Page 19 of Perfect Composition

I cup her cheek as I pass by her. I rub my thumb over the apple of it. For just a moment, I’m transported back to the moment I first held her in my arms. I forgot in that moment all about the times I asked her father’s family about where he was. The certified letters I was advised my father’s attorney sent to his address that were returned unopened. I had the most important piece of him I’d ever need.

His child.

Together, we make our way to the elevator, gushing about the opulence of our temporary home away from home. “I really wish you could spend more than a few days here.”

I tuck my arm around her waist. “Honey, I’ll be back up for almost two weeks at Christmas. I have patients I have to see. Besides, by then we’ll know if you’re going to be permanently based here in the city,” I point out logically.

We step out into the cool November night. I verbally berate myself for not bringing a wrap as the cool air flutters through my thin shirt. Austyn wraps her arm around me and laughs, even as she jumps up and down to keep her legs warm in her miniskirt. “You get used to it, I’m sure.”

“I’m not sure how,” I respond doubtfully. Fortunately, our car pulls up in the circular drive. And blessedly, there’s heat coming out of the vents.

Austyn and I spend the car ride catching up on her last job in Miami. I bemoan, “Why couldn’t I visit you there? I could have put on a swimsuit and lounged by the pool.”

My daughter chokes on her laughter. “Because then Gramps would have insisted on hiring security to accompany you.”

“You’re lucky he hasn’t with you. This time I think he was serious,” I warn her.

“And I still think he’s leaning toward Sheriff Lewis because then he won’t have to worry about security for you.”

I scoff.

“Mom, you’re a babe. Want my opinion?”

“Oh, this should be interesting. Go for it.”

“I think if you didn’t live in the town named after our family, you would have married a long time ago.”

I arch a perfectly groomed brow at her. “It’s not like I lacked for dates while you grew up.”

“Dates, yes. Someone special in your life, no.”

“I had you.”

“You deserved more,” Austyn argues, something she’s been doing more and more of late.

“I had the world, Austyn,” I correct her, not for the first time. And I also know I’m lying to both of us when I remind her, “I had a family who supported me when I got pregnant with you. I was able to study for and build a fulfilling career. And yes, when it was appropriate, I did enjoy dates.”

“You didn’t fall in love.” Austyn’s head turns away when she admits, “I kept waiting for you to. Like Sari’s mom and stepdaddy did.”

I swallow, trying hard to battle against the ache blooming in my chest. I can’t tell my daughter it was impossible to fall in love when I never really fell out of it despite how young I was. Instead, I share, “I’m not opposed to it. If the right man strolls into my life, I promise you I’ll give it a chance.”

“And I swear I’ll compose sonnets to it if you do.”

Exasperated, I demand, “Have I been so unhappy? Have you?”

“No, but you’re a beautiful, giving woman, Mama. I just want you to know what it’s like.”

“What what’s like?”

“To experience when every second of your soul sings.” Austyn reaches over and grips my hand just as we exit the tunnel. “That’s what music is like for me.”

I don’t correct her and tell her I experienced that with her father. That would just make her more infuriated with the fact the man who produced half of her cells walked out of my life without a word when I was seventeen, leaving me alone to face the speculation and whispers of an entire town, pregnant and alone.

And though I’ve protected her from the knowledge, maybe it’s been because I’ve seen him cavorting on the covers of every gossip rag without a damn thought to what his daughter might think that has kept me from doing the same.

But right now isn’t the time to give her the truth. I twist my ring back and forth, the streetlights glinting off the matching one hanging from around my daughter’s neck—a gift I bought us both for her eighteenth birthday. The inscription I had put inside wasNothing else matters but us.

The first time Austyn asked me about her father, she was fifteen. And all she asked was whether he was a good man. It was right after I had seen a picture of Beckett on the cover of some tabloid with a singer from some band. They were wrapped around each other in ways that should have been kept in a bedroom. Hell, maybe they were in a bedroom.