It’s stupid, really. The thought. All these thoughts. All this wasted fucking effort.

It’s not like there aren’t dozens more from where this bottle came from. Taking it away is a pointless endeavor if there ever was one. Pitiful even.

The only thing this guarantees is his wrath...

And despite knowing this—dreading it, even—I don’t put it back.

I don’t move a muscle.

I just wait.

Alice In Chains’ “We Die Young” starts blaring from the speakers, heavy and angry as it wrecks the silence, shaking the rows of bottles stacked along the wall. The noise is grating on the ears, abrupt as it is, and I can’t help but tense.

Waylon pushes off the jukebox and spins toward me, his gaze going right to where he left the whiskey as if pulled by a magnet. When he realizes it’s no longer there, he falters. Blinks hard, then stares blankly, as if he doesn’t understand.

“I’m not leaving you like this,” I tell him, voice surprisingly steady. Like my insides aren’t quaking, bracing for collapse. The bottle pressed to my heart might as well be a bomb, seconds from detonating in my fucking face. Obliterating everything, least of all stupid ol’ me.

Slowly, so slowly, he drags his eyes up to my chest. They linger there, brows knitting together slowly.

I have no idea what he’s thinking. What he’s planning. If it weren’t for the noticeable tick in his jaw, I’d almost believe he’s not bothered by this at all.

My nose flares with my deep inhale. Whiskey wafting up from the open bottle, sickly-sweet, burning my nostrils.

It reminds me of the night of the storm. The night that changed everything.

Standing not far off from where we had lain wrapped in each other’s arms, naked and aching, it’s impossible not to recall the taste of him on my tongue—all smoke and honey and Way, Way, Way.

Impossible not to remember how we broke skin with our teeth and made love with his hate. Breathing wordless pleas with every grasp, stroke, and scratch. Sharing tears like secrets lost in the wind.

A night, perhaps, we were never meant to remember.

Maybe we would have been better off if we hadn’t.

But then...

If the night at Bootleggers didn’t happen, where would we be now?

Had Waylon blacked out the night of the storm—had we both—would it have even made a difference, or would we have just been delaying the inevitable?

“We were always going to end up here, weren’t we?”

Waylon cocks his head, dark earthy orbs glittering with some barely restrained emotion. Anger, and something else. Something terrifying.