EM
'I'll make it up to you I promise'
I sighed as I tucked the phone back into the pocket of my jeans. Reasons not to date an F1 driver No.1: manic schedule. Fortunately the 'Reasons TO date an F1 driver especially if he's Daniel Ricciardo' column was currently overflowing. I couldn't help it - I was like a kid with a new favourite toy that I couldn't bear to be parted with, and I felt pathetic.
'Join me for a drink and stop me looking like a loner?' With all the practice photos sorted, I knew it was my last chance to really chill out before the weekend's real work began. Of course Jules was probably up to her eyeballs in it already, that's if she ever actually stopped.
'Quick one sounds good, I'll come to you'
'One' drink was soon gone as we talked, or rather I bombarded her with questions about the upcoming races and she did her best to answer them.
"Sooooo.....how's life?"
The older woman looked up smiling and changed the subject as I placed a second round of overflowing drinks on the table between us.
"It's good" I replied breezily "Finally getting used to the lifestyle, pictures are getting better all the time..."
I broke off laughing as she folded her arms and glared at me. I knew exactly what she wanted to hear about but I had no intention of making it easy for her.
"And the other stuff?"
"Hotel room isn't bad...food is excellent....OKAY FINE!" I gave in when I could no longer keep a straight face. "It's amazing, he's amazing" I gushed, feeling my cheeks turning red. "I'm just waiting for something to go wrong" I added more seriously. "It's almost too good to be true"
"Does Dan know about...the incident?"
"Nobody does except you, seeing as you were the one who pointed out The Great Rachel Mistake"
"Are you going to tell him?"
"And say what? 'Hi gorgeous, by the way it wasn't until I went home and shagged my ex-boyfriend that I realised I loved you instead...' I bit my tongue sharply as I realised the words that I'd just said, the sudden pain helping to block everything else from my mind.
"And do you?"
"What?"
"Do you love him?"
"I didn't MEAN to" I realised immediately how stupid that sounded."I wasn't LOOKING for this" I clarified - I thought I'd had enough of relationships but he's just so..."
"So Dan?" she finished my sentence with a sympathetic smile.
"Exactly" I groaned, burying my face in my hands.
"You know you're going to have to tell him sometime right, it's bottling things up like that that can tear people apart"
"I knowwww" I kept my face glued to the sticky table top. " but I nearly let Jamie get in the way of this once, I can't let him ruin it now"
"Don't leave it too late Em, trust me" something in her voice made me look up questioningly.
"Don't ask - that's a story for another time and a stronger drink"
"I'll let you off until next time then?" I smiled, pushing back my chair. We left the room in companionable silence, neither of us paying any attention to the occupant of the booth behind.
***
Fifth place might not sound like much after some of his recent results, but it was probably one of the most stylish fifth place drives in recent years. On track as well as off it, I realised that I just couldn't keep my eyes off Daniel. So much for complete impartiality I thought ruefully as I cheered another stunning overtake, my shutter chattering crazily.
"So why didn't you tell me I was working with the big news scoop of the week then?" Somehow Darren had managed to locate me in the post-race crowds, and was looking at me in what I HOPED was mock indignation.
"Because I thought we were a serious Formula One magazine, not a piece of colourful toilet paper" I retorted with a wink.
"Maybe so but you could have warned me that our own photographer was going to become a target for everyone else's photographers" he scolded, spotting a nearby lens pivot in our direction.
"I'm a nobody Darren - I'm not a model or a singer - they'll ignore me once I realise just how boring I am" I insisted, sounding more confident than I was.
"I hope so for your sake"
I hoped so too. As I sat at my computer that evening flicking through the endless pages of photos still to be edited, I told myself that ignorance was bliss, and I wouldn't google my own name to see if I'd been identified, or search todays pictures to see when and where I'd been spotted this weekend.
'Meet me outside. Bring your camera'
I felt those pesky butterflies fill me from top to toe as I saw the name. Then panic set in. Outside? Now? Dress up? Dress down? Were we going for a drink? For a walk? Judging by the second instruction my money was on the latter, but it was by no means a sure bet.
I settled for safe - flats, jeans, jacket...if we turned up at a swanky nightclub I was going to kill him. But why would I need a camera if we were just going to a bar?
"Where are you taking me?" I demanded, spotting him silhouetted against the lights of the car park.
"Secret" he grinned, sending my heart lurching as I grabbed him for a sneaky kiss before jumping into the passenger seat.
*
"I know where we are!" I announced triumphantly, spotting some familiar landmarks as the car eventually pulled up.
"But do you know where we're going?" he asked looking infuriatingly smug as he took my hand and led me through what I would forever think of as 'Gelato Park'
"Wow take a look at the pylon!!" The Torre Branca, a grey steel construction in daylight, glowed a vibrant pink against the night sky.
"It's not a pylon" he huffed, dragging me almost at a run towards the base, and the glass elevator that was waiting expectantly for us. I finally realised why a camera might be required, and mentally ticked off 'cute surprises' on the 'reasons to love Dan' checklist.
Taking our places inside, I lurched against him as the lift jerked abruptly into life, and felt his arms encircle my waist protectively before sliding up and under my jacket.
"Steady now" I whispered as his lips came closer in the dim light, one eye on him, the other on the lift attendant who was making a valiant effort to ignore us.
"You'd better turn around then" he replied, moving his hands up to my shoulders and spinning me round to face the emerging view. High above the park we looked down upon a city transformed by night - every street became a glowing golden river and even the most mundane building was a tiny, glittering beacon.
"Ten minutes mate?" Daniel turned to the attendant and repeated his question in hesitant Italian. It must have done the trick as the man nodded and retreated back into the lift as we stepped alone onto the viewing platform.
"Y' know I didn't just bring you up here for the view." The Milan skyline glinted in his eyes as he closed the gap between us and bent his head to mine, delivering a breathtaking knockout-punch of a kiss which sent my mind spiralling out of all conscious thought.
"I didn't think Aussie men had a reputation for romance" I teased him as we broke apart, my head still reeling.
"Must be the Italian side coming out" he grinned.
"Whatever you say Casanova." I snuggled up against him as the lift returned, eager to feel the heat of his body, despite the warmth of the night.
"Aren't you forgetting something?" he pointed to the camera which hung around my neck, forgotten in the midst of certain...distractions.
"Oh yeah" I looked sheepish, returning my attention to the view, and how to capture it.
"We need one of us too" he insisted, wrapping his arms around me and turning the camera on the pair of us. The resulting image wasn't a picture of beauty by any means, but it was a picture of happy, and if you can't have both beauty and happiness, I'd take happiness any day of the week.
"Come on" he grabbed my hand once more as the lift attendant coughed subtly behind us "We can grab a drink somewhere when we get back, then I'm dragging you up to my room and not letting you out until morning"
*
The bar was packed, but luckily in between the kaleidoscope of colours, and the inebriated inhabitants, we managed to slip in unnoticed, or so we thought.
"Well if it isn't F1's new golden couple" that nails-on-a-chalkboard voice came from nowhere out of the swirling pattern of lights.
"Tara" I acknowledged her with my sweetest 'die-bitch-die' smile. Beside me I felt Daniel take a half step forward and then think better of it. I couldn't blame him. Everything about this woman spelled trouble as plainly as if it had been scrawled across her face in black marker pen (which quite frankly I would have preferred at this moment in time - I'd have even volunteered to wield the pen).
"We were just leaving" I told her, widening my smile-slash-grimace still further.
"So soon? Before you've told Daniel your big news?" Her voice was light but there was a malicious undertone that sent alarm bells screaming through my brain as I tried to figure out what she could possibly be referring to.
"Tell me what?"
I opened my mouth but no sound came out.
"Tell me what?" he repeated, the colour draining from his face.
"She's just jealous - she doesn't know what she's talking about" I fought to keep the panic from my voice as it threatened to choke me from the inside. "Come on, let's go" I laid my hand on his arm and attempted to guide him towards the staircase...and safety.
"Go on - tell him about Jamie!"
BANG!
There was the knife strike out of nowhere. Any other sentence and I could have called her bluff, but there was the name that proved it was more than just a lucky shot. She knew.
"What about him?" I could sense the hurt in his voice that told me he knew too that this wasn't just the poisonous invention of a jealous woman.
"Something happened...after Germany, but it was all one big misunderstanding - they said you..."
"I thought at least with you I was actually your first choice" he cut me off, his choice of words spearing me with a harpoon of ice.
"Dan, I need to explain" I pleaded "and this isn't the place to talk about this"
"You're bloody right it isn't." There was a new coldness in his voice that I didn't recognise and it cut straight through me. This wasn't my affectionate, exuberant, happy-go-lucky boyfriend, this might as well have been a stranger. A stranger that had turned away from me and was blindly stumbling down the stairs like a man betrayed.
"Dan wait!" I lunged after him, tears blurring my vision.
My flailing hands closed on thin air as I fell forwards into darkness.
Note: so I've been enjoying writing the happy stuff a little bit too much and trying to put off the bad, but it was in serious danger of turning into a cheesy slush-fest so I had to bite the bullet at some point, much to my displeasure which is probably why this has taken so damn long to write. It's still probably a huge, predictable cliche' but oh well. Also apologies for no Dan POV, as I told __highflying I broke my Dan-brain this week so you'll have to settle for extra Dan next chapter. I've got to run now so sorry if some of that sounded a bit rushed - it was! Stay tuned. x