Graceful Deception

Chapter 3

Okay, I know I said I wouldn't update this until I finished my others and then I posted a second chapter and now I'm posting a third...it's just that, I felt like it and I had this written so here you go.

Chapter 3

“You don’t look any different.”

I blinked at Syd standing in front of me, tilting her head from side to side, examining me on the busy New York street just outside of Bethesda Prep. “Why would I look different?”

“You just sold your soul to the devil. I thought you’d look different.”

“What did you expect? Glowing eyes and fangs?” I shook my head as she seemed to consider it. “Doesn’t matter, I think I’m still in possession of my soul and as far as I can tell, my father isn’t the devil.”

“Could’ve fooled me.”

“He’s not,” I said firmly, giving her a stern look.

“Who besides the devil would leave his daughters penniless with a mother who has a shopping obsession?”

“He didn’t exactly leave us,” I said on a sigh.

“You don’t have to stick up for him, you know. He hasn’t contacted you in two years, Gray.” Her eyes softened and she reached out to put a hand on my shoulder. “I just don’t want to see you hurt again.”

“Aw Syd, that’s so sweet of you. I always knew that having you as a best friend would be─”

“Yeah, yeah you’re touched. Now tell me how it went when you told your mom.”

I blinked. “Told her what?”

She raised her eyebrows and gave me a look of disbelief. “When you told her that you’re going to be gone for six months with your father.”

“Oh that,” I nodded a few times, looking somewhere over her shoulder at the crowd of students still milling out of Bethesda Prep. “I didn’t tell her.”

“What? Why not?”

I shrugged. “The fewer days she has to yell at me, the better.”

“So when are you going to tell her?”

“I was sort of hoping for never?” I shrugged and gave her a sheepish look.

“Yeah, that’s going to work.”

“I just don’t know how to bring it up, you know? I mean, she hate─”

“Grace Travis?”

I turned my head to the left at the sound of the feminine voice addressing me only to have a microphone shoved in my face.

“Wrong girl,” I muttered, narrowing my eyes at the short woman with big blonde hair, holding the microphone up to me.

“Is it true that you’re going on tour with your father?”

Oh shit.

If Celebz Online knew then did my mother kn─

My phone rang.

“Your phone is ringing,” Sydney pointed out unnecessarily.

I pulled it out of my pocket and winced when I saw my mother’s name on the screen. I pressed ignore before turning back to the camera pointed at my face. “Do you guys have an ignore button too?”

The woman’s lips stretched into a tight smile. “No, we don’t. So, are you going on tour with your father?”

“Oh look at the time.” I tapped my bare wrist. “Gotta run.”