Sugar Baby Beautiful(69)
She’d done it.
Getting up, I squeezed past my parents. Buttoning up the top of my jacket, I headed toward backstage. I grinned when I saw how alive everyone was, cheering her on. Shaking my head at them, even though I couldn’t help the smile from my face, I met up with Nolan, who gave me the large bouquet of roses and a bottle of water.
“Am I a genius or am I genius, brother?” Walt clapped his hands together over his head, dancing his away over to me with the fattest grin on his face. “We did it!”
“No, Walt, you did it. You are a genius,” I admitted, giving him his five minutes of praise.
“I wish I could say it was all me.” He smiled. “But it was all her.”
The routine came to an end. I wished she’d get a chance to stop and accept applause, or have people throw roses at her feet, but it wasn’t that type of event. So she wouldn’t get them on stage, but the moment she stepped behind the curtain, everyone applauded.
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Thank you,” she gasped between breaths, standing straighter. “Thank you all so much.”
She put her hands on her face the moment she saw the flowers and cried so hard her body shook.
“You were amazing,” I said, giving her a small hug.
She pulled her hands from her face, her eyes red, taking a deep breath and accepting the flowers from me. “Thank you, Theo. For everything, thank you.”
“Didn’t I tell you? You never have to say thank you to me.”
Before they could speak, someone clapped even though everyone else had stopped by then.
We both turned to see Violet standing there in a dark purple dress, her dark hair pulled back. “You were great, Felicity—”
“Thank you, Violet.” Felicity turned to face her. “Coming from you, it means a lot.”
“You have to forgive me. I just never thought someone like you could ever pull something like this off, but then again your mother was Amelia Ford.”
I didn’t know who that was, but a few dancers seemed to. They gasped, their heads snapping to Felicity, who stared at Violet in shock.
Violet took another step forward. “Your real name is Felicity Harper Ford, isn’t it? Daughter to New York Governor Daniel Ford.”
“Stop,” Felicity said, glaring at her.
But Violet didn’t stop. “I should have known. You look just like her!”
“Violet, that is enough. You need to go,” I said.
She laughed, shaking her head at me. “She’s been lying to you this whole time, Theo! She isn’t some struggling twenty-something. Her family is loaded! But that isn’t the even the icing on the cake.”
Felicity started toward the exit.
“You were at Juilliard until you had a breakdown!” Violet yelled. “Just like your mother. What did she have? Oh, that’s right. Schizophrenia!”
The roses I had given her slipped from her hand, and there were tears in her eyes.
“No….” She shook her head.
“You have it too! You went crazy. They say you got into a car accident and thought you hit your own mother. They found you holding onto yourself, crying ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry….’”
“I hit someone and went to juvie,” Felicity yelled back.
“Juvie?” Violet laughed. “Since when is Golden Crossroads Hospital a juvenile detention facility? It cost two grand a night, and you were there for three years. You’re really insane, aren’t you?”
Felicity stood there for a second, her mouth open, and looked around in confusion, tears rolling down her cheeks.
“You’re wrong,” she stammered before running.
“Felicity!” I started to race after her, but Violet clenched on to my arm.
“Let her go!” she yelled.
I pulled away from her so hard she stumbled backward.
“DO NOT EVER TOUCH ME!” I hollered in her face.
“Theo, she’s insane, like medically—”
“The only insane person I saw here tonight was you! You’ve always been selfish, Violet. But I didn’t realize you were cruel too. What did this serve, embarrassing her in front of all these people? What do you get out of it other than being a fucking bitch who still can never dance?”
She looked to me like I had slapped her. “She was lying to everyone.”
“The only thing we ever cared about was her dancing,” Walter said. “And she never lied about that.”
“Violet, get the hell out of my building. Don’t contact me or my family or anyone else close to me. You are not welcome. You are nothing,” I said to her before leaving to chase after Felicity.
The first place I went was her dressing room, not bothering to knock before entering, but it was empty, her bag still on the counter. I heard beeping from her old cell phone.