Page 36 of Hero on the Road
“I’ll have Danny deposit more money in Connor’s account.”
That wasn’t really an answer. But I was starting to think it was the best I was going to get.
“Okay, got it. We’ll learn to live on air and grass or something. Anything else?”
Another quick pause, and then: “Kill the rumors about you and Connor hooking up.”
I jerked in surprise. I’d been so overwhelmed by the news about the studio finding out about the extra appearances that I’d completely forgotten that part of the article. Colin had been guessing that we were actually together. And evidently the label was upset with that.
Why?
“Taylor, we’re not hooking up.”
“I don’t care if you are or aren’t. I care about you making the label happy, and they want assurances.”
Okay, that pissed me off. It was one thing for them not to want us to play additional shows and an entirely different thing for them to be poking their noses into my personal life like that. Sure, nothing was actually going on, but that was beside the point.Theywere the ones who’d saddled me with Connor freaking Wheating, and now they were upset that we’d become friends?
Maybe that wouldn’t have happened if they’d sent me out on the road by myself in the first place. Trusted me enough to do a tour on my own.
“And how do you suggest I do that?” I asked through a tight throat.
“You’ve got that blogger with you, right? Flirt with him or something. Make it clear you don’t have a thing for Connor.”
My throat got even tighter at the thought of flirting with Colin and ignoring Connor. We were already in a tricky situation and not talking about it. The idea of making it even worse by ignoring him…
I couldn’t do it.
Iwouldn’tdo it.
“Right. Call me if you hear anything else. I’ll get with Connor and figure out what we’re going to do.”
I hung up without waiting for an answer from her and turned to Connor, who was sitting across from me at the breakfast table. The bar had given us breakfast too, and though I should have been excited about that, I was way more concerned about what we were going to do once we left this haven.
“We’ve got problems,” I told him. “And I think we need to disappear for a couple days while we figure out how we’re going to solve it.”
CHAPTER21
Connor
Idrove 10 miles over the speed limit, hauling butt for the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest and the campground we’d marked as our destination.Magical Mystery Tourby the Beatles was on and Olivia and I were singing it at the top of our lungs.
Not because we were excited to be heading into the middle of a forest to camp with nothing but our beat-up old van and a bag full of supplies. But because we were forcing ourselves to be optimistic.
Magical Mystery Tourhad become our theme song over the last week, partially because we both loved the Beatles and partially because of what Olivia had named the van, and it was the song we played when we needed to hype ourselves up.
Now was one of those times.
When the song ended, I turned the volume down and looked over at her.
“When you’re going this fast, Connor, you keep your eyes on the road,” she said sharply.
“Thanks for the driving lesson, Auntie,” I smirked. “Let’s talk about our plan.”
“The plan is get to the campground, get set up, and lay low for a couple days,” she said, reciting what we’d already been through multiple times. “Disappear so the buzz dies down. Then hit the road and try to stay on track from here on out.”
I bit my lip. Stay on track from here on out. That was going to be the problem. Atomic didn’t want us playing outside of our scheduled stops but they also hadn’t sent us any money, and though Taylor had promised that Danny was going to get us a deposit I knew funds had to be running short for that sort of thing. Danny wasn’t a hugely successful agent yet and he didn’t have a lot of extra money. Avery could have loaned us money but I was guessing both Atomic and Drive In were tying her hands, just like they were with Parker.
And we still had three weeks left on the road.
