“When?” he asked.

“When I went to Nashville…during the weekend that was supposed to be the wedding.”

“Nashville?” Delilah repeated. “When you were supposed to be supervised by your aunt Celeste?”

Otherwise known as Delilah’s sister.

“Mom, I’m twenty-six. No one supervises me.”

“Well obviously.” She gestured to Harper aggressively. “Look what’s happened.”

“Delilah,” Paul said sternly, effectively shushing his wife. “Who is this guy and how did you meet him?”

“His name is Liam James and I met him at the Second Hand Guitar.”

“At a bar! You met him at a bar?” Delilah shouted. So really Paul had effectively silenced his wife for all of about ten seconds. That was something at least.

“Liam James…Liam James,” Paul repeated, ignoring his wife. “Why do I know that name?”

“He’s a musician.”

“A musician? Oh. My. God. Like he plays on the side of the street for dimes?”

“No, Mom. He doesn’t play on the side of the road for money. He’s actually very successful.”

“Successful?! I can’t believe this!” She stood abruptly, the force causing her chair to move back, the feet screeching across the hardwood floors. “Can. Not. Believe. This. Why do you keep doing this to me? First you call off the wedding. Then you get knocked up by some stranger.” And with that she stormed out of the room.

Neither Harper nor her father said anything as Delilah’s footsteps echoed up the stairs. And it was only after the bedroom door slammed shut that Paul finally did speak.

“Liam James is the guy who sings ‘Against the Odds’?”

“Yes.” The word came out on a whisper.

“And he knows that you’re pregnant and that he’s the father?”

“Yes.”

“And he’s going to be involved?” he asked, still revealing nothing.

“Yes.”

“Okay.” Paul nodded slowly, clearly still trying to process.

“I’m sorry, Dad. This isn’t how things were supposed to happen.” She didn’t look away from her father’s gaze. She couldn’t. She was still waiting for it to reveal something.

Anything.

“How do you know?” he asked, tapping his forefinger against his chin.

“What?”

“How do you know it wasn’t supposed to happen exactly like this?” And there it was, the twitch to his lower lip. “Sometimes you have to believe that things happen for a reason. And that’s how I’m going to look at this, because I can’t think of my first grandchild from my only daughter any other way.”

Hope. All she felt was hope at her father’s words. “You’re not disappointed in me?”

The twitch in his lower lip turned to a smile. “Not even in the slightest. No one is perfect, sweet pea.” He reached for her face, touching her chin and pushing it up, his wordless way of telling her to hold her head high. “If we were, life would be pretty boring.”

A soft laugh escaped her mouth. “Yeah, you can say that again.”

“Your mom…she’ll come around.”

“You sure about that?” Harper raised one of her eyebrows, not so sure of her father’s statement.

“You know how well she deals with shocking news.”

“You mean she doesn’t.”

“Exactly. But she’ll get there, and you know how I know?”

“How?”

“Because she loves you. And she’s going to love your child, too. She’s just got to adjust. And she will.”

“Promise?”

“I promise,” Paul said as he pulled his daughter in for a hug. Holding her close for a good minute before he grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back so he could look at her face. “So tell me about him. Tell me about the father of my first grandchild.”

Her dad’s mouth flickered up at the corners when he said the last word, his eyes twinkling more than a little bit.

For the first time since Harper walked in the front door, she took a full breath without that painful constriction over her chest. Yet another reason she’d been beyond stupid to keep the truth to herself. Once it was out there, she’d felt so much better. Could breathe again and not feel like she was suffocating in the slightest.

The truth will out. And for her, when it was out it was so much better.

Chapter Eleven The Elephant in the Room

When Liam first started opening for Isaac Hunter, he was lucky if the seats in the auditoriums were half-filled. The people around the stage were usually only those who were staking out their spots for the main show, while the other forty percent of the space remained empty. But within the last year, the seats had started to fill up before he hit the mike, and the people around the stage were the majority of the crowd that were going to show up for the night.

People were no longer forced to listen to him. Now they were there because they wanted to hear his set.

That being said, the size of the crowd had never had any effect on his performance. He put on a good show no matter the circumstances. He had to. It was his job. But never had that part of his job been as difficult as it had been during those weeks right after Harper had left him in Nashville.

He’d opened for fifteen concerts during that time, and for every single one of those performances it had taken everything in him not to phone it in. This was not the case anymore.

It had been eleven days since he’d seen Harper in Jacksonville, twelve since he’d found her, and in that time he’d opened for eight concerts. For Liam, each performance had been better than the last. If anything, the show he was currently rocking out on the stage might just be the best so far. And when he got to “Forever”—the song he’d written about Harper—he killed it.

Maybe it was because when he sang the song it was no longer physically painful. He’d been able to get the words past his throat without feeling like the biggest tool on the face of the planet. Maybe it was because he was talking to her on a daily basis. Maybe it was because he was going to see her in less than twenty-four hours.

Maybe it was everything that had to do with her.

So okay, things weren’t perfect yet. Far from it. She actually still didn’t know about the song he’d written about her. Well, he was pretty sure she didn’t know more about it than when he sang it to her in May. And as it wasn’t going to be released on the radio for another couple of weeks, he figured he still had a little time.

He just didn’t want to freak her out again. They were in a good spot, or as good as it was going to get when all they had going was electronic communication. So he was taking advantage of the time, because it was going to take time to figure out what was going to happen with them. No matter what, she would be a part of his life forever. She was the mother of his child.

He was going to be a father…a freaking father. That was a reality he knew and though it was more than a little scary, it was an exciting scary. The kind he wanted to run toward and not away from.

“I don’t know what’s gotten into you lately.” Isaac grinned at Liam as he walked backstage, the crowd chanting his name at ear-splitting levels. That was something new. “But you better keep it up. That, my friend, was incredible.”

“Thanks.” Liam tipped back a cold bottle of water, so thirsty it was kind of ridiculous that he hadn’t noticed it until now.

“Go take a breather. We’ll see you onstage for “Practice Makes Perfect,” and you better bring your A-game for the guitar solo,” Isaac called after him.

“Always do.” Liam grinned as he headed for one of the rooms at the end of the hallway.

The second the door closed behind him, he reached for the back of his T-shirt and pulled it over his head. It had been hot out on the stage and he needed a clean one that wasn’t sticking to his skin.

But before he could grab another shirt he was reaching for his phone. As was the norm of late, when he hit the Home button the screen lit up showing texts from Harper. He found himself grinning like an idiot—something else that was becoming the norm—as he entered the code and pulled up their text conversation.