“Liam,” she begged, but I shook my head.

“I can’t, Kennedy. I’m sorry. I’ll be right here waiting for when you decide. But until then, I will only be right here.”

Countless moments passed with her sitting there crying before she left my office. As soon as the door was shut behind her, I dropped my head into my hands and spent the next hour holding back my own tears as I continued to remind myself that running after her would only make the situation worse.

October 27

Kennedy

I SOMEHOW MADE it home despite barely being able to see the road through my tears. After taking a few minutes to collect myself, I got out of the car and walked into the condo. I’d barely made it a step inside when I paused with my hand still on the door.

There was laughter coming from inside my condo.

Kira had gotten so much better, but I hadn’t ever come home to this sound . . . and it felt out of place considering the mood when I’d left, and my mood now.

Taking my hand off the door, I took the last few steps inside so I could see into the living room, and paused again.

Both Kira and Rhys stopped laughing and stared at me with wide eyes when they caught sight of me from where they were sitting on the couches, and an awkward silence engulfed the room for long seconds until I gestured to the front door.

“Uh, we—Kira, we need to go to work.”

Kira quickly got up from her spot on the love seat and walked over to me. When she reached me, she grabbed my hand and whispered, “Are you okay?”

I looked at her in confusion, then glanced at Rhys. “With you laughing?”

Rhys’s worried eyes stayed pinned on me as Kira stepped closer. And even though I knew she was trying to get my attention, I couldn’t stop looking at the man sitting on our couch—just like I did every time I was in the same room with him.

“You’re crying,” Kira whispered, and squeezed my hand.

I finally tore my eyes from Rhys to look at my sister, and put my hand up to my face to find it wet. “Oh, I thought I . . .” I trailed off and shrugged. Apparently I hadn’t pulled myself together as much as I’d thought I had.

“We’ll talk about it in the car. I’ll go get ready.”

Once Kira walked away and had shut her bedroom door behind her, I looked back at Rhys to find him now standing—the same look of worry in his eyes. I dropped my gaze to the floor and walked toward my room, but stopped when I heard his voice.

“Are you okay?” he asked softly. His voice was just as deep as Liam’s, and the rough tone was something I had loved once and craved for long after he was gone. But now the sound was only a reminder that Rhys was back in my life—as if his standing in front of me wasn’t enough—and that I now had to choose between him and Liam.

“I’m fine.”

“You talked to him,” he stated. There was no question; I doubted my face left any room for one.

“Yes, I talked to him. But whatever you’re gathering from the way I look right now, I can tell you that you have it wrong.”

Rhys nodded but didn’t say anything else, and after a few seconds, I began walking toward my room again.

I’d only been in there long enough to change when I heard two knocks on my wall. I turned to find Rhys leaning against a wall with his arms folded across his chest.

“Why are you crying then?”

“I’m crying because I have no fucking clue what I’m going to do, and this entire situation is tearing me up!”

He watched me for a minute before asking, “Do you want me to leave, Kennedy?”

My first thought was to yell at him that I’d already told him to leave, and he’d stayed. But I found myself saying, “I want you to leave because you broke my heart. I don’t want you to leave because like I said, I have no idea what I’m going to do . . . and if you leave now, I’ll always wonder later what I would have decided if you’d stayed.”

With a nod, he pushed away from the wall and took a step back toward the door. “I, uh . . . I used your shower while you were gone.”

“That’s fine, Rhys.”

“If you need anything while you’re at work—”

“I know. But we’re fine,” I said, cutting him off. He’d made the same offer yesterday, but I didn’t need anything from him at the moment—nor did I want him to do anything for me.

A few more seconds passed before he took another step back and grabbed on to the doorframe. Just before he turned to go, he said, “I’m sorry, Kennedy. I’m so sorry.”

“I know,” I repeated, but this time the words were barely audible.

Kira turned the corner in the hall to walk toward my bedroom, and mumbled an apology to Rhys when she bumped into him before looking up at me. “You ready?”

“Yeah. Yeah, let’s go.”

The only good-bye between Rhys and me was a long look as I walked through the living room. He looked hurt again, like he had when I’d left the house earlier . . . but I couldn’t let myself get too focused on his expression. While I didn’t like that he was hurting, I couldn’t feel bad for him. I didn’t know how he’d expected me to be waiting for him after all those years, and after the kind of good-bye he’d given me. I didn’t know what he’d expected to find when he showed up at my door. But he couldn’t blame me for going on with my life.

“Okay, tell me what happened with Liam,” Kira said as soon as we were in the car and she was reversing out of the spot.

“He was mad . . . obviously. He was mad that I’d kept my marriage from him, and wanted to know if I ever would have told him. He told me he loved me—”

“He did?” Kira asked, surprise coating her short question.

“Yeah.”

“What did you say? Did you leave—wait, is that why you were crying?”

“No,” I said on a humorless laugh. “We kind of fought about the whole love thing because of something I’d heard about him, and what he knew about me. But I’m pretty sure I was already crying before that. I’m not sure, though, I don’t know when I started.”

Kira was quiet for a few seconds, then asked, “Would you have?”

“Would I have what?”

“Told him,” she explained. “Would you have told him about Rhys?”

I told her all about the mini-conversation Liam and I’d had during the movie on Friday night. I told Kira his question about our new tattoos, what my response had been, and what we’d talked about Saturday morning before Rhys had shown up. Unlike her usual self, Kira never once interrupted me while I told her everything. She just looked over at me with shocked expressions every once in a while, and when I was done, she let out a huff.

“Wow.”

“That’s pretty much how I feel,” I mumbled, and stared out the window.

“Dad called me again . . .” She trailed off, her tone hinting at what she wasn’t saying.

“I know, he called me too. I didn’t answer.”

“Kennedy, you can’t keep ignoring him. He’s our dad.”

I glanced over at her with wide eyes. “Yeah, and I just found out a few days ago that he’d kept a secret from me for four years! I think I’m allowed to not want to talk to him after that. From what Mom told us about when they met, you think Dad would understand by now that keeping the whole undercover thing a secret while you’re in a relationship is a bad thing.”