"Angry?" He turned to me and his eyes were filled with the light of love. "How could I possibly be angry that you chose to paint me? I'm flattered. Your talent strikes awe within me."

I dropped my head. A sort of pleasure mixed with embarra.s.sment over Sterling's praise cascaded through me.

"Rhiannon," Sterling said. He turned me to him. His hand reached up and held my chin. "I want you to stay. I need you to stay. I am desperately in love with you and I have been since I was seventeen."

His eyes were so serious, his tone so earnest. I knew that Sterling had these feelings for me, and suddenly instead of feeling caged by the idea of being in California with Sterling a great freedom pulsed through me. A huge desire to be with him and have him be with me and share all the laughter and the love that was innate within us. All that stood between us no longer seemed insurmountable. Our parents would learn to adjust, they would have to.

"Sterling, I love you, too," I said.

His lips were on mine, a soft and lovely kiss filled with promises for our future. His hands on the sides of my face. Then the heat shifted between us, taking us, consuming us, and we were two becoming one again.

Chapter 19.

Rhiannon.

"What were you doing with Sterling?" Mama asked. Her voice held judgment mixed with fear, and her eyes blazed. Her gaze trailed up my body and my disheveled clothes. I tugged at my shorts. My hair was filled with tangles and leaves from being with Sterling, from kissing him, from him running his hands through my locks and me clasping for his skin under his shirt.

"Nothing," I said and brushed past her toward the hall that led to my room.

"Nothing?" Mama said. "Well, that nothing can ruin your life. Have you slept with him then? Were you having s.e.x?"

"No!" I said. I turned back to her. Mama had no right to the private parts of my life. Since Papa had left she smothered us like a bear protecting her cubs. There was no room to breathe, no room to be, she was constantly hovering around me and Maeve. Asking and interrogating and expecting and needing Mama's constant needing made me tired. She needed someone, anyone, to fill the hole in her life that Papa had left.

"He's not the right boy for you. He's too old and he's much too experienced."

"Experienced? Mama, what does that mean?"

"He's like his father," Mama said. "And now, to be honest, his mother as well." She shook her head. "I always excused Joanne's behavior. She's been my best friend since I was your age." Mama closed her eyes and shook her head as though she couldn't bear the facts that lay before her-the knowledge that her best friend and her husband were having an affair.

"Have they heard anything from the doctor?" Mama asked. Who else could she ask? She wasn't speaking with Joanne and she wouldn't ask Papa.

"Tomorrow," I said.

"I don't want you involved with Sterling," she said. "I'm certain your father feels the same."

"Papa? Really, does it matter what Papa thinks? As though he has the moral high ground? Mama, he's left us for another woman. Another woman who is your best friend-"

"Enough," Mama said. She took three steps toward me. Three heavy footfalls with a menacing look that ravaged her face. Mama had never frightened me, but in this moment my rage slipped from me and was replaced by fear. Her anger burned with a deep ferocity.

"You're not to speak of it. Not to me, not to Maeve, not to Amanda or Sterling. Do you understand?"

I nodded slowly. Forbidden. My parents had not forbidden anything before this. Now I was forbidden from Sterling and forbidden from speaking about Papa's deceit. My throat tightened. Hot tears that pushed into the backs of my eyes suddenly flooded and my lips trembled. How had this happened to me? To us? And why was Mama so mean? So very cruel. "I love Sterling." The words jolted out of my lips as I fought to regain my breath. Tears streamed down my cheeks. "I love him."

"You are fifteen. You're too young to love anyone. You have a physical desire for Sterling, but that desire is not love. You won't know love until you are much older, and as for Sterling Legend? I doubt he has the ability to ever know love at all."

I opened my eyes to sunlight. So many painful dreams filled with the past. Reminders of why Sterling and I would never work as a couple.

"Have you looked at this?" Sterling turned the corner to our room. He wore only jeans slung low on his hips and no shirt. My body tingled with the sight of his skin, his muscled chest, his arms bare in the sunlight. A desire to kiss him and run my hands over his body overcame me. He held an open book on the palm of one hand and a coffee mug in the other.

"What is it?" I pulled the sheet over my bare b.r.e.a.s.t.s. A smile captured his face as he looked at the book he held open. He settled beside me on the bed and set his coffee on the nightstand.

"This guest book goes back forty years." He flipped to the front of the book. "Seriously, Steve McQueen stayed here and Elizabeth Taylor and Bill Murray. Even Hunter Thompson was a guest. They all left a note. Listen to this one from Liz Taylor." Sterling read the inscription. "'The yellow house is a timeless magical place. Where artists' dreams become their reality.'" He looked up from the book. "Seriously, there is a story here. I'm not sure how to crack it, but there is. With the right screenplay writer there could be a movie or a TV series. There's more than one way into this story."

His exuberance pleased me. Experiencing the creative fire in Sterling caused a smile to break over my face. His happiness helped me to ignore my fears.

"I love this idea," he said and continued flipping through the pages. "I wonder if there is anything in here from Mom. She stayed here with your dad when they wrote The Lady's Regret."

Cold fear sliced like a knife through my heart. What if Joanne had left an inscription? Or Papa? What would it say? Would Sterling finally discover the truth? He turned the pages of the book.

"Here," he said and pointed at the page. "This is around the time they would have been here. He turned the page and his smile widened. "That's Mom's handwriting." He looked at me and pressed his hand to his forehead. "It's amazing to actually see her handwriting, and to know that she was here." He started to read, "'This place is magic. More magical than any moment in my life. My expectation was to come to the yellow house and write a bold and beautiful script with a dear friend.'" Sterling turned to me and wiggled his eyebrows. "That is exactly what they did right? I mean the script is brilliant." He took a sip of coffee and turned back to the page and continued reading aloud. "'This script that we created was meant to bring my career to where I wanted. But the magic of this place brought me so much more. So much more than just a simple piece of beautiful writing, (as though that were so easy), this place brought me my first real and pure love in the form of my friend. A man who I have trusted and enjoyed has turned into more than a friend. More than I could ever expect ...'" Sterling's lips continued moving and his eyes widened, but he no longer read aloud the words his mother had written.

A shiver chased down my spine. I pulled my knees to my chest. His brow pulled tight with deep creases as he regained his voice. "'A man so fully embraced by love, so giving, so warm I feel as though I have been resurrected and brought in from the cold.'"

Sterling stopped reading. I cast my eyes downward toward the sheets. The cloth twisted in my hand.

"There's another from your Dad," he said. He handed me the book, heavy in my hands. I pressed it closed, not needing to read the words of love Papa had written about another woman while married to Mama.

"It's true then," Sterling asked. His gaze landed on me. "Did you know?"

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. "I was fifteen, I'm not certain what I knew."

"But you suspected."

I nodded slowly, afraid that once I'd admitted my suspicions Sterling would leave me. We'd finally been together and I'd finally surrendered to the love between us. Would I now be pushed aside by Sterling because of what our parents had done?

"You never said anything."

"I left, I had to go and then we never talked and now, it's so long ago. What is there to say? Why say it? Joanne is gone, my parents' marriage is over. What good would me telling you something I only suspected do?"

"And Gayle? Your Mom?"

I nodded. "She knew. She doesn't talk about what happened and the one time I brought it up and asked, she told me to never speak of it. Not with her, not with Maeve, and definitely not with you or Amanda."

Sterling looked at the page. "The date indicated they were here during that summer. Right before that night when they split up, the night Dad called her a wh.o.r.e and then I bruised his fist with my cheek." He looked past me, through the tall bedroom windows with a view of the ocean.

"And Gayle took care of us," Sterling said. "She took care of Amanda and me all those years. She took care of Mom when she was sick. After Dad moved back in and you and Maeve had left and"-his eyes met mine-"She took care of my mother after what my mother did."

"Yes," I said. "Mama has always been loyal. She doesn't turn her back on those she loves. It's not her way."

Sterling stood. "I need to get back to Los Angeles." He thrust his hands into his back pockets. My heart fluttered with his sudden coldness. I felt both the physical and emotional distance he created in this instant. I pulled my knees closer to my chest. A need for him to wrap his arms around me and a.s.sure me that we would not pay for our parents' indiscretion laid heavy in my chest.

"I have a meeting this afternoon. Do you want to stay here or go back to L.A.?"

"I want ..." My heart longed for comfort from him. Confusion tore through me with Sterling's sudden need to leave, the abrupt change of his tone, and the way he stood so far from me. "Are you angry? Sterling, is there-"

"No," Sterling said. He reached out and his fingertips brushed my cheek. I pressed my face into his hand. "I want you to come with me. I want you to stay with me. I want you with me, always. I know what this place has done for your painting."

My love for him was reflected in his eyes. "It's not this place," I said.

He tilted his head. His beautiful face so close to me. I could spend a lifetime examining and painting and staring into his eyes.

"This place is beautiful and magical and amazing," I said. "But the yellow house is not the reason I'm painting again." I grasped his hand and pressed his palm against my cheek. "You are the reason. You and me and my surrender to what I wanted and needed, but was so afraid to admit. I see everything so clearly now. I don't want to ever be without you."

"You won't be," Sterling said. "Not ever again. Stay with me. Paint at my house. At least for as long as Maeve is home. Or longer. However long you want. I'm yours, Rhiannon, I always have been."

"And me yours, Sterling, forever and for always."

After thanking Elizabeth and Jonathan, we drove back down the coast the way we'd come. The return trip seemed faster. There was a playfulness combined with the knowledge that Sterling and I had decided to be together. But as we drew closer to Mama's and to Malibu, my belly grew tight. Telling Mama about our decision would cause displeasure and silence. Mama was terribly good at ignoring you when she was angry. We drove along the curves of the Pacific Coast Highway, the last few miles north of L.A. Sterling's hand gripped mine. The warmth of his hand reminded me that we were in this together. I wouldn't face Mama's displeasure alone.

"How did your mother do it?" Sterling asked. "How did she take care of us after what happened that summer?"

"That's a question for her." We turned up the long gravel drive to Mama's Malibu ranch. "She's not perfect," I said. "She has strong feelings when it comes to me being with you."

"Such as?"

"The words the apple doesn't fall from the tree have been used multiple times by both my parents since I was fifteen."

"And by tree they mean my father." His hand gripped the steering wheel and his knuckles whitened. "I suppose my teenage years and early twenties don't help my cause."

"I know nothing of you from when I was gone, other than tales I heard from Amanda on occasion."

"Gayle saw it all. No wonder they shipped you away." His eyes sparkled. "Of course they didn't want you with me. They were terrified that I'd defile their little girl."

"Defile? As though I was a chaste virgin to be kept pure?"

"Weren't you chaste until me?" he asked. A nearly wicked gleam entered his eye. He seemed to revel in the fact that my body, while not untouched, had actually only been his.

He stopped in front of the house. I was nervous. A strange car was parked on the gravel drive in front of the house.

"That's not Gayle's car," Sterling said. "If she has company maybe it will make this easier."

"Make what easier? You think you're coming in with me? That we're doing this now?"

"Yes." My hand was still clasped with his and he pressed my fingers to his lips. "We've waited a long time to be together," he said. "I'm not waiting any longer."

My intention was to stay with Sterling, perhaps even live with him in Venice. But now? Tell Mama about this now? Sterling's look of determination indicated that hesitancy wasn't an option.

"I'm not fifteen, Sterling. I'm not going to change my mind and run off to Europe," I said. My attempt at levity fell flat. The sparkle in his eyes dimmed and a hint of fear entered his gaze.

"You can tell her whenever you want about moving in with me, but I refuse to hide what's between us and sneak around. Pack some things and come back to Venice with me. At least while Maeve is here to help with your mom."

I nodded. We had waited what seemed like forever to be together. We'd overcome obstacles, broken marriages, affairs, and narcissistic parents. We wouldn't wait any longer. We wouldn't hide our relationship. We held hands. I pushed open the front door and entered, my hand still clasped in Sterling's.

I stopped. My eyes flicked from Mama. Papa stood from the couch in the living room.

"Papa?" I rushed across the foyer and threw my arms around him. His arms surrounded me in a tight hug.

"I thought I might have to drive to Montecito and bring you home myself." His gaze drifted past me and his smile fell from his lips. His face tightened into a grim mask when he looked at Sterling.

"Tom," Sterling said as he reached out his hand to my father, but my father would not take it. "Good to see you. I didn't know you had a trip to Los Angeles planned."

"I didn't," Papa said. His grip tightened around my shoulder. "I recently discovered that you've been spending time with Rhiannon. That the Legends were once again trying to steal things from me that I love." His tone was hard. He looked at me. "That's why I'm here, Sterling. To protect what is most dear to me. To protect Rhiannon from you."

"Protect me? Daddy, I'm a grown woman, I-"

Sterling walked closer to Papa and interrupted me. "I know that our trip to the yellow house cleared up a lot of questions for me."

My father's grip slipped from my shoulder and Mama's face blanched at hearing Sterling's words. "I never knew that you were the reason for my parents' separation or that my mother was the reason for yours and Gayle's," Sterling continued.

"Ha!" Papa's laugh was a sharp sound like brittle shards of sharp gla.s.s. "I wasn't the reason behind your parents' separation," Papa said. "I was a convenient excuse. You'd need to ask your father for the facts as to why his marriage to Joanne was so near failure."

Sterling's eyebrow rose.

"My infatuation with your mother was a grave mistake on my part. A mistake that Gayle saw and tried to warn me about, but that mistake shone such a bright light upon the flaws that persisted in our union"-Tom turned his head and met Mama's eyes-"that even once I knew the error, there was nothing that could be done. Nothing to salvage. For that grave mistake I will always, always be sorry." He turned his gaze back to Sterling and his tone hardened. "But it's the Legend curse to ravage and wreck everyone that loves them."

"First The Lady's Regret is cursed and now I'm cursed simply for being a Legend?" Sterling's lips curled into a bitter smile. "Aren't you punishing the son for the father's sins?"

"And what sins might those be?" Papa asked. "Do you even know the depth of your father's depravity? His narcissism? His ability to tear people apart simply to indulge his own need for prurient pleasures?"

"I've produced five of Dad's films. I have some idea," Sterling said. "I'm the guy that fixes his life."

"Ah, yes, the guy who fixes Steve's life? Are you the guy who finds him drugs, and booze, and wh.o.r.es, and hides his messy secrets?" Papa's face was filled with anger.

"What does that have to do with Rhiannon and me? Why do you a.s.sume that I am just like my father?"

"And you're not?" Papa asked. "You've lived your life without experiencing the temptations of Hollywood?"

Sterling shifted his weight from one foot to the next. "Of course not, no, but-"

"But, Rhiannon is different," Papa finished Sterling's sentence. "She is your lifelong love. She makes your heart sing an effortless song." Papa turned to me and lifted a strand of my hair. "She is the princess and you are her knight."

"Papa, please, you are being cruel-"

"Am I? He takes my daughter to a s.e.xual retreat and she comes back smelling of him, his hands upon her, his lips and every other foul incarnation, and I am being cruel?"

"Papa, I'm twenty-two, I am a grown woman."

"Those words, that she was different were the same words that Steve spoke of Joanne. Just before he proposed to her. But Steve was unable to contain his pa.s.sions to one woman. Why, after being witness to the past, should I believe you?"

Sterling closed his eyes for a brief second. "I am aware of my father's indiscretions, but they are not mine."