And now I’m deaf.
‘Keep your groupie quiet on the flight, ok? I have terms to negotiate,’ JC mutters as he gets out.
‘Groupie, hah!’ barks Isa, and it feels unkind.
I seize her arm before she can leave. ‘She’snotflying with us. Isa, I’m being so serious.’
Her sucker punch blindsides me, breath leaving my body in one sharp rush. By the time all my organs have come back online, she’s slithered out. I scramble after her.
‘Jules, whose name is on the side of the jet?’ Isa shouts above the plane’s deep hum.
I groan inwardly, rubbing my bruising stomach.
Jules looks confused as she turns to read. ‘Carmen Isabel?’ She pronounces the ‘s’ like a ‘z’ and it’s weird and wrong and I hate her.
Isa slingshots her gaze back to me. ‘Is your name Carmen Isabel?’
I curse under my breath as I head for the stairs.
‘If you don’t like it, there are two spare seats in coach tomorrow morning!’ she calls after me, laughter ringing through her voice.
Have I ever flown coach? Doubt it. Sounds nasty.
‘Business class,’ Jules corrects tersely and strides ahead of me.
I don’t need this. The race was a bust; it’s like we’re going backwards. I just want to relax and shake it off before New York. Spending eleven hours with Hermione Granger’s not what I had in mind.
‘Rolls-Royce engines,’ I can hear Jules’ assistant murmur as she boards, and I can’t help feeling a wave of pride. This is cool shit. Jules should be thanking me, not slapping me in the face when she wasclearlygiving me signals.
I get waylaid talking to the pilot about his time in Italy and by the time I reach my seat, it’s taken. I swear to God this woman’s been sent to Earth to test me.
‘That’s my seat.’
Jules opens her mouth to reply but I hear Isa’s voice first. ‘Take my seat, child.’
‘I don’t want your seat. I want my seat. It faces forward, it’s got a great window, it’s near the bathroom?—’
She stretches up behind me so she’s very close to my ear. ‘Take. My. Seat.O te sientas en el baño.’
I suck in a long breath and release it. Fine. If I can’t have my seat, I want the next best thing.
‘Are you serious right now?’ Isa hisses as I park my ass beside Jules. Isa sits across the table from me, next to Nyla, and mouths,‘Damage control’.
Trey has no idea about anything and sits across the aisle, headphones circling his neck. ‘Why are you ladies going to New York?’
‘Don’t be nosy, Trey,’ Isa snaps.
‘We’ve got a brand meeting,’ says Nyla quietly, looking a little less like she wants to be swallowed up by the floor than she did a minute ago. ‘Are you guys… from New York?’
Trey chortles. ‘No way. Too cold. We’re going for a wedding and a quinceañera– but not the same person!’ He loves that joke.
Nyla laughs. Jules does not.
‘One’s Trey’s sister and the other’s another cousin,’ Isa elaborates.
Nyla nods as she accepts an orange juice from the flight attendant. ‘Do you have a lot of cousins?’
I lean toward Jules. ‘You look terrible.’
