“I’m saying things are going to change,” her father said, his brown eyes serious behind his wire-rimmed glasses. “I’m going to sell the house and downsize. I’m not going to fret so much about whether you’re eating or how you’re going to pay your bills because I know you’re fully capable of taking care of yourself. And … maybe it’s time I sought out some companionship. Gave myself another chance at love.”

“Wow.” Annika got up and walked to the window, her brain tumbling with a thousand thoughts. She looked down at the hospital courtyard, where a woman in a wheelchair sat surrounded by her family, all of them laughing and talking in the warmth of the afternoon sun. Then she turned back to her dad, remembering all the times she’d worried about him in that enormous house, all by himself. “You’re right. I’m going to miss the house, but you have to do what’s best for you. I think we’ve all seen up close how short and precious life is. As for dating…” She took a deep breath and smiled. “I’m really happy for you, Dad.”

“Really?” He searched her face, not returning her smile. “You don’t feel like I’d be forgetting your mother?”

Annika sat on the edge of his bed. “No. I’m not a little girl anymore. You deserve to be happy, Daddy. More than anything, I want to see you live your life with joy.”

He squeezed her hand. “I want that, too, Ani. For both of us. I want that, too.”

The next twenty-four hours were a haze of flying back to LA, getting her dad checked in to Cedars-Sinai (where he was being treated like royalty, of course; as soon as Queen of the Valley Medical Center informed them about his accident, the other doctors even bought him an all-inclusive trip to Aruba for when he fully recovered, and they were all going with him), and facing the very real possibility of having to close Make Up and declare bankruptcy.

At her desk the next morning, before June came in, Annika reached into her bag and pulled out the broken sculpture Hudson had made her. She’d tried to glue it back together, but it was still very clearly damaged, the seam in the heart glaringly ugly. She set the sculpture on her desk, sat back, and looked at it in the crisp, cool quiet. Without warning, her eyes filled with tears.

Burying her face in her hands, Annika let herself cry.