Unchained Melody (Daniel Ricciardo)

Darkness

When Daniel and Ayla arrive at the large backyard of the Horner property, they aren't the first ones to get there.
Checo is already talking to Christian, beer in hand. Geri is carrying out a large bowl filled with salad.

Ayla watches the faces of Christian and Checo. She knows their team boss was less than happy with their Mexican driver after his dive bomb on Charles.

The temporary buildings that they use for every race aren't very sound proof and Ayla's office is exactly across the narrow hall of Christians. So she was able to overhear a lot of what was said between Checo and Christian.

It wasn't pretty. Christian told Checo in very clear words that he'd better start listening to his engineer because his actions of today caused the team valuable points and money. The car was very damaged which will cost more than Ayla makes in a couple of years to get fixed.

She couldn't hear everything Checo said, but he wasn't really coming across as apologetic, she heard some small parts of his defense and he was blaming Charles for the whole thing.
That didn't go down well with Christian because he raised his voice and it was obvious that Checo needs to get his act together or there would be some major consequences.

Of course Ayla kept what she heard to herself, luckily for Checo, the rest of the social media crew, was outside taking pictures and making videos of the team starting to pack up the garage. They only have a few days to get everything to Austria to build it back up for the Spielberg Grand Prix.

It's Red Bulls home race and Ayla is very much looking forward to it. She loves Austria and she always loved going there with her father. No matter how horrible her dad has been to her since her mom passed away, she will never forget the amazing memories she was able to make with him.

When Christian spots Ayla and Daniel his face lights up. He is done with Checo for today, it wouldn't have been so bad if Sergio would have just taken responsibility for his actions, but the fact that he kept blaming Charles while the poor young Monagasque was completely innocent today, pisses Christian off more than he wants to admit.

But now he sees the woman he unofficially adopted as his eldest daughter and the man he still misses as a driver for his team. The sight of the two together makes everything that happened today disappear to the background.

"Ayla! Daniel! Come on in, I'm glad you're both here. Are your parents coming Dan? And your friend and Sam?" He asks while dragging the two with him to the table with drinks.

"My parents should be here shortly." Daniel replies, thankfully accepting a cold beer from Christian.
"Amy and Sam are on their way as well. They were very excited to be invited tonight." Ayla smiles. She takes a can of coke from the large bucket filled with ice and soda cans.

She looks around the garden.
They have put up fairy lights all over the place and even though it isn't dark yet, still they already make the area look festive and romantic at the same time.

There's two large tables set for everybody to sit on. Christian has hired a cook to do the grilling and Geri has prepared the side dishes.
They even have a small part of the grass covered to create a dance floor.
Soft music plays in the background giving the place even more atmosphere.

Around the dance floor there's some standing tables where everybody can just socialize without it feeling like an official dinner.

After Geri put the salad on the table she comes over to greet Ayla and Daniel.
"Daniel congrats with your result today. You must be thrilled?" Geri hugs him as if she is a proud mother and Daniel is her son.

"Yeah it feels good to finally have some points, but I wish I would have gotten them sooner. And of course I'll have to keep this up." He tells her. Surely he is pleased about today, but if he ends up in the back again next weekend it doesn't mean anything.