Falling into You (Falling Stars 3)

Mel’s lips pressed together, grim and sure. “I’m not with him every second of every day, Violet. But never in the last six years have I known him to even acknowledge another woman other than a polite hello, let alone sleep with one. It would shock the hell out of me to learn that he had. That’s the truth.”

Maggie touched my knee again. “See. The future.”

But I didn’t know how to have a dream of a future with a man when he had been the downfall of the past.Twenty-FiveVioletTwilight hung across the skyline in swaths of pinks and lavenders and blues as I eased up the drive to our house sitting on the hill.

I was still reeling. Reeling from last night and today and all the things that felt like they were catching up to me. The threat of destruction all around. Too many uncertainties to feel stable.

Whole or sound.

The world trembling underfoot.

I parked my truck in front of the porch and killed the loud engine.

Daisy came barreling out, her arms in the air and her goodness bursting from her tiny, innocent spirit, black hair flying around her precious face.

My chest squeezed. My heart in a fist.

This was the good.

The right.

The purpose of everything.

I climbed out of the truck and caught her in my arms.

“Mommy! I missed you. Did you have the best day tryin’ on all the dresses? Did you get one? I bet you are gonna be the prettiest, prettiest ever. Except for your prettiest picture. Now that is the real prettiest.”

She’d always been a smidge obsessed with the mystery of my wedding picture. The unknown man who had stood by my side. The one who was supposed to remain there but had left me high and dry.

I hadn’t had the heart to get rid of it.

She’d only become more interested in it now that she had a name to the face.

“It was a great day. And yep, we found the perfect dress to go along with Emily’s.”

She grinned as she looked at me, her cheeks pink and her dark eyes dancing with unending joy.

My heart.

My heart.

It panged.

Shivered in the distress of uncertainty and clutched in those sparks of hope that were growing brighter with every second.

“I am so, so excited to wear mine. Did you know it came in the mail today from the package man? Papa let me try it on. It’s sooo pretty with my new, new shoes, and my cast doesn’t even look a little bit bad in it.”

She lifted her broken wing.

I touched her chin. Devotion rode free on the waves of affection that pressed from my being. “You will be the prettiest little hostess in the whole world.”

Daisy beamed. A ray of light. “Come on, you’ve gotsta see it. I bet Mr. Richard will think I’m so pretty.”

Yeah.

Obsessed.

I understood the affliction.

She dragged me inside and upstairs to her room where she’d ripped apart the box, packaging strewn, her dress a crumpled mess on her bed. “Papa said I haves to be so careful not to get it dirty so I can’t play with it until the special day.”

“That’s a great idea,” I told her as she was whipping off her shirt and fumbling into the fluffy pink dress that I had ordered online, my little whirlwind shrugging into the garment and struggling to get it on over her cast.

“Let me help you,” I told her, situating it over the bulkiness of her arm and helping her to get it over her body.

She slid her feet into those shoes that I worried were going to be worn out before the wedding day two weeks from now. She brushed the wild mane out of her face with two hands, grinning in the floor-length mirror hanging on the back of her door. She swayed from side-to-side. “See, Mommy! It’s so pretty. I loves it.” She squeezed her hands together in a grateful prayer.

I edged up behind her, planted a kiss to the top of her head, fought the tumble of fear I felt.

This unending worry that I was stumbling toward something I wouldn’t recover from.

But I would fight for her.

For the best thing for her.

Whatever that was.

“You are so beautiful. Inside and out. My sunshine,” I whispered.

She grinned wider. “Take a picture and send it to Mr. Richard.”

I cringed.

She frowned. “You don’t like him?”

She touched the handwriting on her cast, and my eyes were drawn to the inscription he’d left.

Daisy, a precious, perfect flower. Never be afraid to explore, learn, and bloom. Grow with all the love because love is what you are.

“No, sweetheart, I don’t dislike him. Things are just very complicated between us.”

“But you love him?” she asked almost carefully. Hopefully.

“I used to. A lot. But that was a long time ago.” My words were soft. Cautious. I wouldn’t lie to my child, but she sure didn’t need to hear the sordid details.