A sigh gusts out of me before I can stop it. “The band is good.”
“What about this Eric guy? Are you having fun with him?”
There’s no way I’m detecting jealousy in his tone…. Right? I bask in the idea that I’m more than a fling to him and this evidence that he might honestly care about me. “Sure. He’s a nice guy.”
He raises his eyebrows behind those heinous costume glasses. He’s so arrogant with his perfect face, stupid expensive cologne, and women caving to his every whim. Well, not this woman. Not tonight.
“Listen, I’m not going to sit here and bash on my date while he’s off getting a drink for me. He might be clueless and pushy, and okay, yeah, his breath smells like a beefy five-layer burrito, but he’s a nice guy.” I shove his arm off the armrest between us. “Go back to your seat.”
He’s grinning like he won. “I knew it.” He doesn’t move.
“He’s coming back, you know. You can’t hijack my date.”
He just grins and hogs the entire arm rest, completely invading my space.
“Who has Imogen? You can at least put my mind at ease if you’re going to steal my date’s seat.” I know my mom can’t have her. She’s at dinner with her sister about an hour’s drive north of town. And there’s no way he asked Oliver to take her.
His warm smile in response to my question makes my heart trip. “You’re really worried about her?”
I roll my eyes at his non-response. “Obviously, I’m worried about her. I can’t just turn off caring about her because I’m off the clock.” And I’ve gotten too attached, just like I feared I would.
The music crescendos and he’s hard to hear, but it sounds like he says, “You’d be surprised…” At my confused look, he shouts over the pounding music, “You’re good with her.”
Anders is quiet for a minute, seemingly listening to the band instead of teasing or distracting me. I can’t help but picture Eric coming back to an occupied seat, and I’m annoyed that I don’t know who’s taking care of Imogen. I am fully distracted by Anders, and not in the fun way. I check the aisle behind us periodically, but Eric doesn’t return. After the fourth or fifth time I turn around, my phone buzzes on my lap. Maybe that’s him? He has been gone a suspiciously long time.
Instead, I find a bizarre message from Mercer. It’s one of her classic, voice-text-gone-wrong, stream-of-consciousness messages with zero punctuation and lots of decoding required.
MERCER
Hypothetical question period if someone is babysitting and the kid they are babysitting falls off a skateboard and lands on her arm weird and it’s probs just a sprain but you want to be sure it’s not broken but you also don’t want to freak out the parent or alert the general public which doctor would you go to for that? Hypothetically speaking period
I gasp and grab Anders’ arm, clinging to him like a lifeline. I reread the message to make sure I understood it correctly.
“What?” he yells over the music. “What’s wrong?”
I spin on him. “You left Imogen withMercer?” I shout. It’s not a question. “Talk about the blind leading the blind!” I wad up my blanket and snatch my bag. “We have to go!”
I drag Anders to his feet and down our row, pushing through the crowd in a way that’s probably drawing too much attention.
“What’s wrong?” His grip tightens around my hand.
I don’t want to attract any more looks, so I pass my phone to him and let him read while we stomp up the steps to the back of the amphitheater. After reading my message, Anders marches ahead of me, sliding my phone into his back pocket and pulling me behind him. On our way to the exit, I spot Eric chatting it up with two blonde women. I catch his eye. He shoots an apologetic look my way and all I can do is shake my head at him. I can’t even think about that mess right now. One disaster at a time.
18. Anders Gets Distracted
Idon’t get scared. Not many things in this world make me nervous. I’m a big guy, and I can hold my own in a dark alley at night. But apparently a cryptic message from my babysitter where I learn that my daughter might be broken has me running.
When I arrived during the opening act of the concert I parked my blacked-out SUV in a dark, hidden corner of the amphitheater parking lot, hoping to remain anonymous. Now I wish I had left it front and center so I could get out of here faster. I’m dragging Sunny behind me to the car, but she seems to be keeping up just fine.
Yanking the key fob out of my pocket, I unlock the doors and reach for the passenger door handle to let Sunny in.
She brushes me away. “I got it. Let’s just go.”
She doesn’t have to tell me twice. While I drive, Sunny calls Mercer and directs her to take Immy to the clinic closest to the resort. Those two have a shorthand that works well in emergencies, but I barely understand a word of it. The whole time they’re on the phone, Sunny gives driving directions to me with her hands. When I almost turn the wrong way in a roundabout she smacks my arm and gestures in the right direction.
“We might beat you there. See you in a sec.” She throws her phone onto her lap.
“What happened?”
