Tension ripples along his jaw, but he doesn’t argue with me.
“I know you’re going to go get her, and I know you’d probably prefer to go alone, but think about how much time you’d save if we could drive in shifts. Straight there and straight back.”
The thought of him going alone hits me like a fist. If he goes alone, gets sucked into his mother’s dark, depraved bullshit, I fear I’ll never see him again. Dallas never told me the full extent of the details, but I know that during my time in Houston—the year we stopped performing together as frequently—Gavin sank like a rock in a black sea. I can’t lose him again. I won’t. There’s no way in hell I’m letting him go home alone.
He swallows hard, the thick knot in his throat bobbing as a piece of his unruly dark hair drops over his forehead. He needs a haircut, but now is not the time.
“Tomorrow’s the last day of the festival,” I remind him. “Dallas said Mandy’s boss would be here to check out our show. He’s the one who determines whether or not she can actually sign us. Imagine screwing that up because you were too stubborn to let me come with you.”
“No,” he answers abruptly, not even bothering to pretend he considered my offer.
It stings, but I continue making my case in this one-sided debate. “You’ll have to sleep. Like it or not. And you won’t make it back in time. Even if you’re a superhuman machine that doesn’t need sleep to live, what if your phone dies? Or the van breaks down, or bikers swarm you on a deserted road and decide to have their way with you?”
He closes his eyes as a short huff of amused breath escapes his chest. A tiny smile teases at one corner of his mouth, allowing me to finally exhale.
“You gonna protect me from the big, bad bikers, Bluebird?”
“If need be.” We’re joking now, but the protectiveness I feel for him surges in my chest. I want so badly to keep him safe, to keep him away from anything or anyone that would cause him pain. His mother included. His mother first and foremost.
“Your brother would never go for it.”
I lower my voice, even though Dallas and Mandy are likely too caught up in their own conversation to pay attention to us. “I wasn’t planning on telling my brother. Or asking him for permission. Maybe you haven’t noticed, but I’m a big girl now.” I force a smile and wink, even though I’d prefer to take him by the shoulders and shake. Hard.
His eyelids lift and he scans me slowly from head to toe. “I noticed. Believe me, I noticed.”
If I had even the slightest hope that I could convince him not to run off to his mom’s rescue, then I would. But at this point, I know it’d just be a waste of time. Years of watching him drop everything for someone who wouldn’t spit if he was on fire has erased any ability I had to think that maybe one day he’d just walk away from her.
“Then it’s settled. Meet me at the van as soon as we’re done tonight.”
I don’t know how this impromptu trip is going to affect our deal for tomorrow night, but for as much as he protested, there is obvious relief smoothing the lines of concern on Gavin’s face once it’s decided that I’m going. Which I am. Whether he likes it or not. And for me, knowing that I’ve eased even a fraction of his pain is enough. For now.
Of all the people who could screw up my plan to ride to Potter County with Gavin tonight, Afton Tate is the last one I expect to actually do it. And yet, here he is. Standing next to the stage as soon as we step off it. We opened for his band again and he looks entirely too happy to see me considering our “breakup.”
“I’m so glad I caught you,” he greets me while smiling warmly.
“She’s not a fish,” I barely hear Gavin mutter from behind me.