Chapter 1

Seven years after I divorced Wyatt Simmons, I ran into him at a piano showroom. I was there to buy my daughter an upright for her practice room.

The sales associate left me halfway through a question and hurried over to greet him.

“Mr. Simmons. Another piano for your wife? She’s a lucky woman.”

I’d seen restaurant owners walk away from full tables to greet Wyatt’s father. The Simmons name still got people moving.

Wyatt looked past the associate and saw me.

“Let her pick one, too,” he said. “Put it on my account.”

“I’ve already picked one.” I nodded toward the upright my daughter had tried earlier that week. She’d played the same four bars three times before she let me take her home.

Wyatt took a black card from his wallet and pressed it into my palm.

“You always wanted a Steinway, Mildred. You could spend the rest of your life scrubbing floors and still never afford one.” He folded my fingers over the card. “It’s been seven years. You can stop being stubborn with me.”

For a moment, I couldn’t think what to say. He’d decided I cleaned floors for a living without even asking what I was doing there.

I set his card on the counter and asked the associate how soon they could deliver the upright.

I already had a Steinway at home. This piano was for my daughter.

As for Wyatt, I’d stopped wanting him years ago.

……

“This isn’t about being stubborn, Wyatt.”

While the associate checked the delivery schedule, I filled in the address on the order slip. “I’ll take the upright we discussed. Please send it here.”

Wyatt took the slip before the associate could reach for it.

“Harmony Academy?”

He read the address twice. The Simmons family name was on a plaque in the academy’s lobby. His father had paid for the recital hall back when he wanted a few respectable people in Riverton to start returning his calls.

“I know the headmaster,” Wyatt said. “I’ll tell him to send somebody else on these errands. You’ve got enough to do keeping the place clean.”

He stopped. The rims of his eyes had gone red.

“Mildred, if things got this bad, why didn’t you come to me?”

I caught my reflection in the polished side of a grand piano. I’d thrown on an old blue overshirt that morning. The cuffs had faded almost white. It could pass for a uniform if you’d already decided what I did for a living.

“I’m buying the piano myself,” I said. “Leave the headmaster out of it.”

I took back the slip, paid at the counter, and tucked the receipt into my bag. My daughter had won first place at the National Youth Piano Competition that afternoon. She was waiting for me to come home and cut the cake we’d bought before we knew how she’d placed.

Outside, the wind cut straight through my shirt. Autumn had come early to Riverton. I pulled on my gloves and texted Morris to tell him I was ready.

Wyatt caught up with me near the end of the showroom’s covered walkway. He was breathing hard. He shoved a folded purchase order into my open bag.

“I had them cancel your order. They’re sending the Steinway instead.”

I took out the paper. My delivery address was still there. So was my name. The only signature at the bottom was his.

“You remember what you used to tell me?” he said. “You wanted to give a concert on a Steinway of your own. I remember, Mildred. I remember all of it.”

His fingers shook when he reached for my arm. I stepped back.

“Let me give you the piano,” he said. “Maybe then you can stop hating me.”

I set the order on the low wall beside us and took off my gloves, one finger at a time.

Wyatt looked down. The scars ran across every finger. Some of the skin had drawn tight enough that I couldn’t straighten my fingers all the way, even after years of trying.

He fell silent. He’d seen what happened to my hands. He knew I’d never play a concert again.

Eight years earlier, I’d gone into the National Piano Competition as the favorite. I’d written the pieces for the final myself. Wyatt knew where I kept the scores because he’d listened to me play through them at home, sometimes long after midnight.

The day before the final, he took them and gave them to Vera Swanson.

Vera was his protégée. The Simmons family paid for her lessons and made sure she got on the right recital programs. Wyatt wanted a win that would get her noticed outside Riverton. He’d decided my music could get her one.

I went to get the scores back. I’d just put both hands on the table to gather them when Vera picked up the kettle. Wyatt was close enough to stop her.

He let her pour the boiling water over my hands.

For a second, all I could hear was the kettle hitting the table. Then I looked down. The skin across my fingers had started to blister.

Vera took a step back. Wyatt moved between us.

“Mildred Fox, it’s one competition,” he said. “Did you really have to come here and fight her over it?”

At the hospital, he held the door open for the nurse while she brought in a tray of dressings. He waited until she left before he spoke.

“You want a title? I’ll get you into another competition next year.”

I looked at my hands. Both were wrapped so thickly I couldn’t see where one finger ended and the next began.

“This time,” he said, “you step aside for Vera.”

I cried until my throat hurt. Sometime before dawn, I worked the edge of a bloodstained bandage loose with my teeth. I needed to see what she’d done to my hands.