Driven by Ambition, page 2
“Which is?” He wasn’t quite sure what Jaxxon was saying as it was hard to avoid the implication that he had more talent than those who had connections or money. His rise through motorsport could only have been possible with a well-endowed dose of intellectual capability. Shit. The last thing he needed to ponder—during an interview—was Jaxxon’s endowment. He gripped his phone tighter, then slowly breathed out, hoping that Jaxxon couldn’t hear the tremble in his breath through the phone.
“The thing about power, in any form, is that it stops people from seeing the whole picture. Humans are not very good at seeing their own privilege. With my background, I bring a different strategic approach because I can see the sport from a perspective that is rare.”
“Unique?”
“No. There have been others before me, like Louis Kingston whose rise from nothing into a multiple World Champion has been well recorded.” The subtext was that Jaxxon might be daring Freddy not to mention that both himself and Kingston were Black. He avoided the temptation to make the comparison.
“There have been several other drivers whose parents were mechanics, or owned go-kart tracks and worked hard to give their children opportunities. Team Principals, too, who’ve worked hard as mechanical engineers and risen through the ranks.” Freddy knew this and he could name each and every one of them. He wouldn’t be on that list. He had been handed everything he wanted, and he’d still had to work bloody hard to rise above the many other competitors who had also been given every chance. Perhaps that was Jaxxon’s point. Freddy was one of the few who’d made it to the pinnacle as an S1 driver. He tried not to find it condescending when Jaxxon mentioned that humans weren’t good at seeing their own privilege but quickly pushed that uncomfortable prickle across the back of his neck away. Jaxxon was correct. He knew he had a ton of privilege and his reaction against acknowledging that was also a learned response and one he had to work to unlearn.
“Yes. It’s a path that has been trodden before, among drivers and among Team Principals. Not often, which can be an advantage and a disadvantage. I would never claim to be the first of anything, as everyone stands on the shoulders of those who have come before.” The sincerity in Jaxxon’s voice made Freddy pause. It was so fucking admirable, but Jesus, he was going to get eaten up by the other Team Principals. Did Jaxxon have enough fight in him to survive this cut-throat world?
“Tell me about the disadvantages.”
“I am unwilling to give my competitors an advantage by outlining that on the record.” Jaxxon’s quick retort made Freddy smile. He was going to enjoy verbally sparring him with this season.
“You have a business degree. Is that correct?”
Jaxxon’s puff of breath seemed loud in his ear. “Yes. Mechanical engineering and commerce, double degree from Oxford. Full scholarship.”
“Impressive.”
“Thank you. My career pathway has been written about before. Personally, I would rather discuss my more recent roles, including the integral part I played in the recent improvements at Gamble Racing.”
Freddy’s fingers twitched. “Are you referring to the bold decision to employ Victor Tsui as the Chief Engineer?”
“I was an integral part of the selection process, yes. With the Sanchez Shipping sponsorship, we had an opportunity to invest in new personnel, and together with our stable of drivers and engineers, I assisted Socrates and Mike in collating a potential list of candidates.”
“Why Tsui?”
“He was obviously a star on the rise in the engineering ranks in the lower grades of racing. Yes, the promotion we gave him put him under a lot of pressure, but I think it’s easy to say that he has thrived with the opportunity. We are very excited about this season’s car; his second design for us. It is showing plenty of promise in the wind tunnel.”
“Socrates Drayton has given you a big responsibility now that he has ... retired.” Freddy paused, trying to draw out more information, but Jaxxon didn’t take the bait.
“This job is a responsibility that I take incredibly seriously. Socrates has built a fantastic team at Gamble Racing, and this season is about building on our strong history to take this team to the top of the mid-field, and perhaps even to push the top teams.” Oh, he was good. Slippery in just the right way that was required for this role, while also sending out a warning to the other mid-field teams. Freddy smiled into his phone. He needn’t have worried that Jaxxon wasn’t equipped to deal with the politics and game-playing of S1.
“Thank you for your time, Jaxxon. I’ll see at pre-season testing.” He didn’t have enough details, but he didn’t want to linger on this phone call for a minute longer, listening to Jaxxon’s beautiful tones. He would write about Jaxxon’s passion and his obvious love for cars and their sport. He’d make it work, and then when he was done, he’d close his eyes and dream of Jaxxon’s rumbling voice. Freddy shook his head. It wasn’t like him to want more from someone he couldn’t have. He didn’t mix pleasure with work for a fucking good reason.
Chapter 2
Breaking News: The 1988 and 1989 World Championship S1 Trophies are missing, allegedly stolen. Gamble Racing’s new car, the GR-S390, was revealed to the public by S1 drivers Ondrej D’Grieg and Paulo Sanchez tonight. The trophies, won by Socrates Drayton, were to be part of the Gamble Racing car reveal for this season but weren’t there. No further information is available at this stage.
Jaxxon approved the press release—a controlled moment in this bloody disaster—and it was put on all of Gamble Racing’s social media immediately. The marketing team ought to have been sharing videos of tonight’s event; not this. This wasn’t exactly how he wanted to launch his first car as Team Principal. He really didn’t want to go down in history as the Team Principal who’d lost Socrates’ trophies. He’d worked too fucking hard to get here for some asshole to, literally, steal his moment of glory.
The entire place was in an uproar, with both the Gamble Racing staff and Socrates’ house staff searching frantically for the missing trophies. Mike’s face had been ashen when they’d first noticed they were missing, and he hadn’t improved since.
Skye was reviewing the security footage. They hadn’t been overly hopeful since most of Socrates’ house wasn’t under surveillance, only the trophy room. Jaxxon had taken the trophies out of the cabinets himself for tonight’s car reveal, so the footage wasn’t going to tell them anything he didn’t already know. The stress stuck in his throat, and he wanted to punch something—don’t act angry—or cower in a corner—he wasn’t a coward—or fucking don’t react at all because he was the boss and people needed leadership. His emotions had to wait until he found the trophies and could throttle whoever was responsible. This couldn’t be the way he began the job he’d worked so hard to get.
“No one is talking about the car.” One of S1’s highest profile retired drivers and journalists, Freddy Hiptonstall, looked up from his phone as he stated the fucking obvious. Jaxxon wanted people to talk about the car. He’d only talked to Freddy once before, when he’d done an interview with Freddy about his promotion a few weeks ago, although he’d seen him around the paddock for years. Freddy made Jaxxon curious ... But he couldn’t do anything about his unwilling desire for a handsome face so he lifted his chin and did his damned job instead.
“I’m not giving you a quote, Freddy.”
“Off the record?”
Jaxxon knew he needed to build a relationship with the media, so he swallowed his irritation. Freddy was only doing his job, after all, just as he was.
“Sure.”
“Why wasn’t Socrates here tonight? He’s never missed a car launch.” Freddy’s reputation for astute observation gave Jaxxon pause. Who else had noticed?
“Has he run off with his trophies?” Freddy’s taunt was probably designed to draw information from Jaxxon, so he just shrugged.
“Off the record. Socrates is dealing with a personal matter.” It was the reason Jaxxon had been given his promotion, because Socrates didn’t know how long he’d be away from the team and Gamble Racing needed a Team Principal. The season was about to begin. Jaxxon had been positioning himself as the obvious successor to Socrates for over a year now. The promotion itself wasn’t a shock to him; the timing of it was as he’d assumed Socrates would be in the role for several more years yet. The only other viable option for Team Principal was their Chief Engineer Victor Tsui who was even younger and more inexperienced than Jaxxon, while none of the other options had the engineering experience either of them had. And with Socrates wanting to keep his reasons for stepping away from leading his racing team private, they’d kept the promotion internal to avoid any unnecessary press.
“What sort of personal matter?”
“Freddy.” Jaxxon put a warning tone in his voice. “It’s a medical issue. Please respect Socrates and keep it completely off the record.”
“Oh. I’m so sorry to hear that.” Freddy’s tone changed to one of empathy. “Everyone in the paddock adores Socrates. Please give him my best.”
“Thanks.” Jaxxon didn’t have the capacity to deal with any rumours about Socrates’ health on top of everything. “I can give you something. I personally removed the trophies from their secure cabinet and placed them on the stage. We had our own security for them, and the broadcasting team also had security measures in place.” Skye was reviewing the footage of the stage to try and work out when the trophies had been removed and switched out for an empty box.
“Did you expect there to be a problem? That seems like a lot of effort for a couple of old trophies.”
Jaxxon shrugged. “They matter to Socrates.”
“And because he is sick...” Freddy’s voice trailed off and Jaxxon recognised the technique. He wasn’t going to finish the sentence or fill the space for Freddy.
“Anything about Socrates is off the record. You can talk about our security procedures and what we are doing to find the trophies, but not about him.”
“Are you always this defensive?”
“Excuse me?”
“In our interview the other day, you spent a lot of time defending Gamble Racing’s choice to select you for Team Principal. If you want some advice, you should own the job.”
“You want me to take advice from you?”
Freddy’s shrug shouldn’t bug him this much. The man was far too handsome for his own good; like how bloody blessed could one person be? Not only was he a retired S1 driver, but he had a face for television and a fucking posh accent with a voice that could seduce anyone. Jaxxon had worked too hard to get here to be seduced into a mistake by a ... pretty face. If he could frame Freddy as pretty it might help him maintain some distance, rather than stare for a second too long at Freddy’s lips. A kiss ... No, he shoved that thought to the dark recesses of his mind and it could bloody stay there, out of the way, never to bother him again.
“Yes. I’ve been in the paddock for longer than you.”
“Fine, old man. Give me your advice.”
Freddy’s grin lit up the room and did absolutely zero to stop Jaxxon from staring at his mouth. His smile was obscene; perfect teeth and lips combined with the glint of enjoyment in Freddy’s gaze was a little too much. Jaxxon wanted to kiss that smile right off Freddy’s face. Fuck. He swallowed. He wanted to make Freddy smile like that again too.
“That’s more like it. Show us your snark and your personality.”
“Is that your advice?” He hadn’t expected that.
“Yes. Sport is entertainment. S1 is entertainment.”
He conceded the point. “It’s also about selling cars and innovation.”
“None of that is possible without first entertaining your fans. With all the television coverage you have an opportunity and if you want to succeed, you’ll need entertain people. Let them see your sassiness and personality. You need the people to see you.” Freddy’s emphasis on ‘you’ was sinfully attractive.
“And when I do?” He loaded the question with sarcasm because Freddy was only reiterating what Jaxxon already knew. He’d purposefully built a following online as Ondrej’s race engineer as part of his long term plan for get this job, and he aimed to build on it now.
“And when you do, you’ll achieve the dream life.” Dream life? Freddy wasn’t wrong about the entertainment angle. It wouldn’t be enough to be great at leading Gamble Racing or winning races, a huge part of his job would be using the media for strategy.
“How long have you been living this dream life, Freddy?”
“Never long enough.”
Jaxxon smiled. “This sport really gets in your blood and becomes an obsession.”
“You’ve been with Gamble for four years now? Which is your favourite track?”
He shook his head. “Which one is yours?” He turned the question back onto Freddy and deliberately raised one eyebrow.
“Imola.” Freddy didn’t hesitate.
“Makes sense. It was your first win.” Jaxxon had always had a good head for retaining data.
“You follow my career?”
Jaxxon rolled his eyes. “I follow everyone. My uncle Lorenzo took me to Silverstone when I was twelve, and I fell in love with S1.”
Freddy leaned slightly closer, his gaze intensifying.
“Yes, you can put this on record. My parents ran a bakery in Liverpool. They didn’t have much time or money to take me to anything.” He wondered if Freddy would notice that he’d said ran not owned. His parents worked as employees for the bakery owner on a salary. They never benefitted from any profits they generated through their hard work. With this promotion, he had been able to buy the bakery for them and that alone made the promotion to Team Principal hugely satisfying.
“One morning, very early, Uncle Lorenzo arrived and he said he had a surprise for me. We got in his car and we drove for hours until we arrived at Silverstone. The noise, the people. Ahh, the cars.” Later, Lorenzo had told him that his parents were so proud of him and the grades he was getting at school, but they couldn’t afford the time away from the shop to take him on a vacation, and Lorenzo had stepped in to give him a day of fun. Lorenzo wasn’t the most consistent of people, but that one day had put Jaxxon on this path, and for that, he’d forgive all the times Lorenzo promised a day out and never showed. His parents had given him the gift of confidence and a belief in hard work, and Lorenzo had shown him the world he wanted to inhabit.
“It’s a bug that burrows into your heart and stays there.”
Jaxxon raised one eyebrow. “Such a poet, Freddy.”
“And now you have the bug too.”
Jaxxon shook his head. “You make it sound like an STI.”
“Gross.” They both stared at each other for a moment until Jaxxon wanted to scrub the awkwardness off his skin.
“So, the trophies? Any clues?” Freddy reminded him of the most pressing matter in his realm. A pretty face and easy conversation shouldn’t have distracted him from the task of finding Socrates’ trophies.
“It’s too early to know anything much. Our team is going over the footage to see if we have any clues, and obviously we have the local police involved for due process.”
Freddy squinted. “There is a decent trade in S1 memorabilia. I could have a talk to a few people who collect and see what they think.”
“You’d help us? Or is this the journalist in you wanting to solve a puzzle.”
“Always, but it’s also personal. I love S1, and I think it’s horrific that this could happen.”
Jaxxon unclenched his teeth and forced himself to pause. The theft of two trophies wasn’t exactly a horror on a global scale; recovering them might make his boss—a rich old white man—feel better, but it was nothing like the long string of human rights abuses happening around the world. Some of which were happening in countries where they raced.
“Interesting word choice.”
“Excuse me?” Freddy asked.
“This is a frustrating expensive theft, but it’s hardly a horror.”
“It’s not a harmless crime either.”
Jaxxon blinked. “Is there such a thing as a harmless crime?”
“Are we going to debate semantics while a thief wanders around?”
“You think they are still on the grounds?” He had assumed the thief would have bolted as soon as they had the trophies in their possession.
“Leaving immediately would garner suspicion, don’t you think? Is everyone on the invite list still here? What about the staff?”
There was one thing Jaxxon hated the most and it was feeling like a fool. He was a strategic expert, good at planning and foreseeing things that others couldn’t, and yet, the stolen trophies, the knowledge that he was the last person to be known to touch them, and the pressure of this being his first big event as Team Principal, had fried his ability to think rationally about this. He was responsible for the trophies going missing and he needed to focus on finding them. He shouldn’t be wasting time chatting to a reporter about semantics and word choices.
“I hate to say this, but off the record, the timing is terrible for you.”
Jaxxon’s chest squeezed tight. “I know. Socrates is ... away. I’ve been promoted into his job without the usual rumour mill pre-announcing it. And I was the last person to touch the trophies.”
“You were?”
“I told you that already. I took them out of their secure cabinet and placed them on the stage into another secure cabinet. I covered the cabinet with a sheet, ready for the car reveal. Damn it, I made the decision to have them hidden when I could’ve left them on display without the drama of a reveal. Mike and I planned tonight’s car reveal to be a celebration of Socrates’ career and life in S1.” It’d been designed to help Socrates, and now everything was worse.
“It’s an audacious theft to take them from the stage with so many people milling around.”
“That’s why I thought they’d be safe.” He’d discussed the whole procedure with his security staff, and they’d signed off on each step. Socrates’ car from his first ever S1 win was on the stage too, borrowed from the big manufacturer that he’d driven for, and the security around that was even tighter. When they’d wheeled both the old car onto the stage and then parked this year’s car beside it, Jaxxon hadn’t been able to stop grinning. The development that had happened over almost forty years was incredible.
