I could do it. I’d done it with Knight. With Edie. At a party full of complete strangers.

But somehow, this was different.

My father had been tricked by Val. She got pregnant on purpose. He hadn’t wanted me. Yet he had been forced to raise me on his own for the first few years of my life. And it hadn’t been easy, with my lack of communication. They’d called him The Mute because he didn’t speak much, but his daughter truly crushed him with misery over her lack of words.

“Is everything okay?” He furrowed his brows, seeming to realize the atmosphere in the room had shifted. Maybe that I’d shifted, too.

I used to be dependent. Small. Scared. The last few months had changed me. And I was still evolving, changing like clay—spinning through tiny changes that made small, yet significant differences in my life. Each dent shaped me.

I opened my mouth.

He dropped his pen.

My lips moved.

His eyes widened.

I smiled.

He listened.

“Not everything,” I whispered, aware of the way my lips molded around the words.

Sadness laced in my victory. The only reason I was able to speak was because my birth mother had died. There was no reconciliation possible. I’d lost something permanently—but gained something else.

I reached for his hand across the desk, clutching it with shaky fingers. Free at last. The pen he’d been holding a second ago bled ink onto his new leather planner. I only noticed because everything was illuminated, like I was on ecstasy or something.

“I have a confession, Dad.”

I wasn’t sure how I expected him to react. My father had tried everything to get me to talk. I had award-winning speech therapists knocking on my door, the best psychologists and experts in the world at my disposal. I’d seen his back shake from weeping dozens of times when he thought I wasn’t looking, as he mourned the words that never left my mouth.

Then, I wasn’t ready. Now, I was.

“Luna…” He put a shaky hand to his mouth.

I dragged my hand from his, fanned my fingers on his desk. “Val died,” I said.

“How do you…”

“I asked Edie to hire someone to investigate. I’m so sorry, Dad. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I needed to know.”

He made a sudden move. The bleeding pen rolled across the desk and dropped onto the carpet. He shook his head, paused for a second, then stood up, rounding his desk and yanking me to my feet. His eyes bore into mine, saying so many things he’d bottled over the years. I thought he was going to hug me, but to my astonishment, he got down on his knees, staring up at me, his eyes twinkling.

“You’re talking.” He looked puzzled.

I laughed. I actually laughed, which was horrible, seeing as my moment of greatness was tainted by the death of my biological mother. But then I started crying, too. Tears ran down my cheeks, following one another along my neck, soaking my shirt. Talk about bittersweet moments.

“I mean…are you?” His throat worked. “Talking?”

“To some people.” Guilt, guilt, guilt. Piles upon piles of messy, black, foggy guilt.

“Some?”

“You. Edie. Knight.”

“Since when?”

“Since…a few weeks ago.”

“Luna,” he whispered.

“Dad.”

“Say it again.”

“Dad.” I smiled. He closed his eyes. Took a deep breath.

“Again? Please.”

“Dad.”

His shoulders shook. Not with sobs. With happiness. Happiness I’d put inside him. I was drunk on my newfound power.

“Tell me again.” His voice was soft.

The pen behind him spread blue ink all over the lush crème carpet.

“Dad. Trent. Mr. Rexroth. Father.” I wiggled my brows, and he opened his eyes, laughing. The crow’s feet fanning around his eyes squished up his entire face adorably.

“What about your brother?”

“What about him?”

He gave me a really? look, and I pulled him to standing. I buried my face in his chest, inhaling him. I hated that he looked like a man who’d just been released from prison. Happier. Lighter. I’d sentenced him to a reality he hadn’t wanted, caged him into a situation he’d struggled with every day.

“I’ll try. I…I don’t control it, Dad. It’s not like that. Yet. I’m sorry.” I swallowed. “Aren’t you…mad?”

“Which part should I be mad about? The fact that my daughter wanted to understand her past better and I obviously failed her if she felt she couldn’t ask me about her birth mother, or the fact that you’ve just given me the only thing I’ve truly wanted since the day you stopped talking?”

“The first one. Definitely the first one.” I laughed.

Melancholy dripped between us. This was the big moment. The top of the hill. Me, talking to my dad, telling him I knew my mother was dead. He didn’t look surprised. Why didn’t he look surprised?

Ever the mind reader, he cleared his throat and looked down.

“You knew about Val,” I said. There was no accusation in my voice.

He nodded. “It seemed redundant to bring her up after all these years. Plus, she hurt you in such a vital way, I couldn’t bring myself to think what would happen if—”

“It’s okay,” I cut him off. I got it. I did.

“God.” He shook his head, pulling me into another hug. “Your voice. It’s beautiful.”

“I love you,” I whispered into his suit. My words had life, and weight, and a pulse. I said them again. “I love you, Dad. I love you. I love you. I love you.”

He lifted me up like I was a little girl, spinning me in place and burying his nose in my hair. Tears rolled down our faces. The pen bled the last of its ink, marking this page in our lives forever in my father’s office. I knew, with certainty that made my heart swell, that he was not going to replace that carpet.

He was going to look at it every day, remember the day it had happened, and cherish it.

“I love you, too, baby girl.”

“There’s an Emergen-C pack and Advil on the kitchen counter. You know your way around, and if you need anything, ask Vaughn. Or call. You can call me, too.”

Emilia, Mom’s older sister and Vaughn’s mother, practically shoved me out the door, delving through paper bags for all the shit she’d brought Mom. She looked tired, worried, and secondhand sick. I spat phlegm into one of the plants by our door, ignoring the pulsating heat radiating from my body.

“Remind me why I’m getting kicked out of my own house again?”

“You spiked a fever last night. You’re not well, Knight. You know you can’t be here next to her.”

“Fine. I’ll take the guestroom downstairs. I won’t go anywhere near Mom.”

“I’ll be taking the guestroom.”

Emilia finally plucked a pack of chips from a bag. Salty snacks were good for Mom. She’d lost a lot of sodium. “I want to take care of my sister. Besides, even if you took the downstairs bedroom, you still have the flu. You’re a germ-ball, excuse my bluntness.”

I shrugged. “Been called worse.”