He shrugs. “Too late.”

I frown, not quite sure I understand.

He picks at a groove in the wood with his thumbnail. “I didn’t want anyone to know, Will. Ivy was the only one for years.”

“I’m sorry,” I murmur.

“It is what it is.”

Neither of us say anything for a while after that. The lights flicker again as a crack of lightning echoes across the bar. Thunder is quick to follow. We must be right in the thick of it.

The song switches up, and I start to smile when Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down” starts playing.

Waylon whips his hand out, grabbing the phone, hitting ‘Skip’ before I can stop him.

I pout. “Hey, I love that song.”

He’s stiff as a board next to me. “Well, I hate it.”

“Far Behind” by Candlebox starts playing from the speakers instead, and it’s like the air is completely sucked out of the room as I watch Waylon chew on the inside of his cheek. His eyes are trained on the bar top, but it’s like he’s miles away.

“Way?”

“Yeah?”

“You’d probably be a lot happier if you listened to better music.”

He barks out a laugh and looks up at me, eyes glimmering. “That so?”

I nod sagely. “It’s true.”

He studies me with a soft smile on his face. “Maybe I like being sad.” His eyes drift to some point beyond me. “When you’re sad, nothing else really matters anymore.”

Somewhere deep under the heavy wool of alcohol’s influence, a warning bell rings out. But I’m far too gone, far too numb right now to pay it much notice.

I make a face. “And that’s a good thing?”

His eyes focus on mine once more. He shrugs. “When you have nothing to lose, you have nothing to fear.”

I blink.

“Can we go back to drinking and laughing and pretending like”—he waves a hand around—“nothing exists beyond these four walls?”

I study him. “There are more than four walls.”

He groans, slapping his face with his inked hands.

“Pretty sure there are seven if you include that little alcove over there, and that doesn’t include the bathrooms—”

He slaps a hand over my mouth. My eyes flare with surprise, my mouth still pursed mid-word, and he freezes.

He grumbles something under his breath as he tears his hand away, but not before it drags over my lower lip. His skin is hot and salty against my wet flesh. His throat bobs as he glares down at the bar top.

“So violent,” I whisper in awe.

He tries not to laugh. I don’t miss the way his knuckles turn white against his ripped jeans. The tendon bulging in his neck.