“And that’s new,” Marissa added. “You usually trust your first instinct.”
Cassidy watched her quietly for a beat. Her friends knew everything that was going on with her and Sloane, but Cassidy was the most attuned to her feelings, checking in on her multipletimes a day. “You’re not distracted,” she said. “You’re guarded, which makes sense when you think about it. Given everything you have going on.”
Reese leaned back against the wall, helmet tucked under her arm. “I don’t know how to stop thinking long enough to drive.”
“You don’t,” Delaney said. “You stop trying to think your way through it.”
“That’s not helpful,” Reese muttered.
“It is,” Marissa said gently. “You’re trying to solve something that isn’t a driving problem while driving. Your brain keeps wandering because it doesn’t feel settled.”
Reese stared at the concrete. “Well, I don’t know how to settle it.”
Later, as the garage thinned and the day wound down, Reese found herself alone again—too quiet, too much room for the thoughts she’d been keeping at bay. Sloane’s absence pressed in on her from every direction. The empty space where she should have been. The unanswered questions Reese was trying not to ask yet.
That night, Reese sat on the side of her hotel bed, phone in her hand, thumb hovering over Sloane’s name. She didn’t text. Not because she didn’t want to, but because she didn’t know what she could say that wouldn’t sound like pressure.
I miss youfelt obvious.
I’m not okayfelt unfair.
Please come backfelt like too much.
She set the phone down and stared at the wall instead.
The thought came to her slowly, without drama. If this—this life—meant losing Sloane, then no amount of speed or success would make it worth it. Ever.
She would race this weekend. She would show up. She would do her job. But if the choice ever became real, if the cost became final? She already knew the answer.
And that knowledge, heavy as it was, finally let her breathe.
Sloane was already packing when Veronica answered the phone.
The suitcase lay open on the bed, and she moved around it with purpose, tossing clothes inside without folding. She took stock. Jeans, a soft T-shirt, her academy polos, the jacket she always grabbed when she didn’t know what the weather would be like, but needed something familiar.
Her phone sat on the nightstand, Veronica’s voice coming through on speaker, even and unhurried. “You don’t have to rush,” Veronica was saying. “Take another week if you want. We’re not racing this weekend anyway. I feel like this time has been good for you, and I want to see that continue.”
“It has,” Sloane said, tugging open a drawer and scooping up socks. Veronica was worried because she was a good friend, but Sloane felt emotionally stronger than she had in years, and now was the time. “It’s not that I’m undoing the work. If anything, I’m acting on it.”
There was a brief pause on the other end of the line. “Okay,” Veronica said. “Tell me what changed.”
Sloane stopped moving for a moment, one hand braced on the bed. Her chest tightened with certainty, the panic gone.
“I saw qualifying.”
Earlier that day, she’d been sitting on her couch, coffee cooling on the table. She’d had the broadcast muted and her laptop open so she could check in on the progress, monitor the timing graphics. It had turned into more than that.
Reese’s turn came early in qualifying. The first lap was messy. Nothing catastrophic, but off, almost like she wasn’t warm yet. The second attempt was worse. A snap ofovercorrection, a missed apex, momentum bleeding away in places where Reese usually gained it.
Sixteenth.
It was an abysmal result, and Sloane knew how devastated Reese had to have been.
The number had sat there on the screen, stark and undeniable. She’d have an uphill battle going into the race, and a third poor showing was going to start voices behind the scenes talking. The media would join the speculation. Had Laurens acted impulsively when they’d brought Reese on? Would they correct the mistake before the season was too far gone to save?
Sloane hadn’t felt fear then. She’d felt something colder and sharper. Recognition. Reese was so much better than what she was showing, and it was time to step up and support the woman that she loved.
“She’s in her head,” she said quietly. “She’s drowning, and I know I can help.”
