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Chapter One

This week I am a new Catherine Collings.

Well, technically, I look the same—long black hair, pale skin, blue eyes. I’m wearing a black Collings Motors polo shirt—the usual shirt required when I’m working as the personal assistant to my brother, Formula 1 driver Caleb Collings. I wear my credentials on a lanyard around my neck, which lets me pass through security as I enter the paddock on this late August day.

It’s a gorgeous morning in Zandvoort, a coastal town on the North Sea in the Netherlands. The area is filled with resorts and sandy beaches, a popular summertime destination. This is the last F1 race that will be held here, and it’s a shame because the track is interesting—the curves are formed by natural coastal dunes. And the atmosphere is like being on a holiday. The people are fantastic, the setting is beautiful, and I’m glad I get to experience it for one last time.

I’ll definitely miss this place, I think. But maybe it’s fitting that as I say goodbye to racing at Zandvoort, I say hello to a new me.

This is the first race weekend after summer break. I took the past three weeks to do more than rest and relax during the mandatory step away from Formula 1.

I re-evaluated my career. My personal life.

And I’m determined to enter the remaining part of the season by fixing both of them.

For my career, I’m going to launch my own social media platforms. I could be waiting forever for a social media position to come open with the family F1 team. So I’m taking the advice my brother’s girlfriend, Isla Foley, gave me: create my own opportunities. She’s an American TV reporter and content creator, and I consider her one of my closest friends, so I trust her.

There is plenty of room in the world for Formula 1 content creators, and I have a unique point of view from being part of the historic Collings Motors racing family and working in the paddock. I’m so blessed and privileged to have F1 in my blood. Collings Motors is a historic, British-based luxury car brand, but my grandfather launched the Collings Motors Formula 1 team. It’s a true family company: my dad is heavily involved with the Collings Motors F1 team and has recently begun overseeing some sponsorship management things for the GT3 team, too. Caleb is in his second year on the grid, driving for the family team.

And this year I joined Collings Motors in the paddock.

It’s a leap of faith on my part, to launch my own platforms, but I miss creating content. I like making videos and putting fun things on social media. I’ve already thought about what I want my channel to be like, the kinds of content I want to share. I’m nervous, of course, but I know I can do this. I can no longer sit around and hope an opportunity falls in my lap. I’ve got to be brave enough to make my own opportunities.

Starting right now.

A nice breeze is coming in off the sea this morning, carrying the scent of hot stroopwafels towards me. I love the fresh stroopwafels here. They have a little stand in the paddock, and I swing by to pick one up before I enter the Collings Motors motorhome. I bite into it, tasting the sweet wafel and the warm caramel inside, and sigh happily as I approach the sleek glass building that is our pop-up hospitality home for the weekend. It’s really amazing how this building is set up from city to city as we travel the globe following the F1 calendar. It’s where we eat, have meetings, work, entertain clients—the hub for Collings Motors.

I open the door and step inside. The canteen is filled with people wearing the same black polo shirts issued to all Collings Motors employees, all getting breakfast to start the day. Everyone from pit-crew mechanics to media-relations people to the team principal eat here. There’s a lavish buffet, with silver chafing dishes holding everything you could possibly want for breakfast.

There’s also a beautiful coffee bar that can make your coffee and tea dreams come true. I head over, and Sydney, one of our two baristas, smiles at me. I start my morning with either an Earl Grey latte, and Sydney makes it the way I like it—with oat milk and extra vanilla—or I get a coffee with oat milk. But it’s one or the other every day.

“Earl Grey latte or coffee?” she asks.

“Coffee,” I say, smiling back at her. “The usual way.”

Sydney smiles and grabs a paper cup. The usual way is black, but with a generous splash of oat milk.

The machines hiss as the baristas work to fill all the orders. It’s just as busy as a Starbucks on a workday morning. I take a moment and look around the canteen. I spot Caleb and Isla sitting at a table, having breakfast. My brother is laughing at something she said, and I’m so happy for the both of them. They are relationship GOALS. Isla has opened my brother up. I’ve never seen him happier than when he’s with her. And the way he looks at her?

I want that so badly.

I want someone to look at me with the affection, respect, and love that Caleb has in his eyes whenever he spots Isla across the room. Or how he looks at her when she tells him something funny. My brother admires Isla. He’s proud of her and the work she does both on TV and her social media channels. He tells her all the time how beautiful she is and how much he loves her.

The problem is, I want it with the one person I can never have.

I square my shoulders. This is the second thing I worked on during summer break. My personal life. I’m no longer going to participate in this pining for a man who has never shown me anything other than niceties.

It’s flipping cringeworthy when I think of that reality.

I look around the canteen again, but this time, I’m searching for him. Mason Clark. My brother’s rival and the number-one driver on the Collings Motors team. Mason grew up in England, where he first started karting, then went on to do the European circuit like Caleb did. He developed in the driver programme for Eclipse, but signed with Collings Motors a few years ago and became our number-one driver this season.

Oh, and he’s the man I developed a stupid crush on despite the glaring problems with who he is.

As in my family’s name being on his pay cheque and him being engaged in race-to-race combat with my brother in the Drivers’ Championship. Yes, it looks like Xavier Williams will win it—but second is still up for grabs.

With the fight being between the two drivers for Collings Motors.

My crush on Mason couldn’t be any more ill-placed if I tried. There’s no way I could ever date a man who works for my family. My grandfather is Elliot Collings. This team is his baby. He’s shrewd and smart about running an F1 team, and he has the championships to prove it. But the one thing Grandfather can’t stand?