18 England

18

ENGLAND

MID-JULY

COSMIN

The British Grand Prix holds a special magic. It’s historic, fast, challenging, and the English weather can be a bit of a wild card even in the middle of summer. I’m especially excited to be in England because Phaedra’s family owns a small home in Towcester, a few miles from the Silverstone Circuit, and I’ll be staying with her there alone. No sneaking, no pillow-muffled cries, no panicked alibis.

On Tuesday of race week as I drive my rented BMW up the A5, I feel light and buoyant. Bowie’s Diamond Dogs plays through the speakers, and I sing along, remembering when I saw Phaedra playing the album after she left the gym in Bahrain.

I’ve told everyone I’m staying with friends in Milton Keynes so there’s no suspicion about why I’m not in the motorhome. During European grands prix, drivers typically stay in luxury motorhomes that travel from country to country, and hotels provide our home base during races on other continents.

Six uninterrupted nights with Phaedra. A podium finish could scarcely please me more.

I pull into the drive of the Tudor-style house and see the curtains twitch. Phaedra comes out barefoot, in baggy cut-off jeans and a lacy white blouse. She wears white often now, and it makes my heart skip every time, remembering that first conversation about it, and how it stunned me breathless when I saw her in the bar in Melbourne.

I’m pulling my travel bag from the trunk when she walks up, hair tumbling over her shoulders in a mahogany waterfall. I loop an arm around her waist and go in for a kiss, and she veers back.

“Nosy neighbors,” she whispers. Flicking a glance across the street, she deposits a dry peck on my cheek. “There,” she says, stepping back with a wooden social smile.

I give her a wink. “I’m sure the neighbors will be fooled, considering I’m holding a suitcase and your nipples are hard enough to be visible from a block away.”

“Smug bastard.”

“You love it.”

I maintain an appropriately platonic distance as I carry my bag inside, resisting the urge to lace my fingers with Phaedra’s.

The truth is, my feelings for her are starting to make me reckless. I almost wish for a leaked photo or gossip-site murmur to force our hands.

Wednesday evening, I’m in the large bathtub with Phaedra, soaking the tension from my muscles after a long training session with Guillaume. There’s a faint dappling of sweat on her upper lip, which I’m imagining licking off.

Her arms stretch to drape along the edge of the tub where she reclines across from me, and her breasts rise above the waterline, tempting pink nipples breaking the surface. Our legs are entangled. My phone is on the floor beside the tub, connected to a Bluetooth speaker on the counter that plays Slowdive’s Souvlaki , the dreamy buzz echoing in the tiled bathroom.

Phaedra drags aside a tendril of hair that has escaped the pile on top of her head. I cannot help but marvel at even the smallest of her details—right now I’m admiring the way the wet tip of the lock of hair is dark, with threads of copper.

I’ve never felt this before: a near reverence for mundane personal detail. Everything about this woman seems miraculous, from the tiny toast-colored beauty spot on her left earlobe to the pale moons of her fingernails. I want to hoard her like rare books.

“Let’s play the game,” Phaedra says, her eyes sparkling.

She’s referring to something that has become part of our careful non-relationship idiom—telling each other what we would say, were we in love.

I flex one foot and caress her thigh. “Were I in love with you, Miss Morgan, I would say your every particular—right down to the most seemingly insignificant minutiae—holds me in thrall. Heats my blood, makes my imagination light up, and inspires a tenderness I never thought possible for a jaded tomcat such as myself.”

“Hmm,” she replies, lifting her eyebrows. “If you were in love, you’d be a really poetic guy.”

“Thank you,” I say, swinging an arm out as if bowing.

Phaedra tips her head back against the tub, studying me with a faint smile.

“If I were in love with you , sir—” She pauses, and her face gets serious. “I’d ask why you’ve looked sad since your last trip to Bucharest. I’d tell you I want to comfort you.”

“Ah. Well then.” I pull in a deep breath through my nose. “My sister is compromising her principles to accept a donation for Vlasia House from a very bad man. She’s forgiven him for something she shouldn’t. It’s beneath her— he’s beneath her. I’m angry and disappointed.”

Phaedra blows a bit of hair off her forehead, appearing to wrestle with her reply. “Oh my. ‘Beneath her.’ That’s quite, um…”

“Quite what ?”

She shrugs. “Hate to break it to you, but ‘doing such and such is beneath you’ is bossy-shamey language. And whether she forgives someone is up to her .”

“You’re defending her reflexively in the absence of information.”

“Look, I just can’t tell you how many times, professionally, I’ve had a dude say basically ‘I’d have expected better from you’ to bully me into doing it their way. Believe me, the ‘How is someone so smart doing something so disappointingly stupid?’ approach feels like shit.”

My foot drifts away from her leg.

“First point,” I reply crisply. “This is what I’ve said to you —because you asked, please recall—and not how I phrased it to Viorica.”

“Are you sure about that?”

I hold up a finger to stop her from interrupting and immediately feel like a domineering bastard for doing it. “Second point: I believe you said you wished to comfort me. If that’s the case, you’re doing a piss-poor job.”

She sits up straighter, and I refrain from looking at her breasts, as much as I wish to.

“I’m asking a legitimate question, Cos! Not accusing you.”

“I heard nothing in the form of a question.”

She makes an impatient sound. “Okay, it’s perspective , based on my experience. Is that not okay or something?”

I fold my arms. “It’s fine. Proceed.”

“Wow, thanks, Your Eminence. Anyway, news flash: comforting you doesn’t mean I always say you’re right. Aren’t we supposed to be, like, practicing relationship crap?”

“Yes.”

“Well, sometimes ‘comfort’ means pointing out mistakes so people can fix the problem . Do you want me to be honest, or just jerk you off?”

I lift an eyebrow.

“Okay, lemme rephrase—”

“I understand, yes,” I concede. “What would you suggest?” I stop myself from adding in all your womanly wisdom , because I know it would start a full-scale battle, and justly so.

“Ugh, Cosmin.” She rubs both wet hands over her face. “You’re being snippy.”

I’m ready to be even more snippy until her hands drop away and I see she genuinely looks upset. A flare of ache spreads in my chest.

“I apologize. Uita-te la ochii mei, draga mea.”

She peeks up. “I recognize that one— ochii . ‘Eyes,’ right? Look at you?”

“I value your perspective very much. I’m being defensive, and it’s uncalled for. The situation with Viorica is upsetting, and I feel quite at sea.” My foot moves back to her thigh. “Were I in love with you, I would ask in earnest that you advise me, and I’d listen without behaving like a sullen jackass.”

She rewards me with a grumpy smile.

“That’s better. I’m just saying, have you, uh… asked your sister how she feels? About the forgiveness thing? Because I know your take-no-prisoners attitude, and I’d bet dollars to donuts you decided how she should feel , without letting her talk.”

My brow furrows. “Why donuts?”

She pauses and is opening her mouth to explain the phrase when she sees my mischievous smile. She slices her hand through the water to splash me.

“Enough with the cute ‘I do not know this word’!” she scolds, dropping into an imitation of my voice.

I sit forward and grasp her behind the knees, pulling her toward me. She rises and turns, sitting back between my legs, gathered into my chest, and I kiss her shoulder.

“This man—the donor,” I say against her warm, damp neck, “is a villain. He should not be allowed to purchase absolution for his sins. I’m frustrated that Rica sees only the money.”

Phaedra sketches a spiral on my knee with a wet fingertip. “Actual crime ? Like, it’s drug money or something that could get you guys in trouble?”

“No, the man’s business is transport equipment—machinery. His offense is of a personal nature.”

Phaedra is quiet for a minute. “Forgiveness frees the person who’s offering it, Cosmin—not just the one who receives it. I think you need to trust your sister. The world isn’t black and white. And I know how you can hold a grudge.”

Viorica’s words were nearly identical: not everything is black and white .

I idly stroke Phaedra’s hair, enjoying the warmth of her against my chest.

“I will discuss this with Viorica,” I concede. “You’re an impossibly stubborn woman. But wise.”

“Aw, thanks, Legs. You’re a stubborn prick too, but learning.”

She tips her head to grin at me, and I kiss her temple. Just then, my phone chimes. I peer over the edge of the tub and view the screen.

“Fuck. It’s Reece.”

“Why is that bad?” Phaedra asks with drowsy amusement, trailing her fingers back and forth through the water.

“The message is all caps. She asks if I’m staying with you, and demands I text her my location immediately.”