“Nope. The only new thing I did was change the privacy setting. The rest? Well, I have no idea. It happened—and I guess still is happening—so fast.”

“Why change it to public, then?” That was one thing Brady had been curious about since he’d started spending time with her. She seemed to err more on the shy side than the outspoken. If the blog was all her secrets and stories and things that made her go atomic cherry red, why publish it to a potentially massive crowd of strangers in the first place?

Sloane sighed, a movement that went through her entire body. Brady had to look away so he’d actually hear her versus staring slack-jawed.

“Do you want the truth? Because it’s kind of pathetic.”

“I’ve handled all your other truths pretty well so far.”

She removed the shirt over her face and rolled onto her side, facing him. Her eyes skirted across him to Marcus and Felicity, who were back in the water.

“I heard through the gossip grapevine about those two getting engaged, and, well, after that, the blog didn’t really feel real anymore.” She lowered her voice. It was unnecessary but effective. Brady rolled onto his side to face her and propped his head up with his hand to listen.

“There I had been, for years, writing about Marcus and how I felt, and then bam, he’s engaged. Just like that, all those words became, well, just words. No action was ever taken. No one else ever knew. So, what had I been doing all those years other than just wasting time?” She gave a half-hearted shrug. “It was just a lot to question and realize all at once. Add in the alcohol, and I guess I decided to finally do something. It was only during the hangover portion of the next morning that I realized I might have made a slight mistake.”

Despite the fact that Brady wouldn’t keep a blog and definitely wouldn’t publish it if so, he had to admit to himself that he understood Sloane’s need to let it out. Sometimes what you didn’t say ended up being more of a kick to the gut than the things you did.

Take his relationship with Felicity. They’d been happy, but then, day by day, that had changed. He’d catch himself saying something and stop, not wanting to fight. There were more frustrated “never mind”s than there should have been, just like there were more times than not that Brady escaped to Cassidy’s Place to avoid telling her exactly what was on his mind.

Brady hadn’t seen the breakup coming…but he damn well should have.

Still, what could he have really said to save them?

Their fights and resentments revolved around the one thing they never could agree on.

His love for the bar.