Sweet Memory (The Painted Daisies #1), page 33
While everyone was thankful there’d be no more ugly notes, no one was voicing just how devastated they were to be no closer to solving Landry’s murder. Her sister deserved justice. The killer should pay for what he did to Landry and the bodyguard who’d served her selflessly.
“Your mother needs you home,” her dad said quietly.
Guilt joined the regret and heartache in her chest, twisting and turning.
“This is my way of honoring her…” She caught the sob before it fully broke.
He was silent for so long she thought he’d hung up before he said gruffly, “Honor, Ji-An, is important, but not as important as staying alive. We will see you soon.”
He hung up, and her stomach churned because of the pain she was causing them.
She could hear Jonas’s deep voice out on the balcony, talking to his loved ones. She looked down at her hands, surprised to see how normal they looked. She had none of the blood that had been on Ronan and Jonas and Zane, but she could still feel Zane’s touch, and it made her skin crawl.
She shed her clothes and stepped into the shower, resting her forehead on the cool tile. Her vision swam, the blood from today merging with the memories of the wound on her sister’s neck, and before she realized it, she was crying again. Sobs of loss and relief and exhaustion.
Suddenly, Jonas was there, arms wrapped around hers, naked body tucked up against hers as the water poured over them. “I got you, sweetheart,” he said, just like he had in Ronan’s room. Just as he had after Landry had died. Just as he had when she’d sent him away on a swing set in her backyard.
She buried her head in his chest, ignoring the ache and just holding on.
Eventually, he turned the water off, toweled them both off, tucked them into the fluffy hotel robes, and led her to the bed. He wrapped them together, her back to his front, feet tangled, fingers twined. His chin nuzzled on her shoulder near her ear where the warm heat of his breath coasted over her, and her skin broke out in shivers.
“I love you,” Jonas said quietly. “If you’ll let me, I’ll be at your side from now until my heart stops beating.”
Paisley recognized it for what it was. Not a marriage proposal. Something better. A pledge. A promise to be there forever.
She turned in his arms so she could look into those bright-green eyes and see the beautiful boy who’d become a stunning man.
“Do you know when I first fell in love with you?” she asked.
His eyes widened, a slow smile appearing. “You love me?”
She rolled her eyes. “You know I do.”
And then, she realized she hadn’t told him. She’d felt every single ounce of it, had expressed it through hands and fingers and lyrics, but she’d never given him the actual words, and it filled her with another round of remorse. She didn’t want him to ever doubt it…doubt her.
She took his face in her hands. “Jonas Riccoli, I love you more than all the lyrics in the world combined.”
She kissed his lips softly, the heat of it curling through her, hand sliding into his hair, tangling there. He grasped her hips, pulling her closer, and the kiss deepened, turning from sweet and sorrowful to hungry and feverish. They lost themselves for what felt like minutes…hours…days in each other, mouths and fingers competing to show who loved who more.
She finally pulled back slightly, a small smile forming. “I think I loved you from the moment you told me Jim Morrison was overrated.”
He scoffed, but his lips twitched. “You told me I didn’t know what I was talking about.”
“And you let me prove it to you. No one… No one had ever let me do that before. My opinions had never mattered.”
He traced her eyebrows with a finger and then her lips. “Landry believed in you.”
He said it softly, trying not to hurt her at the mention of her sister, and while it did hurt, it wasn’t quite as much as it had been in the beginning. She’d never, ever be able to heal that wound completely, but it wouldn’t absolutely break her anymore either.
“She did,” Paisley agreed. “More than I knew. I’d listened for so long to the negative things everyone was telling me that when she suggested changes to my music, I thought it was just more of my mistakes being pointed out. But now I can see she was just trying to make her mark in the world too. Trying to be seen. She thought I was better than her, but really, we were the best together.”
Jonas didn’t say anything. His hand slid along her back, palms wide, pressing her to him, holding her there.
“When you came into my life…” Paisley continued, closing her eyes against the tears because she was tired of crying. “When you and I started making music together, it hurt her deeply. She felt useless. I know that feeling, and I hate that I made her feel the same way for even one second. I wish I’d been able to tell her that, for every song you and I made, there would be another one for her and me. The love I feel for you didn’t displace hers. There was room for you both. For all of us.”
Jonas kissed her forehead. “She would have gotten there, Paisley. We all would have gotten there.”
Paisley ran her fingers along his chest slowly and then followed the trail with her lips. “I need to forget everything but the music we make together. I need to lose myself in it. Will you make love to me?”
And he hesitated, as if afraid that everything they’d been through during the day would be too much, but then he gave in as she continued to kiss and caress him. They played each other’s bodies. A slow, simple allegro that built and built and built until it came crashing into the finale, sealing them together forever.
♫ ♫ ♫
She wasn’t sure what woke her. At first, her pulse raced, thinking there’d been a noise in the suite, but as she cocked her head to listen, there was nothing. Nothing but the rhythm of Jonas’s heartbeat under her fingertips. His warmth surrounded her, comforted her, made her feel as if she was right where she belonged.
Then, she heard it again.
It sounded like her name. It sounded like Landry.
Like that night by Swan River Pond.
Goosebumps broke out over her skin.
She slowly untangled herself from Jonas, slipping into one of the robes they’d discarded on the floor, and let her feet lead her just like they had that dreadful night. This time, they led her through the suite and out onto the balcony.
The sun was just starting to turn the sky from black to a mellow gray, a hint of orange and pink outlining distant clouds. There was a fountain on the balcony, and the soft gurgling of it was soothing. It reminded Paisley of being at the pond, the serenity she’d once felt there before it had turned into a nightmare. She turned her head toward the sound, and her breath caught, surprise filling her.
A swan was floating in the fountain.
At first, she thought it was fake―a statue or a mirage―but as she watched, mesmerized, it ducked its head under its feathers before untucking and glancing in her direction.
The bird’s eyes met hers, black beads in the barely visible light.
It trumpeted…the noise she must have heard, sounding nothing like her name…and yet, she could hear the pattern of the syllables in its rhythm.
The majestic bird rose out of the water, spread its wings, and took off into the sky. Behind her, from the other side of the balcony wall, a few more birds suddenly took flight, voices echoing through the early morning sky as they fell in behind the leader.
Paisley watched them until they faded into the heavens.
“Thanks, Lan,” Paisley whispered out.
The door behind her opened, and Jonas stepped out in sweatpants and nothing else, his glorious chest on display. He smiled at her, a lazy smile full of love and promises. Her heart sped up for another reason. For the simple joy of having him look at her that way.
He eased in behind her, pulling her into his embrace, placing a kiss on her cheek.
“What are you doing out here?” he asked, voice deep and gruff.
“Listening to the music of the morning,” she said quietly. He nodded, understanding without judging, getting that her soul needed this.
The world slowly came awake around them. Doors slamming, car horns blaring, a motorcycle revving, people on the balcony below them talking. The gray sky burst into a brilliant series of pastel colors and then turned vivid neon before slowly settling into blue. And all the while, they just stood there, listening and watching.
It was a sweet memory layering itself on top of all her painful ones. Pretty soon, the beautiful ones would outnumber the bitter and dark. The black would still be there. It would still be uncovered sometimes. But it would only take a simple movement to shift the good back over the bad. Like the sky brightening and sending the shadows away.
Paisley stepped away, hooking her pinky with his, and said, “If we hurry, we can add our own notes to the day.”
She drew him back into the bedroom where they tossed aside their clothes and joined their own rhythm to the ones the morning had brought. Every touch, every gasp, every kiss leading them to a perfect crescendo once more.
EPILOGUE
Jonas
LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL
Performed by The Afters
TWENTY-NINE MONTHS AFTER
The Daisies were three-quarters of the way through the tour, and the sold-out stadium in L.A. was alive with more screams, pounding feet, and clapping hands than at almost any concert they’d had to date. Maybe because they were back where it had all started for them, in the clubs around Los Angeles.
Jonas was backstage with the Kims, watching as the band performed.
Paisley had been nervous because her parents rarely came to their concerts, even before Landry had died, and since then, they’d seen the band as nothing but a memory of what they’d lost. They hated that Paisley was on tour, even while they understood it―or at least, they understood the monetary reasons. Jonas wasn’t sure they’d ever really understand how the music called to her. How it was embedded in her veins and written on her soul. They were hoping that, after the tour was done, The Painted Daisies would be done as well.
Jonas wasn’t sure what was going to happen when they finished the last stop. Each of the Daisies had been through life-altering experiences in the last few months―danger pounding at their door and love finding its way in. But whatever happened to the band, Jonas knew Paisley would never give up writing, singing, and performing. Music was who she was.
Annie Kim was already near tears just watching Paisley and listening to the songs both their daughters had created. Jonas wondered how she’d handle the last song and the video that went with it.
He stepped forward and put a gentle hand on Annie’s arm. “This last song… I don’t know if you want to watch.” He said it softly, full of compassion, but both her parents’ shoulders went back, pride and strength on display. Jonas wondered if they realized how much their daughters had inherited from them, because the move was one he’d seen both Landry and Paisley do.
“Thank you, but we are fine,” Kim Ji-ho―or Ji, as Paisley’s dad had asked Jonas to call him―said.
And then the notes hit. The notes and the video.
Every single time the band played it, one or two or all of them broke down.
Tonight, maybe because she knew her parents were behind the scenes, it was Paisley’s voice that cracked first, her bandmates picking up the slack, joining her on lyrics that weren’t theirs. The stadium was filled with bubbles as Landry blew them as a little girl on the screen, fireworks ricocheting through the stadium, a light show that echoed the dance of Landry’s feet and the twirl of her body through a field of flowers. Her face on the screen grew closer and closer until it centered on her eyes and the knowing lift of her brow.
Between the images and Landry’s voice echoing through the stadium, Annie broke, putting a hand to her mouth and squeezing her eyes shut. Ji pulled his wife into an embrace, holding on to her in an unexpected show of emotions. The only feeling Jonas had ever seen Paisley’s father express before was anger―an emotion Jonas was all too familiar with but was lucky to find easing out of his life the longer he was with Paisley, the longer her love pushed aside the scars of his past.
When the band’s voice and instruments finally went silent, the audience was sobbing and stamping and screaming just as every audience had every time before. Just like the crew still wiped their eyes at the end of every show, and the band left the stage with tears trailing down their cheeks. It was never the full-on sobs of that first time, but the Daisies couldn’t perform “The Legacy” and not cry.
Annie’s body was wracked with sobs, and even Ji looked like his eyes were watering.
By the time Paisley came offstage, her parents were a mess.
She took one look at them and ran straight into their arms. Jonas tried not to hate it. It was the first time she hadn’t run into his arms since the concert in Albany that had started it all.
As the three of them held on to each other, the band joined them, hugging the Kim family in a tight circle of squished arms and legs. “Get your butt over here,” Adria said, looking straight at Jonas and holding out an arm. He joined them, everyone holding on to each other, savoring their memories of Landry.
Ji finally coughed and extracted himself and Annie from the Daisies.
“I’m going to go change, and then I’ll be back,” Paisley said with a watery smile to her parents. She lifted onto her tiptoes, kissed Jonas’s cheek, and whispered, “Thank you for staying with them.”
When she left, Annie looked at him as she wiped her eyes on a tissue. “It was…unexpected.”
Jonas nodded, knowing it was as close to an apology he would likely get from her. He asked, “Shall we wait in the green room? That way, we’ll be out of the way of the crew while they pack up.”
He led them to the room at the back, and the Kims settled onto a couch together, hands still grasped tightly.
“Water? Something stronger?” he asked them.
“Water is fine,” Annie said.
Jonas brought them each a bottle and then sat on a chair nearby, a sudden nervousness taking over him that he hadn’t experienced in a long time. Maybe it was the way Ji assessed him, weighing him.
“Thank you,” Ji finally said quietly, eyes meeting Jonas’s.
“You’re welcome.”
“Not for the water,” Ji cleared his throat. “After Landry died, Paisley was…lost. But now, she is more herself. I think this is because of you.”
Jonas’s cheeks flushed. He was pretty sure Ji would not appreciate the things he did with Paisley to ensure she never lost herself again, so that she never retreated behind a bubble of nothingness.
“I want to marry her,” Jonas said. “I’m hoping we’ll have your approval.”
A small gasp from behind him made Jonas groan internally. He hadn’t been intending to propose tonight, after a show, when Paisley was already full of emotions. And he definitely hadn’t planned to do it with her parents, the crew, and all the other Daisies around.
He turned, meeting her eyes as she stood in the doorway. She was in leggings and a flowy tunic top, ready for the after-party at the hotel. The top reminded him of the dress she’d worn on their first real date―soft blue with flowers spread across it. But it was her eyes that caught his, glimmering with love and humor because she knew this wasn’t how he’d wanted this to go.
The rest of the band filtered in behind her.
He rose to his feet and met her halfway across the room.
“What did you say?” she asked. It was the shy, quiet Paisley who came out when she hardly ever reappeared anymore. Jonas’s Paisley was confident and sure and hardly ever anxious onstage. She’d found her feet and her wings all at the same time.
“Sweetheart, nothing I said should be a surprise. You know I want to marry you.”
“If that was your proposal, Jonas,” Fee said, coming up behind them, “I’m going to have to kick your ass on Landry’s behalf.”
Jonas chuckled. “I’m not proposing right now, Fee. And even if I was, I’m sure mine would still come out ten times better than the grunt and growling demand of your man.”
Fee’s laugh filled the space. “Wait till I tell him you said that. And at least my proposal involved jewelry.”
Thank God her husband wasn’t there tonight. With all the traveling he did, you’d think he’d miss more than the handful of shows he had, but then he was as addicted to Fee as Jonas was to Paisley. They couldn’t be apart for long without a craving, a deep insatiable urge, bringing them back together again.
“I’m starving. Can we please go back to the hotel so we can eat?” Nikki asked. A tanned arm went around her waist, a dark head bent to whisper in her ear, and then Nikki turned a splendid shade of pink. Jonas wanted to laugh because he had a pretty good idea what had been whispered in her ear.
Everyone filtered out to the SUVs and cars taking them back to the hotel. But as Jonas walked with Paisley’s hand in his, he realized her parents had never responded. Even though it wasn’t their decision to make, and he knew Paisley would choose what was best for her, he also knew she’d want their blessing. Their lack of response tugged at all his old scars that he’d thought had finally healed.
♫ ♫ ♫
Hours later, as the after-party was wrapping up and people were slowly leaving, it was Annie who found Jonas. She hugged him, a display of affection that was as unlike Paisley’s mom as the tears on display at the stadium.
“You should come to dinner tomorrow before you have to leave,” Annie said. She patted his cheek but looked over to her husband. “Yes, Ji? They should both come to dinner?”
Ji grunted his answer with a curt nod, and Jonas’s lips twitched. Perhaps that was the closest he would ever get to a seal of approval from Paisley’s parents.
