Chapter 13 Curiosity

Chapter 13 Curiosity
"Great, now our names are everywhere."

"You idiot, that's not a good thing. They've steered the narrative against us."

We sat side by side in the classroom, going over the WAG dinner fallout. Chris showed not a trace of remorse as the aftermath of our little scene spread across every platform.

"But the internet's split on it—you haven't seen? There are people on our side too, saying we had every right to defend ourselves. Shane's haters, obviously."

My mouth formed a small "o." All I could manage was a quiet "oh" before I went straight to the F1 fan forums. And just like Chris had said—here was a whole camp defending us. Especially once amateur footage surfaced showing exactly how Shane and Emma had baited us.

Behind every piece of evidence in our favour, there were just as many people working to spin it the other way. Clips of me and Chris on the offensive were circulating just as widely. Misreadings were inevitable—I wasn't surprised, just cautious.

"Relax. I know it's a lot—but this isn't the first time. The hate-and-support cycle in this sport is something else, haters thrive here. But the fans more than hold their own when it comes to defending people they care about. Haha—it's loud on all sides, always."

I nodded—more out of habit than anything. Somewhere underneath all of it, questions had been piling up. And the loudest one was the thing Shane had said that had set Chris off a few days ago.

What's wrong with Chris's dad?

Neither Chris nor Mrs Carla had ever mentioned him. Never appeared. Never in the news. Barely even talked about. But nobody had confirmed he was gone either.
"Hey! did you come here to help with my assignment or just stare into space? I don't have time for someone who's not even here."

I snapped back. Sitting right next to this insufferable kid, I decided to leave it for now. Later, I'd find out more.
It wasn't about being nosy. I just wanted Chris to have something to protect himself with — psychologically, socially.

"Can you stop grumbling and nagging? You sound like an old engine that keeps stalling."



"Hm. There's not much out there."

It was 1am and I was still hunched over my laptop screen. I'd worked through almost all of my homework, but my brain was still running too hot to even consider sleeping.
I'd meant what I said to myself that afternoon—the moment I had free time, I'd gone straight to digging up whatever I could find on about Chris's father.

There were plenty of rumours going around, but I wouldn't believe any of them until something backed them up.

Asking Chris directly wasn't an option, not after the way he'd reacted that night. Whatever was between him and his father, it clearly wasn't good.

I scrolled through screen after screen. Information on Chris's father was hard to come by—it wasn't clear why so little had been written about him. Deliberately buried, or simply undocumented.

"Hm. Finally — after all that, at least there's this."

A name. Michael Ergoinn De Luca. Old money? The name had the ring of someone with a coat of arms hanging above the fireplace.

Then, I shouldn't have been surprised—not with a surname like De Luca. The name alone already carried the weight of old money and respectable bloodlines. Could that be one of the reasons why the man's identity had been so carefully kept from public record?

"No photos? Not even a marriage record. Nothing on the family. Hm..."

I propped my chin in my hand. And yet I hadn't once thought about giving up—even though it had been over an hour of circling the same dead ends.

"What are you doing?"

I nearly sent my laptop off the bed. I snapped it shut and sat up straight, doing my best to look like I hadn't just been doing exactly what I'd been doing.

"How rude! You can't just walk into a girl's room without permission!"

Chris just raised one eyebrow, without a trace of guilt. Instead, his gaze settled on me—deep and unreadable—as he brought his face closer to mine, as though he were trying to read something there.

Before you all get the wrong idea—I was staying at Chris's house because Mrs Carla had asked me to. She wanted me on hand to keep an eye on Chris, given how many exams we had that week.

"This is my house."

Delivered so casually it made my fist itch.

"Yeah—that doesn't mean you can walk into a girl's room whenever you feel like it," I shot back.

Silence settled between us — until it hit me why he was even here.

"So what are you doing here? Keep standing there and I'll go straight to Mrs Carla to report suspicious behaviour."

"Hey—don't even think about it. This assignment has been on my mind."

Chris tossed the book onto the table — and apparently he really had been thinking about it. Of all times. Past 1am, and he was here to discuss schoolwork. But that was progress, genuinely. When I'd first taken this job, his enthusiasm for anything academic had been non-existent. Now he was bringing it up himself.

"Stop sleeping during class," I muttered.

"Stop complaining. Helping me is literally your job. I fell asleep because I'm running on empty—racer and student, remember."

"Oh right—the world's busiest legendary racer," I replied flatly, then pointed towards the bed. "My maths notebook should be on there somewhere—just be careful, it's mixed in with everything else."

Chris started rifling through the pile on my bed. It was already messy enough — but if my sticky notes and bookmarks ended up lost somewhere in the process, which was more than enough to set me off.

"Oh my Godness... ever heard of looking for something carefully?!"

Books everywhere, my mattress in no better shape. I crossed the room quickly, trying to put a stop to it before he did any more damage—but my foot caught on something and...

"Hey, fatty girl. where's your book that—woahh!!!"

I had nothing to grab onto. The only thing in range was my mattress—ehere Chris, unfortunately, happened to be standing.

"Rachel, I heard a noise, are you alright—"

Mrs Carla stood in the doorway, frozen. So were we. We scrambled up from what was, by any measure, a very compromising position.

"You two?! Oh my—there will be none of that under my roof, not at your age! What on earth is going on?!"

Why was there always a misunderstanding whenever Mrs Carla was involved?