31. Elizabeth #2
And then I’m nodding and he’s looking directly in my eyes. I dig my nails into his shoulder, and he grips my hip, and when I feel like the crashing waves of pleasure are going to carry me away, he leans in and kisses me, anchoring me here, with him—and he never lets go.
Seconds or hours later, when I finally blink, a cascade of tears falls down my face. But then Wes is kissing them, tracing his fingers over their tracks.
When he says my name, I answer with his.
On Wednesday afternoon, Wes and I part ways for the first time in days.
After stealing as much time as we could to delight entirely in each other, we couldn’t ignore our jobs any longer. So while Wes spends his afternoon playing padel and training with Camden, I join a call with Michelle, the bubbly white woman in her fifties who serves as my agency’s HR director.
But when the call connects, Michelle is not alone.
“Clint,” I say, unable to keep the surprise out of my voice at seeing my boss on a call I arranged with HR. “Hi.”
Clint Katsaros is a legend. He’s taught me everything I know, and I respect the hell out of him. But he’s old-school about client management and protocol—which is why I was going to have this conversation with Michelle first. Then, once the forms were submitted, I was going to tell him everything.
With absolutely no preamble, Clint says, “So. You and Wes Grant.”
I blink. My email to Michelle said that I needed to disclose a relationship, but I didn’t specify who it was with. There was no reason for her to loop in my boss. And the odds that Clint checked my calendar, joined this call, and just took a very good guess are not particularly high.
“You already know,” I say, keeping my voice calm and face neutral.
“Yes.”
My stomach sinks all the way to my toes. “Who?”
He gives me a long look. “A journalist.”
I would have been less surprised if he had fired me without warning. Because what does he mean, a journalist?
I suppose my face has stopped being neutral because Michelle says, “Oh, you had no idea.”
“No,” I say, letting all my cards show. “Wes and I didn’t even decide this until a couple of days ago.”
Clint sighs heavily, and dread crawls up my esophagus. “I received an email from a journalist yesterday morning. It informed me that a story will be running about you and Wes first thing on Thursday, London time.”
I open my mouth to demand why he’s just telling me now when he’s known for a whole day, but he holds a hand up. “There’s more.”
I clamp my jaw shut.
“The email contained photos. A lot of photos. They date back to early May. So even if you and Wes have just decided this, there is a convincing narrative that says otherwise.”
I sit in silence for two full breaths. Then my stomach lurches, and I barely grab the trash can before I’m dry-heaving into it.
“You poor thing,” I hear Michelle say, and I have no doubt that if I were there in person, she’d be holding out a tissue box and a ginger ale. But that isn’t going to fix this.
I am about to be a tabloid story.
People are going to gasp when they read the headline, then gobble it up, share it with their group chat, post about it—about me—on social media.
Strangers, acquaintances, colleagues, friends from high school and college, clients, people who know my parents.
My parents.
Jane.
Holy shit.
But what did I expect? Wes Grant isn’t just some guy.
He’s a professional athlete who earns millions of dollars.
He’s a bona fide person of interest. Not a day goes by that there aren’t headlines about what he does on the track, what he wears in the paddock, and what he’s posted on social media.
And that doesn’t take into account the scandal around Martine, the new teammates, the contract rumors, the conspiracy theories.
The last thing he needs this season is news of a tawdry workplace romance.
He’s going to back away from me immediately.
How did I not see this coming? How have I spent two and half days in bed with the man rather than creating a crisis plan for myself?
But it’s easy to answer that question. I was completely absorbed in the newness and excitement of us. I was having more back-to-back orgasms than I even knew were possible. I thought I finally had something good and healthy and mine.
But girls like me don’t get to be happy. We get opportunities to be in the room, promotions that give us a seat at the table, and bonuses the size of other people’s salaries. But actual happiness? It’s out of the question.
I sit back up and look at the camera, trying very hard to keep my voice even when I ask, “Am I fired?” I don’t succeed.
“No,” Clint says slowly, and I all but sob in relief. I thought firing me would be step one in Clint’s crisis plan. “But I am recalling you from this client.”
I close my eyes against the burn of humiliation and the stab of fear.
I’ll probably be put in what is, effectively, time out.
Not a formal probation or suspension, but relegated to an office where I’ll do no substantive work until I fade from headlines and memories.
Until Wes Grant moves on. Until I’m once more a block of ice with nothing but her career to focus on.
I swallow the pain and open my eyes. “Understood.”
“And now,” Clint says. “I need you to tell me the full story.”
So I do. And when I’m finished, he nods once. “Thank you.”
“What should I expect?” I ask.
“I tried to shut the story down, Elizabeth. I really did. But it’s The Drift. They didn’t give a heads up as a negotiating tactic. It was a power play.”
“Shit,” I breathe. The Drift is the absolute worst gossip rag in London. They’re ruthless and run headlines that would make even William Randolph Hearst blush. “Does Martine know already?”
Clint nods. “The journalist sent both me and Marcus the email.”
“Marcus?” I yell.
“Yes,” Clint says. “He called three minutes after I got the email and threatened to come to New York and personally break my nose if I did anything other than support you and Wes. Not that he needed to do that. I was going to make the same call to him.”
My jaw drops open and for several moments I’m completely speechless.
Then I burst into tears.
Clint laughs. Laughs. It takes everything I have not to scream at the top of my lungs. Instead, I take a deep breath and grit out, “What is funny about this?”
“You really love him, don’t you?”
“Yes!”
And then I freeze.
Because I don’t just like Wes Grant.
I love him.
I am in love with him.
And it took a crisis for me to realize it.
“I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun,” I murmur, suddenly understanding Mr. Darcy with piercing clarity. “Oh my God.”
On screen, both Clint and Michelle are smiling. “Have I entered the Twilight Zone? Is this an elaborate prank? Did…did Wes put you up to this?”
“No,” Clint says, serious again. “Unfortunately, this situation is very real. There is a story coming out tomorrow, and none of us can stop it.”
“But the good news is that you’re in love!” Michelle says, cheerily. “I’ll email you the disclosure forms.”
I stare at the screen, trying to figure out what the hell to do now.
“I need…to call David,” I say, my brain whirring to life. “I need to write a statement. I need to write Wes a statement. Oh my God, I have to tell Wes.”
“Elizabeth,” Clint says. “I’m taking care of it.”
“No, this is my mess. I need to—”
“Wes is finding out right now,” Clint says, interrupting me. “He is currently talking to Marcus and David.”
“No he’s not. He’s training.”
“He’s not,” my boss says calmly. “Well, I assume he’s not. They are at a gym. They went to him.”
My head spins. “What else?”
“Your flight is tomorrow afternoon,” Clint says, gently. “We want to get you out of there before the vultures well and truly descend. You and I will catch up first thing on Monday morning.”
“Holy shit,” I whisper as this all hits me. This isn’t just me and Wes. This is Martine Racing. This is Elio Rocca and Stas Dubinsky. This is Alice Abrams and Liu Zhenghao and the Bugatti and—
…the complete mindfuck of finding out that I met the Bugatti guy, the uncertainty of whether my best friend and his favorite uncle are pawns or criminals…
My entire cerebral cortex lights up as Wes’s voice echoes in my head.
He was wearing grey sweatpants and no shirt, and was about to tell me that he couldn’t stop thinking about me.
But before that—before he crossed that line I had drawn knowing it was already too late, before he begged to taste me, before he crashed and asked me to stay the night and we spent days in bed together, he said that he’s not sure if Stas and Stas’s favorite uncle are criminals.
That must be the same uncle Alice Abrams believes is behind the whole operation.
“Elizabeth,” Clint says, suspicion thick in his voice. But my brain is too busy sifting through this to respond.
Stas’s uncle funded his karting days, helping him get to F1.
Stas left the best racing team at the height of his career to go to a team in a rebuilding phase who had just hired Elio Rocca as their team principal.
Stas called to warn me about Elio—the man who always has the right friend at the right time. And the one I publicly humiliated even though my gut instinct when I met him was fear.
The puzzle pieces snap into place.
“I have to go.”
“Elizabeth!” Clint yells. “Whatever you’re about to do, do not do it.”
“I’ll see you on Monday!”
Then I close my laptop and make a phone call.