Lonely Secrets: Yellowstone Ranch Series

11

"You're being serious?" Hannah slowly stopped smiling. Her face became worried and almost frantic.

I sighed. "Yeah, I think so." I stared down at my feet on the wooden floor of the loft.

"Ada..." She shook her head,"I want to support you, and with any other guy I would-"

I stopped her. "Well why not him?" My voice cracked a little. I looked up at her sharply. I was annoyed by her. Everything she told me about Kayce had been true but she left out all his good quality. "What do you even really know about him other than all the rumors?" I pushed her further than I normally do.

She furrowed her eyebrows, obviously getting pissed at me. "Why don't you just take my word for it? What you don't trust me either now?" She leaned up against the kitchen island, folding her arms.

I rolled my eyes,"No, I just don't get why you never mentioned any of the good things about him." I flopped down on the couch, mentally exhausted from the past few hours.

"Because there's not many!" She threw her hands in the air and raised her voice. Then she just shook her head at me and grabbed a bottle of beer out of the fridge. It clicked against the shelves as she pulled it out and popped off the top. "You don't understand, Ada. He's not someone you wanna be-

"You let me go out with that dirty cop in Wyoming. And you knew he was selling drugs and didn't say anything. So why was he a not a problem but Kayce is?" Thinking back to those days made me shiver with disgust and embarrassment.

"Because he didn't murder people!" She yelled and threw the pop cap roughly into trash can.

"It's not cold hearted murder, Han. I'm sure if you really talked to him, most of them would be rumors anyway." I scrolled through my phone, trying to ignore her glares.

"One was my brother."

I snapped my head up to meet her eyes. "What?" I ruffled my brows. Brother. Kayce was right. Oh god Kayce was right. After the incident. He had said on our first date. "But..." I shook my head. "Your dad- He still works for them." I swallowed hard, trying to make sense of everything.

Brother. I've trusted my entire life with this girl and not once did she ever mention she had a brother.

She sighed. "I guess it wasn't really murder..." she took another swig out of the bottle and sat down in the chair next to me. "Not on purpose anyway." Her blonde hair fell in front of her face as she looked down to her lap. "I never told you because I didn't want you to judge me."

I immediately reached out and grabbed her hand. "Hannah... I would never judge you. Especially for something like this." I squeezed her hand tightly. As much as I wanted to wring her neck for never telling me, I didn't want her to think she would lose me.

She looked up at me slowly with tears in her eyes. "When I was 16," She let out a deep, ragged breath,"I dated a boy. And he slept with my best friend. Well," She paused. "I wanted to get back at him. So a bunch of my friends and I went out to this old barn that his dad owned and..." She sniffled. "We set it on fire." Set it on fire? For a high school boyfriend? "Anyway, we had fun with it. Unfortunately. I know this sounds crazy but I was young and stupid-" She started rambling.

"It's okay, Han." I reassured her and rubbed her shoulder. "We all do stupid things."

I watched as she swallowed hard and tears whelmed up in her eyes. "We kept setting other places on fire. Just abandoned buildings and barns and cars." She shook her head and sighed. "One night, we set one of John Duttons barns on fire. We thought no one was there but I guess Kayce and his brothers were there that night. We tried running away. And I didn't realize," She let out a shaky breath,"One of my friends, Mason, he had brought a gun. And he thought he could scare them away. To keep from chasing us," Her shaking hand pushed away the tears on her face that were now spilling out one by one. I was hanging on to every word. "He just shot a few rounds in the air but they shot back. They didn't hit anyone until we all made it to the main road. By some freak chance, my brother drove by and I begged him to let us get in his truck," More tears spilled out the more she wiped them away,"I told him they were shooting as us because we were trespassing so he got this gun out and was walking back to the woods. I just remember hearing Lee yelling to put it down but my brother wouldn't." She breathed in sharply but gasped a bit. "He thought we were the innocent ones. And the next I knew my brother was going to shoot Lee. Or at least act like it. But when the gun went off, my brother was the one who fell. Kayce shot him." She let out another long breath. "It all happened so fast, I don't even remember what all really happened after that." She wiped her face with both hands. "I couldn't tell you. And I'm sorry." She sniffled. "I've just never been able to forgive myself..or Kayce."

"You can't blame yourself, Han." I whispered. I didn't know what to do or say. My best friend never even told me she had a brother. Not once. I didn't even know his name. "But holding it in like this, is not helping."

"I know." She swallowed hard then sighed. "I guess I just knew if you moved in with Kayce that he would say something eventually. I didn't want you to be mad at me."

I should be mad. You should be mad, I told myself. This woman has been my best friend for years and never even mentioned this other half of her life to me. Get mad. This is a lie, Ada. She lied to you. You told her everything. All the awful, terrible things that happened to you. And she never opened up. Be mad at her. You should be.

"I'm not mad." I gave a small smile.

It's not her fault. This was traumatic to her.

But I'm hurt. Hurt that she never told me. That all those times I opened up to her about my past and never once did she bring any of this up. I didn't know this girl at all.

"But you're still gonna move in with him?" She asked quietly.

I nodded. "Yeah. I am."

Because I feel like I know him better than I know you.