I smile to myself and turn to head toward the kitchen.

“So, how are things going with Kate?” Ryker asks, and my body halts in mid-step, my ears perking up like satellite receivers. I’m stunned that Ryker knows anything about me and Zack.

Or maybe he’s just asking about me in my capacity as a nanny? But if that’s the case, why is he asking? Has Zack been unhappy with the way I’m caring for Ben?

Even though it’s absolutely wrong, I lean up against the wall and lurk outside the doorway.

“Dude,” Zack admonishes him. “You know I’m not going there.”

This is definitely about our personal relationship.

“Oh, come on,” Ryker teases. “Give me something here. I’m dying to know.”

“You’re like a high school girl begging for gossip,” Zack says, and laughs. “Pull the tampon out, man.”

Ryker laughs too, and I roll my eyes over the way men do, apparently, gossip. “Look…I saw it the same way Delaney saw it. You have it bad for that girl.”

Delaney knows? What the hell?

“What could you possibly know in that little bit of interaction you saw?” Zack says in a sneering sort of way, and he doesn’t sound like he’s laughing anymore. “It’s nothing…trust me.”

“You’re such a fucking liar,” Ryker chides, and then taunts him, “Zack, my boy…I do believe you might be in love.”

I can’t see what’s going on. I can only hear the conversation, but my heart comes to a skittering halt when I hear Ryker say that. He must have seen something on Zack’s face or in his reaction to lead him to believe that. Something he has not been willing to show me.

“Ryker,” Zack says quietly, and I have to strain to hear him. “You have it wrong.”

My heart starts beating again, but constricts with anxiety.

“What you see? Between me and Kate?” Zack asks rhetorically, and by the tone of his voice my throat starts to tighten. “She’s nothing but a fuck. Simple as that.”

I don’t hear what Ryker says in response. I don’t hear what else Zack may have to say. I don’t hear a damn thing as I lurch away from the wall and stumble my way back through the house. In fact, my hearing seems to have gone blessedly absent as I make my way out onto the back deck and down the stairs.

I see Sutton’s mouth move as she says something to me, but I don’t hear it.

I can’t hear the other partiers, the music, or the kids laughing. I can’t hear my own steps as I pound down the stairs.

I head over toward Mely, who is still watching Ben and the other kids. Finally, a sound filters through…a cracking sound followed by a sharp stab of pain right between my breasts.

That was the sound of my heart breaking as I come to the utter realization that Zack will never feel for me the way I feel for him. In fact, he must not think very much at all of me if he considers me just a fuck.

All of the other sounds now pour in and overwhelm me. Music, laughter, kids shrieking in happiness. It all grates on my ears.

I grab my purse off a chair where I had left it and turn to Mely, who gives me a smile. But whatever she sees on my face causes it to slide right back off again.

“I have to go,” I mumble to her, then blurt out the first lie I can think of. “Family emergency. Make sure Zack sees to Ben.”

Spinning away, I sling my purse over my shoulder and make my way around the side of the house, not daring to walk back through it and potentially run into Zack. Mely calls after me, but I ignore her.

I pick up the pace, breaking into a bit of a run as I clear the front corner of the house. I cut across the front yard diagonally, heading in the direction I know will lead me out of this subdivision.

The front door opens and I glance over, seeing Sutton tearing down the steps toward me. My step falters, but then I surge forward.

It does no good…Sutton is freakin’ fast, and she catches me before I can clear the yard. Grabbing my elbow, she says, “What’s wrong? Where are you going?”

I turn to face her and she actually leans back away from me, I think stunned by the misery on my face. “I can’t do this.”

“Do what?” she asks me with worry.

“Be a part of all this.” I say the first thing that comes to my mind, and then pull away from her.

She grabs me again. “Where are you going? Are you just going to walk out of here?”

“I’m going back to Zack’s house,” I tell her, and another stab of pain hits me as I realize that it’s not my house. It’s been only a temporary shelter for me. “I’ll catch the bus.”

“Like hell you will,” she says as she starts dragging me in the opposite direction down the street. “I’ll take you there.”

“You don’t have to,” I blurt out.

“Shut up,” she says affectionately as she steers me over to a dark gray BMW. “Get in.”

I do as she says, because it will get me to my destination a lot faster than the bus. When we are both buckled up, she starts the car and pulls slowly away.

“Don’t you have to let Alex know where you’re going?” I ask.

“When I saw you running away from Mely, I knew something was wrong. I told him I was going to talk to you and it could be awhile. I’ll call him after I drop you off,” she says, and then doesn’t even hesitate when she prods, “Are you going to tell me what’s going on?”