My gaze fell to my feet. Kia had brought up something similar weeks before. I’d shoved those thoughts aside then but hearing them echoed by my mom caused a wave of anxiety to wash over me, plunging me into shadowy waters.
“It’s not like that,” I insisted, clinging to my attachment to Luca like a life raft. “I think we found each other for a reason.”
My mother closed the distance between us, taking me in her arms. She smoothed her hands over my hair.
“It sounds like maybe you did,” she said, swiping the tears from my eyes with her thumbs. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to misjudge him.”
I nodded. “It’s okay. I just…I think he’s been dealt a lot of shit, and people don’t know the full story.”
“And you feel protective of him,” she said. “I get it. And I’m sorry. It’s just…I’m protective of you. You’re my whole life, McKenzie. I want to keep you safe.”
“He does too. I really believe that.” Letting anyone in was a risk—one I didn’t take often because I knew all too well how it could end. But Luca walked straight through the walls I had up, rendering them useless against him. So, instead of using them to keep him out, I’d begun to see them as a way of bringing him in and locking him inside my heart.
“Okay. I believe you.” She pulled back and squeezed my shoulders. “When can I meet him?”
“I don’t know,” I answered. “We’re not quite there yet.”
“How serious is it?”
“We’ve been spending time together these last few weeks but only just started dating,” I said. “I do want you to meet him. Just not yet.”
She gave me a reassuring smile. “Okay. Well, whenever you’re ready, so am I.”
I hugged her again. “Thanks, Mom.”
“But tell Katie if she ever gets tired of that Dallas, I’ll take him off her hands,” she joked, lightening the mood.
I grinned and gave her a gentle punch in the arm. “That’s it. I’m disowning you.”
“Luca, these songs are…incredible,”Grace said. It was Sunday at the hobbit house. I’d stayed over the night before, and Grace had arrived around noon bearing coffee and a binder filled with ideas to discuss with Luca.
“That’s what I’ve been telling him,” I said, poking Luca’s leg.
He grinned at me before turning to Grace. “So, you think this could be something?”
“I think it could be something huge.” She sighed and sank deeper into the armchair across from us, Emilia curled in a ball on her lap. “Trends are moving toward solo artists, and we’re seeing albums that are a lot more stripped down, less produced. I know Midnight in Dallas wasn’t heavy on the production, but it’s even less now than what you probably remember. I think that would lend itself really well to what you’ve got here.”
Luca nodded, a smile spreading over his face.
“But I do think there’s something else we need to consider,” Grace continued, stroking Emilia’s head as she slept, her brows furrowed together.
“What do you mean?” Luca asked, and I folded one leg under the other as I listened.
“Well,” she began, “you already have a built-in fan base that’ll be clamoring for anything new from a member of their favorite band since Jax is the only one still in the spotlight.”
I tilted my head. “That’s a good thing, right?”
“It could be,” Grace answered. “But with more attention comes more scrutiny. The media hasn’t always been kind to Luca.”
Luca released a heavy sigh. “You think they won’t even give me a chance.”
Grace hesitated. “I didn’t say that.”
My heart dropped as I pictured the articles my mom had shown me just days before. And those were just the tip of the iceberg. I’d gone down my own Google rabbit holes in the past and found plenty more where that came from.
“But you think it,” I said, filling in the blanks.
She twisted her lips to the corner of her mouth as she considered what she wanted to say.
