Page 4 of It Happened on a Sunday
I pass my tour coordinator, Jace, on the way. His faded blue eyes find and hold mine for several seconds before I look past him. “You up for the encore?” he asks in a voice several degrees gentler than usual. But this is our fourth tour together, and he can read me well.
“Always,” I rasp. “I just—”
I break off, gesturing to my dressing room.
He nods, then lifts a hand like he wants to pat my shoulder. But he drops it just as quickly—Jace knows better than most that I don’t like being touched. Even by the closest thing to a father figure I’ve ever had.
“Don’t take too long,” he calls after me as I stumble the last several yards down the hall and throw open my door. Instead of the peace I crave, I find my stylist with three outfits spread across the couch before her.
“Which do you want to end in tonight?” Lucinda asks in her oh-so-posh British accent.
“Surprise me,” I grind out, tossing my flask on the coffee table as I head straight for the bathroom. Straight for sixty seconds of privacy.
As soon as the door closes behind me, I’m ripping at my tightclothes. I yank the black tube dress and strapless bra over my head and drop them at my feet before wrapping my arms around myself.
Only then do I take a deep, shuddering breath. And another. And another.
I knew I shouldn’t have let them book Austin on the tour. I told them I didn’t want to come here. But the label insisted—it’s a major music city. A huge, happening market. Plus there’s history here, the roots of the Black Widow lore.
Precisely why I didn’t want to come.
For the umpteenth time tonight, Jarrod’s too-pretty face flashes in front of my eyes. And for the umpteenth time, I shut that shit down. Or at least I try. It’s not as easy as it sounds when I can still hear the shouts from the fans demanding I come back for an encore. They’re like vampires, clamoring for an open, aching vein. And tonight I haven’t bled enough for their liking.
I take another deep breath, bracing my hands on the edge of the sink as the woman I’ve become stares back at me—at what the press and the fans and the label have made me. At what I’ve made myself. The Black Widow, who will kill a man as soon as fuck him.
I used to try to explain that it wasn’t like that, but nobody wanted to listen. Then again, killing two boyfriends in a row tends to fuck up your credibility. And possibly even the rest of your life, or so my therapist says.
Turns out, she’s not wrong.
There’s a knock on the door. “Sloane? You okay in there?” Lucinda’s voice is both concerned and urgent.
She doesn’t need to say it because I already know. I’ve got to get back out onstage.
“I’m—” My voice breaks, so I clear my throat and force the words out. “I’m fine. Just had to pee.”
I flush the toilet to prove my lie, then turn the water on as I leancloser to the mirror to check out the damage.
I didn’t cry out there—I never cry—but right now my face looks a little like I did.
The glitter along my cheekbones is streaky, like stardust dragged down to earth, and my smoky eye has smeared a little at the edges. I wet my finger, start to clean things up a little. Then decide: fuck it.
If they want messy, I’ll give them messy.
I thrust my hands into my hair and shake until the last few pins fall out. Smear the gray-and-black shadow into the hollows under my eyes, pressing it into the glitter until it looks like bruises shot through with gold.
Then I put my bra back on, straightening my back and my resolve, before I throw open the door to meet Lucinda’s worried eyes.
She doesn’t say anything, though. Just holds my flask out to me. “I filled it up for you.”
She’s one of the only people on the planet who knows my drink of choice. “Thanks.” I take another long swallow of tea, then nod to the dresses she still has spread out on the couch. “So what’d you decide?”
“Honestly, I’ve got a long, white dress in wardrobe that I’d love to put you in—”
“Only nice girls dress like that,” I interrupt with a snort, flopping down in one of the big easy chairs. The leather is cold against my back, but it can’t touch the chill inside me.
“That’s why I want you to wear it.” She glances at me over the top of half-moon glasses, her gaze catching and holding mine a few moments too long. “Come on, Sloane. Don’t you ever get tired of the act?”
“I am who I am.” I force myself to look away even as a knock sounds at the door.
