‘No, I don’t,’ I grumbled. ‘I haven’t arranged to shadow anyone today. Why doesn’t anyone sleep in this place? You’re all robots.’
‘It’s not that, it’s Miss Chase.’
‘Sky?’ I rubbed my eyes. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Look at your phone. She’s been trying to contact you all morning. She rang reception in a state and asked if you could go and see her straight away.’ Audrey bit her lip. ‘She sounded strained on the phone. I think something’s wrong.’
I reached for my phone and found missed calls, several ‘SOS’ texts and instructions to get my ‘butt’ in her room as soon as I could. I flung my duvet off and raced into the shower, coming out to find Audrey gone and Grace sitting on my bed, with the bed sheets stripped from her mattress and folded neatly in a pile. She looked so fresh and pretty, with her big bright eyes and clear skin, and her long black hair tied back neatly in a ponytail. In comparison, I’d caught a glimpse of myself in the bathroom mirror and actually yelped out loud in horror.
‘Morning!’ she greeted me cheerfully, holding out a mug of coffee, which I took gratefully. ‘I added a bit of vanilla, I hope you like it.’
‘Uh, thanks.’ I took a sip after pulling on jeans and a jumper. ‘Wow, that’s amazing.’
‘Audrey said you had to rush off. She explained that Skylar Chase needs your help. That is SO cool.’
‘I’m sorry, Grace, I know I said we’d hang out.’
‘Can I walk Fritz?’
I sat in front of the dressing table and brushed my wet hair. ‘What? Now?’
‘Yeah!’ She smiled. ‘I took him out while you were sleeping this morning but I think he needs a longer walk.’
‘What time did you get up?’ I asked, attempting to find a matching pair of shoes from the pile in the corner of my room.
‘Early.’ She shrugged. ‘So can I? Walk him, I mean. It might be useful if you don’t have to worry about him today. I can look after him.’
‘Knock yourself out.’
She happily stood up and went to fetch his lead and collar from the kitchen, before popping her head round the door to say goodbye and to throw me one of my shoes she’d found in the sitting room.
‘Aha! Thank you,’ I said, shoving it on. ‘See you later.’
‘See you. Oh –’ she held up her phone – ‘and Olly says hey.’
I had barely knocked on Sky’s door when it swung open and she went, ‘Where have you BEEN?’
I followed her into the suite where she flopped on to one of the sofas. Her entourage were dotted around the room, yelling into their phones. I picked my way through them to get to Sky, trying not to get in their way as they paced back and forth.
She looked terrible. For her. Which actually means she still looked better than most of the world’s population but not so good by her usual standards. Her eyes were red and squinty, like she’d been crying, and she was wearing a jumper several sizes too big for her and some kind of bizarre Aladdin-style trousers.
‘What’s happened?’ I asked, coming to sit down next to her as a message beeped through on her phone. She read it and then cried out, throwing her phone across the room, narrowly missing several members of her team – not that they cared, they were too busy shouting into their own phones to notice one go flying past their heads. I hadn’t actually seen her entourage in its full force before. There were DOZENS of them, making the massive suite seem tiny, and they were all talking so loudly, it seemed impossible that they were able to hear whoever they were speaking to on the phone, but somehow they managed to continue their conversations. One of them was dodging through the crowd passing everyone cups of black coffee. I dreaded to think what the blood pressure average was in this room.
‘Whoa, OK, diva pop star alert!’ I exclaimed, having watched Sky’s phone land. ‘What’s going on?’
‘It’s my party.’ She sobbed. ‘It’s ruined. Completely ruined.’
‘Why?’
‘The club where it was going to be held has been shut down. This morning. What are the chances?’
‘But the party is –’
‘TONIGHT!’ She crumpled into tears.
‘Surely you can find a new venue. You’re Skylar Chase!’
‘You’d think,’ she wailed, ‘but everywhere good is booked. We can’t just hold it at any old place, and we need to let all the guests know . . . Argh, the press will have a field day! And I fly back to LA tomorrow, so I can’t have it another evening. This is a disaster.’
