I told King I’d meet him at the party. He demanded we arrive together. I proposed picking him up in the car Marcy arranged for me. He agreed reluctantly. I wasn’t ready to get into details with him, especially when he could barely make eye contact. And I suspected he wouldn’t take a simple explanation. He’d require a full blown, detailed analysis of why I didn’t ride with people I didn’t know.

Marcy’s driver, Ross, was wonderful. In his fifties he was capable and slow. He understood my issues and always drove with the utmost care. He was one of two people on the planet I would get into a car with.

The moment we pulled up outside the hotel King darted out. I’d wonder how he knew it was us, but the very expensive E-5K Evans was probably a sign. The car wasn’t exactly your run of the mill luxury sedan. It gave Rolls Royce and Maybach a run for their money.

He slid into the backseat beside me, his eyes catching and wandering over my exposed skin. The dress Jess picked out was gorgeous . . . and left little to the imagination. The dark blue fabric glittered and molded to my body, the bodice dipped low between my breasts putting them on display, and even though the skirt went all the way down to my calves, it clung to my thighs and had a slit that went very, very high up the front.

King blinked and then forced his gaze up to my eyes. “I like the makeup.” He slammed the door shut and buckled in.

I had a feeling what he meant to say was more along the lines of that dress is hot.

“Your suit is nice.” And it was. Very nice. Black with a slim black tie and crisp white shirt. It was stylish and made his muscular form seem larger than usual. So basically I wanted to strip him naked and lick him, but I also wanted to wrap my arm around his and be seen by everyone at the party. I wanted the best of both worlds. King naked and King in a suit.

He adjusted the tie and grimaced. “It’s suffocating. I’d rather be in full gear on the track.”

That was probably because he was comfortable on the track. It was his domain. Even covered in restrictive safety gear, shoved into a tiny cockpit, he was more comfortable there than in a roomy backseat with me.

I adjusted his tie and smoothed his shoulders. “That would be a travesty to women everywhere. You look good, King.”

To my complete shock, he grabbed my hand, very much like he had on the swing, and settled it on his powerful thigh. “So do you.”

Tension crackled the air like electricity on a hot summer night before a thunderstorm. I didn’t know where I stood with the moody driver but I knew where I wanted to stand. In his arms with his lips on mine. I didn’t care if I barely knew him. I didn’t care if it was against the rules. There was something more here and that more made me want—for the first time in my life—to explore it.

I’d never been in a serious relationship because no one had ever seemed worth it. I met many nice men in college but most were my friends, not my lovers. I was so focused on school, on who I wanted to become, that a guy needed to be exceptional to make me want to spend time with him.

Needless to say, no one had ever taken my breath or made me fall off an elliptical.

That was all King.

This completely insane response fascinated me and I wanted to know what came next. Would my pulse quicken when we got close? Would my knees go weak if we kissed? Did I make him feel just as wild?

Now that was really what drove me. More than anything I wanted King to want me. I craved seeing him weak because of me, not because I wanted to weaken him, but because it felt necessary to seduce him.

Necessary.

The drive from his hotel to the venue was only ten minutes, but in that time he never let go of my hand. He muttered about Ross’s slowness a few times which just made me happier I hadn’t accepted King’s invitation to pick me up. Ross was my speed. Slow, steady, and heck, he’d probably like my university basement filled with academics, while King was all speed and danger.

Speed and danger were sexy as fuck outside a car, not so much from the inside.

When we arrived King waited for Ross to open his door, then held out his hand for me, blocking me from the press lined up to take pictures. It was the perfectly gentlemanly thing to do. I knew how to properly exist a car in a skirt, but his care and attention did things to my insides. Flippy things.

“Thank you.”

He smiled, then slipped my hand into the crook of his elbow. It was an altogether wonderful sensation. Possessive, warm, natural. Wrong. Whatever my lusty feelings might be alone in a car, they were not appropriate material for public consumption. I tried to pull free but he placed his other hand over top of mine and held it firmly in place. “Please?” He pleaded.

Pleaded.

How could I say no to those eyes? He looked at me like I was the one person in the universe who could save him. “Fine.”

My short reply amused him. He smiled and relaxed—just a little. The press line wasn’t like a Hollywood red carpet. They mostly took pictures and videos. A few called out questions like, “Are you ready for the race?” And, “Can you beat Yedlin?” King smiled and nodded, called out a few quick replies. He was poised, courteous, and gracious, reminding me that King was no normal twenty-one-year-old man. This was a very famous, very rich man with fans and expectations to meet. He had a heavy weight on his shoulders.

Was it fair for me to fantasize plans for seduction when in a few weeks I’d go back to my low pressure life of academia? No, probably not. I was lost in this internal debate when a question caught me off guard.

“Who’s the lovely lady? Are you a couple? Is King Reynolds taken?” A million flashbulbs went off.

My mind scrambled. It was my job to have the smooth answers. I needed to say the right thing to guide King’s public image. I needed—

“Fuck off.” King glared at the man, put his arm possessively around my waist, and steered us inside the building—which was probably the worst possible response. By midnight it would be all over that King was attached and in love with a mystery woman. A non-response like that would only allow them to write their own versions of the truth. This was bad. Very, very bad. Maybe I could run back out and answer questions myself?

“Don’t,” King ground out.

“But you just—”

He spun in front of me, stopping us. His eyes glowed with emotions I couldn’t name. “Is it really so awful if they say we’re together?”

Together! My mouth fell open because . . . because . . . he was serious. “King . . . this has nothing to do with how I feel. I work for Braun-Evans. That’s the problem.” When we asked him to appear in public and have a social life we wanted smiles and good optics—not a potential office place harassment suit.

“Fuck the company. How do you feel?” He tugged a hand through his blond locks before his hands fell to his sides. “I’m sorry. That was . . . I don’t know what that was.” He wouldn’t look at me again and I was starting to believe it might be a defense mechanism.

I moved in front of him. “You want to know how I feel? I’m confused. I’m also scared.” If I was going to be honest I might as well be brutal. “Technically I work for you. I’ve barely gotten my feet wet and now the first thing people will know about me is that I sleep with the men who are my boss.”

For the briefest of moments I thought King might punch the wall, but he didn’t. Instead he let his anger silently seethe. “This is why I hate publicity and parties and images. It doesn’t fucking matter what the truth is.”

He was oh, so right about that. “What is the truth?” He liked to hold my hand but not look at me. My body wanted him and my mind found him fascinating. I didn’t know if I’d recognize the truth if it smacked me in the face. I was so confused and I didn’t understand why that confusion made me panic, but it did.

“I don’t know,” he murmured. “And maybe that’s the problem.” He finally, genuinely looked me in the eye again, and it took my breath away. He was as confused as I was and hoping for answers I couldn’t give him.

“Maybe, until we do know more, perhaps you could keep things more professional?”

“Maybe,” he muttered. “Or maybe we could not care for one night.”

 I . . . had no answer for that. The press wouldn’t be allowed inside with us and the people there most likely wouldn’t know or care who I was. What was done was done and it wasn’t all that bad. King’s anger and possessive hold on me could be explained in a dozen different ways.

“Try it,” he whispered, taking my hand in his and guiding me inside the ballroom.

It was like being plugged into a wall socket. Warm tingles electrified me from head to toe, so much so I barely took in Marcy’s party. The room was dark and dressed in shades of blue. Twinkle lights accented tables, bars, buffets, and a dance floor. A live band played modern versions of classical songs intermixed with classical versions of modern songs (think Metallica’s S&M album.) People moved and danced, spoke and drank.

I didn’t see any of it. My senses were too overwhelmed by one man to absorb anything else. His strong hand held mine like he’d never let me go. He smelled incredibly male and gave off a presence that I was sure made most men quake.

And tonight, right now, he wanted me by his side.

“I can honestly say I’m surprised you’re here,” Adam said as he and his wife came to join us. Adam wore a handsome black suit with a dark red tie that matched Elizabeth’s dress. They peppered us with questions about the work I was doing, all while I kept trying to understand how it felt to have my hand held by King.

It felt good, but it also felt good.

Something Elizabeth seemed to notice. Her eyebrow crept higher and higher until eventually she was all out staring at our hands with open curiosity.

“You’re coming to the race, right?” Adam said.

Wait . . . was he talking to me? I looked up and around and . . . yep. All eyes were on me. Adam’s expectant, Elizabeth’s wary, King’s hopeful.

I cleared my throat. “Uh, I wasn’t planning to. Should I?”

I’m pretty sure Elizabeth rolled her eyes while Adam’s dropped to our hands and I realized he knew full well we were holding hands the whole time. I even got the impression he expected to see us holding hands. “Well, it is our home race. You should come to at least one this summer and this is the easiest.”

That made sense, of course. Most of the staff would be there, except for the teams that always worked out of the factory analyzing data on race day. I hadn’t planned on attending because I had no desire to watch cars drive in laps for two hours, not that I’d tell anyone here that.

“Plus, with your work on King’s brand, it makes sense you’d be there on race day. Maybe even in the garage with us.”

In the garage. Where family and VIPs sat. Where the cameras wandered and the public watched hoping for information. “I’ll think about it.”

“No, you should come and keep me company,” Elizabeth said. “It’ll give us a chance to plan a day for you to visit me. Plus I can help you learn the ropes.”

At this point did it matter? King would be working, focused on the race ahead of him. My presence shouldn’t affect him, but the way he looked at me made it seem like the most important thing in the world. I might be bored but I might also learn a whole lot . . . while making King smile, which was something I wanted to do more and more.

“Okay. Yes. I’ll go.”

I could have sworn King sighed with relief, but I didn’t get a chance to look at him to find out because Adam drew my attention to him.

“Isa, could I possibly steal you for a dance? I know King will completely eat up the rest of your night if I don’t snag you now. I want to talk about the brand strategy.”

That’s how I wound up on the dance floor with Adam Callaway. He was a good dancer. A really good dancer. Excellent rhythm and a gentle command that made him easy to follow. I didn’t know a ton about racing, but I did my research, so I knew that Adam had been a driver when he was a teenager, but left the sport after an accident. For several years he was an engineer with Mercedes before coming back to racing. He was “stolen” (those were the headlines) by Luis to join the Braun-Evans team and he’d gone from an engineering position to head engineer to King’s chief strategist. He was considered one of the most brilliant minds in Formula 1 racing, changing how teams operated and winning championships.

“The helmet design is perfect. So is your entire plan, Isa. You should consider a career with the team.” A classical song played and we swayed and swirled with a dozen other couples.

“Did Marcy put you up to this?” It smelled of Marcy-like interference. She wouldn’t be happy until I agreed to her long-term plan.

“No, though I will admit she did approach me. I turned her down.”

Interesting. “So what is this?”

He studied me for several long beats. “A personal plea. A team is only as strong as the people who build it. I’m always looking for people who fit, even when it comes in unexpected places.”

“I want to get my PhD.” I wanted to do research and teach classes. I kind of wanted to be Elizabeth, actually.

“And you’ll be brilliant at whatever you put your mind to. I’m in love with an academic and I see the same qualities in you.” He twirled me around once. “But, you have other talents and if you ever decide you want to stay closer,” he glanced over my shoulder. I turned and saw King glaring at us. “We could really use your talents full time.”

Work for Braun-Evans—not as an intern out to satisfy an overprotective parent, but as the best fit for my talents? Until this moment, with Adam looking at me with genuine hope, I hadn’t really taken this idea seriously. He was, though, and I had to admit the idea of being wanted for the knowledge and expertise I currently had was a little bit exciting.

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

He spun us in a new direction and led me away from King. “One other thing.” He dropped his voice low. “King likes you. And that means I need to pay attention to your relationship. How he’s feeling affects his head, it affects his ability to drive.”

My feet stopped moving.

“Isa?”

I blinked up at him. “I barely know him. How can I affect him? We’re not together.” Even though it sounded insane I knew it was true. All those sideways glances, every hand hold and thumb rub, for whatever reason, King was affected by me.

Adam put his hand on my hip and guided me back into the dance. “Can I tell you something? Something personal?”

At this point I wondered if anything I thought mattered at all. “Sure why not? Fire away.”

Adam smirked. “I met Elizabeth one night at a restaurant. I’d never seen her before but I knew from fifteen feet away that I was going to introduce myself and convince her to fall in love with me.”

“That sounds terribly romantic. How did that work out for you? Did she call the cops?”

Adam laughed. “No. But two weeks later we both changed everything to be together. We’re married now so I’d say it’s working out pretty well.”

“And why are you telling me this?” Of course he had a point to sharing me such a personal story. He wasn’t talking for the fun of it.

“Because I know what it’s like when you know.”

“Know what?”

“When you’ve found the one.”

I stared at him. And stared some more. “I’m sorry. What?” Somewhere between the twirl and the sashay I must have taken a turn down a wormhole.

“King’s heard stories about you for years, so maybe in some small way he feels like he already knows you, not that it matters. When you meet the right person you just . . . know.”

“And he knows that I’m the one. He said this?” The room was spinning and it wasn’t because we were dancing. Oh no. It was the rush of what the hell is happening right now that was making the world tilt.

The one? The one? I was just beginning to wrap my head around the idea that I liked King and King liked me. We liked each other. And for more than just body bumping good times. I liked him as a person and cared about his happiness.

“No. He hasn’t said anything. But I saw the way he looked at you during dinner last week, I heard how much he talked about you in Austria. He’s taken with you Isa. I know the look in his eye because I’ve had that look.” The song ended and he brought us to a stop. “I have no idea how you feel about King but I thought you should know because it will affect his career. He’s an emotional driver. It makes him damn good. But if his head is confused or his heart is being strung along, it will slow him down, or worse, get him hurt. If you have feelings for him, don’t play around. If you don’t have feelings, make sure he knows now, before things get worse.”