Epic (Fierce) Page 23

  I said nothing. I hadn’t confided in Maya about Shane yet, and I doubted I ever would. It would have killed her to know what had happened with my dad, and then later with me.

  “He wanted roots so bad. He even changed his name, finding ‘Hemphill’ in some Iowa cemetery that was said to be full of his relatives.”

  “What was his name?” I asked.

  Her eyes widened as they met mine. “They never told you?”

  I shook my head.

  She held my hand. “It was Jordan.”

  I gasped as I let that soak in. “You named me after my dad?”

  She smiled. “I named you after the 12-year-old boy I fell in love with. Why do you think Marianne calls you Jordi, rather than Jordana?”

  “But why?” I squeaked.

  “I wanted you to take him, who he really was, with you wherever you went, no matter who you turned out to be. Hemphill was who he wanted to be. Jordan was who he was. And there was nothing at all wrong with that boy. He was perfectly imperfect. It gave me permission to be the same.”

  “Mama,” I said as I reached to hold her.

  Our conversation tired her out, so I rolled her back into the apartment. I helped her into one of her many pretty nightgowns, which she now protected against any food stains or anything that might soil it. They were her “pretties” and she squealed with delight whenever I bought her a new one. She preferred bright pastels, like pinks and yellows, which decorated her life with cheer she had waited a whole lifetime to experience.

  She grasped my hand as she settled against the pillows. She always slept better if she slept in a reclining position. “Thank you for such a beautiful day.”

  I smiled and gave her another kiss. “I figured you deserved one perfect day.”

  She gripped my hand with all the strength in her frail body. “The day you came back was my perfect day.”

  I sobbed softly as I hugged her close. I really couldn’t believe I was about to go on a four-month tour away from my mother after such a long journey to find her. But her health prevented her from traveling along, and she wouldn’t hear of my postponing the tour.

  She had agreed to our holiday extravaganza, but her failing health prevented her from ringing in our “new year.”

  We respectfully dispersed, leaving Diego and Hannah to stay with her as we all split the food and went back to our busy, creative lives.

  Later, in bed with Jace, I still marveled that the question I had been asking the entire year had been right in front of me the whole time. But oddly, the revelation didn’t make me feel any different. “I thought it would change everything to finally know who I was.”

  He caressed my hair with his hand. “When I lost my leg, I lay in that hospital bed for weeks trying to reconcile this new body with my old life. In many ways, Jace as I knew him died on that dusty road. I spent just as long rewiring my brain to accept these new circumstances as I did getting mobile again. Everything I thought I knew about myself changed in an instance. And I wasn’t able to move forward until I let a lot of that go. And look what happened. A new Jace emerged. A singer of all things. And now he tours the country, he won the heart of a beautiful woman. He lives the life of a rock star. So what the hell was I hanging onto?”

  I looked up at him. He pulled me close. “You haven’t lived until you’ve reinvented yourself at least once, Jordi. Life is transformation. You can never go forward until you stop looking back. And you certainly can’t transcend the circumstances of others. Look at your dad. He set someone else’s standard as his ideal. How different would his life have been had he celebrated the clean slate he had been given?”

  “There’s no way to know,” I said sadly.

  “Yeah, there is,” he corrected. “You’re living proof. You gave yourself a clean slate, babe. And it was the best thing that ever happened. It brought us together.” He traced my face with his fingers. “You are my clean slate, Jordi. You are my transformation every single day.”

  “Jace,” I said softly.

  “Marry me, Jordana,” he whispered.

  I reached up for a kiss. “When the tour is over,” I murmured softly, “ask me again.”

  He deepened the kiss and pressed me back onto the bed. Just as he peeled my top from my body, my cell phone rang. It was Diego. He was at the hospital with my mother.

  Whether or not I was ready, life was about to transform me once again.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Los Angeles, CA

  October 14, 2012

  Jace and I got to the hospital a little after two o’clock in the morning. Diego was already there, trying his level best to steer clear of Sonny. “How is she?” I asked him as I hugged him close.

  “She was unconscious when I found her,” Diego cried into my shirt as he held me tight. “I couldn’t get her to respond, or even wake up.”

  “It’ll be OK,” I assured as I cuddled him close. “Let’s find the doctor.”

  Unfortunately, the doctor did not give me the news I had hoped. Her lung had collapsed and her heart had failed. He spoke of hospice and how to ease her suffering, rather than how to make her better.

  “This is a progressive disease,” the doctor told me gently. “It’s not going to get any better. According to your mother’s medical directive, she has agreed for a DNR. She’s tired of suffering, Miss Hemphill. Sometimes the most loving thing we can do is let our loved ones go.”

  I turned to Diego, who sobbed shamelessly and softly into his hands. I held him tight as I nodded to the doctor to do what Maya wanted him to do.

  She lasted for three days in hospice, blissfully unconscious as nature ran its course. Diego and I stayed every single day by her side, until she finally slipped away as we both held her hands. We held her memorial on the beach by her house, though I sat motionless and oblivious and completely disconnected to the process. I couldn’t remember what was said, or what songs were played. All I could remember was the constant ebb and flow of the waves, which would ultimately house my mother’s cremated remains.

  It was the ultimately unfairness. I finally found her only to lose her months later. Jace tried to comfort me, saying at least I was able to give her those few months. I rescued her from her unhappy, impoverished life. She got to see things she wouldn’t have otherwise, including both of her children on stage living out their dreams.

  But I was angry, and nothing he said touched it. What would have happened if I had found her sooner? What more could I have done for her?

  I blamed Marianne Hemphill for my misery, so much so that I wanted to fly promptly to Iowa and tear into both her and Shane for all they had done to wreck my life.

  “Baby, think this through. Your life isn’t wrecked. You’re grieving. It’s normal to feel anger. Maybe you should call Dr. Challis. I think he could help you manage these feelings.”

  “Are you calling me crazy?” I demanded through tears. I was crying a lot lately; even making a grocery list could set me off. The last thing I needed was my boyfriend suggesting that I was hysterical. I knew I was hysterical. Everything had spiraled out of control yet again.

  It sparked an epic fight that sent me to stay with Diego in the beach house. Sonny had split for Vegas to play the mourning boyfriend there, so that left Diego alone when he absolutely didn’t need to be.

  I used that as my excuse to let myself into the empty house, only Diego was nowhere to be found. I texted him and he quickly replied he was with Hannah. He asked if I wanted them to join me, but I told him that wasn’t necessary.

  Maybe being alone with my mother’s ghost was really all I wanted.

  I didn’t turn on any lights as I made my way through the darkened apartment toward my mother’s room in the back. All the medical equipment had been returned. All her clothes had been packed. Diego had offered to stay through the weekend to pack all the belongings before he would come to live with Jace and me in the Hollywood Hills, and he had made significant progress. It already felt empty, though the furniture was still
in place. There were sheets on her bed, which I crawled into to sob softly as I hugged one of her pillows close.

  I couldn’t believe it had happened again. Life had leveled another blow, right as everything else had started to work out.

  What was the point, I wondered desperately as the darkness around me enveloped me. What was the point in being happy? What was the point in being in love or pursuing a dream? It was all fleeting, like wisps of smoke no one could truly hold in their hands.

  I cried myself to sleep and didn’t wake up again until I felt a hand on my leg. At first, I thought it was Jace. But the fingers were cruel as they climbed up my flesh. I shot up into a sitting position, but Sonny Quintero was quick to shove me back down.

  “Well, well, well,” he said with that sick, lecherous smile. “What do we have here?”

  “What are you doing here?” I hissed as I struggled against him.

  He held up a small leather case I immediately recognized as my mother’s. She kept what few valuables she had in that leather satchel, and I knew anything I had purchased for her… including the solid gold ring with my and Diego’s birthstone, was hidden inside. “I forgot something,” he said.

  I grabbed for the case. “That doesn’t belong to you!” I snapped.

  He held it out of reach. “I was around a lot longer than you, sweetheart,” he sneered and I smelled the alcohol on his breath. I gagged. “In fact, I was around when no one else was, including her lazy good-for-nothing son. I think I deserve a little compensation,” he said as he grabbed at my breast.

  “Get off of me!” I screamed and he silenced me with a sloppy kiss soaked in whiskey and cigarette smoke.

  “Come on,” he urged as he reached under my shirt. “I’ve seen the tape. I know what you’re capable of.”

  My eyes widened in terror as he tried to fit himself between my legs. I fought him like an animal until I used every ounce of body weight to force him off of me. He flew completely backward off of the bed. I hopped off the bed and darted from the room, but he grabbed me by the ankle just inside the bedroom door. I fell with a thud against the hardwood floor.

  I thrashed and kicked at him as he tried to cover my body with his own. When that didn’t faze him, I finally brought my knee up to smash his groin. He rolled off of me with a groan and I used the distraction to escape the bedroom. I didn’t stop running until I got to Hannah’s house down the block. By the time the police returned to my mother’s house, Sonny was long gone. Law enforcement caught him before he made it to Interstate 15, and by daybreak he was booked on attempted sexual assault.

  The last thing I needed was more press, but there was no way I was going to let yet another abuser get away with assaulting me. I wasn’t a six-year-old anymore.

  I did relent and go back to Dr. Challis, who helped me manage the publicity of the trial, which sidetracked my tour. My B!tches went on in my place, and were enjoying sold-out crowds. By the Christmas opening of The Journey Home, Jace walked the red carpet with Diego and me. It only took a week for the single to reach #1, where it stayed for three weeks.

  It surprised no one when “Pieces of Me” was nominated for an Oscar. I was invited to perform the song, which was stressful and nerve-wracking and wonderful as I worked closely with Griffin to perfect the performance.

  Jace had just brought his tour to a close the weekend prior to the Oscars, so he was able to join me for my big night. Tempestuous debuted their formal line, Starlet, with the sparkling dress they designed for me, which perfectly fit my new size-14 figure.

  Once Dr. Challis had unlocked how I had used my weight as a defense against another Shane, I was able to love my body enough to make the changes I needed to make to ensure a longer, healthier life than my mother had had. I hadn’t lost it all, and I might never lose it all. But it wasn’t about fitting into a specific size anymore, or waiting for the Great Until, when my scale would validate me with a specific number I wanted to see.

  It was all about eating well, moving more and respecting the gift of my body. As a result, I was able to pick out a tailored gown to fit my curves, rather than hide them.

  They no longer embarrassed me, so I refused to apologize for them.

  Iris and her steady beau, Brant Rierden, had traveled to L.A. to coordinate the publicity. I ran around like a headless chicken all the way up to that Sunday afternoon, when I stepped out of that sleek black limo to walk the red carpet in a beaded lavender dress. I spoke to reporters, posed for the photographers on the red carpet, but who the hell knows what I said to anyone or what I looked like in any of them.

  I couldn’t think about anything other than my performance. It was perhaps the most important performance of my entire life. I was a nervous wreck, nauseated to the point of actually blowing chunks right up to the moment the curtains opened and a lone spotlight fell upon me.

  Right at the edge of my vision was every A-list celebrity I had ever dreamed to meet. I shoved all my nerves down out of reach as I opened my mouth and let that first note burst from my soul.

  I lost myself so much in the music that there were tears in my eyes as the last note faded. The audience applauded and I escaped backstage. That was where I was standing when our category was announced and the winner was selected.

  “And the winner for Best Original Song is…”

  I don’t know if I would have heard the results at all had Griffin not grabbed me by the elbow and led me out to accept our award. He had long before added me to the songwriting credits for all the work I had put into it. So he let me go first to issue my thanks.

  I was numb when I stared out at the audience. “Two years ago, I faced my own image in the bathroom mirror and sang into a hairbrush. If you had told me then that I would be here now holding this,” I said, indicated the pretty gold award, “I would have thought you were insane. I had a dream board a million years ago, but even I didn’t know I could dream this big. That was something I learned along the way, thanks to the amazing people I’ve met along my journey. Graham Baxter, Shannon McKenna and Dixie: you all gave me the opportunity of a lifetime when you opened up popular music to all the rejects and the outcasts. You made it acceptable to be different, to stand out. Without you, I wouldn’t be here. Vanni, Allison and Ryder, you were my judges and my mentors as I learned to crawl under your faithful eye. Vanni in particular has always been a brotherly influence, when I thought I was an orphan in this world.”

  I took a deep breath as I glanced to Griffin. He gave me a subtle nod, so I continued. “Gwen and Iris, you made it look so easy as you transformed me, I could do nothing but grow into your expectations. Iris, you heard my scream when no one else could. Thanks for always having my back. And of course, my Fierce family. You were the single greatest gift I ever got when I got to L.A. I’ve done so many amazing things and met so many incredible people. Shelby Goddard in particular helped teach me about friendship and about courage. I met Griffin,” I said as I motioned to him, “but I thought he hated me. Turns out he’s not a bad guy, I don’t care what the press says.”

  Griffin laughed and so did the audience.

  My voice cracked as I went on. “And then I met my new family, my mother Maya and my talented brother, Diego. It wasn’t always easy, but it was always worth it. And I cherish every single day I had with my mom.” Tears fell. I let them. “And I know she’s looking down at me right now. This,” I motioned again to the award, “Is yours.”

  I glanced out at the audience, where I could see Jace smiling at me. “My award was finding the love of my life. Jace Riga, you are truly my hero. You saved my life in every way it needed saving. Yet every single day, you somehow made me believe that it was I that saved you.”

  He nodded, his own tears coursing down his face.

  “So I can think of no better way to end this night than to ask you this very important question in front of these very important people. Jace, I love you more every single day. I don’t have to search anymore. I know who I am and I know what I want. I’m t
he woman who was created to love you. And what I want is to be your wife. For real, and forever.” I could barely speak as I ended my epic, overly long acceptance speech with, “Marry me?”

  The orchestra began to play my song as Jace hopped out of his chair and flew down the row as fast as he could get there. The audience thundered with applause as they jumped to their feet, while the cameras rolled to catch each historic moment as Jace bounded up the steps to join me on stage. He repeated, “Yes,” as he spun me around.

  Griffin stepped up to the microphone with a cheeky, happy grin. “In case you missed it, he said yes.”

  I laughed before I reached to kiss my love. He was my true reward. Jace Riga, and this amazing, fierce, unstoppable and epic life I was so fucking lucky to have.

  THE END

  About the Author

  Ginger Voight is a prolific author, optioned screenwriter, and freelance writer, covering topics from entertainment to travel. Her fiction is equally diverse, with novels like the edgy, coming-of-age drama DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS, and the fun family adventure for kids of all ages, COMIC SQUAD.

  Having grown up reading different authors like Danielle Steel and Stephen King, Ginger has always been drawn more to story than to genre. This shows up in her various stories. Titles such as MY IMMORTAL and TASTE OF BLOOD are a delicious, heady mix of horror, suspense, and romance.

  Genre romance, however, has held a special place in her heart, ever since she read her first Harlequin novel when she was only eleven. As a result, Ginger is making a name for herself writing romances of her own, starring women who look more like the average American woman rather than those traditionally represented in the size-biased American media. Her Rubenesque romances were created especially for those heroines with fuller figures, who can still get the man of their dreams if only they believe they can. Such titles include UNDER TEXAS SKIES, LOVE PLUS ONE, PICTURE POSTCARDS and the best-selling GROUPIE saga.