Chapter Text
The cursor blinked against the stark white of my laptop screen, mocking me. Three days of staring at the same aerodynamic models, the same data streams, the same suffocating certainty that I was wasting my potential at Ferrari. My coffee had gone cold hours ago, leaving a bitter film on my tongue that matched the taste of my growing frustration.
I pushed back from my desk, auburn hair escaping from what had once been a neat ponytail. The flat felt smaller somehow, cramped with the weight of a decision I'd been circling for weeks. Mercedes data filled my screen—not stolen, nothing so dramatic—but publicly available wind tunnel reports that told a clear story: their rear wing philosophy was fundamentally flawed, and I could fix it..
My phone sat beside my keyboard like a loaded gun.
James Allison's business card peeked out from beneath a stack of technical papers, its edges worn from the number of times I'd picked it up and set it down again. Our conversation at the engineering conference last month had been casual, professional. But when he'd mentioned Mercedes' struggles with their aerodynamic package, I'd seen something flicker in his eyes. Interest. Maybe even desperation.
"You have a different way of thinking about airflow," he'd said, nursing his whiskey while the conference dinner chattered around us. "If you ever want to discuss it further..."
Now, staring at my reflection in the black screen of my laptop, I knew I was about to burn every bridge I'd carefully built at Ferrari. The security, the predictability, the comfortable certainty of being undervalued but employed—all of it would disappear the moment I made this call.
My hands trembled as I picked up the phone.
"James, it's Sloane." My voice sounded steadier than I felt. "I've been thinking about our conversation."
The next day blurred past in a haze of preparation that bordered on obsession. I refined my presentation until every slide could withstand surgical scrutiny, rehearsed my pitch until the words felt like muscle memory. The aerodynamic models I'd developed weren't just theoretical anymore—they were weapons, carefully crafted to dismantle every assumption Mercedes had made about their current package.
My reflection stared back from my laptop screen during a break, and I barely recognized the woman looking back. When had I become someone willing to gamble everything on six slides and a theory? When had playing it safe stopped being enough?
The interview outfit hung on my closet door like a challenge. Professional but not submissive. Confident without crossing into arrogance. I'd checked my laptop battery twice, backed up my files to three different drives, and still felt like I was forgetting something crucial.
Sleep came in fragments, interrupted by dreams of wind tunnels and data streams, of Toto Wolff's reputation preceding him like a storm front. What if I was wrong about their problems? What if he saw right through the careful confidence I'd constructed around my desperation to prove myself?
By morning, my nerves had crystallized into something sharper, more focused. Fear and excitement tasted identical on my tongue.
The Mercedes facility at Brackley rose before me like a testament to meticulous engineering, its sleek lines and glass surfaces mirroring the gray sky above. I adjusted my ponytail one final time, checked my reflection in the glass doors, and forced my breathing to steady. My hands felt solid, reliable, but my pulse hammered against my throat like it was trying to escape.
The corridors inside hummed with barely contained energy, photos of championship victories lining the walls like battle standards. Each image seemed to whisper the same question: what made me think I belonged here?
Conference Room B appeared at the end of a hallway that felt longer than it had any right to be. The air itself seemed charged, like standing at the edge of a cliff with the wind picking up behind you. I knocked once, heard a voice call out, and stepped into my future.
Toto Wolff was taller than I'd expected, his presence filling the room before he'd even spoken. Tension lived in the set of his shoulders, the careful way he moved, like a man carrying the weight of an entire team's expectations. When he looked at me, I felt catalogued, assessed, measured against some internal standard I couldn't see.
"Mr. Wolff." I extended my hand, making sure my grip was firm enough to establish credibility without crossing into aggression. "Thank you for meeting with me."
"Call me Toto." His handshake was brief, professional, but I caught something in his eyes—curiosity wrestling with skepticism. He was desperate enough to hear anyone out, even a Ferrari aerodynamicist with more theories than experience.
We settled into chairs across from each other, the conference table between us feeling like neutral territory in a war neither of us had declared yet.
"James tells me you've identified the flaw in our aerodynamics." His voice carried the kind of authority that made people stop talking when he entered a room, measured and deliberate.
I smiled, feeling the first spark of confidence since I'd walked through the door. "Ferrari taught me to recognize vulnerable underbellies. Even ones disguised with black paint."
Something shifted in his expression—approval, maybe, or at least acknowledgment that I wasn't going to waste his time with pleasantries.
"And yet you're willing to leave them for us." He leaned back slightly, studying me with the intensity of someone who'd built a career on reading people. "I find that intriguing. Most people run toward success, not away from it."
The question hung in the air like a challenge. I could feel him probing, testing whether my motivations aligned with his needs or if I was just another opportunist looking for a better deal.
"I prefer challenges to accolades." The words came out steadier than I felt. "And right now, Mercedes is the more interesting puzzle."
It was a careful deflection, skirting the real reasons I had to leave Ferrari—the ideas dismissed, the potential wasted, the slow suffocation of being undervalued. But Toto Wolff struck me as the kind of man who saw through convenient half-truths, who appreciated honesty even when it came wrapped in diplomatic language.
"I admire your confidence." His tone carried a warning wrapped in silk. "Though I’ve learned that overconfidence is often the earliest sign of failure."
Heat flashed through me—not anger, but something sharper, more focused. "And I've found that doubt is the luxury of those who've never had to prove themselves. I don't have that luxury."
"Touché."
The single word carried more weight than a paragraph of praise. I'd scored a point, earned a measure of respect from someone who didn't distribute it freely. Finally, someone who appreciated intellectual sparring instead of viewing it as a threat.
"Show me what you've got."
I turned my laptop toward him, and the nervousness that had been building all morning crystallized into pure focus. This was my domain, where doubt disappeared and expertise took over.
"Your current rear wing is operating on an outdated principle." I clicked through to my first slide, watching his expression shift from polite interest to actual attention. "You're treating air as an obstacle rather than a partner."
He leaned closer, close enough that I caught the subtle scent of his cologne—something expensive and understated that matched the careful precision of everything else about him. His focus was absolute, the kind of concentration that made you feel like the only person in the room.
"The standard belief is that the goal is to glide through the air with minimal resistance," I continued, pulling up the comparative models. "But air wants to flow. If you work with its natural tendencies instead of against them..."
I watched skepticism transform into engagement, saw the moment when theoretical possibility became practical interest. This was where I shined, where years of study and instinct converged into something that felt like magic.
"You strike me as someone who’s constantly adapting."
The observation caught me off guard. I felt the conversation shifting into dangerous territory, away from the safe ground of technical expertise.
"When necessary."
"And what made it necessary to leave Ferrari?"
The question I'd been dreading, wrapped in casual curiosity that didn't fool either of us. I deflected with professional euphemisms, unwilling to reveal the truth about feeling invisible, about watching my ideas disappear into committee meetings and corporate politics.
"Creative differences. Philosophical disagreements about innovation versus tradition."
He nodded as if he understood the language of diplomatic resignation, the careful way people talked around uncomfortable truths in professional settings.
"Nothing usual about you, Ms. Kingsley."
Heat flushed my cheeks before I could stop it, the compliment landing somewhere deeper than professional appreciation. When had anyone called me unusual and made it sound like praise?
"I'll take that as a compliment."
"As intended."
"I can bring it back to life." I leaned forward, feeling the momentum shift in my favor. "Give me access to your wind tunnel, your fabrication team, and six weeks."
"Six weeks to rewrite our season?"
"Six weeks to give you options."
I could see him calculating, weighing risk against potential reward. This was the moment where theory met reality, where my confidence would either pay off or destroy me.
"At Ferrari, I spent more time explaining why my ideas were worth pursuing than actually pursuing them." The admission slipped out before I could stop it, revealing more frustration than I'd intended. "I need to work somewhere that values solutions over politics."
Something flickered in his expression—understanding, maybe, or recognition of a familiar struggle. He struck me as someone who'd fought similar battles, who understood the need for intellectual freedom.
"You have six weeks to prove your theory. James will get you everything you need."
The words hit me like a physical force, relief and terror arriving in equal measure. I'd gotten exactly what I'd come for, but the reality of it felt overwhelming.
"You won't regret it."
"Bold claim." His smile was slight, controlled. "I make it a policy not to have regrets, regardless of outcomes."
"That sounds like perfectionism hiding behind pragmatism."
The observation earned me another look of approval, as if I'd passed some test I hadn't known I was taking. We stood simultaneously, the meeting drawing to its natural conclusion, but something electric lingered in the air between us.
Our handshake lasted a beat longer than strictly professional, his grip firm and warm, and I felt something I hadn't expected—a connection that bypassed logic entirely.
"Toto?" I paused at the door, gratitude mixing with something more complicated. "Thank you for taking the risk."
I walked out of that conference room on unsteady legs, adrenaline flooding my system with the high-octane hum of a finished qualifying lap. The corridor felt different now, less intimidating and more like a path toward something I couldn't yet name.
In my car, I replayed the meeting... but the moment that burned brightest wasn't the offer. It was the weight of his stare, the unexpected warmth of his hand. I gripped the steering wheel, a strange, unsettling energy tingling under my skin that had nothing to do with aerodynamics and everything to do with the man who listened like I was the only person in the room.
Toto Wolff was nothing like I'd expected. Dangerous in ways I hadn't prepared for, intelligent in ways that made me want to keep talking long after the meeting should have ended. The way he'd listened, really listened, to my ideas instead of just waiting for his turn to speak. The way he'd challenged me without dismissing me, pushed back without shutting down.
Six weeks to prove myself, but something told me the aerodynamics would be the least complicated part of what I'd just signed up for. I'd gotten exactly what I came for, but somehow felt like I'd agreed to much more than I'd bargained for.
The drive back to my apartment passed in a blur of replayed conversations and racing thoughts. I'd burned my bridges at Ferrari, gambled everything on a theory and a handshake, and walked away feeling more alive than I had in months.
Whatever happened next, at least it wouldn't be boring.