Unfinished Business

you. The more I shouted, begged, threatened, the calmer he became. He would take you because he was the one who would give you the proper care. I was—well, it was obvious what I was. He already had tickets for Paris. Two tickets. I hadn’t known about it, but he had been planning to take you away in any case. I was to say nothing, do nothing to stop him, or he would drag me through a custody suit that he would win when it came out that I was carrying another man’s bastard.” She began to weep then, silently. “If I didn’t agree, he would wait until the child was born and file charges against me as an unfit mother. He swore he would make it his life’s work to take that child, as well. And I would have nothing.”
    “But you…he couldn’t…”
    “I had barely been out of this county, much less the state. I didn’t know what he could do. All I knew was that I was going to lose one child, and perhaps two. You were going to go to Paris, see all those wonderful things, play on all those fabulous stages. You would be someone, have something.” Her cheeks drenched, she turned back. “As God is my witness, Vanessa, I don’t know if I agreed because I thought it was what you would want, or because I was afraid to do anything else.”
    “It doesn’t matter.” She rose and went to her mother. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”
    “I knew you would hate me—”
    “No, I don’t.” She put her arms around Loretta and brought her close. “I couldn’t. The baby,” she murmured. “Will you tell me what you did?”
    Grief, fresh and vital, swam through her. “I miscarried, just shy of three months. I lost both of you, you see. I never had all those babies I’d once dreamed of.”
    “Oh, Mom.” Vanessa rocked as she let her own tears fall. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. It must have been terrible for you. Terribly hard.”
    With her cheek against Vanessa’s, she held tight. “There wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t think of you, that I didn’t miss you. If I had it to do over—”
    But Vanessa shook her head. “No, we can’t take the past back. We’ll start right now.”

Chapter 12
    S he sat in her dressing room, surrounded by flowers, the scent and the color of them. She barely noticed them. She’d hoped, perhaps foolishly, that one of the luscious bouquets, one of the elegant arrangements, had been sent by Brady.
    But she had known better.
    He had not come to see her off at the airport. He had not called to wish her luck, or to tell her he would miss her while she was gone. Not his style, Vanessa thought as she studied her reflection in the mirror. It never had been. When Brady Tucker was angry, he was angry. He made no polite, civilized overtures. He just stayed mad.
    He had the right, she admitted. The perfect right.
    She had left him, after all. She had gone to him, given herself to him, made love to him with all the passion and promise a woman could bring to a man. But she had held back the words. And, by doing so, she had held back herself.

    Because she was afraid, she thought now. Of making that dreadful, life-consuming mistake. He would never understand that her caution was as much for him as it was for herself.
    She understood now, after listening to her mother. Mistakes could be made for the best of reasons, or the worst of them. It was too late to ask her father, to try to understand his feelings, his reasons.
    She only hoped it wasn’t too late for herself.
    Where were they now, those children who had loved so fiercely and so unwisely? Brady had his life, his skill, and his answers. His family, his friends, his home. From the rash, angry boy he had been had grown a man of integrity and purpose.
    And she? Vanessa stared down at her hands, the long, gifted fingers spread. She had her music. It was all she had ever really had that belonged only to her.
    Yes, she understood now, perhaps more than she wanted to, her mother’s failings, her father’s mistakes. They had, in their separate ways, loved her. But that love hadn’t made them a family. Nor had it made any of the three of them happy.
    So while Brady was setting down his roots in the fertile soil of the town where they had both been young, she was alone in a dressing room filled with flowers, waiting to step onto another stage.
    At the knock on her door, she watched the reflection in the dressing room mirror smile. The show started long before the key light clicked on.
    “Entrez.”
    “Vanessa.” The Princess