I leave her on read and look up at the ceiling, trying to process her words. I could try my best to change him, but I don’t want to. I’ve achieved many things, and Mr. Donatello may be one of them. But I can only do so much.
I hear my phone ding beside me, I grab it and the notification reads that my favorite WAG F1 Instagram handle posted recently.
Before I started racing, I was always interested in the concept of driver’s wives and girlfriends. Being a professional female athlete, I’ve always wanted someone to make a HAB account for female drivers. But I don’t know if that’ll ever happen. Tapping on the notification, the face ID on my phone unlocks. I can’t lie. I like to see new photos of my fellow drivers being carefree and in love. It makes up for my most evidently shitty love life.
The Instagram logo pops up, then redirects me to a picture of Luca and Adèle kissing. I think it’s an old photo for a second, but then I see the exact same outfit he was wearing when he left.
Trying to keep my morale up, I look at the caption. The thing I like about this page in particular is that they give exact dates to when every picture was taken.
F1WAGS4LIFE:10/26/22 Luca Donatello and his ex-wife, the infamous Adèle Manon, seen kissing outside of her father’s atelier today in the city of love. The big question here: is the divorced couple back together?
I don’t react, don’t even break a sweat. I may be infuriated on the inside, but I don’t like to react to a man’s faults. I’ve experienced many of those in my life. This wouldn’t make him special in any way.
I grab my laptop from my side table and rip it open. Furious typing can be heard echoing around me as I book a flight to Paris. After buying a hotel room for two nights, I get up and grab my suitcase. Making a few calls, I zip my suitcase closed and walk out of my apartment, making my way to the airport.
I’m about to make a bitch remember what he lost.
ChapterTwenty-Eight
Maria Alejandra
“It looks amazing, Ale!” Madeline, my hair stylist, says while shrieking at the same time. I look at my new just above the shoulder length hair, it’s as straight as uncooked spaghetti and I like this new look. After calling my hair, makeup artist, and styling team, they all flew in with me for the gala.
Hisgala that he so needed to attend, where he just happened to trip into kissing his ex. I’m going for something completely different than usual. You can call it a mental breakdown. I call it making a man drop onto his knees in front of me. My vibe won’t change after this, but I need to feel fresh to shed him off my skin.
“I like it. It’s givingkneel before mevibes.” I stare at myself in the mirror knowingly. While I love it, I kind of miss my curls. But I know they’ll come back with time. Hair grows back but embarrassment never washes away.
I’m not mad about the fact that he kissed her, it gave me a reality check of sorts. I’m pissed that he was playing me the whole time.
This makeup look is so weird on me, but it will match the dress that I picked specifically for this. It was inspired by the women he kissed on the streets of Paris, hand-picked from her daddy’s couture collection.
I’m going from my usual matte makeup to a glowy look. The base is wet in a way and my eyeshadow is a gold shimmer surrounding my eyelids. I kept my lashes natural with a little bit of lift by adding single extensions. My nude lip remains with a shimmer gloss over the top.
“The dress just got here,” Giselle says behind me, being my stylist and all, she blew this last minute “project” out of her ass. I see the gold dress in front of me in all its glory. What a perfect name for such a special occasion.
Dropping my robe to the ground, I hop in, and it’s a perfect fit. Zipping it up, I see the metallic gold material draped over the naked parts of my skin. I look at myself and see someone different. I recognize a fighter in my reflection. Ready to lure him in and kill him silently. I should have protected my heart from all of this. This dress pays homage to who I am and who I was before him. A fucking queen.
“You, of all people, know that this has to be perfectly timed out,” I say a little too aggressively to my publicist, Lauren.
“Ale, I know. But we’ve been sitting here for thirty minutes and the event coordinators are calling for you to get out of the car.” I sigh in defeat and jump out of the seat from the side that no one can see me walk onto the concrete sidewalk. Just as my feet hit the floor, I hear shouting.
“Luca, look over here!” I turn my head to Lauren, and she gives me a knowing look in return. When I told her I needed to get an invite for this gala, she was all for it.
I don’t make a lot of public appearances only because I get busy or occupied by the hecticness that is the Elektra calendar. Now that I have a little bit of time off, my vendetta is welcomed with open arms.
The idea to fly to Paris and attend the gala without Mr. Donatello knowing about it was a hard task to take on. Usually, when you attend a gala of this magnitude, they like to announce who will be attending on a list. This helps people like Mr. Donatello find investors they might think are interested. But somehow, with the magic that is Lauren, we got it done. She can be very persuasive when she wants something.
One of the instrumental parts of this scheme is to make sure that Luca goes in first so that I can walk up behind him, smacking him in the face with my presence. It’s working so far, aside from roadblocks happening at every turn, but it’s not anything I can’t handle.
Crossing the street, all the photographers turn their attention from Mr. Donatello to me. They start yelling my name instead of his as they scramble for their cameras.
That’s more like it. Not such the golden boy anymore, huh?
I walk up the stairs, looking down at each step I pass. I give them some poses once I reach the top of the stairs. I don’t want to give too much, just enough for them to wonder why I’m here.
“ALE, I LOVE YOU!” I smile at them, waving in their direction.
“I love you too,” I mouth to a fan, words that the man of the hour couldn’t say in his wildest dreams. I keep going down, giving all the photographers shots of my every movement before reaching the end.