My lips curve. “Really?”
She nods. “You were the most important thing to him. You still are. There’s a piece of his heart nothing else can touch.” Haley cuts a look over her shoulder at Sophie, who’s playing with a tiny toy truck. “I can’t wait for you guys to have kids.”
I laugh. “Me either.”
Her eyes widen, and I bite my cheek.
“We’re not trying. But we’re not not trying.” After last night, we decided. “Once Tyler’s back from tour, he’s not going anywhere for a while. And I’ll be wrapping up my show. We can stay in New York or move to LA… wherever we want to be.”
“That’s wonderful. If you ever need a place to stay—”
“With a convenient recording studio and a pool?” I quip, and she smiles. “I know we will. It feels like home for me, and I know it does for Tyler too.”
Her eyes fill again, and she swipes at them before she heads to keep a closer eye on Sophie.
I reach for my phone to turn it off. It’s filling with congratulations and well-wishes.
I smile as I tuck the phone away and reach for my shoes. I step into them, grateful they’re wedges. My ankle still twinges a little but nothing like last night. The doctor was right about that bruise, but I can live with a live bit of pain from the straps pressing in. And the dress will keep the mark out of the pictures.
With one last look in the mirror, I suck in a breath.
I look good. But more than that, I feel good.
I’m going to meet my husband, whom I couldn’t love anymore.
There are things unsettled—like the Wicked deal and whatever’s between Rae and Harrison. Still, I can set those aside for the moment and focus on the beauty of this instant.
Except…
I frown, scanning the room as I press my hand to my chest above the dress.
“Looking for something?”
My dad’s voice has me looking toward the doorway. Relief floods me—both at his form and the chain he holds up.
I race to him. “My necklace!” The chain is new and the glass is repaired so cleanly it’s almost impossible to see where it was cracked.
“Tyler fixed it. Don’t ask me how.”
Dad’s gruff voice telling me the man I love saved the necklace he gave me the first summer we were together, back when everything was beautiful and angst-filled and chaotic, has my chest aching.
“Thanks.” I throw my arms around Dad’s neck. When I pull back, I realize he’s wearing a linen suit. “Wow. You look like you’re going to bet on a polo match or something.”
“Hell no. I’m not going anywhere. Not today. Not for all the money in the damn world.” His face goes slack, his eyes sad.
“What’s wrong?”
The biggest rock star of all of them shakes his head slowly, surveying me from my half-pinned hair to my wedge-clad toes under the dress. “Nothing.”
My stomach rises into my throat at the emotion in my dad’s voice. He’s quick to anger, quick to fight, quick to defend.
This version of him is new and disconcerting.
“All I wanted was for you to grow up better than I did. And I might’ve failed you in that.”
I shake my head. “You didn’t—”
He cuts me off. “I don’t know if I did or didn’t. But looking at you, seeing the woman you’ve become… I want to take credit for it, but I can’t. It’s all you. I couldn’t be prouder, and I have no damn right to take credit for you.”