After they returned to the house, Steve had left Kayla in the foyer and headed up the stairs to their room. Kayla had told him again that she would be up soon and they would talk about everything. Everything. As he walked down the hall to the bedroom, he couldn't help but wonder what that meant. As determined as he had been to get the full story out of Kayla earlier, he was now filled with uncertainty.

He entered the room and sat down on the bed. The news that Kayla had sold the house had been a shock. Although they had not talked about it, he had pictured returning to Salem and to their home many times. It had never occurred to him that Kayla would have sold it. That had been the plan before his accident, when they had planned their trip around the world, but he had just assumed that Kayla would have stayed in their house after he was gone.

He couldn't blame her for selling it though. Whatever secrets were being kept, there had been nothing but truth in her eyes when she told him how she couldn't go back to their house without him. What was it she had said? "It wasn't my life anymore." What did your life become, Sweetness? As much as he believed she loved him, he couldn't help feeling those old insecurities creeping up. What if the life she had built without him was the life she really wanted? What if she was here with him because she felt sorry for him or simply out of loyalty?

Stop being an idiot, Johnson, Steve told himself. He had seen the love in Kayla's eyes the moment she saw him on the stairs and he had seen it and felt it numerous times over the last week or so that they had been at Donovan Manor. She loves you. Yes, she loved him. But was there somebody else in her heart? That was the question he couldn't shake and the question that caused him to start pacing around the room.

He thought back to his conversation with Shane. He knew he should be grateful to Shane for making sure that Kayla and Stephanie were safe, but he hated that his family had been forced to rely on somebody else when protecting them was his job, his responsibility. Logically, Steve knew his resentment of Shane was unwarranted. The man had protected his family and then saved Steve's life and given him his life back. But Steve couldn't help how he felt. He owed everything to Shane, and he hated owing anything to anybody. The fact that Shane seemed to know more about Kayla's life than Steve did certainly didn't help matters.

Steve looked at the clock on the bedside table and realized it had been at least 15 minutes since he had left Kayla downstairs. The gnawing feeling in the pit of his stomach increased. Had Kayla found another reason not to come talk to him? He knew he couldn't take the delay much longer. Did it really matter where they talked as long as they finally did? He knew he couldn't wait around any longer without going insane, so he headed for the door.

Steve had just reached the top of the stairway when he heard their voices. It was Shane and Kayla. He could see Shane standing just inside the foyer. He could not see Kayla, but he heard her voice.

"That's not what I mean and you know it," Steve heard her say, as she stepped into view, standing very close to Shane. "I know you loved me, Shane, and I loved you, but this. . . ." Steve's breath caught as Kayla held up a ring, the ring she had been wearing that first day.

"It's a symbol of something that can't happen. When you gave it to me, you said your father gave it to your mother on the day he decided he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. He wanted a future with her. That's what this ring represents - the future - and we don't have one."

Steve felt the bile rise in his throat. He felt paralyzed as he watched the scene play out before him.

"It's still yours," he heard Shane say. "I gave it you because I loved you. That's how I felt - and how I felt can't be taken back." Steve watched as Shane looked down at the ring Kayla held in her hand. "Neither can that."

Steve willed himself to breathe. His mind flashed to all those moments that had felt wrong. The way Shane had avoided calling Kayla. The picture of Stephanie he carried. Kayla holding Shane's hand when she had first arrived. The ring. That damned ring. The tension he had felt when he had walked in on them in the stables. Kayla's evasiveness. Kim's evasiveness. Shane's angry comment about Kayla not being honest with him. Kayla living at Shane's house.

How could I have been so stupid? It all made sense now. He had been right; Kayla had been involved with somebody. But not just some stranger back in Salem. No, it was Shane. His friend. Kimberly's ex-husband. The dashing spy with all the money. Shane and Kayla had played Steve for a fool this whole time and he had let them.

That ends now. Steve started down the stairs towards his wife and his friend. "Well, well, well," he said in a voice dripping with sarcasm and anger. "What do we have here? And I thought that ring was just a piece of junk. Wasn't that what you said, Sweetness? You should have told me it was from loverboy over here."