AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Before I can protest, she’s already on her feet, her bag thrown over her shoulder, dog’s harness in her hand. The dog slips into the harness. Penelope straps him in quickly, and in no time at all, she’s walking away.
Shit.
“Birdy…”
I take a step forward to do what exactly, I’m not sure. I can’t force her to stay, no matter how tempting that sounds.
So I keep still, my eyes glued to her retreating back as I try to find a reason to make her stay as I watch her walk the dog out of the room.
Wait…
My eyes narrow as the dog stops in front of the steps that lead off the podium on which the piano is set. The pause is so short, for a second, I think I imagined it. The next thing I know, they’re on the ground, the mutt looking over his shoulder before he proceeds to move toward the door.
She’s not walking him.
He’sguidingher.
As she walks toward the door, my eyes fall on the harness, and for the first time I notice the sign there.
Guide dog—do not pet. I’m working.
Well, I’ll be damned.
CHAPTERFOUR
PENELOPE
The door of the music building closes behind me with a loudthud. Henry stops at the top of the stairs, and after a whispered command, he leads me down and to the nearby bench. My shaky legs give out on me, so I sit down and suck in a gulp of air, trying to breathe through the vice grip squeezing my lungs.
My heart is still hammering in my chest, and my skin burns from where Sebastian touched me.
Sebastian Black is here at Blairwood, and he just asked me to play for him.
That one sentence has been going through my head from the moment I left the music room like the devil was at my heels. I couldn’t even be angry at myself for being distracted. How was a girl supposed to react when she, quite unexpectedly, came face to face with her idol and the boy she’s had the teeniest, tiniest crush on for years? And then he asked her to play for him.
My eyes fall shut, and I let out a long breath.
A freaking Grammy-winning rockstar askedmeto play for him.
The idea shouldn’t make my stomach clench the way it did.
The guy was infuriating with his careless walking, nickname calling, and that deep voice that made my skin prickle at the sound, but…
Play for me.
“Penny?”
My head snaps up at the sound of my name, my heart kicking up a notch until the voice finally registers in my head.
“Hey, are you okay?” A soft hand touches my shoulder as Jade sits next to me. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost. You know, metaphorically speaking.”
A soft, somewhat manic laugh comes out of me.
A ghost.
If that isn’t fitting, I don’t know what is.
“Penny? You’re scaring me.”
