Page 17 of Formula Freedom
Carlos’s eyebrows rise. “Wait! What?LaraLara? Your childhood-best-friend-and-like-a-sister-who’s-engaged-to-your-brother Lara?”
I roll my eyes at him. “Yeah. That one.”
Carlos and I got close last season. His easygoing nature and genuine care for people make him easy to talk to. In such a high-stakes, competitive world, it’s nice to have someone you can let all that go with. He’s been that person for me, and he’s met Lara a few times over the last season. He’s also met my brother, so he knows all the dynamics.
“What did she want?” he asks.
“She left Lance. Packed a bag and ran.”
Carlos immediately sobers. “Ran? That sounds… scary. What happened?”
My teeth grit together so hard, I’m afraid I’ll break a molar. “He hit her.”
His face freezes. The smile’s long gone, and he curses in Spanish.
“Apparently, they’ve been in a bad place for a while. Emotional stuff, control issues, jealousy. She finally confronted him about cheating and he slapped her.”
Carlos swears under his breath. “¡Carajo!”
“She showed up at my hotel with a red mark across her cheek and bruises on her arm.”
He runs a hand over his face. “That’s… I don’t even know what to say.”
“She stayed with me last night—”
Carlos’s eyebrows shoot straight up.
“—in the guest bedroom,” I clarify with a chastising look. “We called our parents this morning to tell them what’s happened.”
“How are your parents taking it?”
His question is pointed. Lance is their son too, after all, but Carlos knows that our parents are longstanding friends who co-own a business. He’s met my parents before, but not Lara’s.
“They’re gutted, of course. Furious at Lance but fully supporting Lara.”
Carlos looks away, jaw tight before his eyes come back to me. “No offense, but Lance always had that smugness about him. He didn’t have many friends in FI3 because of that air of superiority. Lara is so nice. I didn’t really understand her being with him.”
“I think he’s been spiraling since losing his FI3 seat.”
I’ve been thinking about that all morning. Lance had the potential to race in FI but ultimately, he couldn’t hack it. Our racing careers split down very different roads almost a decade ago. Lance started first—karting at seven, already obsessed with podiums and being the center of attention. I followed two years later, just trying to keep up. But while he chased the straightest line to stardom through open-wheel, I veered into rally at fourteen, which turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me. I learned car control in the mud, reaction timing on ice, and how to keep my cool when the road was chaos. When I finally transitioned to Formula International3, I had an edge.
Lance and I ended up on the same FI3 team for one season—and that’s where everything cracked open. I excelled. He floundered. I moved up to FI2 and then up to the top tier, Formula International. Lance didn’t get a contract renewal. He bounced around, never found another seat, and ended up in sponsorship work. His resentment festered from there, and I think watching me rise while he stalled out—watching me succeed where he failed—it broke something in him.
“I think he’s now suffering from a massive inferiority complex and Lara got the brunt of it.”
Carlos nods slowly. “And now he’s lost her.”
“He should’ve. He doesn’t deserve her.”
“What are you going to do?”
I sigh. “She’s staying with me through the weekend. After that, we’ll figure it out. But she’s not going back to him.”
“Good,” Carlos says. “She’s lucky she’s got you.”
“She’s not lucky,” I reply angrily. “She’s traumatized. And scared. And trying not to implode her family while trying to protect herself.”
He nods slowly. “You’re right. That was the wrong word. But I’m glad she went to someone who gives a shit.”
