing that too, propelling me forward, because I would have stopped dead if he wasn’t. Because Dad is standing next to Dario and Rocco.F-U-C-K.
“I got you,” Nick says calmly, sensing my stress level.
He does, I remind myself. When my dad first hired him, I was fresh out of rehab and Nick was a glorified babysitter, and we both knew it. He acted like it too—terse and annoyed with me most of the time. But one night, he saw me at a club with Rocco cornering me, and he swooped in and got me out of there because he read the body language radiating off me. And I told him everything about that night I ‘overdosed’, all the stuff my dad didn’t know and even details I hadn’t told Lucia. We’ve been on great footing ever since. He gets me. And because of that, I can count on him, and he doesn’t let me down.
“Frankie, Dario says you haven’t had a chance to say hello to him yet,” Dad says with a smile. I see Lucia look over from where she is talking to someone at the bar, and she begins to walk toward the group. “I told him not to take it personally. The room and the world are eager for your attention now.”
I smile. It’s tight and uncomfortable on my face. Dario is irked. I have to placate him, and I know it. Forty-five percent is still a big chunk of the business and he’s been friends with my father longer than he’s been his partner. “Dario, you know I would never give you the cold shoulder. You’re like an uncle to me.”
A creepy uncle with a potentially creepier son.
I lean in and hug him. Nick’s hand stays on my back, which I appreciate. Rocco is standing beside his father, arms crossed and a tumbler of rye in his right hand. He doesn’t say anything, but the scowl on his face speaks volumes. His dad, on the other hand, has no problem being vocal.
“Frankie, I am not going to lie, your father’s announcement was a shock. And his decision was without consultation…” Dario informs me. Lucia appears at my side, and Nick steps back a foot. He knows she can handle Dario and Rocco better than anyone. She opens her pink-painted mouth to speak, but Dario keeps talking before my sister can interject. “I’m not against it, per se. But I have legitimate concerns that I’m sure the media and the fans will also note. Like will you stay focused? Will you give it one hundred percent? Can you handle the stress? You’ve had your fragile moments before, Frankie.”
“Fragile moments?” Lucia almost snorts she’s so dismissive. “Isn’t there a famous picture of you passed out with your head in a trophy after you won your first Grand Prix at eighteen, Dario? I doubt your antics back then are something you expect to be judged on now, am I right?” Lucia is laughing lightly as she says it, like it isn’t a biting rebuttal.
“I never over… indulged on illegal substances,” Dario snaps back.
Dad’s brow furrows and Rocco glares at everyone, even his dad. His green eyes narrowed and cold, like moss covered in frost. He knows exactly what his father is referencing, but he gives no hint that he knows more than the tabloid version of events the night I almost died. It was his party and his dad rented the yacht. One of them might know something even if they don’t realize it. I’ve never been brave or strong enough to ask.
I watch my father push his shoulders back and scowl. He hates when people bring up that night. “Well, almost dying in a bathtub on a yacht actually made me stronger, not fragile. And the past is not what I judge people by, Dario. It’s the present. And presently, I am a magnet for big money brands. If I am, I’ll make sure Billy and Antonio are too. We’ll be rolling in sponsors. Turning them away. That’s what matters, right?”
He takes a moment to absorb everything I’ve said and thankfully stops focusing on the horrible night his son found me aspirating on my own vomit.
“That is only part of what matters, Frankie,” Rocco finally decides to speak instead of glare. “But it’s not everything. If all the job required was a brand magnet, we’d hire a Kardashian.”
“Didn’t you date one of those?” Lucia asks. I place a hand on her shoulder, and she shuts up. But the damage is done. Rocco is seething.
I continue to focus straight ahead on Dario, because like it or not, Rocco doesn’t have any real power with this team. “I’ve also got solid ideas for the engine and some race strategies that will have Billy and Antonio on the podiums. They’ll win under me.”
“I guess we’ve got no choice but to wait and see,” Dario says with a resigned sigh.
