“Shit.”

She sank into a chair because her legs went wobbly as if all the strength had drained out of them through her feet.

“I know Chris doesn’t always want to talk about things,” she continued. “But you’ve always talked to me.”

He shook his head and sat on the edge of the king-size bed. “Kassidy.” His somber eyes regarded her steadily. “I can talk to you about my own shit. But I can’t tell you what’s going on in Chris’s head.” He rubbed the back of his skull. “Hell, I don’t know what’s going on in Chris’s head.”

“I don’t think Chris knows what’s going on in Chris’s head,” she muttered.

Dag snorted. “Yeah.” He sighed. “I fucked up. Big time. You know it.”

She pressed her trembling lips together. “If you knew that, why did you do it?” She held up a hand. “Sorry. That sounded accusing. I didn’t mean it to. I just want to know.”

He gave a short nod, dropped his head and looked at the floor, his hands between his knees. She wanted to rush over and sit beside him, throw her arms around him. She tightened her leg muscles to keep her in the chair, gripped her fingers together.

Then he raised his head, and agony and longing blazed in his dark eyes. “I love Chris,” he said simply. “I’ve loved him forever.”

She stared back at him, breathing in tiny shallow breaths. “You mean…”

He nodded again but held her gaze. “Does that disgust you?”

“No. Of course not.” Disgust was nowhere on her emotional radar at that moment. “I just… Are you gay?”

He shrugged. “I guess you’d say I’m bi. I’ve always been attracted to both men and women. Chris is the only guy I’ve ever had feelings like that for, though.”

“He told me you were a man whore. That you slept your way through college. With girls.”

Dag choked on a laugh. “Yeah. That’d be true. I like sex, lots of sex, what can I say? And I wasn’t going to get any from Chris. He made that pretty damn clear.”

Her face scrunched up. “You told him…?”

“No. Christ, no. I just knew from conversations we had he was in no way open to that. And I mean, in no way.”

She nodded.

“It hurt,” Dag added, voice low and taut. “Hurt like hell. But I valued his friendship. Hell, he accepted me for who I was, busted-up family and poor-as-dirt, complete misfit. Not many people have ever done that.”

Her head was whirling with this information that shouldn’t have stunned her like it did. She’d just had no idea. But thinking back to the last few weeks, she felt as though she had known. With some kind of deep-down instinctive knowledge, it made sense to her.

But she was still confused. “Did you tell him–last night? Or this morning?” He’d been gone when she woke up so she didn’t know when the big showdown had occurred. “Is that why he made you leave?”

Dag’s mouth curled. “Why do you think he made me leave?”

Her mouth fell open. “Well… Oh shit. I don’t know. I assumed…”

“Chris doesn’t make me do anything. But no. I didn’t tell him that. He freaked out about what happened and told me to get out. I knew I had to leave.”

Her eyes prickled. Her heart cracked and ached. “Oh Dag.” The words came out in a rough whisper. “I’m so sorry.”

“I’m going back to San Francisco, Kassidy.”

Her bottom lip trembled and her heart stuttered. “When?”

“I booked a flight for Tuesday morning. I have a few business things to deal with tomorrow, the rest I’ll have to handle from there.”

“Oh.” She sucked on her bottom lip and looked down at her hands, a little blurry through her tears. How could he leave? What would they do without him? She felt as if someone were wrenching her heart out of her chest.

“I know I fucked up,” Dag said. “I shouldn’t have done what I did. It was just so hard…not to. Ya know? We’d all gotten really close and it…just happened.” He scrubbed a hand over his face and his eyes looked kind of red too.

She met his eyes. “But…the weird thing is—he liked it. I know he did.”

Dag was silent.

“He wouldn’t admit it to me,” she added. She laid her hands on her knees, bare beneath the hem of her skirt, and curled her fingers around them, her heart slowly splintering into painful shards. “He’s so damn stubborn. I-I accused him of having feelings for you. And that was before I even knew…”

His eyes shot wide open. “What the hell? You said what? Why?”

One corner of her mouth lifted and she hitched a shoulder. “Call it woman’s intuition. Little things. I should have figured things out a long time ago.”

“No. Whatever.” He closed his eyes briefly. “Jesus.” His eyes opened. “That’s not right, Kass. I know he doesn’t feel that way. He never has and he never will. In my screwed-up way, I wanted to be close to him, but as usual, I made a mess of things. Don’t tell Chris this. Please? I’m just going to get the hell out of town again, and leave you two to live your lives.”

“Why did you come back?” she asked. “Why?”

He hitched one shoulder. “I just wanted to see him again. I guess I had some kind of crazy hope that maybe…” His voice trailed off. “It was stupid.”

He’d wanted to see Chris again. He’d hoped they could be together.

And then a question hit her, like a smack in the face. Had he been using her to get closer to Chris?

Oh god. She’d thought he cared about her. She cared about him. Stupid, stupid, stupid. The pain clamped down on her, crushing her, a knife turning slowly inside her. She felt like she might throw up. She stood. Her legs wobbled as she walked across the hotel room, not looking at Dag. She couldn’t look at him. In fact she could barely see, other than a small round window in front of her, everything else faded to black. She fumbled at the hotel door.

“Kassidy.” Dag spoke behind her, his voice ragged. She paused, bent her head, looked at the door knob. A harsh sob swelled inside her and she tightened her stomach muscles to keep it from bursting out, breathed in through her nose. She yanked the door open and walked out, down the hall and out of Dag’s life.

She couldn’t go home. Chris was there. She couldn’t go to her parents. There was only one place she could go.

Hailey opened the door of her small apartment and the surprise on her face quickly morphed into concern. “Hey,” she said, eyebrows pulled together. “Are you okay?”

Kassidy shook her head. She walked in, collapsed onto a chair and buried her face in her hands.

“Kassidy.”

She felt the warmth of Hailey’s hand as she touched her back. They weren’t the kind of sisters who hugged and touched each other. Hell, they barely talked to each other sometimes. But the gesture comforted her in some small, weird way.

“I’m okay,” she finally said, lifting her head. She dragged her palms over wet cheeks, pushed her hair off her face. “I think.”

“What the hell happened?” Hailey took a seat on her couch, her knees almost touching Kassidy’s at a right angle. Hailey’s legs were bare beneath the frayed edge of a pair of jean cut-offs. “It’s not Mom, is it?”

“No.” She squeezed the word out of a tight throat. “Not Mom.”

She leaned back and rested her head against the back of the chair, closed her eyes. Pain throbbed inside her, along with a swirl of confusion. “It’s a long story.”

“I’m sure it is.” But Hailey’s voice held none of her usual mocking tone. “Did you come here to tell me? Or just to…come here?”

“I don’t know. I just know I can’t go home.”

Hailey frowned. “You and Chris? Did you have a fight?”

“Sort of. My life is so messed up, Hailey.” She pressed the heels of her hands to her aching eyes. “I don’t know what’s going on and I don’t know what to do.”

Silence blanketed the room, but that was okay. Hailey probably didn’t know what to say and wisely didn’t say anything.

Finally Hailey did speak. “I know you probably don’t want advice from me, and that’s okay. I’m not exactly the best person to give advice anyway. But if you just want to talk…sometimes that helps.”