Her lashes fluttered, a rush of tears threatening to spoil her makeup. Indecision frayed her insides like a rope battered from a lifelong tug-of-war. She was sick of thinking, sick of feeling, sick of fucking hurting.
Gritting her teeth, she yanked the door wide. No more tears.
She stepped inside and the song on the jukebox ended, giving her entrance an excruciating opening to lure everyone’s eyes and halt any conversation for a beat. They were all McCulloughs, Clooneys, and Mosconis. Where was Finn?
Her stare scanned the stools along the bar and the faces surrounding the tables, but she didn’t see him. Not that it mattered. He’d be there with his wife and siblings. As much as Finn extended an invitation to join them, Erin knew she wouldn’t be welcomed.
He wasn’t sitting in a booth nor did she see him at the pool tables in the back. Another song kicked on and anyone staring her way lost interest. Several watched her and cupped their hands around their mouths to whisper something to a friend.
Her stomach roiled. Her inner demons hissed that they were all talking about her, not a single person having something nice to say.
She should go. The instinct to flee weighed heavily in her gut. But where else could she go? She wanted a drink and a moment to think. Refusing to be a coward, she forced one foot in front of the other and crossed to the bar on shaky legs.
Sue and Ryan were bartending. Both saw her, but neither rushed over to fill her order. Erin reached in her purse for some cash and saw her dad’s prescription and cursed.
Well, she supposed he would have to fall asleep on his own tonight. What did she care if he slept or not? She wasn’t there for him to hassle.
Let him be a tyrant all alone. It was like a tree falling in the woods—the sound was meaningless.
She pulled out a twenty and set it on the bar.
Sue rolled her eyes and tossed a towel over her shoulder, breezing past Ryan. “I’m taking five. You can deal with that.”
Ryan’s lips formed a thin line as he approached. “Erin.”
“Hi, Ryan.” She smiled, trying to be nice, but his expression remained blank. “I’ll take a vodka and iced tea, and make it a double.”
He got to mixing her drink but didn’t bother with small talk like he did with the other customers.
When he set the cocktail in front of her, she asked, “Have you seen your cousin, Finn?”
He raised a brow and watched her suspiciously. “What do you want with Finn?”
“He…invited me.”
He gave a disbelieving laugh. “Sure, he did.”
Her jaw hardened. “Have you seen him or not?”
“He’s probably home—with his wife.”
She was perfectly aware that Finn was happily married to his beautiful wife. She remembered Mallory well. Everyone assumed Erin hated the woman, but she didn’t. She was happy for Finn, happy that he finally found someone who could love him the way he deserved.
That person had never been Erin. The kindest thing she had done for Finn was show him how screwed up she truly was and let him get away. She’d hurt him, but it was for his own good. He would have spent years trying to make her happy, but there was just too much pain, too many bad memories he couldn’t understand.
Ryan took the twenty and slid her the change. The alcohol hit her system like a welcomed tranquilizer and as she resigned herself to being alone. Figuring Finn got held up with his kids not feeling well and the fact that a blizzard was coming, she downed the liquid courage in less than a minute and ordered another.
Ryan rolled his eyes but said nothing.
The tables were full. She didn’t want to sit at the bar facing Ryan and Sue, so when her second drink arrived, she took it to the back wall and hid in the shadows.
The wavy tilt of the room warned her to slow down, but she anxiously welcomed the thought of drunk oblivion. She scanned the bodies filling the bar, spotting several old classmates, a few randoms she’d used for a fling, the cliquey girls who excluded her because she grew up wearing her brother’s hand-me-downs, and the new wives and husbands she’d never met. Those new folks somehow hated her all the same, thanks to the warnings from the locals.
None of them paid her any mind. She was invisible to all of them, a truth that both pained and infuriated her. Anger was always easier than sadness so she glared at them from the shadows, despising them so their dislike of her wouldn’t hurt as much. She lifted her glass and toasted them, mentally assigning every hateful label she could imagine on them as a whole.
Perrin appeared on the stage and welcomed everyone. The music cut off and the crowd clapped. The McCulloughs were so loud. They hooted and howled and banged pint glasses and beer bottles on the tabletops as soon as Giovanni was introduced.