Kiss the Stars

by Jackson, A. L.

  Braxton: Word is, she and Keeton want to talk.

  Me: You don’t buy that bullshit, do you?

  Braxton: Nope. Not gonna lie, don’t trust any of it. You know I’m with you, man.

  Me: Know it was him, Brax. It’s time to prove it.

  Or just fucking end it. Proof or not.

  Me: Find out who knows I’m here. Turn up the pressure.

  Braxton: On it. Will let you know as soon as I find out anything. Be safe.

  My spine went rigid when the door suddenly flung open.

  Lyrik jerked back the second he found me loitering outside the door to their suite.

  The jagged rock in my throat wobbled, shards cutting into my skin.

  I met his eye. “How is she?”

  Lyrik sighed, looking down as he slanted his fingers through his black hair. He warred before he finally looked back up at me. “Terrified. Okay, but terrified. A little road rash, but I’m thinking her colliding with the road was a whole ton better than her getting hit by that car.”

  I gave him an uneven nod, my ribs getting battered by the clanging in my chest. “I should have—”

  Barking laughter cut me off, low and cruel. “You should have what? Turned an eye?” He took a step forward. “Looked away? Or maybe just stood there and watched it go down?”

  My head barely shook. “I . . .” I exhaled a sharp breath, my nostrils flaring. “That car . . . it swerved to hit her, not miss her.”

  Could feel the build of violence. The thirst for retribution becoming unbearable.

  Rage erasing logic.

  “I shouldn’t have come here.” At least I had that bit of sense remaining.

  Lyrik scoffed. “You think this was somehow your fault? You think I’m not sick to my fucking stomach because I wasn’t there? That I was too far ahead and out of reach of being there for my niece? You think I’m not questioning every goddamn misstep leading up to what happened tonight?”

  He got so close he was nearly spitting the words in my face. “No matter if that was an accident or some bastard did that on purpose, which if he did, I promise you, he is going to pay. But either way, none of those things change the fact that you were there. Fact that you dove in front of a car to save a child you don’t owe anything to. Fact that you saved Penny’s life.”

  The last two words broke in his throat. Man suppressing a sob.

  Grief wrenched through my being. I gritted my teeth, tried to keep my shit together. “Yeah, and what if it was me who put her in danger in the first place?”

  Lyrik scraped the back of his hand over his mouth like he was trying to get rid of a bad, bitter taste, glancing away before he pegged me with a dark glare. “And what if someone is after Mia, man? After my sister? What if they followed her here?”

  I blinked, spirit jolting with the rejection.

  “What are you saying? Did something else happen?” I demanded, voice low, a barely controlled growl.

  Aggression hardened his jaw. “Security confirmed it this evening. It wasn’t some kids running the backyard to take a dip in the pool like I’d hoped. Someone tried to enter a code into the backdoor. I think they’re watching. Why is what’s fucking killing me. How can I stop it when I don’t know what they want?”

  Rage blistered. Searing my flesh. Inside and out. Blood molten.

  He almost laughed, his head bobbing with the indictment. “That right there . . . that is why you should have come here. Need someone else on her side, Leif. Need someone else here, looking out for her. Looking out for those kids.”

  Fury raced. “I don’t—”

  “Whatever you’re going to say, don’t. Just fucking stay. Don’t know what’s going on between the two of you, but whatever it is? Just fucking stay.” Helplessly, he glanced over his shoulder at the door that remained open an inch. “She needs you, and I’m pretty sure I can’t fix what she’s missing.”

  “She doesn’t need me.”

  Mia’s soft voice floated out, quiet murmurings of reassurance and hope, the tiny cries of her daughter still seeping through.

  Lyrik turned back to look at me, eyes pinning me to the spot. “Penny asked for you, Leif. What you do with that is up to you.”

  Without saying anything else, he turned and strode down the long hallway, disappearing at the end where the south-wing met the main house. I watched until he was gone, and I warily turned back to the muted movements that echoed from within.

  Terrified of what those sounds were coming to mean.

  Drawn to them all the same.

  Unable to stop myself, I quietly knocked at the wood and poked my head through the door. “It’s Leif.”

  Mia’s strained voice called, “Come in.”

  I shuffled across the floor, my heart a boulder of dread as I eased up to the bedroom.

  A muted glow was cast on the room by a lamp on a nightstand.

  The mood both burdened and relieved.

  At the side of the bed that ran along the right wall, Mia was on her knees. When she heard the creak of my footsteps, her attention swiveled to me.

  Those sable eyes filled with too many things. Things I couldn’t handle. Things I couldn’t bear.

  Guilt ripped through the center of me. But it didn’t matter if my duty was screaming at me to turn my ass around and walk away, I inched forward, glancing at the crib on the opposite wall where Greyson was fast asleep, facedown with his butt in the air, wearing just a diaper.

  Clinging to that tattered teddy bear he always dragged everywhere.

  Blowing out a sigh, I steeled myself as I let my attention drift back to them.

  Penny’s black hair was shiny and wet, the child freshly bathed like it could soak away the trauma of the day, strands spread out behind her on her pillow.

  Her eyes were puffy and red, salty tears coating her cheeks.

  Mia had showered, too, and she’d changed into a thin cotton nightgown. My teeth gritted, and I forced myself to look away, to stop the disgusting direction my thoughts went when this woman had nearly lost her child.

  I was sick.

  Twisted.

  The devil.

  And they were both looking at me like I could be their savior.

  I roughed an agitated hand through my hair, hanging back by the door. “Hey, Penny. How are you feeling?”

  Penny choked over a sob, the dampness in her eyes filling fast, deep, deep pools of onyx that were spilling over. “I’m so sorry, Leif. I didn’t mean to.”

  A heavy exhale gushed out of my lungs, and I took a surging step forward before I could stop myself. “You don’t have anything to be sorry for.”

  “I-I-I . . . I should have looked. It was my fault, and I wasn’t paying attention because I just wanted to have a sleepover at Kallie’s house. I . . . I put you in danger.”

  Her mother brushed her fingers through her daughter’s hair, shushing her gently. A quiet sound of embrace and support.

  A torrent of love that filled the room.

  I beat back the panic, the feeling slithering over me, demons screaming in my ear.

  “No,” I managed to tell her through a shaking voice. “You couldn’t have anticipated that, Penny. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  Her gaze moved over me, her bottom lip trembling. “You’re hurt.”

  Damn it.

  I should have taken the time to change but I couldn’t force myself away long enough to do it. “It’s nothing. Just a little roadrash.” I attempted the joke, but it completely fell flat.

  Mia cringed, like she couldn’t stand it either, although she remained silent.

  Like she was just . . . waiting on me. Trusting me to be there when she didn’t have the first clue that would be her greatest mistake.

  My attention jumped around, like I could find a safer focal point than looking at the sight of them.

  The definition of beauty.

  Goodness and light. Purity and faith.

  My gaze landed on another one of those bears like Greyson had, this
one a patchwork disaster of pinks that lay on the edge of her bed. I couldn’t help it—a smile tugged at the corner of my mouth.

  “What’s that?” I asked her, desperately needing to change the subject before I went out of my mind.

  Before I said or did something I couldn’t take back.

  Because I wanted it . . . I wanted this feeling so badly I thought I might die without it. This comfort that spun through the room like a cold winter’s dream, blanketed and protected. Something safe and sacred. Something right.

  Something that was actually worth living for.

  But that was impossible. Only thing I would bring was destruction. My due a burden.

  She snatched the ratty bear and held it to her chest, rocking just a little like touching it soothed some of the madness.

  “Make it if you want it to matter,” she whispered.

  I was moving forward when I didn’t have the right, too compelled to remain in the shadows when I ached to stand in the light.

  Too bad the light only exposed the demons.

  Called them out of hiding.

  But maybe it was time they saw exactly who I was.

  “Make it if you want it to matter?” I rumbled, repeating the sentiment like a question. A squeak climbed from Mia, and I realized she was holding back a sob.

  That her entire being convulsed like she’d just been struck from out of nowhere.

  Whiplash.

  “My mommy made it,” she whispered, peeking at her mother who gave up the fight on the tears, not that they’d been a stranger to her today. Her face blotched and red and scarred with the fear of losing what was most important.

  “She did, did she?” The words were tight. Gravel.

  Penny nodded emphatically against her pillow before she pushed up to sitting. “See.”

  She held it out.

  Like she was beckoning me forward.

  Bringing me to my knees.

  I was there, on the carpet, kneeling down close to her.

  I didn’t dare reach out and touch it, just let my fingertips flutter in the air like I could feel the soft, worn fabric, the inconsistent patterns of pinks. Blush and rose. Strawberry and hot pink. The lanky bear was threaded together by a thick yarn, the lines almost purposefully haphazard.

  “Your brother has one almost the same, except it’s blue,” I mused.

  She nodded again, tears dry for the first time, like for a moment she’d been distracted from what might have been. “Yeah.” She gazed down at it before looking back at me with eyes that were so much like her mother’s. “Every new baby in our family gets one. It represents new life . . . there is one piece for all the people who make up the family. And this?”

  She dragged her finger along one of the jagged seams of yarn.

  “It represents the love the binds them all together, as imperfect as it might be.”

  She glanced at her mother for approval. Like she was wondering if she got the story right.

  My stomach twisted. Jaw clenching tight.

  “Look, Leif,” she murmured with soft, childlike awe.

  God, I needed to make an excuse and bolt.

  But I inched forward, eyes following her small finger that ran over the material. “This is my grandma, and this one is for my grandpa. They were the ones who were there for my mom when she had me.”

  She was looking at her mother with those astute eyes again. Like she got it. Like she understood the sacrifice they all had made.

  She fluttered her fingers over another patch of fabric. “This is my uncle Lyrik. And these over here are my mom’s aunt and uncle.”

  She hesitated before she touched a spot where the fabric had frayed and partially come loose. “This one is my daddy.”

  Did it make me a fucking psycho that I wanted to jump to my feet and rant and rave and claim? Jealousy boiling my blood into venom and rage?

  Why, yes.

  Yes, it did.

  My teeth grated. “It’s beautiful, Penny. Every single piece.”

  She nodded more. “And one day, when I have a baby, I will make him or her one of these, just like my mommy did for me and my brother, just like my grandma did for her and my uncle.”

  “Because you make it if you want it to matter.”

  She nodded tight, and those knowing eyes lifted, filled with their innocence and wisdom, tangling with mine. “I might get to do that one day because of you, Leif.”

  Her mother whimpered.

  I wanted to die.

  “No, Penny.”

  Her lips pursed. “I thought . . . I thought I died already, Leif, because nothing hurt, and then I was so scared, and then I felt so safe when I realized it was you.”

  “Penny.” Wanted to beg her to stop.

  To spare me this grief.

  To stop this reminder.

  “I just wanted to say thank you. For being brave.”

  My eyes squeezed closed like it could stop the assault.

  The images and the sorrow and the unending grief.

  Like the day had become too much, Penny hiccupped a sigh and then yawned, the child flopping to her pillow in sheer exhaustion.

  For a moment, I just sat there, watching the lines on her face fall into peace.

  My pulse jumped when her lips moved. “Do you sing songs, drummer dude?”

  I almost laughed at the nickname Brendon had given me, it sounding so strange coming from her tongue. “Yeah, Penny, I do. It’s part of my job.”

  She snuggled deeper under her covers, her voice drifting like her own melody. “Good. Sing me a song.”

  A war went down inside me. A violent battle of what I’d done and what was to come.

  I glanced at her mother who watched on with quiet belief.

  Fuck.

  What was the matter with me?

  It was just a song.

  I searched inside myself to find something that was fitting. Clearly none of mine would do.

  I should have picked a random Carolina George song that Richard or Emily had penned. Something innocuous that meant nothing but I knew the words.

  But I remembered . . . remembered the voice that had once sung to me.

  The lyrics so contrary to what I knew.

  But I thought maybe they had been meant for a child exactly like this.

  Leaning forward, I took in a steeling breath and quietly began to rasp the words in a way I was quite sure they’d never been sung. A country ballad meant for a mother to her child.

  I Hope You Dance by Lee Ann Womack.

  The lyrics were low as I grated them from my tongue.

  But I saw it—the way the song wrapped her in comfort.

  A prayer that I meant.

  A prayer that cut me apart.

  And as I watched her drift to sleep from the sound of my voice, as I felt Mia’s spirit twining with mine, I felt something inside me break away. Something burst and come flooding out.

  Darkness.

  Joy.

  Grief.

  Hope.

  If only I were worthy to give them that.

  Twenty-One

  Mia

  Even though he was singing painfully low, his voice still flooded the room. The words gruff and hard and bleeding melancholy.

  The song scraped from his throat with pain and grief.

  The most brutal agony.

  Lost faith and misguided intentions.

  It seemed impossible his voice could come out sounding that way, and still the tenor of it be riddled with the greatest amount of hope. As if faith had found holes in the bricks of his fortress and worked its way in.

  What it’d become was the most shocking kind of beauty. Something that spun both my spirit and relaxed my strain.

  My body slowly swayed.

  Drawn into the sound.

  A deadly lullaby because before you even knew what had happened, you were enraptured.

  Snared.

  Hypnotized into believing that everything was going to be just fine.

  Jus
t like he’d done to my sweet, sweet girl. Exactly the way I wanted her to be. Soothed into a peaceful sleep where all the horrors of the day would be erased. Scrubbed from her memory and healed from her body.

  We’d been lucky.

  So very lucky that there was no way I could just consign it to chance.

  Her wounds had been minor, but I knew what was left on her heart and mind was the sort of trauma that would leave a scar.

  My gaze drifted to her, my heart in a clutch of agony and gratefulness.

  I would never forget that moment—that single, bated second when I thought I’d lost her. That my child had been ripped away. Her life snuffed a century too soon.

  Tremors rolled, and my stare traveled, drifting to the man whose voice had shifted to barely audible. Ragged, frayed words that whispered into her ears and filled her with calm. It was like he was offering everything he had to give, giving it away, any solace in his soul transferred to her.

  Because there was no missing the outright misery that dented every line in his gorgeous face.

  Eyes squeezed shut and his chest tremoring with the remnants of the song.

  The tail-end of it drifted away as he begged for her to live with all she had.

  To chase joy.

  To always, always dance.

  The lump in my throat grew to a fist, and I struggled to breathe around it, to clear the roughness when those eyes finally flickered over to meet with mine. “Did you ever want to be a dad?”

  I shouldn’t have asked it. I was breaking about every rule that had ever been made.

  Jumping right over respectful lines and clear-cut boundaries.

  But this? This wasn’t a question for me. Wasn’t loaded because I was a single mother and wanted to somehow fit with him.

  It was found in the torture that covered him in shadows.

  The expression that took hold of his face made me want to weep. His words hit the air like the slice of a knife. “Once, Mia. Once I did. But guys like me? We aren’t made for the joys of this world. We aren’t destined for the good things. We are bred for destruction.”

  My head shook in disaccord, unable to accept what he said. “I see your goodness, Leif Godwin. I see it shining out through all the darkness. I know it’s there.”