Page 71 of Wreck Me
He’d never survive.
Twenty
Better as a Memory
Megan letherself into the house shortly after six o’clock. When she hadn’t heard from Aidan all day and with no shift to work, she ended up calling Charley, who rounded up the girls and they had dinner and drinks.
The small cabin was dark, save for one small lamp on the side table in the living space, which was empty. A scraping noise from beyond the double doors leading to the deck caught her attention.
She found Aidan kicked back in one of the wrought iron chairs. She bit her lip when she saw a highball glass in his hand that was propped on the arm rest. A half-empty bottle of Jack sat on the side table.
Her heart rate sped up. It seemed odd for him to be sitting in the dark drinking whiskey neat.
She crossed her arms and sighed. He’d never called her during the day. Knowing he was working, she hadn’t tried to call him either. And she had to hold on to her resolve that she wasn’t going to lay down everything for a man again.
She crossed the deck and leaned against the rail in front of him. His long legs were propped up on the deck rail, his eyes unreadable in the dark. “Hey.”
He took a swallow of his drink before responding. “Hey.” His voice was rough as though he’d swallowed a bag of sand.
“Bad day?”
“Yep.”
“Want to talk about it?”
“Nope.”
She looked away, past the tree line and down to the dock where they’d first gotten to know each other. “Aidan, I can’t help you if you won’t tell me what’s going on.”
“Maybe I don’t want your help. Ever think of that?”
“I’m sorry if you had a bad day, but you don’t need to be an asshole.”
He rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger. “I know. I’m sorry.”
Megan lowered herself to the unoccupied chair and waited him out. A blind man could see that he was in massive pain and doing his best to forget it, even if just for the night.
But they both knew that never went well.
Finally, he dropped his hand and looked at her with a bleary stare. “The accident this morning. The one I left for?” He blew out a breath. “It was Rob Davidson.”
She gasped, her heart dropping to her knees. “The man I met last night at the festival? Abby’s dad?”
He nodded and tossed back what was left in his glass, hissing through his teeth. “Yep. Don’t have all the details yet, but what we do know is that it appears he lost control, left the road. Wrapped his truck around a tree. The only saving grace is that he was killed on impact. He didn’t suffer.”
“Oh my God, Aidan.”
“Yeah.” The neck of the bottle hit the side of his glass as he poured another two fingers of whiskey.
Tears fell down Megan’s face as she thought about Abby. She was so little and too young to lose a parent. It was a pain no child should have to face, especially so young. There were all sorts of memories that would never be made now that her father was gone. The father daughter dances, the threats of cleaning his gun when the first boyfriend came around, the walking her down the aisle when she found the man she’d given her heart to.
And Margot…her heart broke again thinking about what it must be like to have the love of her life snatched away from her. A man by all accounts she’d known her whole life and planned to spend the rest of her life with.
But it was a life interrupted.
Megan reached out and put a hand on his arm. “Aidan…”
He shoved up from the chair, causing her to pull back, her eyes wide. His long legs ate up the space on the deck as he paced it.
