“That’s wonderful. You have so many opportunities. I’m sure orchestras around the world would be glad to have you.”
Maybe. There was only so much I could do with a Master’s from Juilliard. Most of my classmates who hadn’t gone on to the DMA program were touring or recording CDs, but I had never wanted to take that path. Notoriety and fame weren’t things I longed for. My fingers tapped a silent tune on my leg.
Aunt Rose smoothed the creases of her pants. “I’m sorry that things didn’t work out with—”
“It’s no big deal.”
She studied my face. “You were together a long time. You must be heartbroken.”
“It was mutual.” It had been eight years since I felt comfortable talking to my aunt about my relationships, I wasn’t about to start now.
“Are you sure? I mean…”
“It wasn’t right between Kaz and I anymore. We both knew it.” I shrugged. “That’s all.”
“Well, if you need someone to talk to.” Her fingers fiddled with the pearls around her neck, the second time today her nerves were showing. We both knew I wouldn’t be going to her for relationship advice again.
She got up from the bed. “I’m so happy you’re home. I hope that we can…”
I couldn’t imagine an ending to that sentence that wouldn’t sound forced. Obviously she couldn’t either.
“Dinner should be ready in half an hour,” she said and left the room.
My eyes roamed back to the blue walls. I ran a hand over the smooth paint. Two years of stark white before a deep ocean blue had taken over. I’d chosen the color, but I couldn’t take responsibility for my room coming alive again. I hadn’t been the one to beat down the starkness in my bedroom, or within myself. Someone else had the credit for all that. But I wasn’t ready to think about him either.
Chapter Three
Tiny arms wrapped around my neck and I was the recipient of a very wet kiss. “Wow, she’s not shy at all.” Not that I was an expert, but I’d always thought two-year-olds hid behind their mother’s legs rather than running up to a complete stranger and holding their arms out for a hug.
I put little Elle down and she ran back to her mother. Lexi picked her up and she nestled into her mother’s lap. “Nope. She’s a little flirt.” Elle grabbed her mom’s long auburn hair and covered her face with it. Lexi laughed.
“She looks just like you.”
“Thankfully.” They shared the same wide-set eyes and pouty mouth. Not that I knew what the father looked like. Nor would I, from the sounds of it.
I sat across from Lexi in her tiny North Hollywood apartment, toys strewn around my feet and a doll digging into my back. Freshman year at Juilliard, Lexi had walked into Ethics class toting her violin in one hand and a stack of books in the other. She accidentally whacked me in the back of the head with her case as she was walked by. Before long, we were friends, roommates and confidantes.
I moved the toy, handing it to Elle when she stretched her arms out for it.
“I think you should tell me where he lives,” I said. “I’ve got words. Lots of words.” There was a ton I wanted to say to the guy who’d left Lexi pregnant and hadn’t been heard from since.
She burst out laughing. “You’re so intimidating.”
“What? You don’t think he’d be scared of me?”
“All five-foot-nothing of you? He’d slam the door in your face.” Her smile died. She hugged Elle closer, burying her nose in the little girl’s ginger hair.
I felt a painful tuba-blast of pity through my heart. “I’m sorry.”
“Stop looking at me like that,” Lexi said, her lips curling.
“I just can’t believe you have a daughter.” After Lexi got her Bachelor’s degree, she moved to LA, got a new job and a new boyfriend. My best friend had a whole new life and I hadn’t been around for any of it. Worst of all, I hadn’t been there when that life fell apart.
“I can’t believe you’re back in LA,” she said.
“Definitely wasn’t the plan.”
Lexi put Elle on the floor. “I’m sorry about Kaz. That really sucks.”
“It was mutual.” Just what I’d said to Aunt Rose. Lexi didn’t seem to buy it either.
She leaned forward, her brown eyes aimed at me. “Really?”
My mind went back to New York. I pictured myself sitting in my favorite leather chair by the window, working on my thesis while Kaz played Bach on his cello.
Kazuo Takahashi was quiet in everything he did. For some reason, I was drawn to it. His talent, vast yet unobtrusive. His soft, almost whispered words. He was the exact opposite of who, and what, I was used to. Our relationship had been easy and comfortable, full of cello suites and piano sonatas, quiet moments and uncomplicated love. After three years together, we came to the realization that quiet wasn’t enough for either for us.
“Yes, it was mutual.”
Lexi nodded. “What happened?”
One leg crossed over the other, my foot swung around and around. “It got too comfortable. Too…nothing. Like there was nothing there. I mean we loved each other but—”
“Not enough.”
“I guess.” I hadn’t stopped loving Kaz, and I don’t think he had fallen out of love with me either. Leaving him, leaving New York, had been one of the toughest decisions I’d ever made. At least this time, I was positive it was the right one.
Almost positive.
Lexi bit a fingernail as she studied me. “Are you sure it has nothing to do with—”
“Don’t even say it.” I pursed my lips. “Anyway, why would it? That’s long over.”
She gave me a knowing look. “I heard he’s just finishing up his second world tour.” She smiled around the nail in her mouth. “Think he’ll settle back in LA?”
“I have no idea. You know I haven’t heard from Eric in eight years.”
“I know. I just thought maybe you’d heard through his fan club or something. You are the president, right?”
I picked up a stuffed puppy from the floor and threw it, hitting Lexi square in the face. Elle started to cry as if I’d struck her mom with a cinder block.
“Sorry, sorry,” I said, cringing at her tears.
Lexi shrugged it off with a laugh, soothing her daughter until she stopped crying.
“So you’re living at home,” she said. “How pathetic.”
I picked up another toy, ready to throw but she raised an eyebrow, her eyes darting to Elle and back. I set the toy down.
“Actually, it’s worse.” I told Lexi how my dad had landed himself in financial cacophony. “Now my aunt is looking for renters. So it’s either find my own place, or end up in Malibu.”
“Ooh, please pick Malibu. Pleeease.” I shot her a dirty look. “I know you hate it there, but beach days! Every day beach days.”
I shook my head. “No way. Malibu is a last resort.”
“You could stay here. It would be like sophomore year all over again.”
I laughed, remembering how we used to stay up until four in the morning despite our early classes, talking and making smorgasbord smoothies.
“I couldn’t.” As much as I wanted to, there wasn’t room in Lexi’s apartment for me. Both bedrooms barely fit a bed and dresser, the living room was even smaller, and her kitchen was nothing more than a sliver.
She rolled her eyes. “I suppose it would be hard to live here after your gigantic mansion in the Hollywood Hills.”
“Come on, I’ve only been there one night. My apartment near school wasn’t much bigger than this.”
“You mean the brownstone on the Upper West Side?”
I sobered. Dad wouldn’t be able to help me this time. I had to find a way to make rent all on my own. But I wouldn’t make things harder for Lexi than they already were. “I need a job.”
She flash
ed me her teeth. “Lexi to the rescue.”
“Really?”
“Yep. I got you an audition with my orchestra.”
“The California Philharmonic?” Jumping from my seat, I planted myself beside her, wrapping her in a hug. Some of her hair caught in my mouth and I sputtered it out. “You’re the best.”
“It’s only five performances this summer,” she said. “But the Maestro seemed excited about you. I told him you got your Masters at Juilliard and TA’d for the great Vassili Fedorov. I think he hasn’t hired a pianist yet because he’s waiting to hear you play.”
I broke the hug but left my arm slung over her shoulder. “You start in a couple weeks though, don’t you?” That wasn’t much time to learn new pieces, assimilate into a new orchestra.
“No biggie for you. Just wow him at the audition.” She rested her head on my shoulder.
I groaned. “Sure. No big deal.”
Elle climbed into Lexi’s lap and the three of us snuggled together on the cracked leather couch. “Play Rachmaninoff. He’s a sucker for Rachmaninoff.”
“I think I can handle that.” Kaz and I used to play Rachmaninoff’s “Vocalise, Opus 34” together. Already the first few chords were running through my head, my fingers moving along to the imagined notes. I knew the piece well, but it didn’t exactly show off my talent—the cello took center stage in the arrangement we played. I’d have gone with “Piano Concerto No. 2” if it hadn’t been such an obvious pick.
“Do you have anything else lined up?” Lexi asked and my fingers stilled. The song in my head evaporated.
“Professor Fedorov set up an interview for me at USC Thornton.”
“Wow, really?” Lexi’s eyebrows had climbed to her hairline. “Aren’t you a little…”
“Young to teach? Probably.” Most musicians my age preferred to perform, join an orchestra, tour, get a crack at some form of fame. But while I loved to play, my aspirations had never been on the spotlight. “I’m also looking into an arts high school in LA.”
“High school?” The surprise in Lexi’s voice was evident. The truth was, I felt more suited teaching high school over a university. At Juilliard, I’d mentored once a week and taught piano lessons at a local junior high. Watching the kids learn to love classical music as much as they loved pop and hip-hop? It was magical.
“The USC interview isn’t until next month. I don’t know what I’m going to do until then.”
Lexi shifted a now-sleepy Elle on her lap. “Offer’s still open.” She stood up slowly, trying not to wake Elle, and then tiptoed out of the room.
I couldn’t accept. It wasn’t that I didn’t love Lexi—she was my best friend—but I would be in the way. She was overwhelmed already. She didn’t need a squatter taking up space in her apartment.
Unfortunately, my list of options was smaller than my bank account.
Chapter Four
“Ava!” Mari burst into one of Kellynch’s many living rooms and flung her arms around my neck. “I finally get my big sis back.”
“Who am I, the maid?” Beth snapped. Mari ignored her.
I pulled myself from her embrace and looked her over. “You look good, Mar.” She’d cut her hair since the last time I saw her. Short waves reached her chin, blonde highlights helped hide the mousy brown color. “Where are Charlie and the boys?”
She grabbed my hand and led me into the dining room. “Charlie had to go into the office. The one night we’re having a family dinner! Convenient, right?”
“If he’s skipping out on seeing me, he’s going to be in serious trouble.” Mari’s husband, Charlie, and I had been best friends in high school. Mari didn’t know him then, she was a couple of years younger than we were and had been sent to boarding school besides. They didn’t get together until after I left for New York. I didn’t even believe they were together until I got the wedding invitation in the mail.
Mari rolled her eyes. “The boys stayed home with the nanny. You know how they drive Dad crazy.”
Mari and Charlie’s sons were only a year apart. Dad always said they had the devil in their eyes, and acted more like a hostage around them than a grandfather. I was there for both births, but I hadn’t seen them since the youngest, Landon, was born.
Aunt Rose marched into the dining room carrying a plate of chicken. “Ava, Mari, bring in the rest of the food, will you?”
Eight years and Elliot family dinners hadn’t changed much. Dad still enthused about the anti-aging benefits of garlic, Beth ignored everyone in the room except Dad and her smartphone, Mari alternated between shoveling food into her mouth and gabbing about nothing and Aunt Rose presided over the whole thing as if it were her house, her family. The only thing out of place was Shelby Clay.
I passed my aunt the Tuscan salad Beth had made. Or rather, poured the lettuce from the bag and then left me to finish. Without a cook around, what had I expected, really?
“Thank you, Ava.” Aunt Rose sat primly at the long dining table, her cream blouse a stain magnet for the cranberry juice she was sipping. Not that she would ever spill a drop. Aunt Rose never made mistakes, unless you counted her ex-husband, which she didn’t. “It’s all in the past,” was all she would ever say about her short-lived marriage. She never had kids, and I’d never even met the guy. She had adopted us as her family and never bothered with one of her own. I’d always wondered why, but never had the guts to ask.
“So, I’ve got huge news which I’ve been dying to share,” Mari said, bouncing in her seat.
“You’re pregnant,” Beth said.
“You’re getting a divorce,” Aunt Rose said.
“You finally lost those last few pounds of baby weight,” Dad said.
Mari scowled at him. “Noooo.” She paused for dramatic effect. “Charlie found someone to rent Kellynch.”
Dad’s fork clattered onto his plate. His mouth opened but no words came out.
“Who is it?” Aunt Rose asked.
“It better not be some twenty-year-old bum who plays video games all day,” Dad said, “like that husband of yours.”
“Dad,” I warned.
“You know what? Never mind. Find someone yourself.” Mari pushed away from the table. “Some fifty-year-old bum who slathers lotion on himself all day.”
“Mari!” I barked. Wow, things really hadn’t changed at all.
“Sit down, Mari,” Aunt Rose said, “and apologize to your father.”
For a moment, Mari just glared at Aunt Rose. I thought she would storm off, but instead she gave my dad a slow but graceful, “I’m sorry,” and returned to her seat.
I blinked. Maybe some things were different after all.
“Now, tell us about this renter,” Aunt Rose said.
Mari glanced at me. “It’s a couple in their forties. Married, no kids.”
Mari’s insult hadn’t fazed Dad at all. He seemed more shaken up about the possible renter. “Who are these people? What do they do for a living?”
Mari swallowed even though she had no food in her mouth. Her eyes darted to me again. “He’s a music producer. She’s a nurse.”
Something tickled at the back of my mind.
“Music producer? No. Absolutely not.” Dad jabbed his finger on the table with each word. “I’m not having some strung out hippie with long hair and tattered jeans living in my house. And a nurse?” He shuddered.
“Dad,” I objected. “You have no idea what he looks like.” Dad was the exact opposite of a hippie. Tall, handsome, dark brown hair lacking a single gray, few wrinkles, and always decked out in immaculate designer clothing. Never a thing out of place, like George Clooney.
Dad ignored me. “He probably chain smokes. Our handmade furniture, the curtains I bought in Greece, everything will reek of cigarettes.”
“Some music producers dress really nice and drive expensive cars and stuff,”
Beth said. “I’ve seen it on reality TV.”
“Like that guy from that show,” Shelby said.
Dad’s expression brightened.
“He’s definitely handsome,” Mari said.
Dad gave a harrumph.
“From what Charlie says, he’s semi-retired now. They’re very well-off. They seem eager to settle in this neighborhood.”
“Well, who wouldn’t?” Dad sliced his chicken a little too vigorously. “And Kellynch is the best house in the Hills.” His frown lessened. “What’s his name? Maybe I’ve heard of him.”
Mari hesitated, she glanced at me yet again. “Croft. Richard and Sophia Croft.”
Chicken caught in my throat. I coughed. I gagged. Tears sprang from my eyes.
“Someone hit her on the back,” Beth said with a sigh.
“Croft?” Aunt Rose repeated, trying to place the name.
Still coughing, I held up my hand to tell them I was fine. Not that anyone was rushing to my aid.
“Why does that name sound familiar?” Dad asked, tapping his fork against his lips.
I downed half a glass of water and gasped.
“Because Sophia Croft is the sister of…” Mari stopped and looked at me, as if waiting for my permission to say his name.
“Eric Wentworth,” I choked out. “Sophia Croft is Eric’s older sister.”
Every eye in the room zeroed in on me.
I fled the table and ran upstairs.
Tears stung at the corners of my eyes but I told myself not to cry as I flopped onto my bed, face-first.
Rolling over, I stared at the ceiling. It had been a long time since I’d cried over Eric Wentworth. It was second nature to squash all memories of him the moment they appeared. Like curtains covering an ugly view, I would use an imaginary hand to push the memory out of sight and back into the recesses of my mind.
Not this time. My heart pounded a painful beat. I couldn’t get him out of my head. The last time I saw him, the last look he gave me, still tortured my soul. Unable to stop it, I stretched my mind back further, to our beginning, rather than our end.
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