She smiled with satisfaction, and I wondered how she could do that—go from yelling to a smile like nothing existed in between. “You’re getting smarter already.” She turned on her heel and went out the door before I could say anything else.
I put my hand to my cheek trying to erase the throb of her slap. How long did I have until security escorted me to the car? I looked around for my street clothes and saw them sitting on the counter. I had started toward them when the door opened. I expected it to be Maren again, giving me more departure instructions. Instead Alex Kingsley stepped into the room. Anger laced his expression, but his voice stayed even. “We're canceling the concert and Kari won’t need a double anymore, so you can go on home.” He eyed me over, and a muscle twitched near his jaw. "Besides leading on Grant, what else did you do while you were pretending to be my daughter?”
I stared back at him without flinching. "I lip-synched songs, signed autographs, and visited a hospital full of sick kids."
He gave a humorless laugh. “Is that how you justified this to yourself—you visited sick kids, so it was okay to swindle thousands of people? You're lucky I don’t turn the two of you in to the police and let everyone know what you’ve done. I swear I would, except I think Maren really meant to help, and you look too much like my daughter for me to haul you off to jail.” His gaze ran over me again. "It's downright eerie. But I will tell you one thing—that money you brought in—it’s going to charity. Neither you nor Kari is keeping a dime of it.” He threw me one last disdainful gaze. "And I’ll give you a piece of advice, young lady. Next time you take a job, make sure you bring your ethics along."
In all my fantasies about meeting my father, not once did I ever think he’d be chewing me out. Everything I'd planned to say to him, my thoughts of being either forgiving or aloof evaporated from my mind. I was angry, and I wanted to hurt him. "Maybe I inherited my sense of ethics from my father.”
"Your father? Who’s that?”
"You'd do better to ask who my mother is.”
He tilted his chin down, humoring me. "Fine. Who's your mother?"
I said the words slowly, waiting to see every inch of his reaction. "Sabrina Garcia.”
No recognition passed through his eyes. None. I hated him at that moment.
He shrugged, annoyance creeping into his voice. "Should I know who that is?”
"Yes, you should.” I put one hand on my hip. "Ask me who my father is again.”
His gaze drifted up to the wall clock. "Listen, I’ve said what I came to say to you—"
"But I haven't," I cut him off. "You’re my father. You. Alex Kingsley.”
Instead of registering any shock, he raised his eyebrows and chuckled. "Miss, you’ve got a bad case of believing your own press. You’re not Kari, and I’ve never seen you before in my life.”
I dropped my hand from my hip. "You're right, you’ve never seen me. That’s my whole point. You were never there for me.” I took several steps toward him before I pulled the necklace from around my neck. I held it up to him, letting it dangle between my fingers. "You met my mother in Charleston nineteen years ago.” His gaze locked onto the pendant, and I could tell he recognized it. His eyes swept back over to mine, and the color drained from his face.
I took one last step toward him, holding the chain out. "This was never meant for me, so you can have it back.” I dropped the necklace into his hand without taking my eyes from his. "My mother raised me by herself. She tried to reach you, tried to tell you that you had another daughter. She couldn't even get through. You were a big star, and she was nothing to you. But I did fine without you." I felt the tears rimming my eyes, stinging, and I attempted unsuccessfully to keep them from coming. "I'm a straight-A student," I said to prove my point. "I’m in the National Honor Society at my school. That’s how Maren found me. She saw my NHS picture and thought the school was posting pictures of Kari. When she asked if I would double for Kari, I said I’d do it on one condition—that I got to meet you. I wanted to know what you were like. I wanted to meet my father."
He stared at me, stunned, and didn’t say a thing. The tears spilled onto my cheeks, but I didn't wipe them away. "And I don’t care what you do with the money. I didn’t do this for the money. I wanted to help Kari, and okay, maybe I wanted to know what it felt like to be famous too, to be your daughter for real, but I don’t need Kari’s money, I don't need your money—" My voice faltered, emotion strangling my words until I could barely speak. "And I don’t need you, either, so I don't care that you don't love me. I’m fine without you."
He moved then, almost as though the shock had passed and he could react again. He reached out and pulled me into a hug. His arms shook, or perhaps that was just me, still shuddering with emotion. "I don’t need you,” I choked out. "I don’t need you.” I said it over and over again, each time becoming less comprehensible until I was sobbing into his shirt.
He held me tight, and when I finished telling him I didn't need him, he spoke softly into my hair. “No one ever told me. I'm so sorry. I would have been there for you if I had known.”
I laid my cheek against his shirt, letting the emotion bleed dry. I could feel each breath he took. He was my father, and he had his arms around me. He cared about me. It was a safe feeling. It was all I had ever wanted.
And then I imagined him holding my mother like this. She had thought he cared about her too.
I pushed away from him, my resentment flaring back. "You never called my mother,” I said. "She gave you her phone number. She was in love with you, and you never even called her. She had to give up her dreams of going to college. It changed her whole life.”
He kept his eyes on me like he was memorizing my features and slowly shook his head. "I put her number in my jeans pocket and then forgot about it and sent it through the wash. All I remembered was that her name was Sabrina and she lived in West Virginia." He lifted a hand and then let it fall. "I didn’t think it would matter that much to her.”
"That’s just great,” I said. “I went through my entire childhood without a father because you're lousy at laundry and didn’t think any of it mattered.”
"I'm sorry," he said again. "I didn’t mean for this to happen.”
I wiped my face to clear the tears off my cheeks. "It mattered,” I said, and suddenly felt drained. I’d wanted to hear exactly what he'd said—that he was sorry and that he would have been there for me. I thought hearing those words would fill the empty places inside me, but I wasn’t even sure I believed him.
I said, "Maren told the driver to take me to the airport. I’ve got to change my clothes now.”
"Don't go yet,” he said. "I just met you.”
I shook my head and picked up my street clothes from the counter. "I still have some stuff at Maren’s. If I don't see her before I leave, can you ask her to send the schoolbooks back? I don’t care about the rest of it."
"You don’t have to leave.”
"I’ve had enough of Hollywood. If you want to talk to me sometime, my mother is listed in the phone book. Sabrina Garcia, Morgantown, West Virginia.”
"I want to talk to you now."
I turned and walked away from him, heading to the back of the room where the private bathroom was. As I reached for the doorknob, he said, "You haven’t even told me your name.”
I turned back to glance at him. "Alexia.” I watched the word hit its mark. He understood the significance. Then I went into the bathroom and locked the door.
I glanced in the mirror. I expected to look like a mess, with mascara stains running down my face. It had stayed put pretty well, though. I guess using high-priced waterproof makeup did have its advantages.