Chapter 2

The testing wasn’t broadcast. The public could buy tickets to the event, held in the south of France this year, but there was no official race.

Though there was a race .

Each year, the riders signed a contractsotheirteams wouldn’tbe liable for any injuries.

From watching with my dad, I knew that each race held qualifying. Much like the testing, each rider would go out on the track and try to make the fastest lap every Saturday, the race commencing on Sunday. The fastest held position one, and the slowest held position twenty-four.

To raise the stakes and show how little they cared for the unofficial race, the previous season’s winner was positioned last and the person who had received the fewest points went first on the grid.

The men in the pit box grumbled about it, but the two riders’ grinning at each other told me everything I needed to know.

Testing was nothing to them. The race was everything.

Nixon would be in last place, seeing as he had won the championship last year.Alvwould be in the middle.

“I’ll still catch you,” Nixon laughed as he zipped up the front of his leathers again. He wore a top underneath, not that I had peaked at all.

“We haven’t been able to talk, MrArmas,” I said to him.

He grunted.

Surprisingly, it wasCristhat came to my rescue. “Go, Nix. She’s here to help you.”

The rider didn’t look at me with gratitude, instead more repulsion, as if he didn’t need my help.

He sighed, heaved himself up and looked around for any distraction. The only one he found was when an assistant passed him an energy drink and a straw. He scoffed at them and laughed, “I need something far stronger for this.”

“Not until after,” Cris scolded.

Nixon only saluted him and walked out one of the doors, cracking open the can. I ran after him.

“It won’t take long,” I promised again, checking I had my bag — and, therefore, precious iPad — still over my shoulder as I followed him down the corridor.

He didn’t respond; he just halted and opened a door, and when I didn’t immediately walk through it, he huffed and gestured me through.

“Oh, thank you.”

Inside was a small meeting room with enough chairs for six people. It didn’t quite cover the distance I’d like from him, but it would have to do.

He sat opposite me and took a long sip of his drink, looking at me through narrowed eyes.

“So, MrArmas,” I started.

He lifted a hand to silence me and his lips twitched into a half-hearted smile. One that took his face from handsome to ravishing. Fuck.

There was so much riding on this man. I felt my whole body tense at how he stopped me before even getting started, and I hated that it might be fury, might be the need in my bones to be dominated.

“Nix or justArmas,” he corrected. “No one calls me Mr.Armas .”

“Right,” I said, shuffling in my seat. “Armas.”

And now I was blushing, again unsure if I was embarrassed or struggling in his presence.

I’d have to keep my distance from this man. The formality of a last name would be needed.

“Do you know your stats?” I asked, regaining myself and pulling out the papers from my bag.

“Stats? I’ve won three of the last four championships. Got a rating of—”

“No. In the media.”

His brows lowered. “Don’t care for that.”

“Well,Ciclatidoes. You should, too.” I chucked him the file I had put together. Strong, independent woman. No man was going to weaken me. “You are the most reported racer in all ofmotorsport. The only other person is PedroVelazco, but he hardly counts as an ex -racer.”

It was damning that the only other man reported on as highly as Nixon was a corrupt ex-racer gone sports analyst, who had worked forCiclatibefore being found guilty of using the sport and the transport that came with it to ship drugs across the world.

His name had become a headline special as he was expected to be released from prison in the coming months.

Armas’ eyes sharpened in anger, narrowing at the mention of his ex-co-worker. “But not by much—”

“You take up 63% of the media coverage. Have a look. ”

Begrudgingly, he picked up the folder and started to flip through it. “Yes, but that’s because I won the last—”

“And, again, nope,” I said, shaking my head. “There were 112 articles about you in the last quarter, bearing in mind that it was out of season, and 87 of those were about your, er, personal life. Guess how many were positive?”

“What does it matter?” he asked, chucking the file back on the desk between us. “It’s no one’s business.”

“Three of them were positive,Armas. Three.”

I was baffled when I went through them. After so much coverage, it was beyond shocking that so few were positive.

“That’s ridiculous,” he snapped, brows lowered and glancing at the folder again. “That’s not true—”

“Look. They are all there.” I pulled out my tablet from my bag, opened the photos app and started swiping through.

Knowing this role was unique and nothing like my last PR job, I found anything and everything onArmas. I’d spent hours scrolling through Twitter, Reddit forums, and comments on articles.

Nazminhad made it clearAlvarowould need to be managed when it came to statements and interviews, but nowhere near as much as Nixon.

He watched eagerly. “I never google myself,” he said, but it didn’t sound like he was talking to me.

“You shouldn’t. That’s my job now. I’m only showing you so you realise how much you need my help. You just need to stick to the racing and less of the…” The what? The drugs, partying, the openly bitching about those that ran the sport or the facilities they went to? “To be frank, the shit.”

“The shit?” he repeated, sitting back in his chair with a cocky smile .

Clearly, my statistics had not been enough for him to take this seriously.

“Drugs, gambling. Your bad-boy image is taking some of the seriousness out of the sport. The sport you love.”

“What do you suggest?”

“We clean you up a little.” When he only raised a brow, I continued, “We show your good side. Vulnerability. Something other than the guy who spends all his money on cocaine.”

He leaned forward, elbows on the desk. “Is this how you speak to all of your clients?”

“Not all,” I said honestly, a hint of regret in my voice. I was truthful when it came to my clients, but not normally so blunt so soon. “But I’ve never had a client so unwilling to see the problem. Or so against good publicity.”

“I thought the saying was any publicity is good publicity,” he said and sipped through his straw with a brow still cocked.

I couldn’t help but be impressed with his fluency. AlthoughStormSprintwas an international sport heavily dominated by Europeans, most people knew some English.

And he spoke it very well.

I’d read that his mum was originally English but had spent most of her adult life in France.

Still, I glared at him. “Only fools say that. And for you, no. At this point, no publicity would be better than anything. You do realise that the CEO ofStormSprintcommented on more drug testing when speaking directly about you. I wouldn’t be thrilled about that.”

He started to argue. “But it’s not just me—”

“Do the public know that?” I countered.

His shoulders straightened. “What aboutAlv?” he asked, defensive. “You going to have this conversation with him, too?”

Alvneeded no talking to. He was beloved and seen as a god in the industry. People would long be wearing his number after he retired.

“No, he naturally generates positivity. You, however…”

His jaw stiffened. “Right. Got it.”

“I’m here to help,” I reassured.

“You’re here to interfere ,” he sighed, leaning back and throwing his can in the bin in the corner of the room. “What’s part of your clean image?”

“Stability.” That was my one-word PR plan for NixonArmas. “No drugs. Changing your Instagram from pictures of bikes to something more… heart-warming. Get a pet or something.”

He snorted. It was a low sound that ran through the room. “Your big plan is for me to putZigon Instagram?”

“Zig?” I questioned, already writing the name down on my notes app.

“My snake.”

I paused my note-taking. Of-fucking-course. “Could you not have a cuter pet?”

He blinked at me. “Cute? She is cute.”

Right, then.

“There’s more,” I said, needing to move on from that. I had to find his redeeming qualities for the sake of his image, but I didn’t need to start thinking about him being sweet . “Buying a house, a relationship, working with charities, having more to your life than drugs and driving.”

He inhaled and exhaled deeply. “We ride, not drive.”

“Family shots?” I begged.

“My family is private. ”

“Friends?”

He shrugged.

“You’re not making this easy. You know that you’ve been told more negative press towards the sport because of you and you’re out.”

“That’s just talk.”

I cocked a brow. That wasn’t what I had been told. “Reputation is important.”

“And I have the reputation of a champion,” he sighed. “That’s what I’m known for. I don’t need anything else.”

“You also have the reputation of being a completeasshat.”

“Asshat?” he asked, brows down, voice higher.

“Some changes need to be made. I’ve been called in to make them.”

“Ridiculous,” he muttered to himself. “Trying to make meAlv.”

This man was refusing to see how crap his situation was right now. “I need to know if there’s any shit about you that is likely to come out. I need to be prepared for damage control.”

“Anything like what?”

“Recent overdoses, drunk driving incidents, anything the media could twist into being bad,” I listed, preparing a new word document, already getting up some bullet points.

“There will always be something,” he grumbled, looking at his nails.

“So tell me what that something might be.” This man didn’t deserve my time. “Whatever you tell me is confidential between us, I promise.”

“You could ordain me a priest right now,” he moaned, “and they’d still find and publish shit from years ago. Really fucked up, bad shit. ”

I sat back, looking him up and down. He had the nerve to feel sorry for himself. My whole career was on the line for this man.

Not that he could know that.

I was beyond grateful for this job. Maybe a little too grateful.

That didn’t mean I couldn’t put him in his place.

“Okay,Armas,” I said and gestured at myself. “One thing you need to know about me is I don’t care. You have a sob story? Everyone does. Everyone has dealt with shit. Even those that haven’t been through the horrifying events of others, their shit is still shit to them. But you are earning millions doing a job you love. A job you are close to forfeiting. I have no sympathy for you; my help only goes so far when you refuse to help yourself. All I have to do is prove I tried and I get paid. You sit back and pity yourself and all you’ll do is lose your career.”

Bluffing. I was completely and utterly bluffing. This man needed to get good publicity if it meant not starting my whole career again.

To think, I’d been offered VP of PR Princeton and turned it down so my ex-boyfriend could have the role. It ‘made sense’ for when we would have kids.

Love-sick, family-orientated fool .

He gave me a stony look. “I’ve been having an affair with a married woman.”

“Fuck,” I breathed.

Lucky cow.

Nope. Nope.

I pursed my lips, hoping it looked like I was unsure what to say as heat rushed to my core.

It was that time of the month when even going over a speed bump had me aroused. Nothing to do with him.

“Assuming you’re going to tell me to end it,” he said, leaning over the table to see my empty document.

“How long for?”

“On and off for four years,” he said with a shrug, leaning back in his chair. “It’s not exactly regular.”

“You’re right. I’d suggest you end it.” My voice gained that edge to it. The no-nonsense one, the putting my foot down one. The no-more-questions one.

It was clearly more than a suggestion.

He smothered a smirk, looking me up and down. “I’d need someone else to entertain me.”

Ha. Right.

“Part of the plan is to have a stable relationship for the media,” I reminded him. “That could be a part of it.”

With his repulsion clear, it would only be a hate fuck between us. I wasn’t about to risk this job for twenty minutes in a garage.

This had been the only place that would take me.

At twenty-nine, I hadn’t expected my career to take such a beating. Everything was supposed to be figured out at this stage. I was meant to have settled down with someone, moved out of London and bought a house.

How naive I had been.

NixonArmaswas smirking, trying to cover his mouth as he looked me over again.

“I don’t fuck my clients,” I sighed and picked up the file. I was sighing because I was losing my patience with him, though I feared he might think I was sighing because of my statement.

Damn, I needed to stop overthinking .

“Guess that’s good for your job,” he said, leaning back to stare at the ceiling. “Crishas a rule that nothing can hurtCiclati. Relationships being one of them.”

Exactly.

He snorted, laughing to himself. “It’s ironic though. It’s all in vain.”

“We’re done here,” I said before he could start asking for me to play my tiny violin. “The next team meeting is in a month. Don’t fuck up beforehand.”

His smirk was let free as I walked out, taking the corridor, hoping for theCiclatidoor to be signposted.