CHAPTER 4
My heart pounded so hard I could hear nothing else. I had to get away. I couldn’t look at Kari. I stood up, leaving my plate on the coffee table. For a moment I felt dizzy; my voice sounded detached, even to me. "I think I’m going to talk to my mother about this whole thing. Maybe we can work something out.”
Ms. Pomeroy saw me heading to the front door and called, "You can step into my bedroom to use the phone.”
I shook my head. I wasn't having this conversation over a phone, not when my mother was somewhere in the hotel. "I’ll be right back," I said.
I’m sure Kari wouldn't have approved of my walk as I went down the hallway. It had no finesse, no strut, just a lot of resentment.
The elevator took me to the basement. I marched down the hall to the housekeeping office. I half expected Mom to not be there. She spends a lot of time checking the rooms, but when I went through the door, I saw her standing by her desk, talking with Don. The whir of the washing machines and dryers muted but didn't cover their words.
"I’m positive,” he said. "She was in the room with that ditzy singer—the one who looks like her."
"Kari Kingsley," I said. "Her name is Kari Kingsley.”
They turned and saw me. My anger must have been evident. Mom said to Don, "I’ll talk with you later,” and he left.
I stared at her, emotion biting into the back of my throat. "Alex Kingsley is my father, isn’t he?”
The color drained from my mother’s face. She sank into her chair.
I always thought I’d be happy when I found out my father’s identity, but instead I churned with a rage I didn't understand. “I can't believe you didn’t tell me," I said. "You knew Kari and I looked alike because she was my sister, and you never told me.’’
Mom’s eyes registered shock. "She knows? She told you?” And that hurt too — that Mom admitted the truth so easily now, when I’d never been able to pry it out of her before. I was not about to answer her question.
Tears pushed against my eyes. "All this time, we had pictures of him in the house,” I said. "I thought you hadn't shown me any pictures because you didn't have them. I thought it would be hard to track him down. But I saw him and heard him all the time, and I didn’t even know it!”
"Lexi—" she said, but I didn't let her finish.
“Don’t call me Lexi!" I yelled. "You named me Alexia. You named me after him, didn’t you? How could you do that? You gave me his name and then made sure I had nothing else from him—not knowing who he was, not even knowing what he looked like. You could have just pointed him out on the CD covers.”
She had always known how badly I wanted to know what my father looked like. Every time I dreamed about him finding me and couldn’t picture his face—every time I scanned a crowd and saw a blue-eyed man with sandy blond hair, I had wondered about him and felt empty inside.
“Does he know anything about me?” I asked. "I want the truth this time. All of it.”
She let out a ragged breath, then looked away. I thought she wouldn't answer, but she did—in a voice so calm I knew she’d rehearsed this speech. "When I was your age, I was obsessed with Alex Kingsley—you knew that already. He came to a concert in Charleston the end of my senior year, and I drove there to see him. He picked me out of the crowd and pulled me up on stage with him. Then when the song ended, he asked if I’d wait backstage for him. I already felt like we were destined to be together, and this was proof I was right.”
Her gaze flickered back to mine, and she shook her head. "I loved him so much, and when you feel that way, your mind stops thinking. I know you can’t understand this. You’ve always been so sensible, but I wasn't like you that way. I was headstrong, impulsive."
I'd never thought of my mother as being impulsive. She went to work every day and to class three nights a week. She did the dishes, paid the bills, and hardly ever lost her temper. I couldn’t imagine her even being my age, let alone my age and starstruck.
"Alex said he'd picked me out of the crowd because I looked so much like his late wife. She’d died eight months before from a brain aneurysm. Kari had only been a year old when it happened, just a baby. Alex was out on the road at the time and blamed himself for not being there. He could have gotten her to the hospital in time if he'd been home. We talked a lot after the concert, and he told me things he’d never told another person. I believed him about that; I don't think it was just a line he used. He was hurting, and I wanted to make him feel better so badly."
She kept her gaze on the desk. "I gave him my phone number, and he said he'd call me, but he never did, which stung. I was still thinking about our destiny together. In my mind I could see myself stepping in and being a mother for his daughter, that’s how crazy in love I was. I didn’t realize then that celebrities only care about people who are as rich and famous as they are.”
She pushed out a breath, and her gaze finally returned to me. "I also didn't realize I was going to be the mother of his daughter after all. When I found out I was pregnant, I tried to call him. I got as far as his manager. I told him why I needed to talk to Alex, and he called me a gold digger and”—she paused and lowered her voice—"a few less flattering things. He told me to leave Alex alone and hung up on me. So the truth is, I never knew whether Alex found out or not."
"Why didn't you keep trying to reach him?” I asked. "You could have demanded a DNA test or something.”
She shook her head. "Your abuela wanted to hide my pregnancy, wanted to make sure no one found out.” Mom stopped for a moment, as though mentally correcting herself. "Well, it wasn't just Abuela. I didn’t want everyone from school to know. That isn’t the sort of thing you announce at your graduation party. If I'd demanded a paternity test, it would have been in the tabloids. Besides, I didn't want to take his money if he didn't care anything about me.”
So it had been because of her pride. Hadn't she ever thought I needed a father, that at least he deserved the chance to be one?
As though Mom had been able to read my mind, she said, "You have to understand, I adored him before I ever met him—that’s blind love, and it’s easy to get crushed when you have that kind of love. A daughter's love for her superstar father—that would be blind love too. If I had told you he was your father and he rejected you the same way he rejected me—I didn’t want you to get hurt. I wanted you to have a firm sense of who you were, to be grounded be¬fore you met him, so no matter how it turned out, you wouldn't be devastated.”
I wouldn’t listen to her words; I wouldn’t let them soak in. "You should have told me,” I said. "I shouldn’t have had to find out like this.”
"I didn’t mean for this to happen. If I had known Kari Kingsley would show up here . . . My mother gripped the edge of the desk, clenching it. "Does she know? Is that why she’s here?"
"No, she doesn't know. She’s here to convince me to take the job, and I’m going to."
The words made something in Mom’s expression change. She snapped back to being herself. "You can’t just drop everything and run off to California.”
"Yes I can." I turned and headed toward the door. "I guess I’m more impulsive than you thought.”
My mother followed, switching into Spanish. "Te trataran como suciedad." They’ll treat you like dirt. “Is that what you want? Is the money worth your dignity? If it is, we might as well get a lawyer and just ask for back child support."
"This isn’t about the money," I said. "This is about me finally figuring out the other half of me—the half you’ve always kept a secret.”
She took hold of my arm, stopping me as I reached the hallway. "You don’t need to go anywhere to figure out who you are. You're Alexia Garcia: a beautiful, smart, talented girl. Can't you see that?”
I pulled my arm away from her. "You don't understand this.” She couldn't. She’d always known both of her parents. She hadn't grown up half empty.
"I understand—you're doing this because you're mad at me. It’s a bad reason, Lexi.” She reached out again but d
idn’t touch my arm. "Think about it before you get caught up with these people.”
"Why should I, when you didn’t?” I turned and walked away from her, but I could feel her watching my every step.
I went to the service elevator, stood inside shaking, and stared at the buttons.
Despite the scene with my mother, I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t even know what to say to Kari. Did I tell her she was my half sister? What exactly was the proper etiquette for announcing that sort of thing? It had been a huge shock to me, and I'd had at least a little forewarning. I’d always known I had a father somewhere, and I might have brothers or sisters. But how would Kari take the news about what her father had done? How would she feel about a sister—about me being her sister?
I looked down at my worn tennis shoes and their fraying laces, at my faded jeans, and my nondescript T-shirt. I compared them to her outfit, right down to her cosmopolitan red heels and flashy gold earrings. I was glad she didn’t know who I was, and I wasn't going to break the news to her. Not now. Not until I’d talked to Alex Kingsley. Alex Kingsley—that's who he was to me. I couldn’t call him my father, not even in my mind.
I imagined myself telling him. I saw his face now, where before there had only been a blurry guy standing beside a horse.
Was it possible he would be happy, that he'd want to be some sort of father to me?
But, then again, if he hadn't cared enough about my mother to even call her, why would he care about me? Maybe he’d call me a gold digger too. I didn’t know any¬thing about him or how he’d react.
I leaned against the elevator wall. Maybe my mom was right and it was better to have a lawyer contact him and ask for a DNA test. Only, getting a lawyer seemed like mounting an attack against him. If he felt attacked, I’d lose the chance to ever have a real relationship with him.
I pictured meeting him at some posh lawyer's office. My mom and I would drive there in our beat-up Taurus with a three-inch crack in the windshield and a side mirror that had been superglued back into place after Abuela had knocked it off while backing out of the garage.
He'd be so impressed with us.
It was better to do it my way.
I pushed the button for the eleventh floor and in a couple of minutes stood outside of Kari’s door. I took a lot of deep breaths before I knocked. Ms. Pomeroy answered. I walked in and forced a smile.
Kari had finished her meal and was sprawled out on the couch with a People magazine. I looked at her profile, taking in our similarities again. It was so obvious now that we were related, a truth standing there in plain sight—no, not standing, waving its arms around, jumping up and down. Why hadn't I figured it out the first time I saw her on a CD cover?
I knew I was staring, so I turned my gaze to Ms. Pomeroy. I kept my voice even and told myself they had no reason to suspect anything. Sometimes strangers look alike. "I'll take the job on one condition. I want to meet Alex Kingsley.”
Ms. Pomeroy raised an eyebrow. "Why?”
“I already told you I was a fan. We have all his CDs."
Kari laid the magazine on her stomach and craned her head around to look at me. "So when it was about meeting me and making a lot of money, the answer was no, but when there’s a chance to meet my father, the answer is yes?"
I shrugged. "I’ve wanted to meet him since I was a little girl."
She picked up the magazine too quickly, and the pages rustled in protest. "Well, I feel special now.”
Ms. Pomeroy walked to a desk and picked up a briefcase. "I'm sure a meeting can be arranged—after you've done a few events for Kari. Let’s get started on the paperwork, shall we? You'll be listed as an assistant. No need to tell anyone more about your duties." She pulled out a paper and handed it to me. "Here’s a nondisclosure form. This means you can't talk to the tabloids about Kari at all. No interviews, no pictures, no leaks, no book deals, or anything along those lines. We’re clear about that?"
"Absolutely,” I said. In fact, I wanted the press to find out about this less than Kari and Ms. Pomeroy put together.
For the next few minutes, I sat at the desk and filled out every piece of paper Ms. Pomeroy handed me.
She watched my pen moving across the paper. “You’ll need to learn how to write Kari’s signature to sign autographs,” she said. "Beyond that, don’t write anything for anyone while you’re pretending to be her. Your handwriting is nothing like hers.”
I nodded. "When am I leaving for California? Tomorrow? Tonight?”
She laughed at my eagerness. "We can give you time to pack, tie up loose ends, withdraw from school—"
I slid the last piece of paper back to her. "Don’t. If you give me time I’ll probably change my mind."
For a moment her gaze zeroed in on me, calculating, then she picked up the papers and straightened them into a pile. "Your mother still doesn’t approve? You did tell her you were going, didn’t you?"
"She knows I’m going. She just doesn't think I should.” Ms. Pomeroy slipped the papers back into her briefcase. "And what does your father think?”
That was the question, wasn't it? Yesterday, an hour ago, I would have shrugged, like I'd done a thousand times, and told her my mother was single. I couldn't bring those words to my lips now.
"My father doesn’t live with us." My voice sounded tense, wrong somehow. And I could see her making note of that, like she made note of everything.
She nodded, closed her briefcase, and stood up. Before she walked away, I asked, "Do you know Alex Kingsley?”
"I used to work for him before I became Kari’s manager.”
"What's he like?”
Ms. Pomeroy glanced over at Kari to see if she was listening. She wasn’t. She’d moved on to a Glamour magazine.
"I think very highly of him." The tone of her voice hinted at more than professional admiration. "When Kari’s next album comes out, I’ll probably go back to working for him." She smiled not so much at me, but at the thought of him. "I won’t have any trouble arranging a meeting for you.”
I should have been glad that she had such easy access to him, but instead my skin prickled. It was stupid to feel jealous on my mom’s behalf just because she’d kept Alex Kingsley’s posters. And still listened to his CDs. Sometimes incessantly. Until I had to retreat to my room and block out his voice by blasting my own music. Mom had moved on with her life. Still, I looked at Ms. Pomeroy's flawless makeup, her perfectly outlined maroon lips, and wondered if she’d ever kissed my father. I didn't like the thought.