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Where’s Sheree? What are you doing? Where are you? Why isn’t anyone coming to the theater?
I feel my heart start to race, but for a different reason than being found out by my best friend once Michael slides his hand on my arm to quiet my thoughts.
I’m not even talking yet he can sense my panic. Calming me with a single touch.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Honey? Calm down. Take a breath and slow down. You’re doing what!” he gasps after listening for another few seconds.
Suddenly, it sounds like it's Zoe’s dad who needs to calm down. In a single moment, Michael’s gone from my new man to stern Professor Grayson, back to being Zoe’s dad about to throw a fit.
I want to snatch the phone from him, find out for myself what’s going on, but I can’t.
Not without giving myself away.
And I’m not ready to tell Zoe anything yet.
I’m not even sure I’d know where to start even if I was.
I’m mad at her, which is ridiculous, but I can’t help it.
Why is she calling her dad? Why can’t she call me?
What am I chopped liver all of a sudden?
While he’s on the phone, I fish for my phone after finding my glasses where I neatly piled my clothes when I came in.
Sixteen missed calls.
Eight text messages.
All from Zoe.
Shit.
I’m reading as fast as she’s explaining to her dad on the phone, but I can only hear his reactions. Not her voice.
I skim over all the ‘where the hell are you?’ messages to get to the meat and potatoes of it all.
I can hear Michael growling with disapproval as I read.
No doubt she’s telling him the same thing as I’m reading. Tracking the drama with my eyes as well as my ears.
She’s leaving. Tonight!
The last flight is booked, she’s heading to New York for an audition for a pilot. A sit-com/rom-com type thing, arranged through and by her new best friend and now agent… Niles Cartwright?
Okay, so she doesn’t say he’s her new best friend, but I catch her drift.
It hurts a little, but I always knew Zoe would grow up and move away for good sooner or later.
And how hurt will she be when she finds out you just got shishkebabbed, skewered, and speared… Harpooned by her own dad?
Once she gets in front of a camera, let alone a paying audience, it’ll be ‘watch out world here comes Zoe’. I just know it.
Her dad? He doesn’t seem to share that line of thinking just yet and he certainly isn’t sharing her enthusiasm over the phone.
Looking up from Zoe’s messages, I can see Michael’s brow crease, his eyes narrow, and his body tense as he starts to pace.
Not holding anything back on account of me being here either.
“No. You will not be going to New York, Zoe… Because I say so, that’s why,” he almost shouts.
“…With who?” he gasps, twisting his face as he pinches the bridge of his nose.
“Tell me again, Einstein. How long have you known this guy? How long have you been part of this theater company? All of how long? Twenty-four hours, Zoe. If that’s how long then the answer is NO.”
I’m glad I’m not on the receiving end. Michael Grayson can be a hardball Professor when he wants to be, but having him as my dad? Uh, no thanks.
I hope we never fight like this.
He’s so… logical, but passionate about his side of things.
I don’t think Zoe should go either. It’s too soon like her dad says.
But then again…
If she was gone a few days, I could just stay with Michael until I sort out everything else.
The airport is closed for at least a week.
Zoe wants on the last plane out of town…
No. I can’t think like that.
I mustn’t.
I’m partway through finishing her texts and telling myself I shouldn’t wish my bestie to be a thousand miles away when I sense the change in Michael’s voice.
I look up to see his lip curl slightly as he thinks to himself.
His brow cocked in a question now.
He’s thinking exactly what I’m thinking. But the answer is still—
“Honey? Where are you?” he asks, suddenly calm, reasonable.
Sounding like he’s letting her win by getting her own way after all, maybe.
“At home? Packing huh?” He creases his mouth, almost frowning, but I can tell what he’s already planning.
Would he really let Zoe go just so he could be alone with me?
She’s twenty-one. And she’s no snowflake.
“I’m coming home… No, I’m calm now, you just scared me is all… Can we at least talk about it before you go? What time’s your flight?”
He looks at his watch, frowns, and then nods, and I can practically hear the gears of his mind turn.
“Oh, I can swing by the dorms, see if she’s there,” he says casually, shooting me a wink.
I feel my sex clench.
Not just to retain my man’s seed, but almost like I’m trying to hide what we just did, long before I have to come face to face with Zoe.
