letters [max verstappen]

34

As expected, Christian was pissed. He called Max the next morning, and from what I heard and Max's face after the call, he basically just yelled at him for half an hour. Max didn't want to talk about it, he seemed upset, but at least he told me that his seat wasn't in danger. Williams was less upset with me, I had a quick chat with Jamie, Eliza, and Gianna who basically just explained that I would have some extra media training to go to and reminded me that the situation hadn't changed, Max and I still weren't allowed to see each other during race weekends.

That night I was streaming with Lando and Charles. "Sooooo Becca, we can finally talk about you and Max!" Lando exclaimed.

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, there's not much to say though." I heard Charles start to giggle in the background. "What, Charlie?"

"Chouchou, there is so much to say." He cackled, and Lando laughed along with him
I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, maybe I'll write a book about it someday."

––

It was late when I finished my stream, and Max was sitting on the couch watching TV when I walked out of the sim room. "Hey." I leaned over the couch behind him and pressed a kiss to his forehead, then walked around and plopped down next to him.

"Hey." He pulled me close, laying an arm around my shoulders as I curled up into his chest. "How'd our first day publicly together go for you?"

I sighed. "Really weird. Did you see all the big sports accounts posting about us? We were on Bleacher Report and Sky Sports."

He traced my arm with his thumb. "Yeah, my DMs are full of people just sending me every post about us. It's weird."

We sat there for a few minutes with just the ambiance of the soccer game that was replaying on TV. "Do you want to talk about your conversation with Christian?" I asked. I couldn't help but be curious, I told him all about my call with Giulia but he still wouldn't tell me about his call.

There was a long pause as if he was thinking about how to respond. "I think you should publicly apologize to Christian." He finally said quietly.

I frowned and sat up to look him in the eye. "Are you kidding me, Max? Me, apologize to him? I'll talk to him, but he should apologize to me."

He looked down, unable to meet my eyes. "You hurt his rep, Becks. All of Red Bull's rep."

"Did he tell you to say this? I don't care about his rep, he almost ruined my career!" I exclaimed. I may have been overreacting, but I was starting to get angry. Max might have gotten his dad out of his professional life, but he just went from one middle-aged manipulator to another.

"Becca." He grasped my hands and finally looked up at me, and I could see the pain in his eyes. "Please, do it for me."

I bit my lip. What isn't he telling me? "I need to talk to Jamie, Eliza, and Gianna about it." I pressed a light kiss to his lips and he leaned into it, wanting more. I ignored him and stood up, going to our bedroom to get ready for bed. After doing my night routine I got in bed, and Max silently joined me a few minutes later. I let him snake his arms around my stomach and hold me close, but I couldn't stop thinking about what the hell he wasn't telling me.

––

The next morning I had a call with Gianna and Eliza and explained what Christian wanted to them.

"Honestly dear, I don't think it's a bad idea." Eliza admitted.

I frowned. "Why?"

"The media is really nitpicking you, especially about Red Bull, we've known that for a while. So, if you give a public apology to Christian, say, during a press conference when we start racing again, maybe the media will accept that the feud is done and they'll leave you alone." Eliza explained.