The Paddock Pact

Chapter 10: Room for Error

POV: Anya

I stood outside room 314 for thirty seconds, looking down at the heavy key with the wooden fob in my hand. Sarah had nodded once and walked away without saying anything. Her job was done. Mine had just started.

The trip to the hotel had been a lesson in unspoken anger. Sitting in the SUV, I’d just looked down at the plastic team pass that lay on my lap: Anya Novak. Personal Assistant to Mateo Alvarez. Every letter felt like an insult. How had my life ended up like this? A few months back I was in my quiet flat in Warsaw having wine and thinking about how to start over after a ten-year marriage ended with a quiet polite sound.

Now I was stuck in the middle of Austria tied to a twenty-three-year-old F1 driver with anger problems and a bad reputation. I wanted a change. But this wasn’t a new beginning. It felt like a mistake in judgment.

An hour later the SUV had left the main road, navigating a series of small twisty paths up into the mountains before stopping in front of a typical Austrian hotel a few miles from the Red Bull Ring. From the outside, it looked like a picture from a magazine—wood balconies, clean white walls and bright red flowers in boxes. To someone, it looked like a quiet place to relax. To me, it looked like a place where something bad was going to happen.

I closed my eyes. Took slow deep breaths through my nose trying to calm the anger in my chest. Be a professional, I told myself. Treat him like a business client. Set limits, stay away and get through the weekend, step by step.

I put the key in the lock, turned it and pushed the door open.

The room was small but smelled so nice. There was an area near the door with a grey sofa, a glass table and a set of doors leading to a tiny balcony. Ahead through a doorway was the main bedroom.

Standing in the middle of that doorway looking at a packed silver suitcase was Mateo. He had no shirt on, just his black team shorts. Up close, he looked like an athlete—broad shoulders, a strong chest and faint marks on his skin from being in a simulator.

When the door shut behind me his head turned.

For a moment his face lit up with unguarded relief. "Anya! You actually—"

He stopped. His smile vanished the second he saw my face. The warmth he was expecting disappeared, replaced by a look of worried confusion. He rubbed the back of his neck. Ran a hand through his dark messy hair looking smaller than he actually was.

"Hey," he said, his voice low and careful. "Look... About the room. I am so, so sorry. I had no idea until Sarah brought the schedule this morning. I told her I’d sleep on the couch, I really did. She said she would take me out of FP1 if I didn’t sleep in a proper bed."

"Let’s get one thing straight right now, Alvarez," I said, stepping into the room. My voice was calm. Firm. The wheels of my bag made noise on the floor cutting through his words. "We are here under a temporary agreement. We are not friends. We are not a couple. We are definitely not sharing a room by choice."

I stopped in the middle of the bedroom and turned to face him. He was at the doorway like a dog that had done something bad.

"You take the bigger bed, I take the small one," I said, pointing between us. "We keep a professional distance. When the lights are off, you stay on your side and don't start conversations. Act like a professional. Understood?"

Mateo nodded quickly. "Understood. I promise I won’t cross the line. You won’t even know I’m here."

I took a breath feeling a bit better because he didn’t argue. I turned away to put my bag down, get my clothes out and make my space.

Then my shoe hit the frame of the bed and I stopped.

My mouth became dry.

The bedroom was much narrower than it looked on the website. Because of the size and a heavy wardrobe the twin bed had been pushed right next to the big bed. They weren’t just close. They were almost touching only with a thin nightstand between them.

If I lay on my side my face would be less than two feet from his.

The situation hit me like a weight. I wasn’t just sharing a room with an athlete; I was going to be sleeping near him. I would hear his breathing. I would feel every time he moved. If he turned in his sleep and stretched his hand could reach across that space and touch me.

"Anya?" Mateo’s voice came from behind me.

His tone was quiet now, lower and more nervous. He had stepped into the bedroom. I could feel his presence right next to me.

"Is... Is everything okay?"

I looked down at the two beds pressed together. Outside the sound of engines testing on the track came up the mountain, a constant reminder of the high-pressure world I had gotten pulled into. In this small room the loudest sound was my own heartbeat.

All my life I had been the careful one. The one who planned, calculated and kept things under control. Standing in this small room in Austria looking at a nightstand the width of a book I realized my control was gone.

"Yeah," I said, my throat tight as I turned to face him.

The air between us felt thick and warm.

"Everything is just fine."