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The worst of this was that she barely got to see Jonah. He had been quiet and reflective, working hard on his own songs. By Week Twelve, he was even allowed to play his own guitar, which won him respect as a musician, not just as a pretty face.

  By Week Thirteen, they said goodbye to Sylvester, who headed home to plan a wedding. “You’re all invited,” he told the camera with a big, tearful smile.

  Both Jonah and Tony felt as though they had lost a big brother when he left.

  Maddie Mercer was the next to go, after battling her way to #7 despite her near-crippling condition. Shiloh was the next domino to fall, which hit Lacy especially hard. She sobbed as she hugged him goodbye. It was as though she was losing her father all over again.

  “My money’s on you, baby girl,” he had said into her ear, finally erasing all the bad memories associated with those words at long last.

  By Week Sixteen, four months into their long marathon, only Lacy, Jonah, Tony Paul, Courtney and Sydney remained.

  Things were still strained between Jonah and Lacy. He was worried she was being too naïve about the Hollises. She insisted that letting Tony Paul see Cody had at least gotten Gaynell off of her back. She hadn’t said word one about filing for custody. As a reward, Lacy invited her to the house to spend time with Tony Paul and Cody, all of which was documented for the show, if only to show that they were trying to resolve their problems now like reasonable adults.

  While her popularity skyrocketed, Jonah remained distant and testy. The more the Hollises filled her life, the more he felt shoved right out of it.

  She tried to make amends the very second that they all had their own rooms. She sneaked into his room and into his bed. He woke to find her hands on his body and her lips on his skin. He flipped her over and kissed her hard, claiming her in a fevered haste before something else happened to tear them apart again. These last weeks without her had been torture.

  By sunrise, however, the same problems were still there. She wasn’t going to budge on the Tony Paul situation.

  In fact, she and Tony Paul had actually become friends through it all. It wasn’t easy, but as long as he was good to her son, she’d be good to him. They were bonded for life through Cody. They might as well get along.

  It made Jonah’s mood even worse. “Didn’t you learn anything the first time around?” he snapped.

  “Didn’t you?” she snapped right back, referring to what had blown them apart in Austin, his lack of trust. She slammed out of his room and went to stay in her own.

  Courtney tried to be there for Jonah, but he was inconsolable. “Can I ask you a question?” she asked as they sat together in the auditorium, waiting for their chance to rehearse with Imogene.

  “One more or was that it?” he teased.

  She chuckled. “Why do you put yourself through this? She makes you crazy and has for … what? A year or better?”

  He sighed. “What’s your point, Courtney?”

  “My point is loving her is one of the hardest things you’ve ever done. Why do you hang in there?”

  “Because loving her is the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” he said softly. “She challenges me to be more than I thought I could be. I’m not the same man I was a year ago. Look at where I’m sitting. Look at what I’ve done. I can take care of my family. I can help my sister,” he added with a hitch in his voice. “If I hadn’t met her, I’d still be entombed in some factory job somewhere, getting drunk on the weekends just to get through each monotonous week.”

  “You did that. Not her.”

  He shook his head. “No, Court. She inspires me every single day. Even this whole thing with Tony Paul. Of course I know she’s right. He needs to see his kid. His kid needs to see him. But goddammit. Just knowing he touched her makes me insane.”

  “Wonder if she feels that way about me,” Courtney mused. Off his look, she said, “Before she came along, I was the closest you came to settling down. I wonder if she ever thinks how close it came to being you and me instead of you and her.”

  “But it wouldn’t have been,” he said. He wasn’t worried about hurting her feelings. She knew this already. They were friends first and foremost. But there had never been enough of a spark for him to take her as a bride.

  “Exactly,” she said as she looked up at him.

  The thought hit him like a locomotive. All these weeks he’d been so sore that she was getting close to Tony Paul. He said it was because of Cody, but that wasn’t the truth at all. He never wanted her close to the only other man to claim her heart. He was so afraid of losing her that he’d been driving her away. “God, I’m such an asshole.”

  Courtney chuckled. “Don’t worry. I’m sure she knows.”

  He spared her a smile. “You’re too good to me. You always have been.”

  “I know,” she said as she mirrored his smile. “Your turn,” she said as she pointed to the stage, where Imogene waited.

  The theme that week was Heroes, where each contestant would sing a song about the most influential person in their life. He wanted to pick Lacy, but they had agreed weeks ago to keep their relationship under wraps. They couldn’t risk pissing off Graham, or alienating their audience. Fierce fans had long decided that Tony Paul and Lacy needed to reunite and had started several social media campaigns in honor of them, lovingly dubbed TP&L. If, at any point, the two of them were photographed together, it went up online immediately. Fans were rapturous over the idea of their finding their way back to each other through the show where they were technically in competition. It was damn near Shakespearian.

  So Jonah and Lacy decided they’d wait until the show had wrapped before they went public with their relationship. They owed Graham that much consideration at least.

  As long as they knew they were together, that was all that mattered.

  Jonah inevitably picked a song to honor his sister, Leah, whose brave fight against cystic fibrosis made her a superhero in his book. Both Sydney and Courtney picked songs for their daddies, Tony Paul decided to sing about his son.

  Jonah assumed that Lacy would sing about Cody, too. But when he passed by the studio, he heard her singing a familiar song that took him right back to Southern Nights, where they first fell in love. He walked into the studio, which made her stop immediately. “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “I’m supposed to sing about the most influential person I know. You’re it, Ace. Since the day we met.”

  It made his heart swell with joy to hear it, so much so that he crossed the room in a flash, taking her into his arms. “Baby, no. I can’t do that to you. I’ve been a spoiled little brat all these weeks. You don’t have to prove anything to me.”

  Her eyebrow cocked. “No?”

  She wrapped her arms around his neck and stretched for a kiss, which he indulged. She still felt like heaven in his arms. So soft yet so strong, his little bundle of dynamite. She just fit. She always had. And she was worth the wait.

  That night they came together with a fiery intensity that had been missing all these weeks while they tried to figure out all these new dynamics of their relationship. He had to share her with Tony Paul, which he hated, but he knew he could trust her. And he knew she loved him.

  As long as he knew that, he could get through anything.

  Their reunion, though long overdue, left her without a song to sing. She knew that Tony Paul had arranged a song for Cody, which he would sing directly to him onstage. It was fitting. She didn’t think anyone had ever changed Tony Paul as much. With Cody he was a brand new man. He didn’t drink. He didn’t carouse with women, hoping to prove his worth with every notch on the bedpost. She was glad to see it, for his sake at least. The way she figured it, parenthood tested a human’s muster, and character, like nothing else.

  It was then she realized there was only one other person she could thank for becoming the person she was. That, too, was long overdue.

  Jules rode with Don to the Fierce studios, where they were scheduled to rehearse with their children. Jules sti
ll couldn’t believe that Lacy had picked her. Their relationship had never been warm and fuzzy. They were simply compatriots fighting the same war.

  “Are you sure about this?” she asked Lacy as she walked up on the stage, feeling completely ridiculous and out of place. It was one thing to be singing karaoke in a crowded little club. It was quite another to stand in front of millions upon millions of viewers. It had long become clear that Lacy belonged there. Jules, however, did not.

  Lacy took her mother’s hand and led her to a stool. “I’m sure.”

  She had opted for a Pink song, to let her mother know, once and for all, that she was fucking perfect. She knew that Lucas’s leaving had affected more than just her. Looking back, she could see how her mother had wilted from his neglect. Seeing her now, so happy, so full of life, she was so sorry that her mother had given up so much of herself for love and got absolutely nothing back.

  They made it through once before they heard a voice from the darkened auditorium. “You should let her sing with you.”

  Lacy peered into the darkness. Don Lambert finally emerged from the shadows. “What?” she asked.

  “Let her sing. She sings karaoke with me every week. I think your voices would blend really well.”

  Lacy turned to her mother with a curious look. “You sing karaoke?”

  Jules shook her head, embarrassed. “It’s nothing, really. Just something we do for fun.”

  Lacy grabbed the sheet music and put it on a stand in front of her mom’s stool. “Can you read music?” she asked. Begrudgingly Jules nodded. Lacy highlighted where she wanted her mother to sing and cued the band to start the song again.

  At first, Jules’s voice cracked when she sang. The sound of her voice reverberating back to her throughout the vast studio had taken her by surprise. Lacy, who was surprised by how good she sounded, encouraged her to try again.

  They made it through the song once, and that was enough for Jules. Lacy, however, had other plans. She parked her mother back on the stool and they sang that song at least twice more, until Jules found her stride. Don applauded from the front row. “See?” he said with a proud smile. “I told you.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me you could sing, Mama?”

  “I really never thought I could. Not like you. Not like your dad. I was a glorified backup singer at best.”

  “You’re good,” Lacy said. “I’d be proud to sing with you on Monday night.”

  Jules slid off the stool and took her daughter into her arms. “I love you, Lacy.”

  Tears poured down Lacy’s face. “I love you too, Mama.”

  The closer they got to the live performances, the more excited that Lacy became. In the recorded interviews, she and her mother had talked about what it was like to be left abandoned, and how hard it was to tread water when they both felt as though they were drowning.

  Now they were singing on national TV. It was mind-boggling.

  By Sunday Lacy was stomping around a bit like a racehorse about to run the Kentucky Derby. She was filled with nervous energy that had her doing a dozen different things to pass the time so that she could get to Monday, when she sang. She was excited about what she and her mother were about to do.

  And she was perfectly okay if she was voted off, too. By now, they were down to the most talented performers anyway. Any of them could have walked away with the title. The time spent in the competition had given them so much more than a recording contract. She just wanted to sing the best she could. The rest would take care of itself.

  Jonah felt that way, too; so much so that he had planned a little surprise for his love. He knew he might not get another chance to say the things he wanted to say. And he wasn’t going to risk leaving with them left unsaid. He couldn’t bear waiting one more day. It took her until nearly midnight to finally reach his bedroom, which was filled with white roses and candles. He was lying naked on top of the covers, pouring champagne into a glass.

  “What’s all this?” she grinned as she slipped out of her robe and joined him on the bed.

  “Just a little something to celebrate,” he said as he handed the glass. “We’ve come a long way.”

  She nodded. “We have.”

  “Just a year ago, I was so lost. I had no idea where I was going or what I was going to do. You gave my life direction, but more than that, you gave my life passion. And there’s no way I can ever thank you for that. But I thought I’d try at least.” He smiled as he reached for his guitar, which he pulled into his lap.

  “What are you doing?” she giggled.

  “Singing to my love,” he answered simply. “If I could have, I would have sung it this week. It’s a new song. Just learned it. So bear with me.”

  He launched into a jaunty Bruno Mars song that said everything he had been feeling for a long, long time. He strummed his guitar and clapped his hands on the side, and she laughed through her tears as he sang about how much he wanted to marry her, something he had never even considered with anyone else. With her, he couldn’t think of anything he wanted more. With his song, he said every single thing she could have ever wanted to hear. And she knew in that moment she had only wanted to hear it from him. When he was done, she pulled his guitar from his hands and put it on the floor. He watched her straddle his lap, throwing her glass of champagne into some dark corner of the room. He grinned. “Can I take that as a yes?”

  “Yes!” she exclaimed with a happy smile. “Yes, yes, yes, yes!” She planted kisses all over his face as he held her close.

  No matter what happened that week, she had already won everything. She was going to be Mrs. Jonah Riley, the most important title of all.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  In the end, Courtney Adams went home that week. Lacy hugged her tight before she left. There were no hard feelings there. There was no jealousy. Courtney had been a good friend to her Jonah, and that meant more her than anything.

  The party was festive as they celebrated how far they had all come. Tony Paul spent most of the time with Cody, who fell asleep on his shoulder, holding yet another stuffed frog in his arms. Now that America knew how much he loved them, he had received hundreds from fans all over the country. Tony Paul watched Jules approach, which meant she was ready to take him home. “You did really well out there tonight,” he said.

  “Thank you, Tony Paul,” she said. She still wasn’t one-hundred-percent sold on this guy, but as long as he made the effort, she would, too. It made her grandson happy, and that was more important than holding any grudge.

  Gay and Jacinda decided to ride with Don, Jules and Cody, which left most of the contestants alone. Before she could escape back upstairs to make love to her fiancé, Tony Paul approached them both. “I just wanted to say congratulations for making it this far,” he said. “You should be really proud. You both deserve to be here.”

  Jonah’s eyebrow arched a little as he listened. He still didn’t trust this guy as far as he could throw him, but he’d made peace with the idea he wasn’t going anywhere. There was no harm in being civil. “Thanks. You too.”

  “It’s just the four of us now,” he commented unnecessarily. “That’s a one-in-four chance one of us will go home next week. I’d like to leave it on good terms if possible. We still have the tour, and then, afterwards,” he trailed off. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that I know I have fucked up a lot of things in my life. And it will take a lot of work to fix them. But I hope this helps.”

  He handed Lacy an envelope. She sent Jonah a glance before she opened it. It was a trust set up for Cody. Her eyes met his.

  “It’s all the money I earned for being on this show. Including the tour this summer. It seems only right he should have it, since this is where I got to know him.”

  She pulled out the paperwork. There was a six-figure check. Lacy’s knees buckled and Jonah had to hold her up.

  “That’s back child support,” he said. “It’s only right that you should have it. I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to give it,
” he offered at last. He turned to Jonah and held out his hand. “Congratulations, man. She’s a great girl.”

  “Thank you,” Jonah said as she shook his hand. They watched him disappear up the stairs, towards his private room.

  “I think it’s snowing in hell,” Jonah said slowly.

  “Not to worry,” she said as she looked again at the check. “We have enough to by mittens for eternity.”

  He took her into his arms. “All I need is enough to buy you a ring.”

  She gave him an impish grin. “I have a better idea.”

  Thirty minutes later they were at a late night tattoo parlor in Hollywood. She was on her back and he was next to her, his arm curled around her head, toying with her hair. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

  “I’ve always been sure when it comes to tattoos,” she said. “And this one is the most important one yet.” She linked her hand with his and they kissed softly as the artist fired up the gun and went to work.

  “You know what I just realized?” she asked and he shook his head. “I haven’t had a new tattoo since the first week of the competition.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “I guess I didn’t feel like anyone else was trying to change me. I finally saw on the outside what I felt on the inside.”

  He searched those deep brown eyes. “Flowers are always prettiest when they bloom on their own,” he said before he kissed her again.

  By the time they left, she had a tribal tattoo over her heart, a microphone comprised of musical notes that the artist had managed to add contrast and light till it sparkled off of her skin. Along the notes, in swooping black letters was Jonah.

  It was official. She was his.

  When they reached the house, he pulled her into bed. “Are you sore?” he asked as he took care not to touch her new ink.

  There was a gleam in her eye. “Not yet.”

  She pulled him down and kissed him.

  Across town, Jules and Don were already in bed. They’d spent a lot of time in bed over the last couple of months. She had a lot of time to make up for, and he was all too willing to give her the love that she had been denied for so long. He loved to trail his hands along her flesh, watching her body turn into him like a flower reaching for the sun. It was like he was twenty years old all over again. He was insatiable for her. She dazzled him in every way.