Chapter 127
[ 1,052 words ]
Katia’s POV
I saw Delia before she saw me.
She was at the edge of the VIP lounge at nine AM, already positioned for maximum visibility. Dressed sharply. Composed. Smiling at anyone with a camera. She had committed to this fully, and she was going to ride it as far as it would take her.
She had no idea what was coming.
Sam had texted me at seven: Delia is here. Atlantis. Arrived yesterday.
I had read it and put my phone down and sat with the feeling of someone watching a car drive toward a wall in slow motion. I could not stop it. I was not sure I wanted to. Delia had made this choice herself, with full knowledge of what she was doing, and whatever happened next was the consequence of it.
I got a coffee and positioned myself near the race screens and waited.
Riya Mehta found Delia at nine fifteen.
I knew who Riya Mehta was. She had broken the original story. She was good — thorough, fast, with the instinct of someone who always knew when a story had a second act. She walked up to Delia with a recorder, a photographer, and the professional warmth of a shark approaching a seal.
I moved slightly closer without appearing to.
“Mrs Windsor,” Riya said, recorder already running. “Following your statement earlier this week about being Catwoman our readers would love to know more. Can you describe Catwoman’s signature move from the underground race here in Dubai last night p>
Delia smiled. That beautiful, practised smile. “It was an incredible night,” she said. “The atmosphere at the circuit was p>
“The underground race,” Riya said again. Pleasantly. Specifically. Not letting her redirect. “Last night. The industrial port circuit. Catwoman won in just over six minutes. Her signature final corner. Can you describe it for us p>
The smile stayed on Delia’s face.
But her eyes changed.
She had not known there was a race last night. Of course she hadn’t. She had been at the Atlantis ordering champagne and reading her own press coverage. She had claimed to be Catwoman before she had any idea Catwoman was going to race. And now she was standing in front of a live recorder being asked to describe a race she did not know had happened.
Holy shit.
“The final corner is—” Delia started. She paused. “The approach requires—” Another pause. She was rebuilding on the fly, assembling something from whatever racing knowledge she had managed to pick up in the last forty-eight hours. “The driver needs to manage the weight transfer through the p>
“Mrs Windsor.” Riya pulled out her phone. Turned the screen toward Delia. “This is footage from last night. I’d love for you to walk us through what you’re doing here p>
The footage was Catwoman’s final corner. Twenty seconds of it. The line, the speed, the exit. Everything that made it what it was.
Delia looked at the screen.
She looked at it for a very long time.
The photographer was taking pictures. Click. Click. Click.
“That corner,” Delia said carefully. “The configuration on that—the car setup is specific to p>
“What car were you driving?” Riya asked. Simple question. Basic question. The kind of question any driver could answer in half a second.
Delia named the wrong car.
Not slightly wrong. Completely wrong. A different manufacturer, a different class, a car that had not been anywhere near that circuit in its entire production history.
The photographer lowered his camera slightly and exchanged a look with Riya.
Riya did not lower hers. She made a note. She smiled at Delia with the specific professional warmth of someone who had everything they needed and was being kind about it. “Thank you so much for your time, Mrs Windsor p>
Delia stood there for a moment.
Then she turned and walked toward the exit with the controlled pace of a woman who absolutely was not running but needed to be anywhere except where she currently was. Her jaw was set. Her shoulders were perfect. She did not look at anyone.
She walked right past me.
She did not see me. Or she saw me and decided not to acknowledge it, which was worse.
I watched her go.
Within fifteen minutes the clip was live. Riya had moved fast. The headline read: Fake Catwoman Exposed? Windsor Wife Can’t Identify Race Car. The photograph was of Delia looking at the phone screen — that specific expression, the one where the calculation was visible, where you could see the exact moment someone understood that they had claimed something they could not back up.
It was devastating. Not because it was cruel. Because it was accurate.
Within forty minutes it had thirty thousand shares. The racing community were merciless — they always were when someone faked their way into their world. The comments were brutal. Borrowed suit and zero knowledge. Disgraceful. Did she even Google the car before opening her mouth?
I put my phone away.
I turned back to the race screens and looked at them without really seeing them.
I felt something complicated and without a clean name. Delia had done this to herself. She had walked into that lounge and made that claim and stood in front of that journalist, and now the whole world was watching her fall apart in a fifteen-second clip. I had not wanted this for her. I would not have chosen this for her.
But I had not been the one who chose anything here.
I was still standing at the window when I felt it — that specific awareness I had stopped trying to explain. The certainty of being looked at before you could confirm it.
I turned.
Julian was thirty feet away in the VIP area. He was not looking at the screen where Delia’s clip was playing. He was not looking at anything except me.
Our eyes met.
His expression was completely still. Not satisfaction. Not relief. Just the focused, unreadable attention of a man who was looking at the person he had spent four years searching for and had already decided what came next.
I held his gaze for three seconds.
Then I turned back to the race screens.
I sipped my water.
My hand was completely steady.
I had no idea why that still surprised me.
If you find any errors (non-standard content, ads redirect, broken links, etc Please let us know so we can fix it as soon as possible.