“Gracie Bean,” he said softly, using my childhood nickname. “I need you. Please?”
“Henry Bear,” I whispered with a sigh. Henry never knew the real reason why I dropped out of school and slowly disappeared from my family’s life. He simply made the assumption that a modelling career was something I wanted and I didn’t correct him. Why would I? He would’ve pulled the big brother card, and who knew where he’d be today if he’d done that?
I mentally reviewed my schedule, knowing there was no free time in there for a side trip to Sydney, but something unfurled in my chest, and with Henry needing an answer, there was no time to pinpoint what it was. All I knew was that he needed me, and just like back then, I wasn’t going to let him down. “Of course I’ll do it.”
“Thank God,” he replied.
“Only God? What about me?”
Henry laughed and my lips curved at the sound.
“We’ll pay you,” he added.
“You know I don’t need the money. Just … tell Frog he owes me dinner or something, okay?”
“Frog is not taking you to dinner. You need to treat him like he has leprosy, or the black plague. Wait! Are they the same thing? I suck at historic diseases. You—”
“Henry!” I heard his band manager, Mac, shout.
“Hang on,” he muttered again. Another muffled conversation followed before he was back. “We don’t play until nine tonight, but if we can you get on a flight this afternoon, that’ll give us time for you to learn the song we’re lined up to play.”
“I can do that.”
“Thanks, Gracie Bean. You know …” Henry hesitated.
“What?” I prompted.
“Well, Frog is going to be out of action for a while. We’d love to have you stay and play for us for a few weeks if there was some way you could manage it.”
“A few weeks?”
“Yeah.”
It wasn’t a good idea. John would be pissed. But getting away was starting to sound really appealing. “Okay. Let me see what I can do.”
After arranging the details, I hung up, startled when I caught John standing just inside the door, his arms folded. I met his brown eyes in the mirror, seeing anger burning in their dark depths. “Did you hear?”
He nodded wordlessly.
“John.”
“It’s a bad time with the shit you’ve got going on. I don’t think you should go.”
I closed my eyes against the censure in his voice. John’s arms wrapped around me from behind and squeezed. I could feel the rapid thumping of his heart where his chest pressed up against my back.
“Grace—”
“I’m going, John. Henry needs me.”
His arms fell away abruptly and my eyes flew open. “Goddammit!” he growled loudly. “You know what? You never listen to me anyway, so just go!”
I flinched when he turned around and punched the wall, leaving a dent in the plaster. Paint flaked off, fluttering harmlessly to the pale timber floor. After drawing a deep breath, he muttered something that sounded like, “stubborn bitch,” before he turned and left the dressing room.
That right there, was the fourth clue that my day sucked donkey’s balls. Surely it couldn’t get worse, right?
With no time to change or take off the thick layer of makeup, I stood up, calling out, “Jemima!” as I left the dressing room.
She was at the small table by the window where everyone was now eating lunch, pulling all our things together between grabbing at food. Mitsy was by her side, chewing through the thick leather leash that tied him to the chair.
Shit. Mitsy.
“Jemima, I have to fly to Sydney. It’s likely I could be gone for a few weeks.”
Not pausing her packing, she replied, “I know. Your flight details just came through on email.” She looked at me then. “And no.”
“No? You don’t even know what I was going to ask you.”
“I’m not looking after Mitsy.”
Dammit.
I looked at John. He sat at the table with a bottle of water, not eating. He reclined back in his chair and folded his arms. The tension was palpable as everyone eyeballed us, obviously having heard our brief argument just moments ago.
“John,” I began. Feeling desperate, I started towards him.
He held up a hand and I paused. “You know I would,” he said, and we both knew he was lying because no one would take Mitsy, not on a dare, or the knowledge of an impending tsunami, or even on the promise of cold, hard cash. “But I’ve got that job up north in three days, and then I’m going to be out of the country for the next couple of weeks.”
“Are you sure?”