His Ultimate Prize

And three points away from securing the championship.

São Paolo was vibrant and exhilarating. The pit was abuzz with the excitement of the season’s final race, and Team Espíritu even more so with a potential championship win only a few short hours away.

Sasha had taken the coward’s way and hidden in her hotel room until the last minute, in case she bumped into Marco. In Abu Dhabi she’d declined his invitation to an after-race party on his sprawling yacht. It seemed he was back to entertaining dignitaries and A-list celebrities with barely a blink in her direction.

Whereas she...she just wanted the season to be over.

The joy had gone out of racing.

With a sharp pang she realised Marco had been right—her guilt about her father had blinded her to the fact that she didn’t need to prove to anyone that she was good enough. Nor did she need to defend Jack Fleming’s integrity. With her deeper integration and final acceptance into the team she’d discovered that most people remembered Jack Fleming as the great driver he’d been. Her guilt lingered, but she would deal with that later.

First she had to get through the press interviews before and after the race.

She spotted Tom heading her way as she was pulling on her jumpsuit. She winced at the sensitivity of her breasts as the Velcro tightened over them.

She paused, then suddenly was scrambling madly for dates, calculating frantically and coming up short every time. Panic seized her.

‘Are you all right? You’ve gone pale. Here—have some water.’

Tom poured water into a plastic cup and handed it to her. His attitude had undergone a drastic change since she’d become involved with Marco. Snarkily, Sasha wondered whether he’d go back to being insufferable once he found out she and Marco were no longer together.

‘It’s the heat,’ she replied, setting the cup aside. ‘I’m fine,’ she stressed when he continued to peer at her in concern.

‘Okay. Your last interview is with local TV.’ He rolled his eyes. ‘It’s that smarmy one who interviewed you in Singapore. I’d cut him out of the schedule, but since we’re on his home turf we don’t have any choice. Don’t worry. If he looks as if he’s straying into forbidden territory I’ll stop him.’

He went on to list the other interviewers, but Sasha was only half listening. She’d finally worked out her period dates and breathed a sigh of relief. She’d had her last albeit brief period just before she’d left León. And her cycle was erratic at the best of times.

Reassured, she followed Tom around to the paddock and spoke to the journalists.

The race itself was uneventful. With her eight-second lead unchallenged after the first six laps she cruised to victory, securing the fastest lap ever set on the Interlagos circuit. She managed to keep a smile plastered on her face all through the celebrations and the myriad interviews that followed, sighing with relief as she entered the team’s hospitality suite for her last interview.

Despite having done dozens of interviews, she still suffered an attack of nerves whenever a camera was trained on her. And, unlike nerves during a race, interview nerves never worked to her advantage.

‘Don’t worry, Miss Fleming. It will be all right.’

The note of insincerity in the interviewer’s thick accent should have been her first warning.

The first few questions were okay. Then, ‘How does it feel to be dating the team boss? Has it earned you any advantages?’

From the corner of her eye she saw Tom surge from his seat. Her ‘no comment’ made him relax a little.

‘After winning the Constructors’ Championship, surely your seat for next year is secured?’

‘No comment.’

He shrugged. ‘How about your ex, Derek Mahoney? Have you heard he’s making a comeback to racing?’

Sasha tensed. ‘No, I haven’t heard.’

‘He gave us an interview this morning. And he mentioned something quite interesting.’

Icy dread crept up her spine. ‘Whatever it is, I’m sure it has nothing to do with me.’

‘On the contrary, it has everything to do with you.’

Her interviewer rubbed his chin in a way that was probably supposed to make him appear smart. It only confirmed the slimeball he really was.

‘You see, Mr Mahoney claims you were pregnant with his child when you broke up, and that you deliberately crashed to lose the baby because you didn’t want a child to hamper your career. What’s your response to that?’

The room swayed around her. Vaguely she heard Tom shouting at the cameraman to stop filming. Inside she was frozen solid, too afraid to move. The buzz in the room grew louder. Someone grasped her arm and frogmarched her into another room. The sole occupant, a waitress cleaning a table, looked from her to the TV and quickly made herself scarce.