Wow, I think I might've just about recovered from the stress of today's race 🙈 I'm off to Silverstone next weekend and may not survive it if there's a repeat of today!
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"Oh, hey." Aimee did a double take as she walked back into her hotel room. "You're early! I didn't think you'd be back until later with everything to sort out?"
"You got plans I'm keeping you from?" Tom asked, turning to face her with a raised eyebrow.
Aimee faltered for half a second, panic descending over her that he knew she'd been with Lando the night before. He couldn't know, could he?
"No, of course not." She shook her head, kicking off her shoes. "It's been such a mad couple of days with all the promo I must've just lost track of time."
She leant in and kissed him quickly in greeting. Tom said absolutely nothing.
"Well, I'm going to shower quickly then probably order room service for dinner if you want?" She asked. "I'm so tired!"
Still, Tom said nothing, just staring at her with something unable in his eyes. Aimee scuttled into the bathroom, locking the door behind herself. Once inside she sat on the toilet seat, trying to work out what was actually going on. It was unusual for him to turn up so angry before she'd even had a chance to do anything wrong.
She got in the shower and quickly washed her hair, still racking her brains for what might've happened. Her mind just kept circling back to the guilt of her dinner with Lando and the crushing fear that Tom knew.
When she stepped out of the bathroom fifteen minutes later, already in her pyjamas, he was still standing in the middle of their hotel room. He was facing away from her but she could see from the tense set of his shoulders he was angry.
Her eyes wandered down his frame to his clenched fist, and the white envelope he held in it, her heart dropping.
"Is there something you need to tell me, Aimee?" He asked sarcastically, turning to face her. He waved the envelope in front of her, stalking across the room towards her.
Aimee kept stepping backwards instinctively, trying to create some more space between them, but just ended up backing herself into a corner. She stumbled over the rug on the floor, falling flat on her back, and not having time to struggle to her feet before he was stood over her.
"You've been busy these last couple of days, haven't you." Tom asked. "I thought we just needed to talk about your little date with Norris, but now I find out you're quitting your fucking job without telling me? What's your plan here, Aimee? You going to be a WAG? Do you really think someone like him wants to be with a piece of shit like you?"
Aimee cried out in pain as the first blow struck her. Her head connected with the wall at the impact and but she couldn't move. She couldn't say anything. All she could think of was how completely and utterly stupid she'd been letting Lando persuade her to go for dinner.
It was always going to end like this, she should've known better. She should've been smarter. Now the regret was going to haunt her forever.
She struggled again to try and get to her feet, if she could just get up and get into the safety of the bathroom.... Maybe she could call for help? But then who was she going to call?
He was still standing over her, screaming at her, but she couldn't even take the words in. All she could think about was the pain radiating through her whole body as she gasped for breath.
"Aimee, Aimee... wake up." The blood curdling scream had sent Lando scrambling through into the spare bedroom. He'd been half asleep, having finally managed to send his parents back to the hotel for the night, but the sound of her screaming had him jumping out of bed faster than his mind could keep up with his body.
"No, Tom please." Aimee begged. "Please."
"Aimee, wake up." He shook her a little harder this time, hoping it wasn't going to cause too much pain. He didn't know what else to do.
"Aimee wake up, it's just a dream."
Her eyes flew open, and then much to his dismay, immediately filled with tears. The frantic sobs that wracked her whole body were like nothing he'd ever seen from her and he froze for a moment, before climbing on to the spare side of the bed and wrapping his arms around her.
It broke his heart to see. Apart from the few tears shed at the hospital, she'd been so incredibly stoic about the whole thing for the entire time he'd known her, he didn't really know how to handle her emotion. She didn't fight him off though as he held her, so he decided to just go with it and let her get it out.
He had no idea how long they'd been sat there like that for before she spoke, the words coming out in some kind of strangled sob as she tried to steady her breathing and calm herself down.
"I thought he was going to kill me." Aimee confessed. She'd had fights with Tom before of course, but he'd been drunk and uncoordinated, the stone cold sober rage he'd looked down on her with in that hotel room though, had terrified her. There was something in his eyes that she'd never seen before and she could tell he meant every single blow that had followed.
Lando froze for a moment, trying to think what to say. It was the closest she'd come to talking about what had happened in that hotel room. He knew from speaking to Zak that the hotel room had been an absolute mess, furniture smashed and blood splattered across the walls. He'd put together his own mental image of what had gone on from that and seeing the state of Aimee when he picked her up. He wasn't sure why he wanted to hear the details. It was only going to make him feel worse. Perhaps some naive hope that whatever she was going to tell him might not be as bad as he'd imagined in his mind.
"Will you... Will you stay with me tonight?" Aimee asked timidly, peeking up at him through her lashes.
"Of course." He whispered, pulling her in closer. "Come on, let's get some sleep, we can talk tomorrow."
YOU ARE READING
Stay With Me- Lando Norris
Fanfiction*Completed* After discovering that one of his coworkers is in a desperate situation, Lando makes it his mission to try and help her. Except she doesn't want his help, and does everything she can to push him away.
