“I just closed on the property, literally the day your dad came to your house. I don’t know how he even knew that, but I had every intention of telling you that day. I came hoping to celebrate with you, actually. Hell, I even thought about trying to convince you to go with me . . . . The house is in bad shape, it’ll take me at least a year to get it ready to live in or sell.”

“Okay . . .” was all I could come up with. Deep down I really believed that he was telling the truth. I didn’t know why, but I just had a gut feeling that he wasn’t lying to me. Not about Atlanta, at least.

I took a deep breath, but kept eye contact. “Okay, so even if that’s all true, what about my dad? And Mendoza?”

“Mendoza is another story for a different day, but just try to put yourself in my shoes, knowing that my friend is deteriorating in front of my eyes and so fucking quickly. I wasn’t trying to keep it from you, but I’ve been really focused on helping him get by. Bringing other people into his shit would only make things harder for him. We’re all fighting the same battle with PTSD, but he’s losing, so I tried to keep everything and everyone around him as normal as possible, to help him feel less crazy.”

His eyes left mine and stared at the seat between us. My heart ached and swelled. It wasn’t my place to force Kael to tell me about Mendoza’s mental health. I felt like shit for even attempting to use that against him when this was really about my dad and the house in Atlanta.

“Okay,” I repeated. “And what about my dad? You’re telling me there wasn’t ever a time to tell me from that first day until now?”

“No, there was. And honestly, I’m sorry that I’m such a selfish person.” He rubbed his hand across his chin and pulled at his lips. “I was selfish, that’s it. I knew you wouldn’t want anything to do with me if your dad told you, which I figured he would. So I just kept taking more and more of your time. Karina, I have felt nothing for so long, I started to think I wasn’t capable of caring about anyone this way, so I got addicted to this feeling.”

“What feeling?”

His hand was warm when he lifted it to gently grab mine. He pressed them both to his chest and I felt his heart pounding.