Page 1 of Tipping Point

1

Chapter 1

CAMILLE

Iadjust the camera until he’s framed from the waist up on the monitor, and nod at the cameraman who steps up when I take a seat in a metal chair, facing the man seated in front of the green screen.

I should be filming real people with real problems.

“Finn is short for Finnley, right?” I cock my head at him.

He’s dressed in an unmarked shirt with his arms crossed across his chest, scowling at the bright lights.

“It’s short for Finnegan.” He has a heavy accent.

Right.

I leaf through the pages on my clipboard, looking for his driver profile.

Finnegan Brennan. Driver for the Grande Prima Ultimate, team Delta Victor, and possibly the most obtuse man I have ever met.

Getting Finn to speak was testing my very limits as the stand-in producer for High Velocity , the latest documentary offering by WebFlix Max.

Dixon owed me for this. He was supposed to be here. He knew this industry inside out, and he had the passion to bring it to life on the screen.

Not me. I specialise in smaller documentaries, one on one, where you unravel people’s mysteries and bring actual issues to light. Stories that can make a difference.

Issues I should document right now, instead of interviewing overpaid drivers for the Annual Grande Prima, the top motor racing competition of the year, every year.

The page in front of me holds his basic information. He’s Irish, which explains the accent, and in his late thirties, which is considered old by driver standards. He’s a reliable mid-placement driver for the smaller Delta Victor team and he had come on the scene young and hungry, exceptional even, but then mellowed out to a pretty nondescript driver.

“Unprepared?” he asks, raising one eyebrow.

Shit. Yes.

“No.” I tuck a frazzled strand of curly hair behind my ear. It has escaped the messy bun I had made on my way over from the airport. My curly blonde hair didn’t travel well. I have been in these clothes for two days straight, and I was hungry and jet lagged.

Dixon would know what to ask him.

Dixon wasn’t here, I remind myself. Dixon was at home, caring for his terminally ill wife. After everything he had done for me over the years, I owed him one. Mentors like him don’t come around often, and this opportunity wasn’t one to scoff at.

He had nominated me to be his stand in, much to everyone’s surprise, including my own.

“I know nothing about racing cars!” I had hissed over the phone when he called to tell me.

“It’s not about the cars, Cam. Or at least, not only about the cars.”

He hung up without elaborating. He knew I wouldn’t turn him down.

If I nailed this, and with what I would make from this project, I could stop sharing my flat in London with a roommate and live on my own.

Or maybe fund my own next project. The Silk Road stories.

I glance at the few scribbled questions I had made in my notebook on the way over.

“Can you walk us through your strategy for this racing season?”

I hear a snort behind me. The sound tech.

---