A phone number for her office in hell? Clearly, this woman is meaner than a demon.
“If Parnell contacts you before, call me immediately, if you know what’s good for you. Now, go,” Helen orders, waving her hand. Once my aunt complies, she stares at Georgie and turns away, as if it’s too overwhelming to look at her.
I’m not buying her fucking act. If she cared so much, Georgie wouldn’t be in this situation.
“I have a proposition for you, Mr. Mason. If you and my granddaughter agree, I’ll expect your complete cooperation.”
“Georgie?” I echo, unable not to look at her, even though I know what I’ll find.
She shrugs. “If she survives. If not, get on with your life.”
A tremble passes through Georgie as if she knew I needed something to stop me from tossing Helen out of the fucking window after her cold announcement.
“Whatever she needs from me, it’s hers.”
Her assessment is smug and shrewd. “I’ll keep that in mind,” she swears, and rattles off Crowell Daniels address.
Georgie
Wildflowers surround me and I twirl, free and happy, the sweet smell invading every part of me. Here, wherever I’m at, I’m unencumbered. No wish for love. No feeling the abandonment of my mother. No anything, except color and light, sweet scents and cool breezes. The sky is vast and blue, mostly cloudless, meeting the sea of wildflowers way off in the distance.
“Georgie?”
A sigh whispers through my lips. Sloane is here. He’s with me. I don’t see him, but I hear his beautiful voice, and I smile.
“Open your eyes.”
“Sloane?” I mumble, grinning like a loon. It’s odd that I know I’m smiling when I feel so disconnected from myself.
“Yeah, sweetheart. Kiln is here, too.”
“You’re here. That’s all that counts. I love you.”
His warm lips brush across my forehead and I smell him. “You don’t know me, lamb,” he chastises. “Now, open your fucking eyes.”
The floral scent is strengthening and combining with his smell and antiseptic. My pain receptors are kicking in and my arms and wrists are burning.
“You want to see my handsome face, you’ve got to open those pretty eyes.”
His voice coaxes me to comply. More than anything, though, I do want to look at him. I slide my eyes open and he visibly sags.
“Jesus Christ, finally,” he whispers. “Four fucking days, Georgie. That’s how long you’ve been out.”
My throat is scratchy and achy. He grabs my hand and squeezes, threading his fingers through my hair. It startles me at how easily his hand glides through. The last time I touched my hair, it was snarled and tangled.
My last memory is of being locked away.
“What fucking possessed you to—“
“I just wanted out of that room Mom put me in,” I tell him, starting to cry. “It was dark and lonely and cold and smelly. She wouldn’t let me out.”
He calls the nurse’s station and lets them know I’m awake. Ten minutes later, my vital signs are checked and it’s just me, Kiln and Sloane in the room.
Sloane shakes his head at me. “If that maid hadn’t gone to collect that fucking tray, you’d be fucking dead.”
He sounds tortured by the idea. I swallow. “Who’d miss me? I’ve been out of school for weeks and no one has bothered to check up on me. I’ve gotten home assignments, but nothing more.”
He eyes me with suspicion. “You couldn’t work in the dark.”
“I mean before she locked me up.”
Standing, he shoves his hands into his pockets. “Several of our concerts have been cancelled because Maitland’s little sister is so gravely ill.”
“Really? Is she here in Houston?”
“She’s laying in this fucking bed,” Kiln says dryly from the foot of my bed.
Eyebrows raised, I shoot him a surprised look.
“There was no valid reason to cancel tour stops,” Sloane says from beside me.
“Th-thank you,” I whisper, but my heart is sinking. “When do you leave again?”
“That depends on when you’re released,” he tells me. “And what you’d like to do.”
“What does that mean?”
“I want to take you on tour with me, but I have some conditions.”
Is he joking? I’m so afraid to hope he’s telling the truth that I feel lightheaded.
“You have to listen to me,” he tells me.
“You’re right here. I can’t help but hear you.”
“Not now,” he snaps. “On the tour. You follow my orders. We’ll sneak you out of here because once you’re seen, the secret is out. Everyone will know you’re Georgie McCall.”
“Really?” I scoff. “As if I’m so fucking famous.”
“You are,” he says tightly. “And that’s another condition. Clean up your fucking language.”
I glower at him.
He visibly grits his teeth. “You and I won’t be lovers.”