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“I’m not the one that lied about things,” Billie pointed out. “Perhaps you’ll think more carefully in the future before bending the truth.”
Jules groaned. “I will, I will, I swear. Just please let me get through this.”
“You talking to me or someone else?”
“I’m talking to whoever in the universe is listening. Whoever has the power to help me,” Jules said.
“Yeah, well, maybe have a chat with your own self-control whilst you’re at it,” said Billie, turning the wheel and starting to slow down. “No more snap decisions, eh?” She indicated. “And this looks like the place.”
JULES’S HEART STOPPED beating for a moment when she saw the dark hulk of the piano sitting in the corner. The only small grace that she could see was that it was in a corner, the piano itself would block her from view of both the audience and the stage. At least no one would see her embarrass herself.
“You can do this,” Billie hissed, grasping her elbow.
“Jules!” Alea came flying out of a side door, hair bouncing and green eyes gleaming, a smile wider than a mile across her face. “Thank you so much, you’re a life saver, you really are.”
“Anything for you,” Jules said automatically.
“This could really be my chance,” Alea said. “There’s a rep from one of the big talent agencies here, or so rumor has it. And I really want to make a good impression. I really…” She trailed off, looking at Billie. “Who’s this?” she asked, still smiling.
“Billie Brooke,” Billie said.
Alea tilted her head to one side but Billie said nothing more and Jules didn’t have the words to explain who Billie was or what she was doing here. “Um, shall we do a run through,” she asked, mouth dry.
“No time for that,” said Alea. “We’ve got to jump right into it, we’re already starting fifteen minutes late.” She grinned at Jules. “I’d trust you with my life though. Go on, piano’s over there.”
She turned away, heading toward the stage. Jules thought that she might throw up.
“You know you can do this because you’ve done it already,” Billie said, taking Jules’s arm and leading her toward the piano. “You have nothing to fear.”
“It’s terrifying,” Jules stuttered. The place wasn’t close to full. There were maybe forty people dotted around at tables. But that didn’t help.
“You’ll be so lost in the music, in what you’re doing, that you won’t even notice,” Billie said calmly. They skirted around the piano until they could see the keyboard. “You’ll be absolutely fine. You had an amazing teacher, after all.”
Jules laughed at this and felt the nerves loosening a little in her body. “I did. I don’t know how to thank you.” She took a deep breath looking down at the familiar keys and feeling that actually, she might be able to do this.
“Oh, I forgot,” Alea said, popping her head around the piano. “I’ve been singing for ten days straight, so my voice has dropped a bit. Transpose it down a second or better yet, a third, would you?”
She disappeared immediately and Jules turned to Billie. “I have no idea what any of that meant,” she said.
But Billie was already turning white and her hands were starting to shake. “Oh god.”
“Oh god what?” asked Jules, her own nerves bubbling to the surface again.
“You can’t do this,” Billie muttered.
Chapter Twenty Nine
What really got Billie was the look on Jules’s face. A sort of frozen panic that made her look like a small child. Up to this point, Billie rather thought she’d just been along for the ride. She’d helped because, well, that was what people did.
And so what if the person she was helping was Jules’s one true love? So what if she was giving away everything that had been donated to her? She realized what she thought she’d always known. She was just a caretaker, looking after Jules until someone else came along to do the job properly.
Not that Jules would have admitted to needing to be looked after. Still though, looking at her face now, Billie could feel something welling up inside her.
Maybe she loved her. Maybe she felt something for Jules that she’d never felt before in her life. No, not maybe. Definitely.
Definitely she loved Jules Hawthorne with a love that was simultaneously comforting and terrifying. And love meant making sacrifices. This time the sacrifice would be Jules herself. It felt somehow right. She’d had her taste, she could live the rest of her life knowing that she’d loved, that she still loved because she couldn’t imagine herself not loving Jules any longer.
But Jules had rushed to Alea because there was something there and Billie was now about to play a part in that. Pathetic? Perhaps. But she had to do it. She had to rescue Jules just this once, just to prove that she could, that she was maybe, in a way, good enough.
