The first place fit the affordable bill but not the cleanliness one. The toilet rocked in place, its bowl discolored with ancient stains. The kitchen was the same, with an oven that had never been cleaned, if Alyssa had to guess, and a tiny refrigerator that smelled of something old and sour. Ghostly brown squares and rectangles on the walls revealed the place hadn't been painted, and suspicious stains dotted the carpet. No way.

Her cell rang as she crossed town toward the next apartment and brought the bad news that her second appointment was canceled because the place had just rented.

By the time she arrived at work, she was barely holding it together. Her gaze flashed across the lot and landed on Betty. But Marco would be leaving soon, and if she had any luck remaining in the universe, she'd be able to avoid him until he left. Afterward, she could only hope dinner would be the busiest ever and keep her hands and mind occupied for the rest of the night.

She was successful. By the time the doors opened at six and customers flooded in, Jameson was behind the bar and Marco was long gone. Any time Alyssa had a spare moment, she threw herself into helping the other waitstaff or found some busywork to keep herself distracted. By the time the band played its last set, Alyssa's head pounded and her back ached, but she'd made it through. Tonight, that was all that mattered.

After she helped close out the floor, she made her way to the kitchen and leaned against a high metal table. "I'll take the green room tonight, if that's okay." Given her new hotel bills, the extra money would be useful.

Eric glanced up from where he was wrapping the tops of some pans. "By yourself?"

"I don't mind."

Frowning, he dropped what he was doing. He settled onto his elbows next to her, his shoulder just touching hers. "You don't look so good."

Alyssa's head sagged on her neck. "Gee, thanks."

"No, I didn't mean it that way."

She bumped into him. Guilt immediately flooded her. She wasn't blind. She knew Eric had a thing for her, but she wasn't leading him on, was she? "I know. Just a very bad day." She put a little space between them.

He looked at her for a long moment. "Want to talk about it?"

Desperately, actually. But she didn't have a soul she could spill this to. "Not at all." She threw him a small smile. "But thanks for asking."

He frowned and tilted his head. "Whatever you want. How 'bout you get started and I'll come help with whatever's left when I'm done here."

"Sounds good."

Eric rolled the cart over and she swore the thing held her up as she made her way to the green room.

When she arrived, the band's crew was removing the last of their belongings. Alyssa waited outside the room as they gave the place a once-over. The last roadie filed out toward the stage door, a black case in his hand. "Good night," he said.

"Night," she called after him. Then she pushed into the room and went through the motions of cleaning up. Food on the cart. Kitchen cleaned. Fridge emptied. Trash collected. Toilets scrubbed.

Eric arrived some time later. Part of her stupidly wished it were Marco.

"Damn, you work fast, girl." He ran a hand through his brown hair and surveyed the space. "Anything left?"

Alyssa followed his gaze. "Wasn't too bad tonight. The trash needs to go out. Cart needs to go back to the kitchen. And vacuuming."

Warm fingers gripped her chin. "I'll do it. You go home. You look like you're two minutes from falling over."

She tugged out of his touch but gave him a smile she hoped would take the sting out of her rejection. "Okay," she whispered, stepping around him to the door.

"Alyssa?"

She glanced back over her shoulder. "Yeah?"

He crossed his arms and faced her. An array of emotions played out on his face. "No one...uh, hurt you. Right?"

Heat filled her cheeks and she squirmed inside. She knew what Eric thought of Marco, and of course everyone had seen them happy together yesterday. "No. I'm fine."

His gaze narrowed. "Okay."

Time clock. Purse. Out into the humid night air. Alyssa collapsed into the driver's seat of the Corolla and tore out of the lot.

She had no idea where to go. No way was she going back to Marco's. But returning to her hotel room felt like such a huge defeat. So she drove. Just to be moving. Just to give her brain something to think about besides the pain sitting so heavily on her chest it was hard to breathe.

She batted away the tears when they fell and held her breath when sobs threatened. Finally, she couldn't suppress her grief for another second.

As a strangled cry burst from her throat, Alyssa pulled the car haphazardly to the curb and let some of the suffocating pain pour out of her. Minutes passed, or maybe it was hours, before the tears stopped falling, leaving her eyes sticky and puffy, her throat raw, and her chest aching with emptiness.

Loneliness pressed in on her as if gravity itself were made of the desolate emotion.

Alyssa wiped her face. Breaking down like this did no good. She sat up in the car seat and looked around, sucking in a breath when she realized where she was-just two blocks from her father's house.

Without thinking, she drove through her old neighborhood and parked in front of the run-down rancher.

She stared at the dark silhouette of her house. Well, the house she grew up in. Even that description wasn't right, though, was it? It was the house in which she'd lived happily until three weeks after her twelfth birthday, when her mother had died.

If she'd thought things couldn't have gotten any worse, she'd been so, so wrong. Because that was when her dad became a complete stranger. Brady had done everything he could to protect her from backhands and thrown bottles, to shield her from shouted obscenities and kitchen-sink vomit. He'd had it so much worse than her. Five years older and close to graduating high school, Brady took over the job of raising her.

And he'd been the one to get her out, too. Brady never left the house without taking her with him, and that meant she'd spent a lot of time at Marco's. When the guys graduated high school, they refused to go off and pursue their dreams while she was too young to move out or be on her own. So they'd gotten jobs, rented an apartment for the three of them, and taken some courses at the community college until she graduated.

Brady and Marco were her heroes in every sense of the word.

She glanced at the house and a shiver ran down her spine.

Was her father still the same?

His pickup truck sat askew on the short driveway in front of the house, one tire well over the edge on the grass.

I'm telling you, not everybody comes back from war...right.

Van's words slammed into her brain. Her mom's death had been her father's war, and it had ruined him for life. Could the same be true for Marco?