“I can understand why. You’re literally drinking for two.” Irina eyed Courtney’s stomach. Then she dropped the accent. “Seriously, that kid must be massive. How are you even standing up right now?”
“Write this down.” Courtney pointed to the open notepad app. “‘My job is to take Courtney’s side on everything, while not calling her massive.’”
Irina smirked. “‘Get her to drink water without actually telling her I’m doing it.’ Done. ‘Tell her she’s gorgeous.’ What else? Can I plan a gender reveal?”
“No.”
“If I promise there won’t be pyrotechnics?” Irina tried again.
“No, we’re not finding out.” They’d already decided.
Irina made anurghsound. “Then what am I supposed to do?”
“Every once in a while, do birth-guide stuff.” Courtney waved her hand.
“I don’t know what that would be, but I am happy to do some research and find out. I’ll probably need a stethoscope and some tongue depressors if we’re going to pull this off.” Irina seamlessly slipped back into the role of French birth guide.
“What do you need tongue depressors for? Why didn’t you bring them with you? What are you pulling off? Why did your accent change?” Knox asked, sticking his head between Courtney and Irina.
Courtney’s heart seemed to lodge in her larynx.
“Hell! You’re supposed to be onstage.” Courtney smacked him on the shoulder. “Why aren’t you onstage?” He was just onstage.
He jerked his thumb toward the bathroom. “Had to piss.”
“You can’t just leave to pee,” Courtney whispered, and glanced around to see if anyone had noticed they were missing a bandmate.
“You don’t want me to do it onstage, that’d be gross. PR nightmare. I went pee for you, Courtney.” He said this with huge puppy dog eyes that did nothing to sway her.
“Liar,” she said.
“Touché.” He studied Irina for a beat. “The guys barely miss me. I’ll get back to it. But first”—he pointed to Irina and then to Courtney—“I wanna know.”
Fine, he wanted to know, he could know. “This is Irina, she’s my traveling birth guide.”
“You’re fucking with me right now?” he asked, shoving his hands on his hips. “Because she didn’t even bring a stethoscope.”
Dammit, if she couldn’t even convince Knox, how would she convince the rest of them?
“Get. On. The. Stage,” Courtney said through gritted teeth.
“I’m getting there. You need to spill about this first.” He made a motion with his finger like was stirring the pot, then spilling the pot.
Courtney didn’t know what to do in this situation. She glanced at Irina, who shrugged and lifted her palms in anI’ve got no idea eitherkind of gesture.
“Nice to meet you, Mr. Knox.” Accentless Irina held her hand out for him to kiss her knuckles.
He stared at her knuckles like he had no idea what to do with them.
“Ladies, I’ve got to get back onstage,” he said, as though Courtney wasn’t saying the same thing two seconds earlier. “I don’t have time to be fucked with.” He popped a breath mint and glanced at the band. They’d jumped into the next song.
“Actually,” he said, “I’ve got about thirty seconds to be fucked with.” He glanced at his Apple Watch. “And… go.”
“Get your ass back onstage,” Hans said menacingly from behind Knox.
“I am getting my ass back. But first I’m talking to these ladies who are trying to hide something.” Knox crunched the breath mint and smacked his lips.
“Go.” Hans pointed, and his tone said there was no arguing to be had this time.
