The First Crush Is the Deepest by Harrington Nina

Author:Harrington, Nina [Harrington, Nina]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Romance, Contemporary
ISBN: 9780373207190
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2013-05-20T16:00:00+00:00

TWELVE

‘No,’ Sam replied, resting the palms of his hands on Amber’s shoulders and drawing her back to the boat to sit down. ‘That was never going to happen. Never.’

His gaze locked onto her lovely eyes and held them tight. ‘I’ve spent the last three days watching you connect with these girls. Where did you learn those skills? Not from Julia Swan and certainly not by being some diva.’

She smiled back at him but her eyes were suddenly sad. ‘I can say the same thing about you. Those girls love you. But you don’t understand. It had already happened. And do you know the worst thing? The moment it hit me what I was doing was when I finally understood her. After all of these years I finally understood that my mother didn’t hate people—she hated her job. She hated it but she didn’t know anything else, so she took her frustration out on everyone around her.’

‘You might be right. But what did you do? Just walk off the tour?’

She flashed him a look. ‘Hardly. No. My friend Parvita had organised a series of charity concerts in small towns and school halls in Kerala and Goa. Until then I had always said that I was too busy, but at the very last minute their solo pianist had to go to New York and Parvita asked me to take his place.’

She raised her hands then dropped them to her lap. ‘What can I say? India knocked me sideways. I love everything about it. The heat, the colours, everything. We travelled with a group of incredible sitar players, and we had the best tour of our lives. And the very last day was a revelation. Can you imagine—the whole musical troupe was in a rickety bus, dodging the potholes, in the middle of nowhere heading for a string of orphanages for abandoned girls?’

She looked at Sam and managed a smile.

‘Nothing can prepare you for what we found here. I thought I had seen it all. Wrong again. Same with my friends. I think I cried every night. It was tough going but Parvita worked her magic and for a short while we had a real working music school right here in this village. We had planned to do two nights at the orphanage before heading back to the airport. We stayed a week! Can you imagine? By working all around the area, we raised enough money to pay for hospital treatment for the girls with enough left over to give them a decent meal every day for a month. These girls. Oh, Sam. These amazing girls.’

She broke into a wide grin. ‘You wouldn’t believe the fun we all had. It was crazy. They are living in the worst conditions and they found happiness. It was very precious. I’ll never forget it.’

‘I can see how important it is to you. Is that why you decided to come back here for Parvita’s wedding?’

Amber nodded. ‘Parvita wants to create the music school but she needs help to pay the teachers’ wages and keep things going.

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