Free The Crescendo (The Musical Interlude) by Kasonndra Leigh

Signorina.”
    “How lovely for no one to tell me. Thanks for the help,” I say and start walking toward my new boss’s vehicle, stopping just inside the doors leading outside. Great. I’m probably picking up the most conceited, arrogant ass ever. Why else would he choose to arrive this way? I slam through the glass doors, plastering a smile on my face as I get closer to the car.
    At once, my heart speeds up, my breathing increasing. What the freak? A panic attack? Only my body would do this to me right now. I reach into my bag and remove my pump, turning around so our new boss doesn’t see me inhaling the medicine. Swansea will probably quit before he even gets started after seeing me standing here this way. I hold a hand up to my chest and try to keep my balance on the skyscraper high Manolo Blahniks Selene has let me use. The car door opens as I step down and shield my eyes from the sun’s rays that are blinding me on top of everything else going on at this moment.
    Quick note to self: remind Katerina to send Hagar to pick up any future tour managers. Damn the sun’s brightness is vicious right now, and for some reason, I hear Alek’s voice inside my head. “I don’t know what happened, Erin. Forgive me for being a heartbroken asshole. I’m not perfect. I’m new to this relationship thing.” I think the panic attack has brought out the voice of my fiancé at this awkward moment. He has hounded me about carrying my medicine ever since the day he first met me at Black Butterfly, the time when I suffered an attack so strong I couldn’t even find the strength to reach my pump. If it weren’t for Alek coming to my rescue, I’m sure my bosses would’ve found me passed out on the floor.
    That thought just spins me around to our disagreement. He didn’t even give us a week before he returned to his lifestyle. What a way to sustain an engagement as we both fall under the danger of insecurity paired with infidelity—the two words that divorce court lawyers live to hear from their new clients.
    Focus, Erin. Remember what you believe in, who you believe in , and things will work out. I turn around and plaster a smile across my face again as I look at the open door to see a foot decked out in a super expensive shoe step down on the pavement. Signor Swansea has finally decided to get out of the car. I was beginning to wonder if he’d fallen asleep in there or something. A head of wavy brown hair emerges first, a second shoe next, and then the rest of him steps out of the car and I almost faint.
    The road manager, the guy we’ve all been led to believe is named Mitchell Swansea, is actually Sam Tomkins, the boy who broke my heart when I was sixteen.
    I’m speechless and my mouth’s hanging open as I stare at the man who was part one of the reason I swore off love six years ago—the day he broke my heart when he chose to move back to London with his mom. Gone is the shaggy bangs and wiry body of a young boy hidden by huge black tee shirts and ripped jeans. Instead, a man, who stands around six-feet-tall and weighs a perfect 170lbs of pure muscular perfection—which is visible even while hidden underneath a tailored gray suit and tapered pants with a dusky blue shirt that highlights his green eyes—and wavy brown hair, waits with his dimpled smile directed straight at me.
    “Hello, Erin Angelo,” he says in that British accent that used to do things to me I didn’t understand at the time.
    “Sam?” I whisper because shock has knocked me stupid. He bounds toward me and pulls me into his arms, embracing me, and for a moment I’m ripped back in time, my mind transported to the day in high school when he first told me he loved me—the same night we gave our virginity up to each other. Life has done that thing it loves to do to me; it has thrown one of those curve balls at me except this one makes a softball look harmless.
    “You’re—you’re Mitchell Swansea?” I ask, unsure whether I should curse, smile or