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Bryce fumbled for her phone. The tiny front inside pocket of her leggings had her car’s key fob, so she patted at her back pockets…and realized that when she’d taken off her workpants to run, she’d forgotten to grab her phone.
“Damn. I left my cell in my car. I’m sorry I put you in an awkward position, Imani. I totally get why you called them.” Bryce shot a glance at the Paynes, dressed in matching frowns and navy-blue outfits. Adele was in a dress, and Harvey wore a shirt in the exact hue of his wife’s outfit.
They sidled over, not exactly inserting themselves into the conversation but not keeping far enough back for it to be private.
Imani winced. “I really am sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Bryce squeezed her friend’s hand and gave her a reassuring smile as she moved out from behind the cubbies, spotting Cecily and Addison standing next to the studio’s bathroom door. Addison’s yellow wings sagged off her shoulders, and she had a finger in her mouth, crying in a horrible, hitching-guttural way that made Bryce’s insides twist in sympathy. Cecily had one of her ballet shoes in her hand, holding it over her head. As Bryce watched, one of the dancers got a little close to the bathroom and, fast as a snake, Cecily leaped out, bopping the child over the head with her pink shoe, sending the tiny dancer into face-crumpling hysterics. Undeterred, Cecily moved back into position, shoe over her head, ready to bop the next gawking kid who dared get too close.
Her nieces were the stars of a shit-show spectacle, and it was her fault.
Again.
Chapter 4
You did the right thing, Imani.” Bryce tucked her sweat-plastered hair back into her braid, giving Imani a weak smile as her friend retreated to gather up the other dancers and continue class.
“Which is more than we can say for you.” Harvey practically vibrated with indignation. “Some guardian you are, if you’re not there when the girls need you. You’re lucky we were eating at the Beef Haus around the corner. We left our dinner and got here five minutes ago. We’d have been here sooner if we were the first ones listed on the emergency contact form instead of you.”
Bryce restrained her urge to say something snarky about how they always seemed to be hovering, waiting for her next mistake, tallying them all for the trial next month. But that was her inner bitch rising up. She owned this. Not the Paynes.
“I’m here now. Why didn’t you grab Addie and Cici?”
“We tried,” Adele said. “They refused to leave until June comes out.”
Luckily, her nieces’ dance class was over, and Imani’s assistants were attempting to corral the last class as the new ones—much older girls—began to arrive to warm up. Bryce slipped off her sneakers before she stepped on the shiny, wooden studio floor.
She wended through the clump of ballerinas, girls in buns and various-colored leotards, and saw in the studio’s massive, full-wall mirrors that the Paynes had stopped before the wooden floor as if it were uncrossable lava. Before they found a free chair, sat to pull off their shoes, and made their way over here, Bryce had planned to get June and the girls out of the studio.
“Addie-bell, I’m here. Don’t cry.” She rubbed the little blond head as Addison rushed her, tackling her with a hug. She chucked Cecily under the chin, and the girl reluctantly lowered the ballet shoe. “Thanks for holding down the fort, kiddo, but you can re-holster your shoe. Can you take your sister over by Nana and Pop-Pop and help her get her shoes on? The next dance class is starting, so as soon as I get June, we’re gonna leave, okay?”
Cecily straightened, a good soldier, nodding and grabbing Addison’s hand to lead her tear-streaked sibling to the shoe cubbies.
Thankfully, Imani clapped her hands, calling the new ballet class to attention and starting the classical music—all a great cover for Bryce as she set down her sneakers to rattle the locked doorknob, calling softly through the studio’s bathroom door.
“June? It’s Aunt Beamer. Let me in.” Bryce pressed her ear to the door, hearing the sniffing and low sobs of her almost thirteen-year-old niece but no telltale movement toward the door to unlock it. “Open the door, honey.”
“Go away! I’m not coming out! They’re all going to laugh at me.” A loud wail rose from the bathroom, competing with and briefly overwhelming the tinkling strains of piano music. Heads swiveled in Bryce’s direction, despite Imani’s best efforts to gain the attention and warm up the next class of dancers.
Bryce thunked her forehead against the white wooden door, stymied.
“What do you need?” came a low voice from behind her, and Bryce jumped. It was Ryker. Somehow he’d gone behind the building to the back door, let himself in, and was standing next to the dance studio’s small office.
Bryce lifted her head, speaking in a low voice. “A blanket, or something to cover her, would be great. She…I think she got her period for the first time. I know you’re a guy with two brothers, but take it from me, this is DEFCON 3 level in the teen-girl freak-out meter.”
He pulled his baseball cap lower, nodded, and disappeared into Imani’s office. Moments later, he reemerged holding a purple towel.
“There’s a back entrance behind the office. I’ll have the door open for you when you’re ready.”
Bryce gave him a look of wordless thanks, and knocked on the door with purpose.
“June, I’ve got a towel and nobody is looking,” Bryce said in the most reassuring stage whisper she could manage. “Let me in and we’ll put this around you and scoot you out the back door.”
As soon as the lock clicked, Bryce was in, nearly barreling over June, who was holding a wad of folded brown paper towels between her legs that did nothing to hide the splotch of red on the fabric of her leotard and tights, confirming Imani’s suspicions. The poor kid had gotten her first period at dance class. In a pink leotard. That sucked.
June’s eyes were swollen, and the skin on her face was blotchy. Her normally defiant expression was absent, and her tears rolled down cheeks still rounded with youth. She looked so young, so bereft, that Bryce’s breath caught in her throat. With the calls in to the principal’s office and complaints of belligerence and sarcasm from her teachers, it had been easy to overlook the fact that June was only twelve. A kid. One whose mom and dad had died without warning, leaving her to muddle through puberty and the hell of middle school all alone.
Except for a screw-up aunt.
