AN: Sorry for the delay, I had writer's block and stress like you wouldn't believe and on top of all that, the site went beserk on my account and wouldn't let me on. Hope this is worth the wait!

...

Whinny

Jade stood, motionless, in front of the stall of the world's fattest horse. Stupid thing was so lucky. All it had to do was eat and be pampered by André and make sure the baby in its belly grew nice and strong. It probably hadn't seen the sire since she'd gotten pregnant. She didn't have to care if some pretty little filly caught its eye. She was just fine on her own.

Why couldn't Jade be like that?

It was like everything inside her had been trampled, then tangled into hopeless, dizzying knots. She couldn't get the image of the entwined Cat and Beck out of her head, but more than that, she felt dirty. Ashamed, like she'd witnessed something private that she shouldn't have. So what? He's MY boyfriend. I had every right! He should be the one crawling like a worm!

Except she couldn't get the phantom of Mason's lips off of hers.

As if sensing her traitorous thoughts, the mare's head jerked up, eyes wide. "I know, I know," Jade snapped, and then rubbed her temples with her hands. She was talking to a horse. She'd cracked. She knew it. She'd cracked.

Except the horse wasn't looking at her. She was eyeing a nearby vacant stall with apprehension in her eyes. Jade's curiosity got the better of her. She picked up a shovel before kicking the door wide open.

It was a moment before Trina and Robbie realized they were being watched. "Oh – hey!" Trina yelled, shoving Robbie away from her. "How dare you! Get off, jerk!" She slapped him soundly across the face and stormed off dramatically, not seeming to realize there were still traces of his makeup slashed across her face.

Robbie seemed a little too stunned to move until Jade rounded on him. "Was she just kissing you voluntarily?"

He started slightly, and then a big, sloppy grin spread across his lip gloss-stained mouth. "Oh, yeah."

"Well, what happened?" Jade demanded waspishly. "Did she fall off her horse? Bang her head? Go for Botox and get a lobotomy on accident?"

And for once, Robbie Shapiro was not even fazed. "Nope," he said cheerfully, brushing past her to run after Trina. "Whether she likes it or not, she fell in love!" He bolted out the door, calling Trina's name.

Jade kicked the stall door again. Of course. Even the dweebs were getting a happily ever after. So typical.

She needed a release, but she'd ridden and ridden all of yesterday – after she'd found them, of course – and it had done nothing but make her legs unbearably sore. So she did the next-best thing; she grabbed a curry comb from the tack box by the door and hurled it across the barn. It landed with a thunk atop a pile of hay.

Jade nearly jumped out of her skin when the haystack said "Ouch!"

Her heart sank as a red-velvet head popped up. "Why'd you do that?" Cat asked, wounded.

"You think I wanna talk to you?" Jade snarled, and then she got a better look at her face. Cat's big brown eyes were rimmed heavily in red, and even as she watched her lip quivered and her shoulders trembled softly. She had an idea she wasn't the only one who had never gone back to the cabin last night.

"Jade," she wavered, sliding down from the haystack and coming to stand in front of her, "I'm so –"

"Don't you dare say sorry!" Jade shouted, clenching her fists. She hadn't realized that no matter how tangled up emotions were, they could always explode. "Don't you dare tell me you're sorry! If you were sorry you wouldn't have done it!"

"All right!" Cat said, putting her hands over her ears like a child. "All right, I get it! I'm still sorry, Jade! I'm sorry you're hurt! I'm sorry he used me! I'm sorry I let him use me! I'm so, so sorry I love him!"

They both froze. The horse whinnied suddenly, its sides heaving. They ignored it. "Care to run that last one by me again?" Jade asked through her teeth.

Cat tried to make a run for it. Jade swooped like a hawk, digging her nails into Cat's arm. "How long?" she hissed. Cat didn't answer, and she shook her roughly. "How long?"

"Awhile, okay?" she shouted, and then just as abruptly the fight went out of her and she admitted, "ages."

"Since before we were going out?"

"Way before." Cat's eyes were closed now, her voice curiously emotionless, as if she'd found a way to mentally remove herself from the situation. "We've known each other since preschool, you know."

No, she didn't know. How could she not have known? "What exactly happened in there?" she asked, dreading the answer. Cat didn't respond until she let go of her arm.

"He was waiting for me." Her voice was utterly blank. "I was tired. He was on my bed and wouldn't get off." A hint of a plea entered her voice. "I should have seen it coming, Jade. I should have known what he was going to do the second he tried for my hands. But I was just so tired . . . I wasn't thinking straight . . . he offered to rub my back, and I didn't stop him . . . and it happened." She opened her eyes, staring desperately at Jade. "I wanted to stop, I really did, but . . ."

"You couldn't." Now it was Jade who sounded dead.

"Yes," Cat said, looking away. The horse trumpeted again, now bathed in sweat. They ignored it again.

She'd heard this before. She'd lived this before. This was her and Mason, knowing what was coming, knowing it was wrong, and yet powerless to stop.

And she hadn't wanted to.

"I trusted you," Jade said flatly, deflecting. She didn't want to think about Mason. She didn't want to remember that last conversation, just after her world had turned upside-down.

Incredibly, Cat was starting to get mad. "I said I was sorry!"

"So that automatically means it didn't happen, does it?"

"I can only do so much," Cat snapped, "and that's more than you did to Beck after Mason!"

"Cat? Jade? What are you doing?"

Tori had appeared in the door, a little pale but otherwise fine. Cat looked over at her. Jade didn't move. "Tori! You're not supposed to be out of bed!"

"I don't think I'll drop dead any time soon, Cat," Tori said patiently. "I just wanted to make sure – Jade, what are you doing?"

"I'm going to kill her," Jade said steadily.

"Oh, like that's my fault?" Cat cried, taking an instinctive step back. "You weren't exactly secret about it, were you? How could you get so mad at him?"

The horse made an odd strangled sound, and Tori skirted around the couple to touch her nose. Her eyes widened. "Have either of you been paying attention to her?"

"NO!" both Jade and Cat shouted. Without another word, Tori rushed forward, unlatched the stall, and dived inside, murmuring steady encouragement to the horse. Jade's attention never wavered.

"He cheated with my best friend," she snarled.

"And you cheated with someone who meant nothing to you," she shot back. "Unless . . ." Her eyes widened. "Do you love him, Jade? Or were you just using him to make Beck jealous? Have you even talked to him since?"

"Of course I have!" Jade exploded, throwing her arms up. "You think he wasn't the first person I ran to after I found Beck with you? You think I didn't feel so guilty for dragging him into this? You think I meant for this to happen?"

"What'd he say?" Cat's voice had dropped, and now only held curiosity, and a hint of understanding that Jade desperately wished wasn't there. Better to be screamed at than to be pitied.

"He said . . . He told me . . ." She didn't want to tell her. She didn't want to even think about it. But she started this mess. She owed it to Cat. "Choose," she said quietly. "He told me to choose."

There was a moment of silence, broken only by grunts from the horse's stall. "What'd you say to him?" Cat asked softly.

Jade shrugged ruefully. "Nothing. I didn't know what to say – I still don't." She couldn't get the look in his eyes out of her mind. He wanted her to choose him. It was plain as the dye in Cat's hair.

She didn't know what to do.

"He's right, you know." Cat was uncharacteristically intense, her eyes making it impossible for Jade to look away. "You can't have both. You're going to have to choose one of them."

Jade snorted feebly. "Gee, I wonder which one you want me to choose?"

"I'm not sure I want Beck after what he did to me," she said matter-of-factly. "And I've given up a lot over the years to make sure you guys are all happy, I can give a little more if I have to. But you can't just leave them both hanging. We've only got a week left. What are you going to do?"

"I'll tell you what she's going to do," Tori called irritably from the mare's stall before Jade could respond. "She's going to help me help this mare give birth while you, Cat, do something useful and go get André!"

Scary how fast Cat's mood could swing around. "Ooh, a baby, I love babies!" She whipped around and raced out the door, already calling for André even though he was probably all the way up at the Big House.

Jade stepped hesitantly into the stall. The mare was on its side, legs sprawled out, chest heaving and bathed in sweat. Tori was kneeling beside her, palm flat against her swollen side and her ear to her belly. "Hey," Jade said, feeling an awkwardness that was becoming way too familiar settling around her, "thanks."

Tori didn't even look at her. "No problem, but she is right, you know."

"I know," Jade said wearily.

"All right. Just as long as we're agreed on that." She sucked in her breath. "Holy crap, it's moving!"

And then André was there and Jade was in the corner, watching the mare totally relax in his capable hands as Tori did whatever she could to help. She watched Lori run over, slow, and then settle in to watch the two in a mixture of disbelief and pride. She watched Cat in the opposite corner, totally enraptured by this process of new life, stroking the mare's velvety nose and coo encouragements after particularly bad contractions. She watched, after four hours of urgent murmurs and hurried instructions, that final push, the gasp of breath, and the string-thin whinny of new life.

Cat cried. André kissed Tori.

Jade wondered if the only way to make something so freaking beautiful was to go through something so freaking painful.

...

IDEA SUGGESTIONS NEEDED. This might be a spoiler, but I need original, inventive but not far-fetched ways of starting a barn fire! All ideas will be considered short of an alien invasion! Many thanks!

~AmbyrRose