He grunted. “Thanks.”
“I’ll always be honest with you.” I shrugged. “Just fucking talk to her. I know Robyn’s strong, but she’s still human, Lachlan. She’s not invincible. And she’s pregnant for the first time. Do you not think she’s scared of what’s coming? Of being a mum? She needs you now more than ever, and you just need to fucking man up and communicate with her.” I ripped the whisky out of his hand because I was equal parts sympathetic and annoyed.
After I’d taken a drink, he yanked the bottle back. “You know, you’re bloody irritating when you’re right.”
“Aye.” I sighed heavily. “Doesn’t happen much, so I wouldn’t worry yourself over it being a regular occurrence.”
Silence fell between us as we passed the bottle back and forth, getting drunker by the second.
“Do you think because I’m a bag of shite right now that I haven’t noticed your dark mood these past few weeks? And tonight”—he waved the bottle at me—“well, you didn’t even get drunk at my wedding, and look at you now.”
I grunted.
“What’s wrong, Arran?”
Squeezing my eyes closed, memories assaulted me. Memories I wished were just a dream.
But they were real.
So damn real, it was a living nightmare.
Why was it so bad this year? Why was I so haunted?
Krabi Province, Thailand
Three years ago
There was nothing but midnight sky bleeding into black water, the moonlight rippling across its lazy waves. Ocean lapped at the shore in a rhythmic sound that lulled beachgoers to sleep on their loungers during the day.
It was cooler at night this time of year, and I welcomed the whisper of a breeze on my skin as I took another swig of my beer and stared out at the water. Sometimes I wondered if I shouldn’t just walk into it. Just walk in and let it take me.
Like it took him.
“So, this is what running a bar looks like?”
The familiar voice jolted me from my morbid thoughts. It was a voice I hadn’t expected to hear.
Turning toward it, I saw my brother in the moon’s glow, walking along the sand toward me. “Brodan?” I murmured, pushing to my feet, staggering as the world spun.
“Damn it.” Brodan hurried to help me, but I pushed him off. His eyes dropped to my beer and then to the cooler at my feet filled with many more. “How many of those have you had?”
I curled my lip at the judgment in his tone. “Apparently, not enough.” I’d been happy to hear my brother’s voice only seconds ago. Now I wished he’d fuck off. “What are you doing here?”
“It’s nice to see you too,” he said, and I tried to focus on his face. Whatever he saw on mine made him curse under his breath. “Okay, I came because you’ve not been answering anyone’s emails or texts, and I was worried. I paused a shoot to come find you.”
“Sorry if I wasted your precious time.” I stumbled back and fell onto my arse in the sand. But since it was where I wanted to be, I just shrugged and reached for another beer.
Brodan’s hand curled around my wrist.
Anger boiled in my blood. “Let me go, Bro, or I will fuck you up.”
“Considering you’re half cut, I like my chances.”
“You’re a prick.” I wrenched my hand away and tried to focus on the water.
I heard my brother sigh and then watched him out of my peripheral vision as he sat down beside me to stare out at the dark ocean. We hadn’t seen each other in six months. I didn’t suppose this was the welcome he’d expected.
“I always understood why you wanted to work at the bar here. The Highlands couldn’t compete with paradise.”
That felt like another dig, even though he probably didn’t mean it as one. The truth was, I hadn’t been running from the Highlands. I was running from who I’d been there. Overlooked by my father, not talented like Lachlan and Brodan or smart like Thane or passionate like Arro. I was the joke. In trouble constantly at school and even with the police. One day, I realized I didn’t want to be that person. I didn’t want that to be my label, and staying meant it always would be.
So I followed my wanderlust around the world, bartending wherever I could to pay for the next flight or the next train to my next adventure. I’d stayed in Thailand the longest.
Bartending for my friend Kasem.
We ran his bar together and befriended people from all over the world as they came to the province for a piece of paradise.
We weren’t alone, though. Colin had tended bar with us too. Until last summer.
And for the past year, paradise had become purgatory.
“You’re miserable here,” Brodan said, as if he could read my mind. “You’re wasting away, Arran. You’ve lost weight. Come home.”
I snorted. “Why should I listen to you? You’re never fucking home.”