Pepper was pleasantly tipsy when she walked the ten feet from Samantha’s cottage to her own and as such, nearly killed herself on the package sitting on her doorstep.

Luckily she was back in bare feet, having left Samantha’s death trap heels back where they belonged.

Still, she grunted in pain when she tripped over the box, scrambled to not trample it, overcorrected on her sore ankle, and ended up colliding hard with the doorframe.

“Well, that’s going to leave a mark,” she muttered, bending carefully to pick up the small cube of cardboard.

And when she saw the label, she was extra glad to have not squashed it.

Her phone rang, and she would have known who it was without the Star Wars ringtone.

Only her father would call so late.

Only her father’s spies would tell him the exact moment she’d gotten his gift.

It almost made her want to chuck the cheesecake to the deck, the way he kept tabs on her.

Except it was cheesecake.

Carefully, she set the box on her patio table and extracted her phone from her purse.

“Hi, Dad,” she answered.

“You’re welcome for the delicious and expensive delivery, Father.”

Just that quickly, annoyance swept through her. She bit back a frustrated sigh. “Thank you for the cheesecake. It’s my favorite.”

“It cost more than its weight in gold.”

She flopped down onto a chair and tilted her head back toward the sky. The stars were always so bright here, so much more than in Los Angeles.

“I didn’t ask you to do that, Dad, but thanks,” she said.

“Well, no need to be snotty,” her father said. “I just wanted to spoil my daughter.”

And lord it over her.

Pepper opened her mouth to snap out a reply then just as quickly closed it.

Nothing she said would make one lick of difference anyway.

There were so many other important injustices—starving children, natural disasters, terrorist attacks. No one gave—or should give—a damn about her irritation over a flipping cheesecake.

It didn’t matter.

She chanted that to herself over and over as her father continued to talk. Not that it made her feel any better.

Derek’s name booming over the airwaves and colliding with her eardrums snapped her out of her inner diatribe.

Derek of the soft lips, flat abs, and hard—

“He’s what?” she shrieked, finally processing her father’s words.

“Going to escort you to the wedding.”

She shot to her feet. “He is not.”

Peter’s eye roll was practically audible. “Yes, he is. The man is working for me. I need my security guards for the press tour, and you need someone to watch out for you.”

“I don’t—”

“You could do worse than Derek. He comes from a good family. His background is squeaky clean. He knows the business.”

“And it always comes back to the business,” she said, knowing her voice was bitter yet unable to stifle it. “Doesn’t it?”

“The business gave you . . .”

Off he went.

Pepper got it. Her family had given her a lot, and she wasn’t ungrateful. Or didn’t mean to be anyway.

She just wanted something different.

Why was it so bad to dream of a small life?

Her existence didn’t need thousand-dollar shoes and Maseratis to be worthwhile. Her months at the beach had been her happiest ever.

If only she had a way of making some money.

Then she could completely cut ties with her family.

She dug through her purse and pulled out her keys as her father prattled on. A quick second later the door was open and her purse was on the little table she kept in the front hall.

His voice never faltered as he regaled her with the reasons she was so lucky and ungrateful.

He wasn’t wrong. Or not entirely.

She was both of those things in that moment.

After grabbing a fork from a drawer, she went back onto the deck and opened the box.

Low Fat.

The cheesecake might as well have been laughing at her.

Her father had bought her low-fat cheesecake.

Figured.

She closed the lid, set her fork on the table. Strings. Why did there always have to be so many strings?

Strings for gifts. Strings for favors. Strings for affection. They wound around her, tightening, siphoned off her air.

“Now don’t eat all of that in one sitting,” her father said. “It’s low-fat, not calorie-free, and the dress that your mother chose—”

“I’ll see you at the wedding.” She hung up.

Hearing to her father’s voice suddenly cut off made her feel slightly better. The low-fat cheesecake sitting on her table did not.

With a huff, she scooped the box and fork up and went into her house.

The container made a satisfying thunk when she dropped it into the trash.

After swapping the fork for a spoon, Pepper grabbed a pint of ice cream from the fridge and dug in.

Full fat with chocolate chunks and bits of brownie mixed in.

Fit into her dress.

For God’s sake.

The worst part was that her father still got to her, even though she’d tried to lock that part of her life away. She wished that she could be one of those people who could live and let live.

That wasn’t her.

Pepper brooded. She thought and thought and thought. Dissected every single detail, thought about all the ways she could have done things differently.

And nothing changed.

Nothing ever changed.

With a sigh, she put the ice cream back into the freezer.

She walked over to the sink, dropped the spoon inside, and rested her hands on the counter, staring out the window to the dark beach beyond. The swoosh-crash of the waves just barely reached her ears.

“What are you going to do with your life, Pepper?”

Hollywood was out. She might have made an okay actor, perhaps even a semi-successful one. But that was gone, and she’d never loved it anyway. It had been another way to prove herself, to show her family she could contribute to the O’Brien success.

She could go back to school. Except she didn’t like school much anyway and was she going to spend even more time getting a degree that didn’t matter?

Maybe she could get her teaching credentials.

Except kids and a classroom full of scissors and pencils was basically a time bomb of ways to injure herself or them.

Or worse, she could teach teenagers.

Shuddering, she let her head flop back.

Or rather, start to.

Because as it moved, her eyes stopped on a reflection. On the same sparkle that had caught her attention when Derek had broken the jar a few days before.

Wood. Glass. Shells. Sand. Steel.

Derek. Her father. Andy. Weddings that were supposed to have been hers.

She grabbed the container and dumped it into the sink. The pieces clattered together, glass broke further, shells chipped.

And it all somehow made sense.

String. Glue.

Her hands moved, but not as fast as her mind.

A piece of glass there. A shell with twine here. The wood was the base and the other parts somehow just came together.

The sky was lightening when she finished. Pepper held up the small sculpture, watched little rainbows of the sun’s rays reflect through the glass and throw rainbows onto the bright white shells.

Somehow it all made sense.

How?

How did it make sense?

And yet, her pain and hope for the future had been encapsulated on the washed up chunk of driftwood.

She felt lighter. More whole, despite the pieces she’d put on that wood.

She didn’t care about her father quite so much.

Carefully, Pepper set the sculpture on the window sill. She watched it for a minute more, sparkling, broken yet still hopeful, and with a smile on her lips turned and left the kitchen.

Sleep took her away the moment her head hit the pillow.