Page 134 of Knot So Fast
"Recovery is just as important as training," Terek announces, though his smile suggests he's enjoying this way too much.
It becomes a dare, because of course it does. Everything with this team becomes a competition.
Dex goes first, lasting forty seconds before scrambling out with a string of curses that would make sailors blush. "Fuckthat," he gasps, grabbing towels like they're life preservers. "That's not recovery, that's attempted murder."
I go next, forcing myself to sink into the ice with what I hope looks like confidence rather than barely controlled panic. The cold is like being stabbed by a thousand tiny knives, every nerve ending screaming in protest. But I focus on my breathing, on counting the seconds, on not giving Terek the satisfaction of seeing me quit.
Fifty-two seconds. Not bad for someone who prefers her water at hot tub temperatures.
I'm about to climb out, victorious and hypothermic, when Lachlan slides into the tub beside me. The space isn't really designed for two people, and suddenly we're pressed together from shoulder to hip, sharing body heat that does nothing against the arctic torture surrounding us.
"Show off," I mutter through chattering teeth.
"You love it," he responds, and his breath stutters as the cold knifes into his skin.
His gaze locks on mine, and suddenly the ice bath becomes something else entirely. A challenge, yes, but also an intimacy. We're both suffering, both fighting our bodies' desperate need to escape, but we're doing it together. The countdown app ticks away—sixty seconds, seventy, eighty—and neither of us moves.
When we finally emerge at ninety seconds, I'm laughing and shivering in equal measure. Lachlan's palm spans my back—heat after frost—and the contrast is so good I actually moan. Just a little. Quietly. But from the way his hand tightens, he definitely heard it.
"Get a room," Kieran calls out, but he's grinning.
"Get your own ice bath romance," I shoot back.
We dissolve into the kind of easy bickering that's becoming our signature—Dex complaining about his frozen extremities, Caspian explaining the science behind cold therapy, Kieranmaking increasingly ridiculous suggestions for tomorrow's challenges.
"Naked yoga," he suggests with a straight face.
"Vetoed," Terek says immediately.
"Fire walking?"
"Also vetoed."
"Competitive eating?"
"Now you're just being ridiculous."
We head for the showers, still laughing and complaining in equal measure. The hot water is heaven after the ice torture, and I stay under the spray until my fingers prune and my muscles finally stop shaking.
When I finally change back into street clothes—jeans and a Titan Racing polo that makes me look official—I find something that makes my blood run cold for entirely different reasons.
Folded into my bag, placed carefully on top of my phone, is a printed note. The paper is cheap, the kind you'd get from a home printer, and the ink is already slightly smudged from the humidity.
Stay off the track or we'll take you off.
The typos are almost comical—"of" instead of "off" in one place—but the message lands with the weight of genuine threat. Someone was in my bag. Someone got close enough to leave this while we were all distracted with training.
I snap a photo to show Katie, already knowing she's going to lose her mind about the security breach. Then I fold the note carefully and tuck it into my pocket.
The thing is, I've been told I don't belong since the day I first put on a helmet. Too small, too weak, too female, too Omega. Every single step of my career—what I can remember of it and what I've been told about the parts I can't—has been accompanied by someone insisting I should quit.
They said it when I started karting.
They said it when I moved to cars.
They said it when I first tried out for Formula racing.
They're saying it now, with more creativity and violence, but the message is the same: You don't belong here.
