Page 20 of Until The Lights Go Out

“But it’s weird, people who don’t know you thinking they know you,” I finished for him.

“Yeah.” He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Sorry, I’m trying. I just hate this.” He gestured around.

“Interviews?”

“It feels so fake.”

“What if you just pretend you’re talking to me?” I suggested, then reached forward, plucking the tiny microphone from his oversized hand and clipping it to his shirt instead.

“It’s just us. Like…” I choked on the word ‘before,’ not being able to get it past my lips. Because it wasn’t like before, nothing was. He was in a racing suit, and I was bearing burns and scars with a microphone instead of getting ready to get in a car. But I was still here, in a world I never expected to be back in, with a man I never expected to see again. And when push came to shove, despite it all, I didn’t want him to come off bad to the fans. The whole point of this series from PitSpark was to gain traction, and they needed Theo to do that. The permanently mysterious driver. People were obsessed with him, but they also assumed many narratives. I was sure that was quite overwhelming as a whole.

“Just us,” I repeated. “Just talk to me, tell me about your routine.” I looked up at him, and he sighed.

“Okay, hit record.”

I did just that, and Theo began again. It started slow, but eventually he really got into what he was saying. I asked what certain things were that I had never heard of. He gestured with his hands explaining workouts, and I couldn’t help the smiles that slipped out of me. With each one, Theo opened up a bit more, explaining routines and mindset techniques. He was the same driver I remembered: precise, disciplined, unapologetically himself. And for the first time in years, I realized I had missed this. The passion, the drive, the way he inhabited the paddock like it was an extension of himself.

The interview moved along. I kept catching myself scanning his expressions, memorizing details I shouldn’t care about—how his jaw flexed when he was thinking, the faint crease between his brows, the way his sleeve rode up slightly when he gestured. I caught a glance at the same roots that peeked out of his sleeve earlier and wondered what it was again. I had diligently not looked at any photos related to Formula One in the last decade, so the first time I saw Theo’s face again was just yesterday. He had grown into an incredibly handsome man. I would have to be blind not to see that. He was broader; he had filled out his gangly limbs of teenage-hood. Veins now laced down his hands, and God, his hands. They had to be double the size of my own. I thought about the long-lost feeling of his hand in mine. His fingers wrapping around my hand and squeezing tight, bringing me back to the present when I got in my head too much. I felt the chill run through my body and tried to stop the visceral reaction to thinking about Theo’s touch.

I shook my head, scolding myself silently. Professional. Keep it professional.

“Alright,” I said, clicking off the recorder for a break. “That’s everything for the intro segment. Thank you, Theo.”

He gave a small nod. “Yep.” There was something in the pause after that made the air feel heavier, almost unbreathable. I thought maybe he was about to say something else, but silence flooded around us instead.

I packed my equipment quickly, forcing myself to focus on the checklist, the angles, the lighting—anything to avoid looking at him again.

But as he walked past me, I caught a whiff of a familiar scent I’d somehow remembered all these years. An odd mix of two scents that were so aggressively Theo—sweet bourbon and cherry. I knew the fragrance belonged to the aftershave he started using long before he could grow any facial hair, but it affected me all the same, and my knees felt suddenly unsteady.

8

THEO | PRESENT

After the first interview with Maisey, I had practically run away from where we’d recorded and toward the track. I needed space, I needed to breathe in air that wasn’t saturated with her strawberry scent. It clung to me, to my skin, my clothes, like some sort of cruel tattoo. I needed it gone. When she looked at me with those eyes—God, those eyes—I was transported back. If Maisey asked me for something, I would do it, simple as that. If she wanted me to jump off a damn mountain, I would. You would think a decade would dim those feelings, but that cheery, pink-filled woman stood in front of me, and I was a goner.

The track was empty, the engine bays silent except for the hum of the few mechanics checking setups. I sucked in a lungful of crisp morning air, trying to convince myself that it was enough, that just being here, away from the trailers, would erase the ache in my chest. It didn’t. Not really.

I walked the perimeter, hands shoved deep in my pockets, eyes scanning the asphalt and the garages without really seeing them. My mind was doing its own laps, replaying every detail from the interview—the tilt of her head, the faint curl of her lips when she scribbled notes, that goddamn steady calm she carried like it didn’t faze her to stand across from me after ten years. It fazed me. Fucked me up. I hated that she still had that effect. I hated that I still noticed everything.

I kicked at a stray piece of gravel near the pit wall and exhaled a long, ragged breath. I tried to focus on racing. That was supposed to be my world. Media was the distraction. Interviews, cameras, promotional bullshit—I was supposed to endure it and move on. But she’d…she’d wrenched something loose inside me, some corner of memory I’d carefully sealed off. And now it was all tangled up. God, if only my father knew Maisey Andrews was now in the inner circle of people I worked with after all this time, after everything he ruined. What a fucking cruel joke the world was playing on me.

I tried to push it down, tried to tell myself she was just like any other presenter on track. Just a professional doing her job. That I didn’t need to care about how she looked at me, or how she smiled when she caught me off guard. That the last decade didn’t matter anymore.

I ran a hand down my face, tugging my hair back, and muttered under my breath, “Fucking focus, Bauer.” I wondered—briefly, painfully—if she’d even noticed me flinch when I saw her again. Or if she’d been just as composed as she always was. Unaffected, perfectly…Maisey.

I shook my head. I hated feeling out of control; it made my skin itch and my heart race. Maisey made me feel out of control. I was so riddled with regret when it came to her. I let a decade go by without seeing her or talking to her after years seeing each other every weekend at races and exchanging letters so my father wouldn’t find out. I tried not to stare at the burns on her hand today. Seeing her wear a long sleeve on a rather blistering day had made something in me boil with anger. Anger at the crash. Anger that I wasn’t there for her, that I couldn’t be there for her. That she had a physical reminder etched into her body of her worst day. That she felt she needed to cover up those reminders. I hoped she didn’t for me. I hoped she didn’t for others. I felt the rage boiling up my bones thinking about anyone making comments about them or making her feel self-conscious about them. I immediately pulled out my phone and typed out a memo to all the Kaz Energy Racing paddock team that we had a new member, and she would be treated with welcome and respect and nothing else would be tolerated. A not-so-subtle, team-wide, hands-off order. It wasn’t much, but it was something that felt like a small balm. Something I could control. I hit send and walked into the Kaz garage.

The pit lane gates clanged as a mechanic wheeled a cart past me, and the sound barely registered. I wasn’t here yet, not fully. I was still wrapped up in the aftermath of seeing the one person who had been my undoing. My phone buzzed in my pocket, a welcome distraction. I dug it out and stared at the screen, hoping it would distract me enough.

Sebastian:

Inner circle group meeting in 10

Angel:

Inner circle?

Sebastian: