“I slept with Wade.”

Missy nearly choked on her margarita. “Wait? What? When did this happen?”

“Two nights ago, when we got back from Rhetta’s.”

“He went with you to West Virginia?”

“Yes. Another long story, but one thing led to another, and he ended up staying the night—because I asked him to.”

Missy was leaning forward in her chair, grinning like a schoolgirl. “I knew it! I knew you were holding out on me. So spill. Was it amazing?”

Christy-Lynn struggled to keep her face neutral and to remind herself that ending things with Wade before they went any further had been the right thing to do. “Yes, it was amazing, but there’s nothing to spill. I told him I made a mistake, that I wasn’t ready for anything beyond friendship. And maybe not even that.”

“Oh, Christy-Lynn, please tell me you didn’t.”

“I had to. He wants more. And maybe I do too, but I don’t know how to be that.”

“That being . . .”

“A couple. Half of someone else.”

Missy sighed. “You were married for eight years.”

“That was different. I didn’t need Stephen in my pocket, and he certainly didn’t want me in his. In fact, there were times when he seemed to forget I was there at all. And I really didn’t mind. It worked for a while. And then obviously it stopped working. I don’t think I could bear that again. Not with Wade.”

“Are you saying you want Wade in your pocket?”

“No. Maybe. I don’t know.”

“Talk to me, Christy-Lynn. What’s going on in that head of yours?”

“I don’t know what’s going on. He’s a good man, a good friend, a good listener. He brings toys for Tolstoy and leaves spaghetti in my microwave because he thinks I need looking after.”

Missy groaned, then drained her glass. “Tell me, please, how any of this is bad?”

“It’s bad because I’m starting to depend on him more than I want to.”

“You’re scared.”

“Yes. And realistic.”

“Doors,” Missy said, staring woefully at her empty margarita glass. “You get that, right? That you’re slamming doors on your chances for happiness?”

Christy-Lynn nodded somberly as Marco approached with their nachos. “I do actually, though I prefer to think of them as loose ends. And tying them up is the only way I know to protect the people I care about.”

Tolstoy came running as Christy-Lynn stepped through the door, squalling insistently as she went to the kitchen to fill his bowl, then rescued one of his catnip mice from under the fridge. She had just retrieved her purse from the counter when she spotted the note she’d left for Wade crumpled on the kitchen table. She picked it up and dropped it into the trash without rereading it.

Slamming doors.

Maybe Missy was right, but it was for the best. Wade had already been hurt by one woman who didn’t know how to love him. He didn’t need another one.

And there was Rhetta. Tomorrow she was going to have to pick up the phone and make Rhetta understand that adopting Iris was impossible. She’d be only too happy to help place her with a good family and to provide whatever financial support was needed for them both, but that’s where it had to end. For her sake as well as Iris’s.

She took a quick shower to scrub away the aroma of Taco Loco then brewed a cup of Dar’s valerian root tea. She needed sleep desperately, preferably the dreamless kind, but when she stepped into the bedroom, Wade’s manuscript was waiting for her on the nightstand—another loose end that needed tying up. She had promised to finish it, and she owed him that much. Whether he would bother reading her notes was another story, but at least her conscience would be clear.

The light was still on, the comforter scattered with manuscript pages when her cell jarred her awake several hours later. She squinted at the clock as she fumbled for her phone. It was after midnight.

“Hello?”

“Christy-Lynn?”

For a moment, she thought she must be dreaming. “Mama?”

“I’m sorry it’s so late.”

“Is something wrong?”

“No. Look, I know I said I wasn’t going to call, and I really wasn’t. But then I found the card you left on the coffee table.” There was a pause, the sound of smoke being inhaled and then exhaled. “After you left, I got to thinking about . . . well, about everything, and I realized I never said I’m sorry. I may have said the words, I can’t remember, but if I did I meant I was sorry for me. It wasn’t about you—about how I hurt you—and it should have been. That’s why I’m calling.”

Christy-Lynn sagged back against the pillows, wondering where this fresh wave of contrition was coming from—and where it might be going. A few hours ago, her mother had shown her the door. Now this. Had she changed her mind about the money after all?

“It doesn’t matter now, Mama.”

“Yes, it does. And there was more I should have said. So much more. I always swore that if I ever got the chance I’d make sure you knew how much I regretted it all, and then there you were, right in front of me with that necklace in your hand, and all I could think about was getting rid of you. That’s why I rushed you out the door—because I was ashamed. I could see what I’d done to you—then and now.”