Chapter Twenty-Nine
Lily
The knock came as I was pulling my hair into a loose braid, still trying to get ready for my media day in Belgium. I padded across the hotel room in bare feet, expecting room service to deliver the latte I’d ordered twenty minutes ago.
Instead, Ollie stood in the hallway, shoulders slightly hunched. He was dressed ready for the paddock, already in his nice jeans and a blazer.
“Hey,” he said.
I didn’t say anything for a moment, just stood there, one hand on the door, the other gripping the frame as I tried to work out why he was here and what it was going to cost me emotionally.
“Hey,” I said eventually.
“I wanted to check on you. After Silverstone.” He paused. “Can I come in?”
Every instinct screamed no. I was tired of speaking to people, and I didn’t have the energy to navigate whatever this was going to be. I didn’t have the reserves for careful words and managed expectations. I barely had the reserves to stand upright.
But he’d come all this way. And he was looking at me like he genuinely just needed to see that I was in one piece.
“Sure,” I said, and I stepped aside, though everything in me wanted to close the door and crawl back into bed.
He walked in and looked around the room the way people do when they don’t actually care about the décor but need somewhere to put their eyes.
I closed the door and leaned against it, arms folded, keeping the distance between us.
The room felt too small with him in it. Everything felt too small lately.
“How are you feeling?” he asked, turning back to me.
“Tired.” I shrugged, the gesture empty.
He nodded slowly, then he sat down on the edge of the armchair near the window, elbows on his knees. I stayed where I was, by the door, like I might need the exit.
The silence between us was full of a mountain of things unsaid.
“Ollie—”
“Lily—”
We both stopped. He huffed out a small laugh and gestured for me to go first.
I made myself cross the room and sit on the edge of the bed, though I kept my arms wrapped around myself.
“I think you know what I’m going to say,” I said quietly. The talk I needed to have with Ollie. I wanted to ask him about Henri and the story, but most of all, I needed to tell him I wasn’t interested anymore.
“Yeah. I think I do.”
I pulled at a loose thread on the comforter, winding it around my finger until the tip went white.
“I really appreciate all the dinners and chats, Ollie. But we need to stay friends.”
The words came out plain. No softening, no preamble. I owed him that much—the clean version, not some dressed-up speech designed to make me feel better about delivering it.
Ollie’s entire body seemed to go rigid for a second before relaxing back into his usual comfortable ease. He studied the carpet between his shoes.
“I’m sorry if I led you on. That wasn’t fair, and I know it. I genuinely enjoyed hanging out with you. The dinners, the paddock stuff. You made me laugh when I really needed it.”
“You don’t have to do that.” He looked up. His eyes were dry and clear, no trace of surprise in them. “The whole letting-me-down-easy thing. You’ve chosen Henri, I can see it.”
I nodded uncomfortably.
“After your photos from the Beetle racing in London, I knew I’d lost.” A light smile tugged at his lips. “I am a journalist, after all.” He sat forward, rubbing the back of his neck. “I owe you an apology too, actually.”
“For what?”
“The fan questions. During the podcast taping.” He wouldn’t meet my eye now. “I picked the meaner ones on purpose, to rattle you.”
I’d suspected this, somewhere in the back of my mind, but hearing him confirm it was different. The ground shifted under something I thought was solid.
“That’s—”
“Spiteful. It was spiteful. I was jealous after seeing those photos of you and Henri, and I took it out on you in the pettiest way I could find.” He finally looked at me again. “I’m not proud of it. I’ve been carrying it around since Silverstone, and it’s been eating me alive.”
I sat with that for a moment, letting it settle into place alongside everything else.
“It’s also why I told you that story about Henri.
The story about F2—I shouldn’t have told you that.
” He pressed his palms together between his knees.
“I was young and stupid, and what I did to Henri back then was wrong, period. I should apologize to him, too.” Our eyes finally met.
“I only told you that because I wanted to drive a wedge between you two. I could see what was happening, and I thought if I made you doubt him, you’d pull away and pick me. ”
“I appreciate you saying that.” I chewed my lower lip, tasting the remnants of my lip balm.
“And Henri… He’d appreciate an apology.” I wasn’t so sure about the last bit, but it felt right in the moment.
Deep down, I believed that leaving negative energy in the universe would come back to haunt us.
If there could be some peace between Ollie and Henri, that would be a win.
“Yeah, well.” He gave a half-smile. “It’s long overdue.”
His gaze drifted past me, toward the desk by the window where I’d spread out the notes earlier that morning. I’d been photographing them for safekeeping, arranging them in order, and hadn’t bothered to put them away.
“What’s all that?”
I followed his eyes to the desk. My first instinct was to wave it off—nothing, just work stuff—but I’d just asked him for honesty, and he’d given it. The least I could do was return the favor.
“Someone’s been leaving me notes.”
His eyebrows lifted. “Notes?”
“Well, threats. In written and virtual form, all anonymous.”
Ollie stood and crossed to the desk, not touching anything, just looking. His head tilted as he scanned the handwriting.
“Do you know who it is?”
The question lingered, and I watched his face carefully—the set of his mouth, the way his fingers curled at his sides as he read the notes.
“No. I have no idea.”
His shoulders relaxed, just barely. The change was subtle, barely perceptible, but I caught it—a release of tension he’d been holding since he walked over to the desk. His chest dropped half an inch with a breath he’d been keeping shallow.
“That’s creepy, Lily. Someone in the paddock following you around, leaving anonymous… Have you told anyone? Security, the FIA, your team?”
“No.”
He turned from the desk, disbelief plain on his face. “No? Lily, this is— Some of these are genuinely threatening.”
“I know what they say. I’ve read them enough times.”
“Then why haven’t you—”
“Because I don’t want to make a scene.” I pulled my knees up onto the bed and wrapped my arms around them.
“I mean, you’re part of the media. They’ll make a circus out of this one.
And then my sponsors… I don’t think BetHere Gaming will love this very much.
No one wants to talk about how sports betting is affecting athletes. There’s no money in that.”
Ollie’s mouth opened then closed. He looked back at the desk, at the careful rows I’d arranged.
He ran his hand along his jaw and neck the way people do when they’re sorting through too many responses and none of them feel right. Then he stepped away from the desk and faced me.
“Look, I get it. I do. But if you change your mind—if you need someone to dig into this, or just someone to talk to about it—I’m here. Journalist hat off. Just as a friend.” He paused. “If you’ll still have me as one.”
I rested my chin on my knees and studied him.
He wasn’t angling for anything, or so it seemed.
No agenda behind his eyes, no calculation.
Just a guy who’d screwed up and was standing in the wreckage of it, offering what he had left.
He had a long way to go before I genuinely believed that, but forgiveness had to start somewhere, right?
“Thanks, Ollie.”
He nodded once, shoved his hands into his blazer pockets, and headed for the door. He paused with his hand on the handle.
“For what it’s worth, he’s lucky. Henri.”
Then he was gone, and the room felt enormous again, and I sat there on the bed with my arms around my knees, staring at the desk full of poison someone had written just for me.