“A gorgeous ex-model stage mom.”
A faint smile crossed her mom’s lips. “Perhaps, but Gavin is around stunning women all the time. Younger women.”
She stared at her mom, trying to understand what she wasn’t saying. “Were you insecure?”
A laugh huffed from her mother’s mouth. “Oh, my darling girl, I’m always insecure. I simply learned how to shove it all down so no one could use it against me.” She took a long breath. “All right. I’m going to tell you the truth, the whole truth. I was afraid to trust anything after your father died. You know that part of the story.”
She knew that her dad hadn’t told her mom the truth about their financial situation. “You were left with a mess.”
“I was left mourning a man I also was so angry with I could barely make it through a day. I was left with two little girls and my own mom utterly dependent on me, and I suddenly had no means to provide for any of you. I sold everything I could, but your father’s debts soaked it all up.” A flush stole across her mother’s cheeks. “I never meant for you to support us. You might not remember this, but you had been in a couple of your father’s films and you loved it. Well, I think what you loved was the attention.”
“And the cookies from craft services,” Brynn admitted. “I never blamed you for that. I still don’t. I’m glad I could do it.”
“Sometimes I wonder. But I digress. I’d met Gavin when I was married to your father. I wouldn’t say they were friends, but they were friendly. He was actually one of the people your father owed money to,” her mom admitted. “He’d loaned your father fifty thousand dollars. When you got the part, I was terrified he would reject you because I hadn’t offered to pay him back.” Her mom blinked, her eyes shining. “I walked right up to his house and I had a big speech prepared threatening to sue him if he dared to get you fired from the show, and he hugged me and asked how I was. No one asked how I was. Certainly not the people William owed money to. He invited me inside and never once mentioned the debt. After you started filming and he found out I was struggling to handle Mom’s illness, he offered to help me.”
“He paid for the nurses, didn’t he?”
Her mom nodded. “He’s arrogant and can have the attention span of a gnat, but he’s also the best man I’ve ever known. And I couldn’t trust him because I couldn’t trust anyone. I couldn’t trust the universe. I’d worked so hard to get out of that dreadful town. I worked hard to build something with your father, something you and your sister could count on, and it all went to hell.”
“But you started a relationship with him.”
She nodded. “I did. I told myself we were friends with benefits. He would come over for dinner with all of us and then I would show him out and he would come back when you and Ally were asleep. He asked me to marry him when the show was ending, and I couldn’t. I couldn’t trust that it would work.” A frown pulled her mouth down. “Then he went and dated that twenty-four-year-old as revenge.”
“You turned him down, Mom. You can’t dictate who he dated after you left him,” Brynn argued. Things were starting to fall into place. “You got back together with him when I got the Janie’s World role. That was six years. Were you with him the whole time?”
She shook her head. “We saw each other often during that time, but by then I had established myself as a manager. People took me seriously. I was able to make my own money and to ensure that yours was safe. If I’d married Gavin, I would have ended up dependent on him, and I couldn’t do that again.”
“I think there’s a compromise to be found.” She wanted her mom happy. She wanted Gavin happy. Despite the fact that the day had held such heartache, she was already warming to her mom again. “But I need you to understand that you shouldn’t marry Gavin because you want to get my job back.”
“How about I marry him because I’m tired of being scared and I’m tired of my heart hurting at the thought that I’ll never be ready?”
She reached out for her mom’s hand. “That sounds like a perfect reason to get married.”
“Are you really done acting?” There was an ache in her mother’s voice.
She didn’t want to let anyone down. It was right there. It would be so easy to change her mind, to let the need to please everyone around her lead her decision-making process. Her whole childhood had revolved around pleasing her director and her costars and her fans. It was time for her to grow up. “I am for now. If I change my mind, then I’ll deal with the consequences. I’ve thought about this a lot. This isn’t some rebellion or me trying to punish you.”