-Katia- Sam texted at : I'm outside . Go . That was our system . She parked two blocks from the building , engine running , and sent one word when the coast was clear . I was already dressed . The carbon fiber suit lived in the false floor of my wardrobe behind the winter coats , a cavity I had engineered myself , measured to the centimeter , and lined with sound dampening material so the zip didn't carry . Aiden had never found it . He found everything eventually , but he hadn't found this . I intended to keep it that way . I checked on him first . Always .

Every single time , without exception , I stood in the frame of his door for thirty seconds before I left . He was on his back tonight , one arm flung wide , duvet halfway off , the nightlight casting everything in soft amber . His breathing was deep and even . The monitor on his bedside table was linked to Sam's phone , she'd see any movement , hear any sound , and be up those stairs in four minutes if she needed to be . Four minutes was fast enough . I pulled the door almost closed and went to get my helmet . The Bronx circuit wasn't a circuit in any official sense .

It was three blocks of decommissioned industrial road behind a logistics park that had been closed for two years , bordered on two sides by chain - link and on the third by a concrete wall someone had been painting since before I started racing here . The artwork was extraordinary , actually . I had spent more time looking at that wall over the years than I had ever admitted to anyone .

Tonight it was lit by floodlights someone had rigged to a generator , and the crowd was pressed three deep along the chain link on both sides , and the noise was already at the level it reached when something worth watching was about to happen . I arrived in Sam's car . I changed in the back , an exercise in spatial awareness I had perfected over years , and walked to the start line in full gear . Blacked - out visor . No name . No number . Just Catwoman , the way I had always been Catwoman , which was entirely and without apology . Twelve riders .

Mostly men , a few women , one I recognized from the Monaco underground circuit who gave me a nod I returned with a tilt of the helmet . The bike was already there . Sam had arranged collection and delivery through a contact who asked no questions and charged accordingly . I ran my hand along the seat the way I always did before a race . Not superstition . Just the physical act of making contact , of saying to the machine : I know you , you know me , let's do this properly .

The starter raised the flag I found the line in my head the geometry of the three blocks , the camber of the road on the second turn , and the slight compression at the far end that most riders didn't account for until they'd done it twice . I had done it nine times . I knew where the road breathed and where it held its breath . The flag dropped . Under four minutes . That was the target I had set myself in the car on the way over , which meant I needed to take the second turn wider than felt comfortable and trust the compression on the exit . Most people didn't trust the compression .

They braked before it , which killed their speed on the back straight , which was where this race was won or lost . I trusted the compression . I won by a margin that made the crowd do something between a scream and a silence that particular stunned beat before the noise caught up with what had just happened . I felt it even through the helmet , even at the speed I was moving when I crossed the line I didn't stop . That was the rule thad made for myself years ago and had never broken . You crossed the lime , you kept moving You were gone before the crowd finished reacting .

Catwoman didn't take bows Catwoman didn't give interviews Catwoman existed in the gap between the flag dropping and the noise arriving and nowhere else . I was already turning onto the service road when I saw him . +25 Bonus He was standing at the far end of the chain - link , slightly back from the crowd , and he wasn't filming the race . He was filming me . The camera , a proper one , not a phone , was pointed directly at where I was and had been pointed at where I was for what looked like the entire race . Not the start line , not the action , not the other riders . Me .

I clocked the position . The angle . The fact that he had placed himself at the exit point specifically . I took the service road at speed , turned left instead of right at the first junction , cut through the logistics park access route , and came out on a street that ran parallel to Sam's position . By the time anyone following my expected exit route reached the road I was supposed to be on , I was two blocks away and moving in the wrong direction for them to matter . I pulled over after three blocks and sat on the bike in the dark for a moment . Someone was watching Catwoman specifically .

Not the race . Not the other riders . Me . I thought about Julian's intelligence analyst . The one Gail had mentioned . Spent twelve years tracking financial criminals , now applies the same methodology to racing aliases . I thought about Julian in the boardroom , sitting very still with his folder , and the other breach , Katia . I thought about the drone grid on the bridge and the heat signature and the man in the crowd tonight with a proper camera pointed at my exit line .

H4 Then I stopped thinking about it , because thinking about it in the dark on a street in the Bronx at midnight was not useful , and I had a six - year - old asleep at home . I texted Sam : Change of route . Give me ten . She responded in four seconds : Clocked . Moving . Back home I scrubbed the suit in the bathroom sink the way I always did , cold water , no soap , thirty seconds , and hang in the cavity behind the coats to dry overnight . The helmet went in its case . The case went under the false floor . The floor went back . The coats went back .

I stood in front of my wardrobe looking exactly like a wardrobe . Aiden was still asleep . I stood in his doorway for another thirty seconds , the cool - down version of the pre - race check , making sure everything was exactly as I had left it . It was . I poured wine I probably didn't need and stood at the floor - to - ceiling windows with the Manhattan skyline doing what it always did at this hour glittering , indifferent , enormous . I had stood at this window more times than I could count , at all hours , in all states , and the city had never once offered me an opinion about any of it .

found that useful . I should stop racing . I knew that . The rational case for stopping was overwhelming : I was a public figure now , I had a son , I had a company , I had a contract with the most powerful private conglomerate in the country , and there was a than with a proper camera standing at my exit line in the Bronx at midnight . I knew all of that .

the I turned the wine glass slowly in my hand and looked at the skyline and thought about the way the road felt under the tyres at the compression point , the way the bike responded when you trusted it , and the specific quality of silence that existed in the half second before the flag dropped when the whole world contracted to a single point and everything else the company , contract , the boardroom , Julian Windsor and his almost smiles and his intelligence analysts and his drone grids disappeared completely . I thought about that half second . I finished the wine . I couldn't stop .

Not yet . Maybe not ever . Racing was the one thing in my life that had been entirely nuume since I was eighteen years old , the one thing I had never shared , never explained , never asked anyone's permission for . It had kept me sane when everything else was falling apart . It had funded Harvard . It had given me Catwoman , which had given me something to be when I had nothing else to be . I wasn't ready to give that to anyone . I rinsed the glass , turned off the kitchen light , and went to bed . The man with the camera was a problem I would handle tomorrow . Tonight I had won .

And for now , that was enough . COIN BUNDLE : get more free bonus 上 Sara Lili Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland's breathtaking cold.