Nathan brushed a hand down Maggie’s cheek, but she hardly felt it. “What’s the matter?” he asked.
“She . . . who . . . she . . .”
Before she could stop herself, she pulled away from Nathan and marched over to her mom’s truck as she was backing it into position by her tree. It was prepped and tied and lying on a platform by itself. It was not a ten-foot tree. More like five.
Sandy slid out of the truck just as Maggie reached her. The man in the truck was anything but country in his tan slacks and dress shoes. So normal—not like anyone Sandy would ever let into her life. Not the Sandy Roads Maggie knew. Then again, Maggie had never thought she’d end up falling for someone like Nathan.
“Maggie!” Sandy cried. “I thought you were heading off with Nathan.”
“We came over to help you,” she answered in a shaky voice as the man walked around the front of the truck toward them. He was tall and muscular, about the same age as Todd, with a hint of a goatee and unremarkable short brown hair. His strongest feature was his eyes—a sharp, savage green. They looked straight at Maggie and made her feel like she was two inches tall.
Maggie faltered for a second then straightened her shoulders. “We came over to help you,” she repeated to make sure the man heard her, “but it looks like you already brought help.”
Sandy looked from Maggie to Nathan to the man and then back to Maggie. Her mouth reminded Maggie of a fish trying to breathe out of water.
All Maggie could think was, Please tell me I’m wrong. Please. Please. Please.
Sandy swallowed and motioned to the man. “Maggie, this is Gordon.”
Maggie folded her arms and waited.
Sandy stuttered, “Gordon is . . . Gordon is . . .”
Gordon stepped forward and wrapped an arm around Sandy’s shoulders. Maggie had to stop herself from rushing at him and punching him in the nose. He reached out a hand. “Your mother and I have been together for a few months,” he said without blinking. Maggie glared at his hand. Yeah, right. Like she was going to shake it. Was he completely stupid? They were in public. Her mom couldn’t possibly be okay with this. What if someone recognized her?
Maggie met her mom’s eyes. “A few months? I thought Dad was the one who cheated.”
“He did.” Sandy swallowed again and looked like she was going to burst into tears.
“So you decided you’d get back at him? Does he know?”
A tear rolled down Sandy’s cheek as she bit her bottom lip and shook her head. “No, he doesn’t. Maggie, please don’t tell him. It’s not the right time. Gordon is only here with me because I was sure we could get his tree quickly and nobody would recognize me. I needed to talk to him about some things. We haven’t seen or spoken to each other in weeks.”
Maggie couldn’t believe this. She couldn’t believe any of it. She threw up her hands and turned to look at Nathan. He was pale and she didn’t blame him. When she turned back to her mom, she was whispering something to Gordon. He removed his arm and stepped a foot away from her. So she was afraid someone was going to see. At least she hadn’t completely lost it.
Maggie blinked as the truth hit her. “The miscarriage?” she whispered to her mom so softly she was pretty much mouthing it. She glanced at Gordon and realized that was why her mom had been crying earlier. She had told him about the miscarriage. Gordon had gotten her pregnant, and that was why she was so dead-set on a divorce. It wasn’t because of Todd cheating. It wasn’t for any of the reasons Maggie had thought.
Nothing was like she had thought. Her whole world. It was all wrong. All upside-down.
Looking straight into her mom’s eyes, Maggie wanted to scream at her until she lost her voice, but she stopped herself. Screaming wouldn’t be nearly enough. With a growl, she stomped past her mom and Gordon and yanked open the truck door. Yep. Keys on the seat. It was one of her mom’s bad habits. Maggie snatched them up and climbed inside.
“Maggie, what are you doing?” Sandy rushed toward the door, but Maggie locked it and jammed the keys into the ignition. The truck roared to life. She was going to tell her dad and nobody was going to stop her. He had every right to know what his wife had done. He had been man enough to tell her when he had cheated. He had tried to fix it, and Sandy hadn’t done a damn thing except lie. To everyone.
She had to get to her dad. Right now.
Gritting her teeth, she put the truck in drive and peeled out of the parking lot, heading straight for the freeway entrance. Her mom’s truck was an automatic and easier to operate than Cole’s, but it was also a lot bigger. It felt like driving a bus in comparison. She hoped she wouldn’t accidentally crush all the cars moving down below her.
Don’t hit anyone. Don’t hit anyone. Stop at the stoplights and stop signs. Check intersections. Shoot. Shoot. Shoot. She hissed that word over and over until it turned into something worse and she had to blow air through her clenched teeth to get herself to shut up.
Her thoughts were a mess, but her main focus was on getting to the studio. It was maybe thirty minutes away if she didn’t get lost. She knew her way there from the freeway. As much as the thought of driving on the freeway scared the crap out of her, she forced herself to do it. After a few minutes she was merging and settling into a lane where she felt comfortable. She turned on the radio and cringed as foreign music blared out at her. It was a mix of rap and rock. What had her mom been listening to? It must have been him.
End of radio. She turned it off and gripped the steering wheel as hard as she could. Her head was pounding by the time she reached the studio. The lady at the gate booth recognized her and buzzed her in. She found her dad’s truck in a corner of the parking lot. There was an empty space next to it, so she parked there and walked inside. She hadn’t been pulled over. She hadn’t wrecked her mom’s truck and killed herself. She let out a relieved sigh.
Forcing a smile on her face, she walked past the front desk. They waved her through and she pushed open a pair of glass doors then walked down the hallways until she reached her parents’ usual recording room. Eddie looked up from the mixing console and waved. There were usually more people in there, but not today. The recording light wasn’t lit up and nobody looked particularly busy. They were obviously taking a break, so Maggie waved to Eddie and stepped inside the music room. Her dad was laughing and talking to Ray. His smile fell when Maggie shut the door behind her.
“Mags?”
Everybody turned to look at her. She hadn’t stopped to think about the fact that other people would be around. Lynnette and Aaron were in one corner, Scott and Ben in another. Maggie didn’t see Mark, but he was probably in one of the booths playing his drums. That was where Cole usually was.
Cole. Being here made her miss him all of a sudden.
Swallowing, she focused on her dad. “Can we talk?” she asked in a forced, steady voice. Her head hurt so badly she wanted to curl up and cry.
Todd’s brow furrowed. “Of course we can talk.” He nodded to the others and led Maggie out of the studio and into the hallway. When she leaned against the wall and sucked in a deep breath, he wrapped a gentle hand around her arm and led her into the control room.
“Hey, Eddie, mind stepping out for a bit?” He reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet, and handed Eddie a wad of bills. “Maybe get us all some coffees down at Stan’s?”
Eddie smiled and took the money, giving Maggie a sympathetic look. “Sure.”
“Don’t worry about the change,” her dad said as Eddie walked out. He waited until Eddie was gone and then patted an empty chair. She sat across from him and he put a hand on her knee. He knew she needed something to ground her. She placed her hand on his. She was not going to cry. She wouldn’t. Oh, hell.
The tears came so fast she couldn’t stop them. “Mom’s cheating on you,” she got out before it stayed stuck in her throat forever. She wiped away tears, but they kept coming. She could hardly breathe. She had to keep talking.
“I know you’ve signed the divorce papers and everything and you’re not together anymore, but she’s with somebody else. She’s been with him for months now. She . . .”
Got pregnant. Did the worst thing I can imagine her doing.
“I know,” Todd said.
Maggie’s breath caught in her throat. “You do?”
He nodded. “I’ve known for a while—or I guess I should say I’ve suspected.”
Maggie’s mouth dropped open. “Then you know about the miscarriage?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Staring at her hand, he shook his head. “I’ve seen her go through that too many times. I know the signs, even from a distance.” He shrugged and pulled his hand out from under hers. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, Mags. You’ve seemed so distant lately, and I thought it might be best if I didn’t add to all the stress me and your mom have been causing you.”
As if not knowing why her family was disintegrating was less stressful than the truth.
He reached out a hand and brushed her cheek. “You’ve lived under our shadow for so long. That can’t have been easy.”
She sucked in a breath and tried to stop her tears.
“When I saw you on that stage, Mags, and I heard you singing, you stole my heart. You were beautiful up there. Your voice is gold when you hit your groove. We discouraged your singing for so long because . . .” He lowered his hand and stared at the wedding ring he still hadn’t removed. “Well, look at me and your mom. This kind of life comes with heavy sacrifices—and not just in marriage. I don’t talk to my brother anymore, not since he went to the press and tried to blame his drug habit on me. I’m always here in the studio or on tour or writing or figuring out what to do to keep us at the top.”
Maggie was about to ask him what he’d always wanted to do, but he kept going. He had opened a door and there was no going back.
“We wanted more kids,” he said in a choked voice. “We wanted to live on a farm and take you to rodeos. Your mom, she was so happy when you were born. We were both happy. We thought we had everything, and then it all got bigger and bigger—so big it became something outside of ourselves. We never found the time to take you to a rodeo just for the fun of it. I don’t know why we didn’t try harder. There must’ve been time somewhere for that. The point is,” he said, focusing on her eyes, “no matter what you decide to do in life, you’ll make sacrifices like we’ve made. Follow your heart, but it is what it is. We’ll be okay. We’ll all be okay.”
Her tears finally slowed. “Do you really think so? What about Mom and that man? Why did she end up with him? What went wrong?”
He took a deep breath and looked over at the band through the window. They were all sitting around talking. Maggie missed hanging around them.
“Things have been going downhill for years now,” Todd explained. “Little things at first, then bigger. Our music got to be more important than us. We became icons, and that’s disorienting in a lot of ways. We’d make excuses not to spend time with just the two of us, and we let ourselves drown. Then one day I stopped and looked at your mom and I didn’t know her anymore. She wanted to sing songs I didn’t feel connected to. She wore different shades of lipstick I’d never seen her wear before. Just little things, all piling up to something huge. I’m pretty sure she felt the same way about me. Well, except I don’t wear lipstick.”
Maggie rolled her eyes. “I get it, Dad.”
He forced a smile. “As for your mom and ‘that man,’ like I said, it will all work out. Maybe not in the way you want, but it will. You don’t need to worry about it, okay? The only thing you can do is watch from the sidelines. If you want, we’ll keep you more in the loop from now on. Will that help?”
“Sure,” she mumbled. Her parents were divorcing. Her mom was going to be with another man. She didn’t even know how to start sorting through all that, but if her dad said it would be okay, she had to have faith in that. Besides, she wasn’t as fragile as they seemed to think. She could handle things if she was prepared. The only reason she had been falling apart was because everybody was trying to keep things from her, like she couldn’t handle the truth. She was pretty sure she could handle it just fine if she had all the pieces to work with.
She pulled her knees up to her chest and wiped away the last of her tears with the back of her hand. She needed to take this in a new direction while she had her dad’s full attention.
“I’m not sure I want to sing anymore,” she said in a steadier voice. “Not because of what you just told me. I was thinking about it last night. I mean, what if there’s more to me than that?”
He leaned back in his chair and sucked on his top lip. If she didn’t know any better, she would have thought he was trying to keep himself from crying too. Maybe he was.
“I didn’t sleep much last night,” he finally said. “I was at Ray’s house, and I kept thinking about you up on that stage and what we’ve done to keep you from getting up there. You did it anyway, and that means something.” He frowned. “I’m sorry, Maggie. We’ve tried to protect you in all the wrong ways. We thought if we encouraged you enough to work on your voice, you’d excel and it would create a sort of competition between the three of us. We were afraid you might never reach the kind of success you’d want, or if you did reach it, what it would do to our relationship with you.” He let out a forced laugh and rolled his eyes. “Turns out the alternative wasn’t any better. We had no right to hold you back.”
She wanted to hug him, but at the same time she didn’t want to be anywhere near him. There was so much that could have been different in her life if they’d had more faith in her. He was waiting for her reaction, so she shrugged and looked up at the ceiling.
“You know what we were doing right when you walked in?” he asked, breaking the tension.
She sniffed and looked away from the ceiling, back to him. “What?”
“We were discussing the intro to ‘Sunrise.’”
“Sunrise” was her song. She had written the music and lyrics last year, and just last night she’d watched the original music shrivel in the fire. Of course, she had given a copy to her dad a while back and officially submitted it to the band and the record label for consideration, so it wasn’t totally destroyed. Her heart pounded and she wasn’t sure why.
“We want to sing it,” Todd said slowly. Maggie was sure he could see the shock on her face. “The label’s approved it for our next single, if that’s all right with you, of course. They’re going to offer you a publishing contract, just like for ‘Digging Home.’ That should help with you getting on your own feet, right?”
She shrugged, secretly thrilled at the idea of making money off another song. If it did well, she would make a decent amount of money. But then her dad leaned forward and she cringed. Something bad was coming.
“Do you want to sing it with us today since your mom’s not here?”
Had he not heard what she’d just said? “Remember last night, Dad? I ran off stage in tears. I burned my music.”
He waved his hand as if batting away a fly. “Nonsense. Minor hiccup.”
Of course he would treat it like it was nothing, just like everyone else had. She pressed her knees tighter to her chest. “I can’t sing and you know it.”
“You can sing and you know it.” He stood and walked to the other side of the room where two guitars leaned on stands. He grabbed one and sat back down in front of her. Before she could stop him, he was playing the intro chords to “Sunrise.”
She remembered when she’d written those chords and the lyrics that followed. It was inspired by when she and Cole had been together, and the memory made her squeeze her eyes shut. That time they’d stayed up all night long in the back of his truck and watched the sun spill over the tree farm. When the orange light bathed the pines, she had told him it made her think of the way music might look like if you could see it, the way it lit everything up and changed your perspective.
Todd lifted his foot and nudged her calf. “C’mon, sing so I can hear that beautiful voice again. I’m ready to support you all the way. Isn’t that what you want?”
“Yes, but I’ll sing out of tune.”
He grinned. “Then we’ll sing until we get you in tune. Giving up is for quitters.”
She laughed. “Brilliant insight, Dad.”
“That’s my girl. Smiling!” He played louder and nudged her calf again. “Sing!”
He wasn’t going to give up. She waited for the chorus and then came in, unbearably out of tune. Her dad didn’t flinch. He kept playing and she kept singing. A strangled cat. The girl with no fireworks.