Page 1 of Mending Hearts

Chapter One

Mia

Icouldn’t remember the last time I had been this nervous. It might have been when I was fourteen and executives from Shooting Star Records knocked on Mom’s door to offer me a recording contract. Or it might have been when I was nominated for a Grammy Award at sixteen. That was the year I knew, without a doubt, that my life was no longer my own. Picking out clothes, styling my hair, choosing my meals—it was all controlled, examined. Every time I turned around, my mother was hiring someone else to make life easier. Was it working? Neither of us were capable of slowing down enough to be sure.

From the rental car, I stared at the well-kept secondhand shop on the edge of Little Falls, NY, and bit down on the tip of my nail. The acrylics I’d gotten at fifteen forced me to stop biting them. Even now, five years later, I hadn’t broken the habit of putting my nail between my teeth, desperate for the rip and tear. I was so used to someone else making decisions that coming to this store without being instructed to, felt like anarchy.

No one knew I was here.

Out of the corner of my eye, my bodyguard, Pasha, stared ahead, expressionless. I didn’t think he spoke much English, which was why I plucked him from the pack. He also seemed to be the only one mymother didn’t have under her thumb. Laura Malone could never know what I was about to do.

“You’ll wait here?” I asked.

“Yes.”

A small smile played at the edges of my lips despite my nerves. Some nights I stared at the ceiling of the tour bus as it rumbled through another city and practiced speaking like him. Trying out his thick Russian accent was an opportunity to slip into another skin, another life.

God, that tour bus.I was so done with that bus.

Tomorrow afternoon I had to be in the right city at the right time to meet Mom and the tour. Only three more months. It was my mantra. Three more months on that bus. I didn’t want to think about all the commitments flooding my calendar beyond the last tour date. People beyond me planned my life eighteen months to two years in advance.

Whenever I felt frustrated or despondent, I tried to remember I was lucky. Lots of people wished for this kind of success. My right to complain was voided.

“You sure person here, Ms. Malone?” He raised one pale eyebrow and scanned the sidewalk outside the shop. “Not busy.”

“It’s a secondhand shop and a costume place. Other than Halloween parties and being poor, why would anyone go in there?” I rolled my eyes and threw open the passenger door before I talked myself out of this.

My best friend, Sarah, was the only person who knew my secret. As one of the judges on the talent showCenter Stage, it was Sarah who suggested Grady Castillo as a songwriter for my album. He’d been a winning contestant who produced a single hit album and settled into anonymity writing songs for other people. At first, I was wary. Men who avoided the spotlight usually had things to hide; behaviors, interests,habits that made a twenty-year-old girl like me a prime target. That sort of man gave me a vicious lesson at the start of my career, one that still echoed.

Grady turned out to be the opposite—funny, smart, creative as hell, and genuinely enjoyed the songwriting process, even when I called him a thousand times to discuss changes or ideas. I liked him. So, when he slipped in the clause to our songwriting contract about performing at a benefit of his choosing, I hadn’t given the request a second glance. My mother and agent thought a benefit concert was good PR. What could go wrong?

They underestimated my ability to turn something so altruistic and mundane into a catastrophe. It was fine, though. I was handling the screw-up. Or I would as soon as I remembered this guy’s name.

His store was the last one in the shopping plaza butted up against a pizza place. If there’d been more than one secondhand shop in Little Falls, I might have been in trouble. We exchanged very few details in my hotel room, but at least this one stuck. A costume designer confined to a costume shop seemed a little sad. Who’d choose this life?

The bell above the door tinkled when I entered. I kept my sunglasses on even though it was January, and the sun was hidden behind a swath of clouds. My black winter coat was from last season and the most discreet one I owned. Odd to be here on my own. Normally, I was surrounded by people—handlers, dancers, fans, bodyguards. Shedding that insulation was more disorienting than I’d expected.

From the back of the store, a deep male voice called out, “I’ll be right there. Just helping another customer.”

In the middle of the store, I stopped and took in the scene, a surge of panic running through rampant. Did he say he was helping someone else?

Shit.

There were other people here? We’d sat outside the building for fifteen minutes. What sort of service was he providing to whoever was back there? My Chucks were silent on the linoleum floor while I rushed to one of the clothing racks. My clothes were casual, non-designer on purpose. This was a secret mission. With feigned interest, I rifled through the racks, not seeing any of the clothes as they went by.

The bell above the door rang again, and I glanced up, half-afraid it would be another patron. I’d lose my nerve soon. Why did I come?

Another customer. A plethora of silent curse words reverberated in my head.

The owner, and I knew he was the owner because he’d told me that night, headed for the cash register. God, why couldn’t I remember his name? ‘Hey, you’wasn’t going to cut it in this situation. He retrieved a package from underneath the register and passed it to the woman who was getting out her wallet. His gaze skimmed over me and the rest of the store, not taking me in as he rang in the purchase.

“If there’s anything I can help you with, let me know,” he called out, his tone somewhat dismissive.

I liked the timbre of his voice just as much as I had that night, deep and calming. The measured way he spoke had been appealing, as though he was used to dealing with complaints or conflict in a rational, reasonable way. His blond hair was tinged with red—not quite brown—and that fascinated me too. The shade was unusual, pretty, even.

A few months ago, he’d been in better shape. Not that his physical appearance mattered now. He’d been tall and fit, and his voice turned my insides to liquid. He’d been enough. Unlike so many people in my life, he let me take complete control, lead the way. Being with him had been a vacation from being Mia Malone, superstar singer.

An escape.

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