Page 105 of The Sun & Her Burn
When I turned onto my street, I realized it was much worse than that.
News trucks and paparazzi vans had pulled up in a tight grouping around the front of our little yellow house, and people crowded over the front yard.
Around Miranda, who was in her pink sweatsuit, curlers in her hair, shouting and pointing at the cameras.
“Oh my God,” I breathed, horror eclipsing every other thought in my head. “Oh God.”
I pulled over as close as I could get to the house and pulled my phone out of my purse with a shaking hand.
Adam was the first person I called.
It rang for so long, I was about to hang up when the line clicked and his cool voice said, “Hello.”
It was strange that the simple sound of his voice could center me a bit.
“Adam, the paparazzi are at the house. Miranda is having an episode in the front yard. I-I just arrived, and I have to get to her, but I don’t know what to do about the cameras, and oh God, Miranda will be so horrified when she’s in the papers and media like this…”
I choked on a sob as it came up.
“Linnea,” he said so firmly it was like a wakening slap to my face. “Take a deep breath for me. Good. Another, please. Okay, listen to me. I’m twenty minutes away, so I’m going to call some people, and they’ll be there to help you before I arrive, but Nea, Iamcoming. We’ll get this sorted. Do you trust me?”
I didn’t even have to think about it, which was absurd because I’d only known him for a month, and during most of that, he had been emotionally closed off.
But I knew the shape of his heart, even if I couldn’t yet map the details of its topography.
Adam Meyers would never let anything happen to the people in his life if he could help it, and he was capable enough to make that so.
“Yes,” I breathed on a shaky exhale.
“Good girl,” he said tenderly, and the words pulsed inside me. “Now, I would rather you wait for someone to join you before you enter the fray, but is there any hope of you waiting in the car?”
“No,” I said, already shaking my head, eyes fixed on Miranda as she wailed. “I have to help her.”
I spotted Mrs. Ramirez at the front door, hiding partially behind it with something obscuring her face. It looked like an ice pack or a rag, and I wondered if Miranda had hit her to get outside, and Mrs. Ramirez didn’t want to set off the sharks with cameras when they saw her bleeding.
“Get her inside as quickly as you can, then lock the door and close all the blinds. I’ll be there soon, Sunbeam. I promise.”
“I know,” I said before I hung up the phone.
I hesitated for just a moment as I considered calling Sebastian too, but someone shouting pulled my attention back to the scene on my front lawn, and I knew I couldn’t delay any longer. I shoved the cell into my overstuffed tote and started running in my wedge-heeled flip-flops. Only Miranda’s tutelage walking in heels for hours until I was proficient, while I lived with her in London, ensured I didn’t fall on my face as I sprinted to the crowd, then elbowed my way through.
It took the photographers and media hounds a second to realize who I was, but as soon as they did, they parted to let me through.
They probably thought this would be gold.
I cursed under my breath at them before shoving them to the back of my mind.
Miranda needed me.
When she was having one of her paranoid episodes, she could become frantic and violent. FTD caused incoordination, too, so even when she wasn’t trying to hurt me, she occasionally did.
The flash of lights, noise, and general chaos were not a good recipe for calming her, and I wondered if I was up to the task and if someone had been thoughtful enough to call the paramedics.
“Miranda,” I said softly as I approached, my steps much slower now. My voice was a little unsteady from the run and stress, but Miranda’s wide eyes swiveled to me instantly.
“They don’t understand,” she insisted in a low, almost growling shout that ended in a scream. “They are trying to take everything from me.”
“We won’t let them,” I assured her. A local FTD support group had taught me that it was a better tactic to agree with theparanoia and get on their “side” of the conflict than it was to tear down their illusions. “We’ll make sure everything is safe.”
