Under the Microscope (Book One of Three)

Chapter 37

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We both undo our seatbelts and slip out of the car, ready to go incognito again with some fans staying near the track. I start to get nervous when I see cameras around before I realise that it's Netflix and they have probably been invited, and so I walk into the hotel alongside Max, and we continue chatting but avoid the topic of what we're here to do.

"Do you know any Dutch?" He asks as we walk through the lobby and I shake my head, he smiles happily. "You are good with languages though?" He asks and I say yes as his smile widens. "I'm going to teach you Dutch!" He decides happily, clapping his hands together once in excitement and I smile at that.

"Sure. Anything you want me to teach you?" I ask and he tilts his head to the side as he thinks.

"What are my options?" he asks jokingly as he leads me and the camera crews down a hallway, I'm just following him because he seems to know where it is that we are headed.

"Er, French, Spanish, Italian, German, Russian?" I list off, "I sort of know a couple more but those are the ones I am confident in... or I could teach you how to do a handstand...or something else if you're not bothered about a language?"

"What else could you teach me?" Max asks suggestively in a low voice which makes my stomach flip at the suggestion, and I just send him a quick sideways glance before refocusing on the hallway, hoping that my cap is hiding how red my cheeks are becoming.

"How to code?" I offer as strong as I can, trying to ignore the second meaning of his words. I keep my eyes trained straight ahead as I feel his unwavering stare on me, enjoying the jokey banter that we are starting to form. Suddenly he stops and before I can say anything else he opens a door to the conference room we sat in before. Christian, Helmut, Adrian, Hannah, Toto and Suzie are all there waiting and chatting. My flushed face causes Toto to raise his eyebrows at me and I just ignore him and smile at my new bosses who cheer as the two of us walked into the room. I see more Netflix crews in the room and realise that my assumptions were correct, either Toto or Christian invited them no doubt.

"Welcome, welcome! You ready?" Christian says bounding over to the two of us and I nod happily at him as he pulls me into a one-armed hug before he leads me over to the table where I see some paper set out and Max trails along behind us. "So, we have a couple of things for you to sign here, firstly your Red Bull Racing contract that has been approved by Toto," I glance at Toto and see him nod, satisfied with the contract before refocusing on Christian as he motions to the other pile of papers. "And your termination of the Williams contract and the Mercedes Driving Academy contract," Christian says and I suck in a quick breath, that statement hurt more than I thought it would. I began to chew anxiously on my lower lip as I glanced at the second piece of paper.

Normally a move like this wouldn't be allowed, but I was being granted permission to break it as Mercedes knew they would not have a seat for me to race in within the next three years. Also, I was lucky that Mercedes were somewhere in-between Ferrari and Red Bull when it comes to their academy. They use their academy to get talented drivers to F1, but they don't guarantee you a place in their team, as George experienced for a few years and now me. In an ideal situation, I would have raced for them, but it wasn't set in stone, and so yeah, they were okay with the move.

That being said, typically going to a rival team, especially their main rival would be a huge no-no but at the end of the day, the drivers' academy is about helping you get to Formula One so that you can take a seat at the team. I did everything required of me, but there was no seat. So, in that sense, we had both tried to fulfil our obligations, but it had been unlucky due to timing errors. Because it was only being broken as Mercedes couldn't give me a competitive offer to this one, I didn't have to repay the team or feel like I was doing anything wrong or betraying the team which I appreciated.