Chapter 1
June
THURSDAY
“ Y ou know how much I love seeing your beautiful face every morning,” my mom says, walking across her kitchen to set a mug of freshly brewed coffee on the table in front of me, “but you don’t need to keep an eye on me anymore. I’m all right now.” She crosses her arms, peering down at me.
“Maybe so,” I say. “But if I’m not around, who’s gonna stave off the fashion police when you try to go out in public wearing this?” I tug playfully at the hem of her favorite old Dr. Pepper sweatshirt.
“Oh, stop.” She laughs, plopping herself down next to me. “Seriously. I’m fine, and I’ve been fine for a long time now. I can take care of myself, hun. For real.”
I nod, and she leans in to give me a little side squeeze.
“I love you, Mama.”
“I love you too, baby.” She rests her head against mine for a moment.
I have to admit, my mom is doing pretty well these days, but I still come by every morning to check in.
It’s been four years since my dad left her but only two since she’s been back on her feet.
She still gets overwhelmed sometimes, but she has good friends who support her and a part-time job she loves at the senior center.
Still, seeing my mom go through something like that changed me.
It taught me a lot about trust and the dangers of letting yourself get too attached to a man.
No matter how strong you are or how resilient you think you might be, if you let yourself become dependent on a person like that, then when they do finally leave, you will be devastated. You’ll never be the same again.
I’m nothing if not stubborn, but that is one lesson I don’t intend to learn the hard way.
“When your dad left, I completely fell apart.” Her expression turns serious. “You were just a teenager then, and it was too much responsibility to put on you.”
“No, Mama. I was eighteen, and I wanted to be there for you.”
“I know, June-baby. You were there for me when I needed you, but I leaned on you too much. I wish I could go back and do better, but the only thing I know how to do is move forward. I’m back on my feet now, OK? It’s time for you to move on too, baby. I wish you’d stop worrying about me so much.”
“I know, Mama,” I say, pausing to take a sip of my coffee.
“You’re so young. You should be out there spreading your wings, finding your own place in the world. Not sitting around my place worrying about me. Besides, I know how busy you’ve been with work lately.”
She’s got me there. I’ve been running myself ragged trying to keep things from going off the rails at the club. The owner, Larry, is almost never around, so as manager, I’m the one who picks up all the slack .
“Hey, and speaking of the club…” She has a twinkle in her eye.
Oh no.
Here it comes.
“Aren’t The Lost Souls playing tonight?”
She has a mind like a steel trap.
“Mom.” I tip my head to the side and give her a little glare over my coffee, but she shoots me her most innocent smile and flutters her eyelashes.
“You’re unbelievable,” I say, shaking my head.
“If you must know, yes. The Lost Souls are playing our club tonight. Actually they’re doing three nights in a row, and all three shows are completely sold-out, so it’s gonna be crazy.
I’m meeting their tour manager at the club in an hour to start working through the details. ”
“Wow. Three whole nights with Anthony, hmm? Anything could happen.” She winks.
I roll my eyes. “No. Nothing’s gonna happen, Mom.”
Anthony Von Essen is the unbelievably charming front man for The Lost Souls, but I know him from when we started bartending together at the club three years ago.
Those nights when it was just the two of us working behind the bar were always my favorite because Anthony is a wild good time.
He’s bold and funny, and he has a good heart.
He’s also drop-dead gorgeous.
It was clear he always had a thing for me, too, so keeping our relationship strictly platonic was no easy task. But after seeing how much my mom suffered when my dad left her, I was steering clear of romance altogether.
I still hooked up with guys every now and then—a girl has needs—but there was no way I was going to cross that line with Anthony. I could just tell things were going to get serious if we ever fooled around.
Once his band really took off, Anthony quit bartending to focus on his music full-time. He’d still come out and see shows at the club, though, and he’d always stick around afterward to help me close up.
But after they started touring two years ago, I didn’t see him for a long time.
Then last year they came through Chicago and played our club as part of their national tour, and that’s when…something happened.
I honestly don’t know what came over me. I remember watching him up on that stage—he was absolutely mesmerizing.
His deep, rich voice and his sexy swagger were taking me places I’d only ever let myself go in the privacy of my own bedroom. Of course, after the show, he asked if he could stick around to help close up.
In the back of my mind I knew it was a bad idea, but Anthony’s got this slow, easy smile, and that night he melted his way through my toughest defenses.
He has this warm intensity about him that’s almost impossible to resist, but that night he was a force of nature, wrapping me up inside his energy, and the next thing I knew, he was fulfilling every sexual fantasy I never even knew I had.
Sex with Anthony was like nothing I’d ever experienced.
He was wild and exciting and…attentive. Honestly, even the nonsexual parts of that night were weirdly intimate.
We’ve always enjoyed each other’s company, but that night there was something about the way he was listening and sharing with me, and I found myself telling him things I’d never told anyone before.
There was something powerful and fierce happening between us that night. I couldn’t deny it, and it scared the shit out of me.
But it was just one night of admittedly mind-blowing sex and nothing more .
Or at least that’s what I tried to tell myself.
But Anthony had other plans. He tried calling and texting me a few times later that week, but I wasn’t about to fan those flames after what had just happened between us.
I ended up blocking his number. I know it was a terrible thing to do given our friendship. I wasn’t trying to hurt him; I just needed things to cool down. Like, way down.
A couple of weeks later I got his first postcard. The Souls were playing in Toronto, and the card had this beautiful picture of the Royal Ontario Museum. On the back, in his distinctive loopy scrawl, he’d simply written, “Hey, Chicago. Wish you were here.”
That night we hooked up, when we were walking back to my place, I made a joke about how he probably had a girl in every city at this point. He didn’t deny it, and the whole rest of the night he kept teasing me, calling me Chicago.
Every single postcard he sent started with those same six words. Dozens of them from all over the world—London, Paris, Madrid, Tokyo. I even got one from Latvia.
And they were sweet.
He’d write about how the shows were going, or he’d tell some funny anecdotes about things that happened with the band or the crew. They would have been fun to read if they hadn’t gotten me so worked up just thinking about him again.
Why was he even writing me? I mean, Anthony knew I’d always wanted to travel the world, but there was too much going on at the club for me to get away like that.
So maybe he wanted to give me a little taste of that experience.
But it didn’t feel that way. It felt like he was trying to make us into something that we weren’t.
Sometimes a few days or even a whole week would go by, and I’d start to think I might be able to put it all behind me. But then another postcard would show up, and all those sexy memories would come flooding back, just as vivid as the night it happened.
Then, as if that wasn’t bad enough, my mom came across a stack of his postcards at my place.
I swear to God, if I could go back in time and shred every last one before she ever caught sight of them, I would, because ever since, she’s been over the moon about there being a man in my life.
My mom is even more stubborn than I am, so convincing her that Anthony and I were nothing but a hookup was a lost cause.
“Did you see that picture of him in the paper last week?” she says.
“Uh, nope. I must have missed that one.” I shake my head at her. I can imagine how excited she was to see it, too. I’m surprised she didn’t cut the article out and frame it for me.
“He’s so handsome.” She presses her hand over her heart.
I roll my eyes and take my last swig of coffee.
“They’re a pretty famous band now, it seems like,” she says.
“Yeah, they’ve really blown up this past year. They’re gonna be the biggest band we’ve ever had play the club,” I tell her, hopping out of my seat to clear my mug. “I have no idea why they didn’t book a bigger venue this time around.”
“Maybe I know,” she teases.
“No. Wrong.” I give her an exasperated sigh as I set my mug down in the sink with a clunk . “For the gazillionth time, Mom, there is nothing going on between Anthony and me, all right? I’m not even looking for romance in my life. I like things the way they are.”
“But honey, love is what makes the world go round. It’s a wonderful thing to find a person you can really connect with. Someone you can depend on.”
Mm-hmm. Like you depended on dad until he walked out on you.
“Anthony was just a one-time thing, Mama,” I remind her .
“Uh-huh. Well, it must have been a pretty good one time .” She winks.
She’s incorrigible.
I head to the bathroom to check myself in the mirror, and she follows me.
“You’re so beautiful, baby.” She smooths my long hair back over my shoulders. “I’m loving this pink color in your hair.”
I like to play with my look, and this is the first time I’ve tried this color, Pretty in Pink. My mom’s family is Japanese, and I’ve got her soft olive skin. The pale shade is really setting off my skin color and making my dark eyes pop.
“Thanks, Mama.” I lean over to give her a kiss before applying my sparkly lip gloss. “I’ve gotta run, but I’ll be back to check on you again tomorrow, OK?”
“Do I have a choice?” She laughs, shaking her head as I head toward the door. “My little warrior.”
“But seriously. Promise me you’ll never wear this God-awful sweatshirt out in public again? Pretty please?”
She laughs. “I love you, June-baby.”