Chapter Four
LATER THE NEXT MORNING, Millie walked into the penthouse suite of the team’s hotel, her eyes widening as she took in the skyline views of the Pudong district, Shanghai’s Bund and Huangpu River, and the Oriental Pearl Tower from Taz’s high-in-the-sky hotel suite.
It wasn’t just the views outside, it was the suite itself too, the luxurious furniture, the baby grand piano and the bank of floor-to-ceiling windows.
The white, black and grey colour scheme was interrupted by splashes of tangerine.
The décor was stark, hard, severe…just like her boss.
Talking of, where was he? He’d been discharged from the hospital earlier this morning, and he knew she was here to see him.
The only place he could be was the suite’s bedroom.
After their kiss last night, she wasn’t going anywhere near where he slept, so she dropped her bag onto the couch and walked over to the telescope standing in the corner of the room.
She’d lain awake for most of the night, her thoughts bouncing around her brain.
Ben’s death, Taz’s kiss, how she viewed herself, how her parents viewed her.
Why she was here, how she was going to save Taz’s reputation, if that was even possible.
Why had he kissed her? Promoted her? What did it all mean?
And why was life getting more complicated, not less?
‘Millie.’
Millie turned, and Taz stepped into the room to her right.
Behind him, she saw a brief glimpse of a massive free-standing bed in the middle of a huge room.
But it was Taz’s appearance that caught her off guard.
He was a stylish dresser and usually favoured designer suits with open-neck shirts and expensive shoes, or business casual outfits that screamed style and sophistication.
Today he wore a loose T-shirt over straight-legged track pants, his big feet bare.
His hair was unbrushed and his scruff was thicker than before.
He looked disreputable and dangerous and so, so sexy.
She dropped her head and cleared her throat, cursing her attraction.
Maybe it was because he was the polar opposite of the men she’d dated over the past few years.
They’d been bland, uninspiring and so very uninteresting, all the things her parents accused her of being.
When she finally took time to work out why she sat through the interminable meals and boring weekends, why she tolerated bad or mediocre sex, she realised it was because she believed she didn’t deserve any better.
Tired of wasting her time, she’d distanced herself from men completely.
Sabotaging herself had to stop, and she decided she needed to find a new way to navigate life, to figure out how to view herself going forward.
That was why she’d upended her life to join the F1 circus, to take on a new challenge.
And if part of her life lesson was dealing with her attraction to this charismatic man, then so be it.
Had life thrown Taz into her path to challenge her habit of second-guessing herself?
Millie cleared her throat and nodded to his cast. ‘How are you feeling?’ she asked, sitting on one of the two bucket chairs opposite the enormous boxy couch.
‘Like they shoved a pin into my finger to stabilise the bone,’ he retorted. Sarcastic as always. Millie watched him, but nothing in his eyes or his expression suggested he was going to mention what had transpired between them last night.
He was back to being her grumpy, detached, frequently annoying boss. This was what she wanted, right? For them to go back to normal, and Taz being sarcastic and difficult was normal.
Taz dragged his free hand down his face. ‘Sorry.’
Damn, just when the earth had stopped moving under her feet. Taz apologising was not common, but Millie didn’t know how to handle him doing it, so she ignored his snappy, one-word apology.
‘Being indisposed makes me tetchy. Showering was a bitch, dressing wasn’t easy. I’ve been in a foul mood all morning,’ he added.
She could imagine his frustration at only having one working hand. Millie waved her phone at him. ‘I got your message to meet you here, and here I am. Can we talk about you promoting me now?’
He frowned at her. ‘Why is that such an issue? Most people would have thanked me a thousand times over by now.’
God, he was arrogant.
‘Because I’m not sure I want the promotion, and more importantly, I don’t know if I can do it!
’ she half shouted, surprised she’d raised her voice.
She’d trained herself not to react emotionally.
In her family, it wasn’t safe to lose her grip on her emotions, to let them see that what they said bothered her.
It only made it worse. Why was she losing that tight grip now?
What was it about Taz that pushed her to the limit?
He brushed her words aside with the swipe of his hand, unfazed by her reaction. ‘Of course you can.’
His conviction was contagious, and for a few seconds, she believed him. Then reality strolled back in, and she shook her head. ‘You don’t understand. I haven’t worked on a big campaign.’
‘It’s the same principle, isn’t it? To build and maintain a positive image, right?’
Essentially. ‘Well, yes, at the most basic level,’ she admitted.
Taz’s shrug suggested their discussion was over. But she still had questions. ‘I don’t think—’
‘It’s done. Moving on.’ Just like that.
‘The F1 stewards doled out community service as a punishment for me pushing the rookie,’ he informed her, sitting down on the couch and casually placing his bare feet on the glass coffee table.
He looked at her and grimaced. ‘In a meeting late last night, they agreed that I’d punished myself enough by punching the wall and putting myself out of commission, but they still had to censure me. ’
Millie had to think fast to keep up with him. She’d come back to her promotion and her worries around it later. ‘Community service isn’t so bad,’ she said, linking her hands around her knee. ‘How much do you have to do and by when?’
‘The only proviso was that I had to make an impact, so it’s up to me.’
Millie mentally ran through some options. ‘You could do what your brother did and visit a children’s hospital or an orphanage, speak at high schools, do a shift at a community kitchen feeding the homeless.’
An emotion she couldn’t pinpoint flickered in his eyes before they turned flat and unreadable.
Was it frustration, annoyance or anguish?
She wasn’t sure. ‘No. I don’t want to be seen to be taking the easy way out by doing what he did,’ he replied.
But something in his tone suggested it was a pat answer, one he trotted out to get over what he thought was a bump in the conversation.
‘Your brother got a lot of good press doing those appearances,’ Millie pointed out.
But doing community work had reportedly been part of Alex’s personality, fed by his deep desire to help people less fortunate than himself.
Alex was as lauded as much for his philanthropic endeavours as he was for his racing.
Losing him was a tragedy. It must still be deeply painful for Taz.
Yet, how could two brothers grow up in the same house, under, as she believed, the same set of circumstances and turn out so different?
She’d often wondered if she’d had a sibling whether they would have been like her, quiet and withdrawn, or more like her parents, a sunflower constantly turning its head to the light, happy to bloom?
Ben was raised in much the same way as her, but he’d been happier, sunnier, more confident. Was it a male thing or was it because he discovered his passion for racing young and was able to pour all his energies into his sport? The sport that he lived—and died—for.
‘Why do the good ones always die young?’ she murmured.
‘You assume Alex was good?’ Taz asked, dropping his feet and leaning forward, his eyes blazing with an emotion she couldn’t identify.
Millie frowned, confounded by his fierce expression.
In reality, she’d been thinking about Ben but wasn’t about to reveal that.
She rarely told anyone about her semi-famous parents, and she’d yet to tell anyone, including Taz, that she was related to Ben, partly because talking about him was still hard and partly because she wanted to avoid comparisons between her and her gregarious and popular cousin.
Still, his reaction was…confusing to say the least. Almost as if he was daring her to contradict the narrative.
‘Um…he was well-known for giving his time and attention to causes he cared for, always visiting sick kids in the hospital or making guest appearances to help charities,’ Millie stated, confused.
‘He was a saint.’ Taz’s tone was so bland she wasn’t sure if he was being sarcastic or not. Then as quickly as it had come up, he moved on.
‘I haven’t had a moment to read Mika’s reports on the PR my crash and fracas caused. Update me.’
‘It’s a train wreck,’ she warned him.
‘Not unexpected,’ Taz murmured. ‘Give it to me straight.’
Millie took a deep breath and told him how he was being called temperamental and an uncontrollable, spoilt, overprivileged hothead. How he was risking his title and his brand, and when was he going to grow up?
‘That reporter I wanted you to meet on Thursday? She’s now one of your harshest critics. Her podcast, the one where she discusses how different you are to Alex, has shot up the popularity charts.’
Taz narrowed his eyes at her. ‘If you tell me I shouldn’t have blown her off on Thursday, I will fire you.’