Page 124 of Full Throttle

Ranya settled into a chair. She looked tired, Juliette observed, although she’d done well to cover it; it was only the slight waxy concealer beneath her eyes that gave her away. Not that Juliette blamed her. Between the broken pirate ship, the on-track fighting, the crashes and clashes…

It had been a hell of a season.

Juliette’s voice was quiet. “I’m going to lose my seat, aren’t I?”

Ranya’s mouth tightened. “Nothing’s decided yet.”

In other words, yes. “It’s okay. You can say it.” And then, just to lay her cards out on the table: “I get the sense that Robert hates me.”

Ranya’s mouth had all but disappeared. “Robert hates all ambitious women.”

“And here I thought I was special.” She looked out at the shadowy mountains. “Is that why the female drivers’ academy will never happen? Because the world isn’t ready for ambitious women?”

“Who says it won’t happen?”

“Experience.”

Ranya shifted her cane between her legs. “You got here, didn’t you? You’re proving to the world that women can drive a race car. You drive like hell is on your heels. I’ve never seen anything like it before.”

“Thank you,” Juliette said. “But…”

“What?”

She leaned her forehead on the cool glass. But it was hard, she thought, to be “the female driver.” A privilege, yes, but also terrifying and overwhelming and so goddamn tiring. What people didn’t understand—what she couldn’t find the words to explain—was that every woman was different. Asking her to represent an entire gender was like cooking only with basil and claiming that you understood spice. You were missing out on so many flavors. So many wonderful nuances and layers.

“Sometimes,” Juliette said, “I wish that you’d seen a dozen of me before.”

Ranya looked away. “I have to ask you something. That interview,” she said, and a sliver of ice lodged in Juliette’s throat. “Is it true? I’m well aware that I happened across the two of you in quite a…compromising position, but I’d expected you to break things off after Monaco.”

Juliette paused. Ah. She thought she’d gotten away with avoiding this conversation. Ranya hadn’t mentioned anything before qualifying that morning, but that was before both she and Hastings had put multimillion-pound race cars into the wall.

So, you know.

Fair enough.

Juliette raised her head. “It’s true.” The oddest urge to laugh filled her, although it wasn’t funny. “I think…I’m pretty sure that I’m in love with him.” A lump rose in her throat. “No, I do love him. I know I do.”

For god’s sake, how was it possible to love someone who had hurt her so badly? That cooked with bee pollen as a hobby? But Dominic was kind, and clever, and when he looked at her with that half smile…A lump rose in her throat.

She’d messed all of this up. So badly.

The moonlight cast Ranya’s face in shadow. “You’re certain that you love him?” She looked away, and Ranya exhaled, as if that was all the confirmation she needed. “I see so much potential in you, Juliette. But I don’t need to tell you that relationships and racing don’t go together. In the end, there always has to be a sacrifice. So I’m asking you: What do you love more?”

A cold ache spread through her chest. “You want me to break things off.”

“I don’t want you to be distracted,” Ranya said. “And that’s what Dominic will always be. A distraction.”

Juliette swallowed. “And what if you’re wrong?”

“About what?”

“My potential.”

The words came out more mocking than she’d intended. But perhaps, Juliette thought, her chest heavy, those men were right. Perhaps she didn’t deserve her seat. Didn’t her own brother say as much? Didn’t people see her as a diversity hire, something new and shiny, a token that the industry held up to show progress in gender equality?

Maybe she hadn’t earned her seat.

Maybe, Juliette thought dully, she’d gotten it simply by being a woman. The only woman qualified to drive a race car.