About my dream.
Three years of struggle because I wanted to be the lead singer in a professional rock band.
And we did it.
Only for me to no longer want it.
How could I tell her that? And how could we talk now without her realizing that I was miserable? This was my mom, my best friend. She’d know. She’d know.
Worse still, she had a good life now. I bought her a beautiful big house, an SUV, she had no mortgage, and a monthly stipend I paid into her account. I had plenty of money and a great financial adviser that invested it, but I knew my mom . . . if I left the band, she’d go back to worrying about money.
I didn’t want that for her.
I didn’t want Bryan to say “I told you so” and for her to have to hide the disappointment she felt at my failure.
And then there was Micah. I’d sacrificed our love for our band and now we were so messed up, there was no fixing us. I couldn’t hate this life after choosing it over him.
It was too much. I wasn’t thinking clearly, I—
The door to my dressing room opened and Gayle poked her head in. She frowned at the sight of me on the floor and stepped in, closing the door behind her. “I’m worried, Skylar. What’s going on? What do you need?”
“I need a break,” I blurted. “I need to be alone for a while.”
“Where do you want to go?” She pulled her phone out.
“Somewhere quiet. Secluded.”
“And that’s all you need?”
I felt her anxiety and hurried to assure her. “I’m not leaving the band, Gayle. I just need a break.”
A break would help. I’d feel better after time apart from the guys.
But the next morning as my phone exploded with notifications, including missed call after missed call from my mom, I knew a break wouldn’t help. My anger toward Micah was building and building as I stared at the multiple photos, taken from different angles, of him kissing me on stage. They were all over the internet. The fans loved it.
I stared at one particular shot, taken from someone close to the stage.
It looked like something from a movie. Micah kissed me with so much longing that an ache for him pierced my lividness.
But only momentarily.
Because it might look like a kiss of pure longing, but I’d tasted it. Tasted his petty wrath and immaturity in that kiss.
And I wondered what this life we’d chosen would be like if Micah and I could break this toxic bond between us.
Then I hightailed it to a summerhouse in Norway, hoping some space would make me feel less crazy about everything.
Present day
Glasgow, Scotland
I GLANCED AWAY FROM THE Hydro, from the memories there. Just a few weeks after hiding out in Norway, I’d returned home to my mom and had that stupid argument with her only for her creepy husband to come on to me.
Instead of the guilt I usually felt, anger suffused me.
I never saw it coming. Not once had Bryan ever made overtures toward me. Looking back, I remember he’d compliment me more than he used to but I thought he was being a douchey sycophant.
It was his fault I felt this guilt. He’d put me in the untenable position of either having to break my mother’s heart and gain her anger, or keep the secret from her. I chose wrong.
The secret tore us apart anyway.
“‘Oh, I wish that I had told you, all the truths locked inside me, instead of cutting you out, like a knife through our lives,’” I sang softly under my breath. Tears burned in my eyes.
There was no going back, I realized.
All these months of hiding, some crazy part of me held onto some hope that I could go back and fix everything. But I couldn’t. She was gone and there would never be any closure. The only way to get through that, I thought, sucking in a shuddering breath, was to believe with every bit of light left within me that my mom died knowing I loved her. That I loved her the best. Always.
Tears fell slowly down my cheeks and I let them. I had months of tears locked inside me. I would no longer be afraid of releasing them.
Bracing my head down and into the wind, I walked slowly back toward my apartment. I knew it wasn’t really my apartment but rather a haven. A place where I think I was finally ready to heal.
* * *
AS SOON AS I LET myself into the apartment, I knew someone was there.
I froze at the threshold. “O’Dea?” I called.
“In here,” his deep voice rumbled from the front of the apartment.
Relaxing, I closed the door behind me and wandered down the hall to find him. His coat and scarf lay draped over the couch and he was standing in the kitchen drinking coffee.
“What are you doing here?” My eyes landed on the guitar case lying on the island and my heart sped up. “Is that . . . ?”
O’Dea studied me as he put his coffee mug down. “The police returned it. They wanted to release it to you but I convinced Calton you didn’t need to make another trip to the station.”
A well of emotion churned deep in my gut as I walked over to the case. My hand trembled as I took my time unlatching one side, then the other. And then my breath faltered as I opened it and found my Taylor lying inside, right where I’d left it. Grasping the neck, I lifted it out carefully. O’Dea saw me struggling to turn it one-handed for inspection and stepped in to help me. I took in every inch of it as he held it up for me.
There wasn’t a scratch on it.
I focused on the personalization etched on the back along the curve of the body.
“Music is the outburst of the soul” and your soul is beautiful, my darling. Love you always, Mom.
And it hit me with the force of a car knocking me off my feet. She had known. When my words failed me, my music spoke, and it told her everything she needed to know.
She’d known I was unhappy and all she’d wanted was for me to say it out loud so she could help me. I knew it.
I could feel my throat closing with the need to keep the mass of emotion inside of me from exploding out in front of O’Dea. I didn’t want to have a meltdown in front of him.
“I need a minute,” I managed to whisper and hurried into the bedroom.
My body shuddered as I tried to lock the feelings down. I’d made the decision to let all the tears out whenever they wanted but not here, not in front of him.
“Music is the outburst of the soul” and your soul is beautiful, my darling. Love you always, Mom.
No, no, no, no! I squeezed my arms around myself but I couldn’t stop it. The sob got past my throat but I clamped my mouth shut, holding it in.
My heart was pounding so hard, the blood whooshing in my ears deafened me. That’s why I didn’t hear the door open and nearly jumped out of my skin at the touch of O’Dea’s hand on my shoulder. I whirled around, taking in his unsure, uncomfortable expression.
“I’m okay,” I said, sounding not okay at all. “I’m okay, I’m okay.” My voice grew shakier and shakier with each claim and I felt it coming again. God, get out, leave me! I wanted to scream. “Please, I’m o—” but I wasn’t okay.
She would have forgiven me. I knew it.
My mom would have forgiven me, so why couldn’t I forgive myself?
The sobs racked my body. I couldn’t hold them off any longer.
“Fuck, Skylar,” I heard O’Dea whisper.
I held up my hand to ward him off, but he gently knocked it out of the way and then my cheek was pressed to his hard, warm chest. His strong arms bound tight around me.
It was permission to let go.
So I did.
I cried, wrapped up in his strength, wondering if the tears would ever stop now that I’d really let them loose.
IT WAS BECOMING FAMILIAR TO wake up in bed momentarily confused about how I’d gotten there. It was still light out, daylight streaming in through the open curtains.
The last thing I remembered was sobbing in Killian’s arms.
Ah, shit.
He was Killian again.
Why did he have to be such a complicated asshole? Just pick a personality, I grumbled to myself as I got up and wandered into the bathroom.