Page 46 of Pretty When It Burns (When The Lights Go Down #1)

Chapter forty-three

"Phone" - Witt Lowry/GJAN

Johanna

Grayson, the fucking idiot that he is, looks like he’s fighting for his life on stage.

They’re only halfway through the set, but it feels like something legendary. The Miami show had been electric, but this… this is different. The guys are locked in, tight as hell, and the crowd is going wild right along with them.

If I hadn’t known Grayson my whole life, I wouldn’t have seen it. Wouldn’t have recognized the way the pain is bleeding into every lyric, every scream. The way he grips the mic stand like it’s the only thing keeping him upright. He’s singing like it hurts.

I stand in the wings with Jake and Rylee, trying hard not to show how desperately I’m scanning every face that passes us. Still no sign of her.

I don’t understand.

I could’ve sworn she’d be here.

I didn’t think I’d been that wrong about her.

I check my phone again.

Still nothing.

With a breath I don’t want to admit is shaky, I shove it back into my pocket and force myself to focus on the stage. I have to be ready. If she isn’t coming, I have to figure out how the hell I’m going to explain it to my brother—how I’ll have to watch him break all over again.

Then it starts ringing, as if on cue.

A number I don’t recognize with an Austin area code.

My stomach drops, and I step away from Jake and Rylee, ducking behind a curtain for some privacy.

“Hello?”

“Is this Johanna Harris?”

The voice is nearly drowned out by sirens and shouting in the background. I press the phone harder to my ear.

“Yes. Who’s this?”

“This is Officer Montoya with the Austin Police Department. Yours was one of the last numbers dialed on the phone belonging to Mia Alexander. Do you know how we can get in touch with her emergency contact?”

My breath catches. My entire body locks, as if my knees are going to give out underneath me. I reach for the nearest support beam to keep myself upright.

“Mia… she’s my…” I try to gather myself enough to put together a coherent answer to his question as I look out on stage. “She’s my brother’s girlfriend. He would be her emergency contact, but he’s… unavailable at the moment. What happened?”

“Details are fuzzy, but from what we understand, she was on her way to Moody Center from the airport when she was run off the road by paparazzi chasing her vehicle. Miss Alexander is on route to the nearest major trauma center now.”

“Major trauma center? How bad is it?”

I close my eyes. I need to be strong for Mia. For my brother.

“It was a rollover, ma’am. She was unconscious when the paramedics pulled her from the car. The doctors will know more once they evaluate her. That’s all I can tell you right now.”

I manage to thank him and hang up, staring at my phone in my hand like I’m trying to convince myself that the conversation really happened.

Behind me, the crowd screams even louder as Fallout shakes the arena and Grayson’s voice rips through the speakers. I have no idea how I’m going to tell him what just happened.

I rush over to Jake and Rylee, still trying my best to stay composed.

“Johanna?” Rylee questions, turning her attention away from the stage. “What is it?”

I don’t ease into it. I can’t. Mia may not have time for me to beat around the bush.

“It’s Mia,” I choke. “She’s been in an accident. It’s bad.”

Jake whips around in an instant.

“What?” he demands, eyes wide. “What the hell happened? I thought she’d just decided not to come!”

“She was on her way here from the airport. Paparazzi chased her. She crashed and rolled her car.” I shake my head, trying to push the images forming in my head and the sounds I’d heard over the phone from my mind.

“She was unconscious when they found her. They said they’re taking her to a major trauma center. ”

Jake turns in a full circle, trying to process what I’ve said before launching his clipboard at the wall in anger and frustration.

“She was coming here?” Rylee asks, tears already pooling in her eyes. “She was on her way to see him? She didn’t bail?”

I nod, unable to say anything else.

Jake curses under his breath, dragging a hand down his face. He looks like he’s just taken a punch to the chest. “Jesus Christ.”

“We have to tell Grayson,” Rylee insists, her voice becoming even more broken. “We have to get him off that stage.”

“I agree,” I say, already moving towards the barrier. “He needs to know. Right now.”

Jake moves to block me before I get any further. Why is he getting in my way?

“Wait—wait, wait. Just… think for a second.”

I turn on him, unleashing the inner ice queen that I’ve shoved so neatly in a box for the whole world to see.

“Think?” I hiss. “Jake, she could be dying and he has no idea. You know what we just went through with our mom. Do you really think he’s going to make it if she dies and he doesn’t get a chance to say goodbye because he’s on stage—again?”

“I don’t want him losing his shit on stage in front of almost twenty thousand people,” Jake snaps back.

“You think he’s a disaster now? You tell him this, he’ll lose it completely.

Right in front of everyone. The press has been a nightmare for this entire tour.

You want that moment to be the one everyone remembers from the biggest night of his career, for it to be immortalized on a livestream? Because they’ll make sure it will be.”

“That’s not what this is about—” I start.

“Yes, it is,” he says, quieter as we notice people beginning to stare. “It’s not just about the press or the cameras. I care about Mia, too, believe me. But it’s about him, and what this night would have meant to them both. She would’ve wanted him to finish the show.”

I feel Rylee step in beside me. “But what if she doesn’t make it, Jake? What then?”

The silence that follows nearly breaks me. Jake looks at the floor, not daring to make eye contact with us again.

“We’ll pull him the second the set ends,” he says. “We wait right here in the wings. No encore—the label can deal with it. The second he walks off, we tell him and we’ll have a car waiting to take us to the hospital.”

“And if something happens before then?” I push. “If she—”

“We’ll deal with it,” Jake insists. “But if you go out there now and pull him off that stage, you’ll shatter him before he has a chance to finish what she came here to see in the first place.”

I hate that he’s right.

Moreso, I hate that we’re even having this conversation.

But I nod reluctantly in agreement, because Mia would want what’s best for him.

We stand there like a firing squad, barely breathing, phones in hand, ears tuned to every note—waiting for that final chord to ring out.

Praying it won’t be too late.