SEVEN

"Anthoine, are you here for the superior Frenchie, or for little old me?"

"For the both of you actually, papouille."  Anthoine Hubert smiled softly at one of his closest friends. She held a mango and passion fruit smoothie in one hand and a croissant in the other.

Larissa squealed in protest as her friend stole her croissant from her hand and took a bite from it, tearing a large section which was roughly half of the size of the pastry that she had bought for her breakfast.

"You annoying little shit!" Larissa huffed in annoyance, before she glared at the sound of loud laughter, turning to see her team mate, Pierre Gasly approaching the duo with an elated smile on his face. "Docinho, the asticot is bullying me and stealing my food!"

"Ooo, croissant." Pierre spoke, eating the other half of the croissant, ignoring his team mates whine in defeat. "Hey, buddy." He greeted his friend with their usual handshake.

"Hey, Pierre. I can't stay long, I said I would meet Charles and Esteban too, but until then, I figured that we could catch up, and you two can tell me all about how Charles took the news of Larissa being Luiz's daughter." Anthoine grinned as his friends laughed, rolling their eyes at his words.

"Well, he didn't do a Lando."

"No fainting?" Anthoine gasped, placing his hand on his heart. "Not fair, he should have fainted!"

"He ran away." Pierre admitted with a loud laugh.

Anthoine's eyes widened. "Oh, that is way better than doing a Lando, do tell me more."

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"You know what to do, right?" Zahra held her friends shoulders, staring in to the brown of her eyes. "Floor it, don't crash, get as quick lap as you possibly can."

Larissa rolled her eyes. "Really? I thought that after turn one that I would just drive in to the barrier, you know. Seems like a fun idea."

"You know, this is the problem with you." Zahra huffed. "You're being sarcastic but at the same time, you would literally try it." The Bailey woman shook her head.

"I'm not gonna be there to pull you out from your wrecked car again if you do, I'm in the Toro Rosso garage and I think Franz has got one of the engineers to babysit me." Zahra warned her best friend to drive with caution.

"Relax, it's in the Cohen genes to do well at Bahrain, I got this."

It was true.

Larissa did have it.

She qualified in 7th, just behind her team mate who also had it, qualifying 6th.

Zahra was next to Franz when both of his drivers made it in to the top ten with ease, and she swore that the man nearly had a heart attack from shock.

She also noticed that as soon as her best friend left the car, that she was approached by a certain team principal, dressed in red.

"Miss Cohen, great qualifying." Maurizio Arrivabene smiled at the young girl. He noticed her scowl at his presence. "I came to wish you luck from Ferrari for the race."

"I do not care, leave me alone." Larissa glared coldly at the man who was in charge of the team that killed her father.

"We hope to recruit you to our Ferrari team next season, since you declined the seat this season." Maurizio spoke politely to the girl.

"I'll decline it again next season too, I told you. I'm not interested." Larissa practically snarled at the man. How could he not understand that she did not ever want to drive for Ferrari.

"But we think that it would be in your best interests to-"

"It'll be in your best interest to fix your brakes so you're not killing your best drivers, but since you're too dumb to do that, watch your back. If my uncles die in one of your cars because of your failings, I will ensure that the whole world knows that you ignored my dad's worries about the brakes and sent him out anyway." Larissa took a step forward to threaten the team principal of Ferrari, who seemed incredibly surprised.

Not by her threat. But by the knowledge that his team had knowingly sent the Brazilian racing driver out knowing that there was a problem with the brakes.

"Miss Cohen, I was not aware of that, I'm so-"

"Yeah, yeah. You're sorry, you had no idea and whatever. Doesn't bring my dad back with your apologies. So, I hope you'll understand that when I say that I will never drive a Ferrari, that I mean, I would rather lick the feet of every person in every garage that get in any Ferrari. And I fucking hate feet." Larissa's face scrunched up in disgust, but it was true. There was no way in hell that she was getting in a Ferrari.

"Now get out of my sight, I want to be able to celebrate with a team who actually listens to their drivers."

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"Okay, so we're going to need you to try and keep your position for as long as possible. We have a real good shot at double points, let's keep it that way."

"Copy that."

Larissa was just behind Pierre on the starting grid, but as soon as the race commenced, she roared in front of him and the driver in front of him, having got a better start than her team mate, but thankfully, he was right behind her.

She was in 5th, straight out of the start, if she could hold on, then she would get some good points as would Pierre.

There had been a yellow flag not long after, which had meant that their was a safety car for a few laps, until the debris was clear, and as soon as she noticed that she could not see her team mate in her mirrors, she spoke to her engineer.

"Who got hit?"

Larissa's voice crackled through the radio. She weaved to keep her tyres warm to ensure that once the safety car was gone, that she could set off and get ahead since she had gone up another place before the safety car.

"Looks like Gasly got shunted from behind by Verstappen who got hit by Ricciardo. They're all out. It's all on you, kid."

Her radio engineer sounded worried, presumably because she could easily lose her place and end up right down the grid.

"Who's behind me?"

"Lewis. He's catching up, so do your best."

Great. Larissa groaned. Double points was now out of the window, and she had Lewis heading her way, and honestly, she just hoped that she could pull it off.

She could see the Mercedes of Valterri Bottas in front of her, and knowing that there was another Mercedes on their way, she knew that she was going to struggle, but she decided to take Zahra's advice and floor it.

Valterri Bottas could hear his radio engineer screaming at him to not let the Toro Rosso past him and to defend until Lewis could arrive to overtake. So he did just that.

Every turn he took, he took the inside line to force her to take the outside line if she wanted to overtake. The crowd roared as the pair battled, with the Mercedes defending just enough to allow his team mate to catch up.

Lewis was now visible in her mirrors, and whilst she loved the guy, she was not prepared to let him past. He would have to steal it from a Cohen, one who wasn't going to go down without a fight.

The laps passed by as the two Mercedes were involved with the Toro Rosso that refused to give in. The crowd seemed to love it that just when they thought Bottas had got away from the Brazilian, she seemed to pull it back, whilst  defending at the same time from Hamilton.

She had been informed over the radio that she was now currently sitting in third, since Raikonnen had a DNF to his name, which was a massive achievement in itself to even hold a podium, even if she faced the possibility of losing it at any given moment.

She pitted for fresh tyres at the same time as Lewis and she prayed that she had got out before he did, and maybe, just maybe, her dad was watching over her.

Because she was ahead of Lewis coming out of the pits.

"Come on Lis, you've got this." She whispered to herself as she neared the final lap, still defending from the Mercedes of Lewis. Surely, she was getting points now and potentially a podium. Surely.

"FUCK!" Larissa screamed as Lewis had just managed to squeeze past her at the final corner. She once again floored it to attempt to take back the place but after holding the Mercedes back for 80% of the race, the Mercedes roared home to a podium.

"P4! That's P4, kid! You've got points, well done! Don't beat yourself up about the podium, you did amazing."

"P4 will do, I guess."

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Two races in to her first formula one season, and she had managed to get points. Admittedly, she knew that she could and should have bagged herself a podium, but there wasn't much that she could do about it, she just had to hope that she could steal a podium from Mercedes in the near future.

Payback will be a bitch.

But, in the meantime, twelve points would do her nicely. Franz was over the moon for her to have won her first points, as was her team mate, who despite being taken out as the two Red Bull's had crashed in to each other and took him out along the way, never let his smile fade as he congratulated the Brazilian.

"Mon Cherie, you did amazing! I'm so proud of you." Pierre hugged her tightly, kissing at her cheeks.

He noticed that she just hummed quietly and he knew that she was annoyed with herself for letting Lewis past, but there was nothing that she could have done. She did everything right, and it was only the experience and speed of the four time world champion that had stolen the podium from her.

"Thank you, docinho. I'm sorry that you couldn't have got points." She apologised to her team mate as she allowed him to hug her tightly, finding some comfort in his arms.

"Not to worry, I will get them soon enough, as you will get your podium." Pierre comforted her, before he wrapped his arm tightly around her small frame and walked with her to where the Larissa Cohen fan club was in full attendance.

"You did great, kiddo. Your father would be proud." Kimi patted her head softly, a fond look in his steel blue eyes that was solely reserved for his best girl. His niece.

"He's probably screaming right now how happy he is." Fernando Alonso walked towards her, pulling her in to a hug.

"I've got to make it quick since I won, but I'm so proud of you." Sebastian Vettel ran in to the Toro Rosso garage, kissing at her temple, hugging her from behind before he was forced to run away, as Lewis waved at her, also running towards the podium.

"Lis, you know I could cry with happiness, and I would, like really I would, but-"

"Your foundation was expensive, yeah I know." Larissa laughed as Zahra grabbed a hold of her, pulling her in to her chest, the pair clinging to each other desperately.

"You kicked my ass this time, for sure." Esteban Ocon teased as he entered the garage, winking at his friend. He approached her from behind, wrapping his arms around her small frame, draping them over her shoulders as his chest nestled its way on to the top of her head.

"I told you I would, Estie. You just didn't believe me." Larissa smirked, a glint in her eyes that made her uncles do a double take. They knew that they had seen that look before, since it was one that they had seen many, many times.

She was definitely her father's daughter.

Her phone burst to life, causing her frown as her best friend handed it to her. Immediately her eyes widened upon recognising the contact that was sprawled across the screen of the phone. She clicked the accept button and quickly placed the phone on speaker.

"Honey, I'm so proud of you." Sara Cohen's voice shot through the speaker of her phone, causing Zahra to drop her drink of water in surprise.

Her uncles watched her facial expressions carefully, in case they needed to step in and cut the conversation short, but found that it wasn't needed.

"Hello, mother. How lovely of you to remember me." Larissa spat coldly, surprising her loved ones around her.

"I'm so sorry baby, I've just been super busy."

Larissa nodded, a look of bitterness across her face. "Ah yes, I know. Manicures and massages are needed for your survival, I'm well aware of that."

"Don't be like that, I'm trying my best, honey." Sara's voice sounded sad, as if it hurt her to know that her only child was unhappy with her.

"Good for you, try your best elsewhere. Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to celebrate with the family that I do have who actually attend my races." Larissa hung up on her mother, seeing the concerned looks from her friends and uncles.

"I need alcohol."

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