I tried to resist you, tried not to kiss you

  You speak soft and you move slow

  You’ve got strong hands and few words

  But I hear it anyway, everything you don’t say

  I tried to resist you, tried not to kiss you

  But god, your lips, the way you moved your hips

  The way you said my name

  And said you felt the same

  The way you took my hand

  And kissed me in the sand

  * * *

  You said it won’t work

  I said it won’t hurt

  You said it’s just for the moment, let’s own it

  What I didn’t say was, here’s my heart just break it

  What I didn’t say was, I’m feeling love, can’t shake it

  Baby, that was me lyin’,

  Because baby we shoulda kept tryin’

  Now I’m sitting here without you

  Wondering how do you go on

  When your heart’s gone

  Because you walked away, said you can’t stay

  * * *

  It was all too much,

  God, it was more than lust

  My heart’s full of rust,

  My soul’s full of dust

  It’s such a rush,

  It’s more than a crush

  More than your strong hands and slow sighs

  More than your soft words and dark eyes

  It’s something I can’t define

  Something in your eyes, the way they shine

  Makin’ me want, makin’ me wish

  Makin’ me moan, makin’ me kiss

  Makin’ me groan, makin’ me miss

  Everything about you

  * * *

  I couldn’t resist you, tried not to kiss you

  But god, your lips, the way you moved your hips

  The way you said my name

  And said you felt the same

  The way you took my hand

  And kissed me in the sand

  * * *

  You said it won’t work

  I said it won’t hurt

  You said it’s just for the moment, let’s own it

  What I didn’t say was, here’s my heart just break it

  What I didn’t say was, I’m feeling love, can’t shake it

  Baby, that was me lyin’,

  Because baby we shoulda kept tryin’

  Shoulda kept tryin’

  Now I’m sitting here without you

  Wondering how do you go on

  When your heart’s gone

  Because you walked away, said you can’t stay.”

  * * *

  I’m gutted. I sag against the doorframe of the bar, listening to the song. Hearing Delta’s voice, the sorrow in it, the sweet, rich tone, the layers of emotion she can put into the words. Too fucking much, it’s too fucking much. I shove out the door as the song ends, but I’m hearing it in my head over and over and over, hearing her words and knowing she meant them for me.

  I barely remember getting back to the boat, and stumbling aboard. Instead of my bed, though, I end up on the bridge with Dominic, who doesn’t say a damn word to me. He hands me a cup of coffee. He’s kicked back in his captain’s chair with a paperback in his hands. I just stare out the window at the night, the stars, and the lights of the shipyard, the water. Hearing Delta singing that song, over and over again in my head, on repeat.

  Fuck.

  I have to get out of here. I have to leave. I can’t stay here.

  I leave the coffee and head down to my berth to sleep off the whiskey.

  This shit right here is why I sail. Out there, nothing but the waves and the wind? There’s nothing to hurt you, no one to make you feel things you never wanted to feel.

  I pass out, grumbling to myself in Spanish.

  New York City

  One week later

  * * *

  I have a temporary ID finally, which lets me access my account in the Bahamas. It took some wrangling at the Columbian embassy, which meant hitching a ride on a freighter heading north to New York and walking halfway across the city to the embassy, but at least I’m an official person again.

  I hear that damn song everywhere I go. It’s gone viral. There’s even a video. YouTube, I guess, but I haven’t seen it yet. She’s a bonafide viral sensation, apparently, and I’m pretty damn proud of her for that, even if my heart twists and aches every time I hear that fucking song.

  I finally can’t resist the temptation, so I buy some time at an internet cafe, pull up YouTube, type in her name and the song title.

  Why am I doing this? What do I hope to accomplish? Add more confusion and pain? Make myself miss her and want her more? She’s a star, now. They play that song on the radio every half hour, and it’s even getting play on the pop stations since it has “crossover appeal,” according to one DJ.

  The computer finishes loading the page, and Delta pops up to fill the screen, the video playing automatically. It was filmed on a beach somewhere, not sure where. Dawn, the sea glassy and still. She’s in a white sundress, knee-length, modest but sexy and beautiful. She has a guitar, looks like the one the guy from the beach let her use. She’s gazing at the sea, playing the song and singing as the sun rises. The longing on her face is heart wrenching, the pain in her voice is just . . . it slices through me.

  The song, the words . . .? What I didn’t say was, here’s my heart just break it, what I didn’t say was, I’m feeling love, can’t shake it . . .

  I watch the video on repeat, because I can’t seem to stop. Can’t seem to figure out how to turn off the computer, how to get up, how to walk away, how to stop staring at the screen, at Delta, how to stop listening to her telling me she was feeling love, and I walked away.

  I fucking walked away.

  I had to, though, right? That was what we agreed to. We both knew there was no way anything could work. She said it, I said it, and there was no question.

  My life is on the ocean. It’s all I know. It’s all I’ve ever known. What am I supposed to do? Learn a whole new life, a whole new trade? I’m a sailor; I sail.

  Fuck this.

  I tear off the headphones and storm out of the cafe, leaving the song playing on the computer.

  I’m feeling love, can’t shake it.

  No. It’s not true. It’s not. It’s just not. That’s only a clever line in a song.

  I start out running but end up walking. I don’t know where I end up, except it’s at the water. The bay, late at night, moonlight and city lights glinting off the rippling water. There’s a houseboat tied up nearby with the lights on. A couple sits on the front deck, her head on his chest, and his arm around her. There’s a radio playing inside the cabin, and yeah, it’s playing Delta’s fucking song.

  I groan in frustration and slump against the railing of the dock. I can’t get away from the damn song.

  It’s like Fate is trying to make a point or something, putting Delta’s song in my face everywhere I go. I don’t believe in that shit, though.

  I should just . . . go. Get on a trans-Atlantic freighter or something. Lose myself out there, where I belong.

  Only, the farther I go, the more it feels like I belong somewhere else. I don’t know where.

  That’s a lie.

  I know where part of me wants to be, and that’s wherever Delta is.

  I don’t know how to do that, though. I ran away after that last hurricane, when I was a kid. I ran because I couldn’t save them, because I never could have, there was nothing I could do. I’ve run away my whole life, because it was what I knew. It’s what I know. Ship to ship, shore to shore. Never still, never staying.

  Hell, that could be a country song, couldn’t it? Ship to ship, shore to shore, never still, never staying.

  Maybe it’s time to stop running and start staying.

  9

  Nashville, Tennessee

  * * *

  “Mama? When are we going back to Chicago?” Alex is in a booth across from me, eating French fries.

  We’re between recording sessions, finishing up the EP. Rob is working like a crazy person, acting as part manager and part producer, working like crazy to capitalize on the frenzy surrounding “When Your Heart’s Gone,” pushing the video, pushing the radio play, setting up a tour.

  Setting up a tour? What? Me? Hell no.

  But yes, he really is. Says Miranda needs an opening act for a handful of dates, and so does Carrie, and a few others, and if he can stitch the dates together just right and nail it all down, we’ll have a killer debut tour on our hands.

  I sip at my iced tea, chewing on the straw. “Not sure, baby.”

  He frowns at me, dipping his fry into ranch dressing. “I miss my friends. I wanna go home.”

  “We were going to move anyway, I told you that already.”

  “I know, but . . .” he trails off, shrugging. “I don’t understand what’s happening.”

  “Me either, honey-buns.” I steal one of his fries and pop it into my mouth. “What would you think if we never went back to Chicago?”

  He stares at me. “And stay here? In Nashville?”

  I shrug. “Maybe. Or we might live on a big bus and travel all over the country.” I pause, watching his reaction. “Mama could be a famous music star, baby. What do you think of that?”

  He wrinkles his nose. “Really? So you wouldn’t be a waitress no more?”

  I sigh. “That’s the idea.”

  “And you’d be famous? Like for really real? Famous like Tony Stark?”

  “Could be”—I laugh—“although, Tony Stark is a fictional character, and last I checked, I’m real.”

  His blue eyes—my eyes, Ava’s eyes, Mom’s eyes—examine me carefully, thoughtfully. His blond hair is a little too long, shaggy on top and curling at the neck, but it looks cute on him, and he likes it, so I’ve been leaving it. “Would you not be sad anymore, if you get famous?”

  I tilt my head, frown at him. “What makes you think I’m sad, baby?”

  “Mom.” He rolls his eyes at me. “You’re always sad. You play your guitar and sing sad songs when I’m sleeping. I like to wake up and listen.”

  “Baby, it’s just—”

  He interrupts me. “Will you get a famous boyfriend?”

  “What?”

  “You’re all alone,” he says. “My friend at school, back in Chicago I mean, Melissa, you know her. She says her mom has a new boyfriend every month, but they never stay around long, and my other friend Will, he says his mom never has a boyfriend, but she comes late from work sometimes acting weird and crying and stuff. Did you ever have any boyfriends? I thought if you got a famous boyfriend, you wouldn’t be alone.”

  “I’m not alone, baby, I have you.” I swallow back tears and emotion so he doesn’t see it. “I don’t need a boyfriend.”

  He finishes his fries and picks up a crayon, scribbles aimlessly on the paper under the plate. “Your song on the radio, it sounds like you’re singing it to a boyfriend.”

  “Alex, listen—”

  “If we live on a bus, does that mean I won’t have to go to school anymore?”

  “I can’t keep up with you, buddy.” I sigh. “If we live on a bus, you’ll have a tutor.”

  “Dang it. I thought I wouldn’t have to learn no more.”

  “You have to learn, Alex, that’s how you become smart.”

  “Did you go to college, Mama?”

  “No, but that’s not—”

  “And you’re pretty smart, aren’t you? So why do I have to have a tutor? I can just watch PBS.”

  I laugh. “I did finish high school, kiddo, so I learned some stuff, but I do wish I’d gone to college. And no, you can’t just watch PBS. I’m not sure we’d get PBS on the bus anyway. And all this is beside the point, since I’m not sure that’s happening anyway. I just . . . I don’t think we’re going back to Chicago. That’s my point.”

  “So could I stay with Gramma and Grampa in St. Pete’s sometimes? That was fun! I got to have cake for breakfast once, and Grampa made pancakes like every day, and they let me have Coke whenever I wanted.” He frowns, stopping abruptly and staring at me in something like panic. “Um. I mean—I had broccoli every day, and never had any sweets. So . . . I wouldn’t mind staying with them sometimes.”

  I laugh. “Buddy, even if I didn’t already know that your grandparents spoiled you rotten while you were staying with them, you still couldn’t live with them.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you’re my son, and I’d be sad without you.”

  “Oh. So I’m kinda like your boyfriend.”

  “Noooo, you’re kinda like my son.”

  “What about Auntie Ava?” he asks, still tracing the crayon in idle circles. “If we go on a bus, and you’re a famous music star, what will Auntie Ava do? Is she gonna be famous too?”

  “She’s . . .” I haven’t really addressed the situation with Christian being missing with Alex just yet. I don’t really know how to start that conversation with a six-year-old. “I don’t know. She’s . . . she has her own life, buddy. She’s just spending time with us for a while.”

  “Where’s Uncle Chris?”

  Here it is.

  I sigh. “Um. Well, actually, buddy . . .” Alex hears something in my voice and looks up at me, alert to what comes next. “Uncle Chris is . . . he’s kind of . . . he’s missing.”

  Alex is quiet a moment or two. “He’s missing? Where’d he go?”

  God, there’s so much to explain. “Um. Well, we don’t know. That’s why he’s missing.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “He was on a sailboat, and there was a storm, and now he’s missing.”

  “Is . . . is he . . . is Uncle Chris dead?”

  I sigh, taking his hands. “I hope not. Right now, he’s just missing.”

  “Are people looking for him?”

  So many questions I don’t know how to answer.

  “I . . . yeah, there are people looking for him.”

  Alex thinks about it for a bit and nods seriously. “Uncle Chris is pretty smart. They won’t find him; he’ll find them.”

  I smile at his confidence in his uncle. “I think you’re right, buddy.” I pay the bill and extend my hand to him. “Come on, kiddo. Mr. Rob is probably waiting for us back at the studio.”

  We walk back to the studio, and Alex glances up at me. “Mama?”

  “Hmmm?”

  “Can I be on your album? I can sing real good!”

  And he shows me how good he can sing, going through the theme songs of half a dozen of his favorite shows, then goes into renditions of his favorite radio songs, and damn, the boy can actually sing like an angel. When we get to the studio, Alex repeats his request to Rob, and Rob indulges him, letting him sit on the stool in the recording booth and sing into the mic for a while, and even hits the playback button so Alex can hear himself singing.

  “I don’t sound like that!” Alex says, upset. “That’s not how I sound!”

  I laugh. “Our voices sound different in our heads than they do to other people,” I tell him. “It’s always weird to hear a recording of yourself.”

  He frowns and crosses his arms. “I don’t like it. You can be the music star, Mama. I’m gonna be an astronaut.”

  Rob and I both laugh as Alex stomps seriously out of the recording booth and takes his place on the chair in the production area with the iPad Rob gave him, watching Paw Patrol as Rob and I get back to recording the last song on the EP. It’s going to be just me, my guitar, and a new song, one I just finished writing the other day. No band, no production, just a raw cut.

  We do half a dozen different cuts before Rob calls a stop and comes in to talk to me in the booth. “I don’t think this is the right song. It’s a little too raw, too much emotion. That’s a song you should only do live, to really show people what you’ve got. It just . . . it don’t translate right, without the visual of you singing it. We could do a video for it, but honestly I think the best video for that song would be a concert cut of you singing it on stage, really pouring your heart out. Either way, it’s not the song to close out the EP.”

  “So . . . what do we do?” I ask.

  Rob shrugs. “I have a couple ideas. You can write somethin’ else totally new, or you can demo me some of your older stuff, and we can pick one.”

  I nod, thinking. “I have a couple songs in mind. If you give me a little time, I can work up some demos for you.”

  Rob shakes his head. “Nah. Just play ’em. We won’t isolate the vocals and guitar for this last one. Just play me a few songs, and I’ll record ’em, and we’ll pick the best cut. Play from your heart, honey, that’s when you’re best.”

  He mics my guitar and I spend a few minutes just fooling around, mentally going through some of the songs I’ve written over the years.

  “I think I’ve got one,” I say, and fiddle with the strings, trying to remember how the chords went. “Do we have any tour dates?” I ask to buy time; I still don’t quite believe it’s real, that an actual tour opening for actual country artists could really happen.

  Rob just grins. “We do. I’ve nailed down six dates so far. The first one is in three days, actually. Opening for Miranda in New York City.”

  I squeal, hunching over my guitar and kicking my feet excitedly. “Seriously? Six dates?”

  He grins even wider, leaning on the glass. “I have several more coming, just have to figure out the particulars. This tour is going to put you in the stratosphere, babe. You’ll be a headliner before you know it.”

  I shake my head. “I can’t even think about that, Rob. It’s too much. None of this feels real.”

  “It is real, though. Really real.”

  “I know, I know.” I sigh. “I just . . . it’s surreal.”

  Rob smiles. “I know. I’ve seen it a hundred times. Advice from an old dog, honey? Don’t ever get used to it. Always be amazed.” He leans back, keeping his finger on the button. “Keep that fresh-eyed excitement. Stay passionate. That’s what’ll translate into stardom. You have all the talent in the world, Delta, you just needed the right break.”