A Million Kisses or More (29 page)

“Yes, my secret,” Heather agreed with a sigh.

Ana’s brows furrowed as she wondered how the secret could be known since she still didn’t know who her father was and her mom was continuing to hold his name close to her heart, her lips sealed. “How would anyone know?”

Heather’s face twisted up in remorse as she explained, “Your father’s genes are very strong in his children.”

“Jesus,” Ana breathed, imagining a herd of kids who looked like her running around. “Just how many kids does he have?”

“Just two,” Heather said quickly, holding up two fingers. “Your… half-sister works at Madd.”

Ana’s jaw dropped to her chest as she stared at her mother, feeling as if they had lost what little ground they had gained. “Is that why you offered to pay off the scholarship? So I don’t accidentally run into my half-sister and give all of your secrets away?”

Heather’s face twisted even further as she admitted, “She knows about you. I’m just not sure how eager she is to meet you.”

Ana didn’t think it was possible for her to be any more shocked. “Does she know that I’m going to be the new intern there?”

Heather pressed her lips together before she said, “Maybe. Probably.”

Ana squeezed her eyes shut and slumped against the back of the couch, wishing she could wake up and find herself in Harrison’s arms. She’d tell him about the crazy dream she had, they’d laugh, and then he’d make love to her.

“Let me pay back the scholarship,” Heather continued in a soft, urgent voice. “Don’t court heartbreak by going out west and falling in love with someone who will promise the world but only bring you pain.”

“I’m with Harrison,” Ana said. Peeking an eye open, she glared at her mom, “And no pretty boy actor is going to turn my head.”

Heather nodded, “Then let me pay it back so you can stay here with your knight in a polyester uniform.” At Ana’s glare, Heather amended her words, “Your beloved Harrison.”

“I earned the scholarship on my own merits, right?” Ana asked, just to clarify, her mind still reeling with everything her mother had told her. At her mother’s nod, she glanced over her shoulder towards the window, as if she could see Harrison through the walls that separated them. She could accept her mother’s offer and stay with Harrison but then she’d always wonder if she could have done it, if she could have gone out to California and succeeded. If she could go out there and meet the sister she hadn’t known about. She could only hope that Harrison wouldn’t hate her when she told him about her mother’s offer and why she had to refuse it. She had to do this on her own, no matter what it took. Ana sighed, “Then I will pay it back by completing the terms.”

“The internship,” her mom sighed.

“You have no idea how tempted I am to accept your help,” Ana admitted, her soul feeling as if it was being torn in two. “But I have to do this. And I don’t want to be indebted to you, especially now.”

“Ana, I’m your mother,” Heather scolded. “There’s nothing wrong with a parent helping a child.”

Ana almost smiled before she said, “I don’t want to leave him but I need to prove to myself that I can do this on my own. Even if there wasn’t a chance I’d meet my sister, I’d want to do this. I want to do this
especially
if there’s a chance I’ll meet her.”

Heather heaved another sigh, looking at her hands in her lap. “I see.”

“I don’t think you do,” Ana said softly, her words choking her with what she truly wanted. “I’m afraid of making the wrong choice, of settling before I ever try, of having underdeveloped wings and never being able to fly, with or without Harrison.”

Glancing up, Heather tilted her head to the side. “How do you mean?”

Licking her lower lip, trying to make sense of the turmoil in her head, Ana slowly started to speak. “All of my life, I’ve seen what happens to people who have had everything handed to them, the kids of the people you design rooms for… they’re like butterflies who’ve had their cocoons opened for them.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Ana wasn’t entirely sure she knew what she was talking about either but she still continued, “They’re beautiful but they can’t fly. For so many people who have been given everything they appreciate nothing and then they want more and more to fill the gaping holes I their souls. They’re miserable but they’re stuck in their little realms and they don’t have any curiosity about anything and I don’t want to be like that. I want to see what’s out there, what I’m capable of, and no matter how badly I want to stay with Harrison, I can’t. I have to do this.”

“Ana, you’re beautiful just the way you are,” Heather said with a slight smile. Shaking her head, she continued, “You don’t have to go to California to prove yourself.”

“I do because I’m a relic of a different era,” Ana said, the words forcing themselves past her tight throat. “I want nothing more than to be Harrison’s wife and the mother of his children, including Jolie, but I feel like I should want more. Yet I can’t imagine anything else making me happier. So I have to do this to prove a point, if only to myself, so when I come back, I’ll know that this is what I truly want.”

“Stubborn and independent,” Heather growled under her breath. “Needlessly so in this case.”

“I want him to be proud of me, mom,” Ana said softly. “The way I am proud of him.”

“Ana,” her mom breathed, her eyes filled with concern. Gazing at her for what seemed an eternity, her mom finally asked, “What will you do when you return?”

“I want to work in the theater,” Ana answered. At her mother’s arched eyebrow, she added, “Backstage, making props and costumes and doing makeup. I want to work on the production of plays and stuff. I’m good at it.” Ana chuckled to herself as she continued, “My original goal was to find work out in Hollywood after my internship was over. I figured with all of the connections I’ll be making at Madd, that it would be simple enough finding employment.”

“If that’s what you want, you can still do that.” Her mom’s words were encouraging but it was apparent that her mother didn’t want her to remain in California.

Ana swallowed, nodding her head in acknowledgement of her mom’s words. “I know. But Harrison is here and I realized I’d be almost as content with a local theater.”

“But you don’t know for sure,” Heather said softly.

Slowly, Ana raised her eyes and looked at her mom. Torn in two by her conflicting desires, by a love so absolute she knew she was meant to be with Harrison forever and the fear that it wasn’t enough, she admitted, “I don’t know for sure. When I’m with him, I am so happy it hurts and I could easily lose myself in this life. It’s a temptation that I don’t know if I’m strong enough to resist. But what if I do turn my back on the opportunity out west and then one day I wake up and I wonder where my life went?”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” her mom said softly, not without sympathy. “When I was seventeen, I thought I had everything figured out. I was going to get my degree, get a job, eventually find someone that I could spend the rest of my life with, have children with, and then we were going to grow old together, a happy couple with more love than money. But then I met your father and my entire world was flipped on its head and ripped inside out. By the time I was your age, I was desperately trying to hold on. I was raising my beautiful daughter while my heart resided with a man who was desperate to find the perfect high. Now? I have more wealth than I’ll ever know what to do with, I’m still in love with a man who is beyond broken, I have an amazing daughter and I’m still trying to figure it out as I go myself.”

Ana smiled slightly as she reached out and took her mother’s hand. At first, Heather stiffened but then she quickly relaxed, squeezing Ana’s hand in return. “You don’t have to leave tomorrow, mom.”

“I do,” Heather said, looking down at their joined hands. Letting out a long breath, she said softly, “I told you before that I’m going to Arizona to see your father. I have just been putting it off because it kills me to see him when he’s in the hospital after one of his binges. He makes all of these promises and I no longer believe he’s capable of keeping them. It’s even worse when he’s in rehab because he’s clean and a reminder of all of the reasons I fell in love with him in the first place.”

“Take me with,” Ana said, reconsidering the words as soon as they were out of her mouth. Looking towards Harrison’s house again, she shook her head but she couldn’t take the request back.

“No, Anavrin,” her mom said with finality, though there was amusement in her voice. “Enjoy your time with Harrison and his daughter and put the thoughts of your father out of your head.”

“How am I supposed to do that?” Ana asked.

“Just don’t think about him.” Heather and Ana stared at one another for a moment before they grinned at the same time. “If only it were that simple. I don’t know, sweetheart, I just don’t know.”

“Well, it’s late,” Ana said, bone tired. “We should head to bed. The guest room is made up because Jolie spends some time over here. Um, the sheets are clean.”

“That’s fine,” her mom said, standing up when Ana did.

At the top of the stairs, Ana paused and turned to her mother, asking in a hushed voice, “Why did you tell me you slept with so many men, that you didn’t know who my father was?”

“Because I just wanted you to stop asking about him,” she answered softly.

Ana let the answer settle in for a moment before she nodded her head since that almost made sense. In an even softer voice, she asked, “Who’s my father?”

Her mother’s eyes moved over her face, questioning, seeking. Taking a deep breath, Heather met Ana’s eyes and said, “Maddox Cooper.”

Ana hadn’t thought it was possible to be even more dumbfounded than before but with those two words, that one name, her mother managed to completely and utterly destroy her hard won calm. Her mouth opened and closed a few times and even though she knew she looked like a suffocating fish, she couldn’t help it. “Maddox Cooper, lead singer of
Absynthe
, is my father.”

“Yes,” Heather said, moving past Ana and heading towards the guest room. When she got to the door, she turned around and looked back but Ana was still frozen in place.

“
The
Maddox Cooper?” Ana asked, desperately trying to wrap her head around the fact that her father was one of the most famous, if not
the
most famous, musicians of all time. His music was revolutionary, his lyrics sheer poetry, his voice utterly divine, and he was her father. At her mother’s tight nod, she blurted, “But I don’t look anything like him.”

Heather huffed out a laugh, “Trust me, you do. You even have his eyes.”

Ana had no idea of whether or not that was true, she’d just have to accept her mother’s word about that. Trying to wrack her brain to remember what he looked like, she came up blank. Staring at her mother, she uttered, “You never let me listen to his music.”

“Yet you did anyway,” Heather replied with a sad smile that took away the bite of the words.

Catching her lower lip between her teeth, Ana asked, “Are you his butterfly or his rose?”

Heather’s smile widened and grew impossibly sadder. “
You’re
his butterfly, Anavrin. Your sister is his rose. Good night, Ana. I’ll see you in the morning before I leave.”

Her mother couldn’t drop a bombshell like that and then just expect to leave! Finally finding her feet, she rushed into her mother’s room. “You can’t leave now.”

“I’m not leaving now,” Heather said, standing with her back towards Ana. Glancing over her shoulder but not looking at Ana, she continued, “I’m leaving in the morning.”

“Mother….”

“I have to see your father and you need to enjoy your time with Harrison because when you get out west, everything is going to change,” Heather said, a tear sliding down her porcelain cheek. “Get some sleep, Ana. I’ll see you in the morning.”

Numb, Ana turned around and let herself out of the room. In a blind haze, she went back to her room and sat down on the bed, everything within her rebelling at the idea of going to sleep. Grabbing the phone, she dialed Harrison’s number, needing to hear his voice.

He picked up after three rings, his voice heavy with sleep when he answered, “Hello?”

Taking her first breath since leaving her mom’s room, she murmured, “Harrison.”

“Ana, what’s wrong?”

“You know the expression, when it rains, it pours?”

“Yeah.”

“My mom told me some things tonight and I don’t think I can handle it by myself right now.”

“Give me a second,” he said. She could hear him fumbling around as he got out of bed and put on some clothes. “I’ll be right over.”

“Thank you.” Setting the phone down, she headed down the stairs to wait for him. Opening the door, welcoming the cold blast of air, she watched as he left his house and jogged across the street.

“Ana,” he murmured, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her into the house as he went.

“Harrison,” she murmured, hugging him with everything that was brewing inside of her. “Where’s Jolie?”

“Carrie has her for the rest of the weekend so they can have Thanksgiving with her family,” he said, still holding onto her as they walked into the kitchen. “It works out well because it will give me a chance to get to know your mother.”

When he set her down, she looked up at his beloved face. Softly, she told him, “She’s leaving in the morning to go see… my dad.”

His eyes widened as he took her hands in his, offering his support without needing to say anything. “She told you who he is.”

“She also offered to pay back the scholarship,” she admitted softly, working up the courage to tell Harrison the identity of her dad, especially since she still didn’t quite believe it herself.

He stiffened slightly but his smile was so beautiful she almost decided to accept the offer. When he saw her face, he tilted his head to the side and carefully formed his words, “That’s… fantastic.”

Guilt consumed her alive as she shook her head, “I turned her down.”

Silently, as confusion and hurt washed over his face, he shook his head. In a low, quietly furious voice, he asked, “When you talked about wishing you could stay… did you mean any of it?”