The Lion and The Bull - Max Verstappen

Chapter 9 - Keeping it in the Team

Cecilia sat across from Max in their plane seats and Cecilia gave Max a frightened look as the plane began to take off from the runway. Max simply smiled and did an exaggerated breath to force her to breathe. She, after a couple of deep breaths, finally calmed down and took a sip of her wine. They were flying to Italy from Monaco for their next race. Their plane was massive and had a full bar in the back of it. Cecilia, as much as she traveled, hated flying and often had massive panic attacks when she was forced to fly for her father's work. Now that she was with Max and not her stressful parents, she was able to calm down and enjoy the luxury that was flying. Next to Cecilia sat Max's social media manager, Sophie, who would be photographing Max's journey throughout the season. Max and Cecilia made the decision to not sit next to each other just so that it would make pictures easier and allow Max to be the center of the spotlight. Max posed in his chair and Cecilia held back a laugh as he posed with his wine glass. Once pictures were over, Sophie got up and sat over with some of the other managers to do some work and so Max came and sat next to Cecilia. "How did I look?" Max asked, striking a pose. "You looked fabulous," Cecilia said and adjusted his hat over his hair. Cecilia had decided to stay in Monaco with Max for a few more days and let her father head to Italy for preparations for the race. Of course she did not tell her father that the reason she wanted to stay in Monaco was to be with his top driver but whatever excuse she used worked. Cecilia and Max chatted as they slowly sipped their wine until one of Max's managers came and sat down across from them. "Alright guys. How are you doing?" he asked. "We're doing pretty good. How about you?" Max said a little confused as to why he was here. "Okay. I just have a couple of questions that we need to ask just to avoid any media conflict that may happen at this next race." Cecilia and Max both gave each other a questioning glance and then Max said hesitantly, "Okay." "Alright, first big question, are you two dating?" he asked. Max hesitated and Cecilia said, "Yes." The manager nodded and said, "Okay and this one could be for either of you. Is there anyone we need to be worried about with this relationship?" They gave each other a bewildered glance and Max responded, "Well I guess my ex, Kelly." Cecilia thought for a moment and said, "Well not really. But possibly Esteban, Pierre, or Charles." The manager gave her a look of concern and said, "Okay I will take note of that and we can get into the details later. Thank you, I'll see you two around." They nodded him goodbye and then turned back to each other to debrief what happened. "What if he tells my dad?" Cecilia said worriedly. "You're going to have to tell him at some point if he hasn't caught on already," Max said and gave her a comforting look. "Well, are you ready for your race?" Cecilia asked with a smirk. "I'm ready to win, baby," Max said with an Italian accent. She laughed and said, "Okay I need to take a nap before we get there. I gotta get ready for your win." She closed her eyes and leaned on his shoulder but could not help from smiling as she tried to fall asleep.

"And the race is off at the Monza Grand Prix," The announcer said and the whole team immediately jumped to running analytics and looking at the car's levels. Max started P2 and Checo P9. Checo spun out in the last qualifying and so he was forced to start at a lower position. Max took off from the start and was able to pass Charles on the first corner and gain P1. The first 5 laps were back and forth between Max and Charles before Max was able to get a sizable distance between the two. On lap 23 Lando and Nyck spun out into the gravel but they were both able to get back into the race with little damage and no safety car. Most of the race was slow movement on Checo's part and Max did not move from his position in P1 for over 30 laps. Max's car began to give out with about 5 laps remaining and Charles was beginning to gain back the distance between them. Max was pushing the car as hard as he could but it was not keeping at the proper pace. The engineer team scanned the car and found a valve that was off. Luckily just as Charles overtook Max, the team was able to remotely adjust the valve and Max was able to gain pace again. He overtook Charles again with one lap remaining and was pushing the car to the limits. Charles was pushing as hard as he could but wasn't able to keep up with Max. They were neck and neck on the last straight of the race when Charles managed to Pass Max. With only a 4 car sized length left on the strait, Max was able to activate DRS and regain his position. Max zoomed through the finish line and the whole RedBull team cheered. Checo finished in P3 and the whole team was ecstatic. The race finished and the whole team ran out to the fence to celebrate with the boys. A double RedBull podium was an amazing result for them. Checo in P2 would have been amazing but he wasn't able to make it happen with the competition up top and with his starting position. Max pulled into the first place spot and stood on his car's rim as the crowd cheered for him. After his few moments of fame, he came running over to the team. But not really to the team but to Cecilia, he gave her a big hug and the team let them have their moment before giving him pats and hugs and words of congratulations. He took his helmet off and came back over to Cecilia and gave her a kiss. She couldn't believe that he did, so all she could do was smile and cheer. Her father gave her a look of shock but continued cheering as Checo came over to the team and gave everyone hugs. As the crowd moved over to the podium Checo's wife, Carola, came up to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "So are you and Max dating?" she asked at a whisper with a cheeky smile. Cecilia loved Carola and she often chose to spend her time around her instead of her mother when she attended races. "We are. But please don't tell anyone," Cecilia whispered. "I promise I won't" Carola gave her a giggle and motioned a zipper on her lips. The two walked with intertwined arms over to the podium to watch the boys get their trophies. Max was called last up to the podium and gave Checo a good slap on the shoulder as he walked up. As the anthems played, Max looked down at their team and winked at Cecilia gazing up to him with her grin. When the anthems finished the four of them on the podium grabbed their champagne and began to pour it on each other with no remorse. The crowd cheered and they walked down off of the podium back down to their teams. In this time there would be a commercial break where they could actually talk before interviews. Max ran down the stairs and picked Cecilia up in a hug. "You did amazing Max," Cecilia said and wiped some of the dripping Champagne from off of his forehead. "I did it for you," He said and leaned down and kissed her. They were out of view of most people but some of the interviewers still saw their 'friendly' exchange. Max held her in his embrace and gave her a kiss on the head before walking off into the interview area. Cecilia's father walked up to her after Max left and asked, "Now is your relationship still platonic?" Cecilia rolled her eyes and just smiled as her father breezed past her off into the interview area. She knew that wasn't the last of it but was surprised how he reacted. Cecilia walked into the interview area where a couple photographers took pictures of her standing off to the side. She watched as Max got interviewed and listened in to the conversation. "So Max, how do you think the result was today?" The interviewer asked. "I mean I think it was pretty good. We had some problems towards the end but the team was able to solve it and we still came out on top," he responded. "Alright well that's good. Just one more question for you Max, we saw you after the race just a few moments ago with a girl, does this happen to be a more than 'friendly' relationship?" Max held back a smile because he knew she was listening and gave a quick glance over to where she was standing, "Um, well I'd say it's more than friendly. But if you kiss your friends then please label it as whatever you want." The interviewer laughed and Cecilia could not help but chuckle at his round-a-bout answer. "That's all mate, thank you," the interviewer said and Max stepped away from the microphone. Cecilia took a seat on one of the benches as Max finished up his interviews and scrolled through twitter to see what people had to say about the race. The first thing that popped up was her tagged in a picture of her kissing Max with a caption keeping it in the team I see with a smirk emoji. Cecilia could not help but laugh and kept scrolling down. Another photo but it was just a picture pulled from her instagram from when she was in Monaco, how in the world did he manage to pull her? Another post was just tagging her and said damn, I don't know who I would rather be. She looked at a couple more and decided to stop before she got to the more hateful posts. Max finished his last interview and came over to where Cecilia was sitting on the bench. "Hey C," Max said and Cecilia looked up from her phone. Her face lit up and she gave him a big hug. "How were your interviews?" she asked after a long embrace. "They were pretty good but they didn't have a whole lot to do with the race," Max said with a smirk. Cecilia rolled her eyes and said, "Well now they all know who the mysterious girl is." Max pulled Cecilia towards his body and said, "I just hope I've scared the other drivers off from wanting to fuck my girl." Cecilia smiled and joked, "I don't know, I feel a text coming from Pierre tonight." Max rolled his eyes and leaned down and gave her a kiss through her big smile.