Page 98 of The Temptation of Truth

I turn and look over the glass half wall. Directly below is an infinity pool with a swim-up bar and a hot tub. Past that is a sliver of yard full of bright green grass, a deck with modern lounge furniture, and a firepit. Then, just beyond that, down a small hill, the grass gives way to a sandy beach that leads to the ocean. This house backs up directly to the beach, and it’s beautiful.

“Wow.”

I scan the horizon, then close my eyes and inhale, the briny air filling my lungs as the ocean waves create the most relaxing background music.

How lucky am I that this is my life now?

Last week, I was in a luxury hilltop lodge in Adelaide. This week it’s an oceanfront mansion in Sydney. And in a few days, I’ll be playing another sold-out show for thousands of people who love my band. They’ll dance and sing along to music I helped create, and I’ll leave that stage feeling alive and loved and immeasurably happy.

It’s almost perfect.

As close to perfect as I could get, anyway, and not for the first time, I wonder how it would have been different if I’d not been left at that fire station. The question has been occurring more frequently since learning about my birth mom. It’s been so persistent that it’s in my dreams, as if even my subconscious needs to weigh the pros and cons of meeting her.

What would it change? Nothing? Everything? I don’t know which outcome I fear more.

Who would I be if she’d kept me? Would Mabel Rossi even exist? Would The Hometown Heartless? Would I have ever learned to play drums or met Sav and the guys? It’s hard to imagine myself without the music. Without my band. My family.

Family.

If my birth mother had kept me, I might not have gone through all those foster homes. I wouldn’t have found Ms. Mabel’s lifeless body. Wouldn’t have run away at fifteen, been recruited into Oscar’s gang of lost kids, and become a busking pickpocket. There are so many difficult, painful memories from the last thirty years of my life that I could do without. That I likely wouldn’t have had to endure had my mother kept me.

But if I’d not endured them, would I still beme?

“I think it’s called Whale Beach.”

Aurora’s voice pulls me from my thoughts, and when I look at her, she’s studying the GPS on her phone.

“And apparently there’s a rock pool”—she glances up and points into the distance—"that way down the beach.”

“A rock pool?”

“Yeah. As far as I can tell, it’s like a pool carved out of the rock that sits just off the ocean. Here.”

She hands her phone to me, the screen full of images of Sydney rock pools. I click on the first one to enlarge it, but beforethe photo can load, her phone rings, and the screen fills with a video chat request from Brady.

My eyes dart to Aurora, and what I see fills me with anger.

The color has leeched from her cheeks, and she’s staring wide-eyed at the phone. She is the picture of dread, and I can feel her fear in my gut. It spikes my adrenalin so my fingers tremble. I fist my hand and try to stay calm.

“I can leave so you can talk if you want?”

Her attention jumps to my face, and she shakes her head. “No. Stay. Stay.”

I nod and hand her the phone. I watch her take two deep inhales and exhales before plastering on a fake smile and answering.

I hate his voice immediately.

“Hey, Br?—”

“Oh, so you can answer the phone.”

She flinches. “I told you I was flying.”

“Your location says you’ve been in Sydney for almost three hours.”

“Yeah, but I’ve been unpacking. I took a shower. I’m sor?—”

“I just wanted to make sure you weren’t in some club doing God knows what.”