Remnants of her surrounded him here. Her parents, her annual memorial, people who’d come to their wedding. Taking the ring off had struck him as disrespectful, but now . . . now it was starting to feel even more wrong to keep it on.
Tonight was not the night to make big decisions, though.
He had a duty to be at the memorial and be mentally present, so he would be.
“I’ll be there,” Brendan said. “Of course I will.”
* * *
The first few years after Desiree passed, the memorial potlucks had been reenactments of her funeral. No one smiling, everyone speaking in hushed tones. Hard not to feel disrespectful being anything but grief-stricken when Mick and Della plastered pictures of their daughter everywhere, brought a cake with her name in bright blue frosting. But as the years went on, the mood had lightened somewhat. Not completely, but at least nobody was crying tonight.
The venue probably didn’t do much to cultivate an easy atmosphere. The basement of Blow the Man Down hadn’t seen renovations like the upstairs. It was a throwback to the days of wood paneling and low, frosted lighting, and it reminded Brendan of the hull of his ship, so much so that he could almost feel the swell and dip of the ocean beneath his feet.
A collapsible table and chairs had been set up against the far wall, laden with covered dishes and a candlelit shrine to Desiree, right there next to the pasta salad. High tops and stools filled out the rest of the space, along with a small bar used only for parties, which was where Brendan stood with his relief skipper, trying to avoid small talk.
Brendan felt Fox studying him from the corner of his eye and ignored him, instead signaling the bartender for another beer. It was no secret how Fox viewed the yearly event. “I know what you’re going to say.” Brendan sighed. “I don’t need to hear it again.”
“Too bad. You’re going to hear it.” Apparently Fox had taken enough orders over the last three days and was good and finished. “This isn’t fair to you. Dragging you back through this . . . loss every goddamn year. You deserve to move on.”
“Nobody is dragging anyone.”
“Sure.” Fox twisted his bottle of beer in a circle on the bar. “She wouldn’t want this for you. She wouldn’t want to be shackling you like this.”
“Drop it, Fox.” He massaged the bridge of his nose. “It’s just one night.”
“It’s not just one night.” He kept his voice low, his gaze averted, so no one would pick up on their argument. “See, I know you. I know how you think. It’s a yearly nudge to stay the course. Stay steady. To do what you think is honorable. When the hell is it enough?”
Goddammit, there was a part of him that agreed with Fox. As long as this memorial had remained on the calendar, Brendan kept thinking, I owe her one more year. I owe her one more. Until that refrain had turned into I owe it one more year. Or I owe Mick one more. For everything his father-in-law had done for Brendan. Making him captain of the Della Ray. Would that faith and trust go away if Brendan moved on?
Whatever the reason, at some point the grieving had stopped being about his actual marriage, but he had no idea when. Life was a series of days on land, followed by days at sea, then repeat. There wasn’t time to think about himself or how he “felt.” And he wasn’t some selfish, fickle bastard.
“Look,” Fox tried again, after a long pull of his beer. “You know I love Mick, but as far as he’s concerned, you’re still married to his daughter and that’s a lot of pressure on y—”
“Hey, everyone!”
Brendan’s drink paused halfway to his mouth. That was Piper’s voice.
Piper was here?
He gripped his pint carefully and looked over his shoulder at the door. There she was. In sequins, obviously. Loud pink ones. And he couldn’t deny that the first emotion to hit him was pleasure. To see her. Then relief that she hadn’t gone back to LA already. Eagerness to talk to her, be near her.
Right on the heels of that reaction, though, the blood drained from his face.
No. This wasn’t right. She shouldn’t be there.
On one arm, she had that ridiculous lipstick-shaped purse. And cradled in her other arm was a tray of shots she’d obviously brought from the bar upstairs. She clicked through a sea of dumbfounded and spellbound guests, offering them what looked like tequila.
“Why the long faces?” She flipped her hair and laughed, taking a shot of her own. Jesus. This was all happening in slow motion. “Turn the music up! Let’s get this party started, right?”
“Oh fuck,” Fox muttered.
Brendan saw the exact moment Piper realized she’d just crashed a memorial for a dead woman. Her runway strut slowed, those huge blue eyes widening at the makeshift shrine next to the pasta salad, the giant poster-board picture of Desiree’s senior photo, her name in script at the bottom. Desiree Taggart. Her mouth opened on a choked sound, and she fumbled the tray of shots, recovering just in time to keep them from crashing onto the floor. “Oh,” she breathed. “I—I didn’t . . . I didn’t know.”