Being Me(Inside Out 02)(72)

done by telling him about Michael now? I shove through the
door and head for the exit. I have to stop Chris from doing
something he’ll regret.



Chapter Twenty-one

I make it halfway to the exit of the bathroom when Gina rushes
inside, blocking my path. “Oh, no.” She holds up her hand. “You
aren’t going out there looking like you do. The press will butcher you and Chris. They’re vicious.”
“Move, Gina,” I order. I have never wanted to physically hurt
another person before, but I do now. I want her out of the way. “I have to stop Chris from doing something he’ll regret.”
She fixes me with a determined stare. “You’ll thank me for
this later. Chris called security to have whoever gave you trouble taken to their booth in the back of the museum. We’ll fix your makeup and then you can meet him there.”
“No, I—”
“Look in the mirror, Sara.” Her command borders on a bark.
“Think about the kind of attention you will get for Chris and
you.”
I draw several heavy breaths and do as she says. And she’s

right. My mascara is streaked down my cheeks, impossible to
miss. I am a front-page nightmare.
She holds up a bag. “My miracle bag. Let me do my magic.”
My fingers trail the puffy skin under my eyes. “No amount
of makeup is going to fix this.”
“I have a miracle gel for that in my bag,” she assures me.
“Let’s get to work.”
I hesitate. I don’t have time for this. I don’t want to do it with her. I don’t even want her involved.
“Let me help. You have time.” She moves to the sink and
sets her bag down. “It’ll take security several minutes to find
whoever Chris wants found and escort him to security with any
level of discretion.”
Slowly, my shoulders slump and I join Gina at the sink.
“Please hurry.”
“Speedy is my middle name when it comes to outsmarting
bad press.” She removes a towelette from her supplies and gently starts wiping my cheeks. “And don’t worry about Chris. He
never does anything he isn’t sure about.”
My gut clenches at the hint of intimacy between them. “You
seem to know him very well.”
Gina applies the cooling gel to my eyes. “Don’t start imagining something that isn’t there. We never dated, and we’d be a
horrible couple. I adore the spotlight and that man acts like it’s poison.” She swallows hard, her delicate neck bobbing with the action. “I … my sister died of cancer.”
Taken aback, I barely manage to spare her the “I’m sorry”
that I know will make her cringe. “How old was she?”
“Sixteen.” She starts to apply foundation to my face with a

roller brush. “She had all the medical care available to her but
she worried that others didn’t.” Her voice cracks. “She volun—
teered until she was too sick to keep it up. That’s how we met
Chris.”
Her words wreak havoc on my calm. Chris will lose everything he’s created with the charity if Michael paints him as some
kind of freak. I can’t let that happen. No matter what that means, or what I have to do.
“I have to go,” I say, and dart around Gina before she can
stop me.
“Sara!”
I ignore her shout and I’m past the other woman guarding
the door before she even knows I’m gone. I dart into the main
events room and head toward the back of the museum, where
Gina said I’d find security. “I’m supposed to meet someone at
security,” I tell the first waiter I find. “Where is it?”
He points to an archway and a set of steps, and I rush toward
them and take the stairs too quickly for my high heels, right—
ing myself from a near trip. Finally, I see the sign indicating the security offices, and any hope I had of catching Chris before he talks to Michael evaporates when I hear his voice.
“I’ll take that number now,” I hear Chris say.
“Dream on, *,” Michael responds. “You aren’t getting
shit from me.”
“Have it your way. I can get the number myself.”
Michael snorts. “Good luck with that. Even Sara doesn’t
have it.”
I hear the phone go to speakerphone and a number being
dialed before Chris is speaking again. “Yeah, Blake. I need a

personal cell number for a Thomas McMillan, and yes, I’m talking about the CEO of the cable company. He’s Sara’s father.”