Chapter 178 Aurélie
aurélie
One sentence that just slipped out. That’s all it took to unravel everything. And I swear, I felt her leave the room before her body did. –Callum
Victor Reinhardt, the FIA president of all people, was in my hotel suite, as if it was the most normal thing in the world.
His steel-blue gaze scanned our little band of rebels—me in my fuck-me funeral dress, Callum in that perfectly tailored button-down and brooding silence, Ivy mid-sip of her drink, Marco with trail mix halfway to his mouth, and Kimi frozen beside the minibar like this was a high-stakes poker game.
It kind of was.
But… what the fuck was this?
Oh God. Was this where he demanded all of us to back down or my career was over?
Merde. Maybe my threats were issued at the wrong time.
Without a word, Reinhardt moved to the breakfast bar, unlatched his briefcase with a flick of his finger, and shrugged out of his jacket.
He hung it over a chair, rain still dripping off the cuffs.
Then he rolled his sleeves to the elbows, revealing inked—and surprisingly muscular—weathered forearms and a watch that probably cost more than most people’s rent.
“I support what you’re doing,” he admitted, voice measured as he pushed his wet hair out of his face. “All of it.”
My spine stiffened. Callum rested a hand on my lower back for reassurance.
“But if I say that in front of the FIA board, the stewards, or anyone on official record, I’ll be removed. And I can’t make any real change if I’m locked out of the system that needs reform.”
Callum tilted his head slightly. “So you're playing the inside game.”
Reinhardt’s mouth tilted in a lopsided grin. It was the most emotion I’d seen from the man, and it was… disarming, to say the least. “Someone has to.”
Ivy’s heels clacked on the tile of the kitchenette as she came to flank my other side. “What exactly are you saying?”
He exhaled slowly and gripped the counter until his knuckles whitened.
“I’m saying the sabotage should’ve been addressed weeks ago.
The optics of a female driver being mishandled by her own team are already bad enough.
But the falsified technical submissions?
The tampered brake bias and dampers? The manipulated data and ghost diagnostics?
” He turned toward me. “That’s not just unethical.
That’s actionable and criminal. And you were right to threaten legal recourse. ”
I stilled.
“Your attorney’s letter got circulated within the board.”
Of course it did. Alain was nothing if not an efficient, articulate expert.
I swallowed hard, blood turning to ice. I clasped my hands in front of me to hide the shaking. “And?”
“And it scared the shit out of them,” he said bluntly, crossing his arms over his chest, his muscles flexing beneath his dress shirt.
“As it should. The language was surgical. No emotion, just precision. You laid out everything. If the FIA didn’t start investigating internally, you’d sue Luminis, Orion, and the FIA for gross negligence, endangerment, gender-biased discrimination, and failure to enforce safety protocol. ”
Kimi moved closer to us. “Oh, you mean her voice is finally being heard?”
“Yes, she was terrifyingly convincing,” Reinhardt confirmed.
Then to me directly, he stated, “You’ve endured more than I can publicly admit without implicating myself.
But I see it. We all do. The problem is, Orion isn’t just a team.
It’s a brand built on legacy that employs a two-time world champion.
You confront their driver, you confront the team as a whole.
And if I go scorched earth, the board will protect it out of self-interest.”
I threw my hands in the air, snapping, “So what, they get away with it?”
“No,” Reinhardt said sharply. “Henric’s finished.
I have enough documentation to end his career tomorrow.
The chain of falsifications leads directly to him when you look at the big picture.
But I think it’s best to wait until the end of the season to nix him, because we can use his compliance to our advantage. The real problem is Morel.”
Callum’s eyes flicked to me. I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t. Not yet.
“I have copies of everything your counsel sent, along with the FIA’s internal response,” Reinhardt continued, pulling a stack of documents from his briefcase. “This is the unofficial version—unedited, unpolished, unredacted.”
He placed the thick folder on the counter and opened it, spreading the pages out for our review. Everyone gathered on our side of the counter like we were about to dissect state secrets.
Ivy reached for the first set, flipping through the pages with practiced speed. My eyes scanned over headers and footnotes:
Correspondence: Henric Beaumont, FIA Steward Review Log (Flagged Inconsistencies), Telemetrics Reconciliation: Race 6–9, Orion GP: Internal Memo – Driver #29 Deviation Justification, Sponsorship Retaliation Timeline.
Each line read like a death knell.
Emails Henric had sent to tech stewards, asking them to "reclassify" telemetry anomalies.
Official copies of the FIA submissions with my submissions stapled beneath them, proving that Rhea had falsified them.
Internal memos from Luminis trying to justify my mechanical failures as “driver error,” even when the data told a different story.
And worse, contracts tied to sponsorship payouts that were slashed right after I started speaking out.
It wasn’t paranoia.
It was a playbook. A pattern. Proof of retaliation disguised as coincidence. Evidence of sabotage cloaked in red tape.
And it was so much worse than I could have ever thought.
“Holy shit,” she breathed.
Marco leaned over her shoulder. “These are all real?”
“Stamped and signed,” Reinhardt said. “Off the record, I had to threaten two internal auditors to get this. The FIA would rather this be buried in a concrete vault than see sunlight. But I believe if you want systemic change, you have to drag the rot into the daylight.”
He pulled out another folder. “This one’s for your attorney. Let them lead with whatever they think will stick. But I suggest giving copies to the GPDA tonight.”
“Wait,” I said. “You want us to present this?”
Reinhardt’s expression sharpened. “Morel sits on the GPDA board. The moment he sees this file circulating, he’ll panic. And panicked men make mistakes. We can rely on Fraser and Bianchi as votes.”
We all murmured in agreement.
“And if he doesn’t?” Callum asked.
Reinhardt’s smile was thin before he nodded in Ivy’s direction. “Then you leak it.”
A collective inhale echoed off the walls.
He turned to me again. “You’ve got a window of opportunity. The court of public opinion is already leaning in your favor after yesterday. Use it.”
I nodded, throat tight. “We will.”
Then Callum, still quiet beside me, let out a slow breath before he detonated the entire room. “Maybe it’s time for me to retire.”
Every head whipped toward him. Even Reinhardt looked startled.
I turned to him sharply. “What?”
“I’m serious,” Callum said, eyes on the folder in front of him.
“I’ve done everything I set out to do. Four titles, maybe five.
I’ve been in the sport for a decade. I’m injured.
I’ve got a target on my back for every opinion I voice.
Maybe I could do more from the inside. Help do the right thing, make the sport a better place. Same as you, sir.”
My pulse spiked. My stomach dropped like I'd missed a corner at 200 kilometers per hour.
But I didn’t let it show. I didn’t flinch or frown. I didn’t even blink. I just stood there, motionless, as a white-hot crack opened up somewhere beneath my sternum and began to splinter outward.
This couldn’t be real. Not here. Not now.
Marco’s jaw dropped. “Are you seriously saying this right now?”
He looked between us like he was waiting for someone—me, maybe—to laugh and say Callum was joking. “You’ve never mentioned retirement before,” Marco added, incredulous. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
The room erupted.
Ivy immediately pivoted toward Callum with wide eyes.
Kimi muttered a stunned Finnish curse and dragged a hand down his face.
Marco rounded the breakfast bar, still shaking his head like this had to be some kind of twisted prank.
Even Victor blinked in mild surprise, though he remained silent amidst the noise, arms folded, unreadable.
“I’m saying I’ve been thinking about it,” Callum said, his voice low but steady.
“Just… recently. I’ve been thinking about my future outside the cockpit.
I’ve got other ventures already—investments, real estate, engineering, media.
There are ways to stay close to the sport while making it better from the outside. ”
He glanced at me then. Quickly, almost apologetic, like he had forgotten I was there and that this decision would impact me.
“And if we want long-term reform… maybe someone like me has to step out of the driver’s seat and into the control room.”
Marco groaned and paced around the room before stopping by Ivy’s other side. “Mate, are you hearing yourself? You’re not even thirty! You are the sport!”
But Callum didn’t flinch. “Maybe it’s time to make space. For drivers who’ve never gotten a shot. Women who’ve graduated from the F1 Academy but can’t break past the barriers. Maybe it’s time someone made the ladder easier to climb.”
God, it was noble. Devastatingly noble. And that was the worst part.
Because I understood him. Of course I did.
I always understood him. The same conviction that made me love him was the same blade now gutting me open.
He wasn’t saying this out of ego or exhaustion—he meant it.
Every word. He wanted to make the sport better.
Wanted to build something that outlasted him.
And that’s what destroyed me. Because for the first time, I realized his vision of the future didn’t need me in it.