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Everyone laughed.
“She planned a trip to Fairhope to surprise me for my birthday, bring me back to my hometown, see my parents, and I had to explain to her why we couldn’t go,” Rob whined.
“You hid the fact you had a son from her?” I asked.
It was the first time I’d spoken since we hit the road, so everyone turned toward me to ensure they heard right.
Silence descended on the car before Rob answered.
“I’m not exactly proud of that, man.”
“Sort of sounds like you only came back home because every other plan fell through,” I said roughly.
Rob’s face sobered, and he put aside his empty beer can. “I came home because it was time to man up. I made a mistake. I’m paying for it now.”
“Water under the bridge.” Wyatt waved a hand, trying to calm things down. “You’re back, it’s all good.”
“Look, I know I really fucked it up with her. Nessy, I mean.”
Julianna and Dani, too, Sir Fucks-a-Lot.
“You gonna try to win her back?” Kyle licked the rollie paper of his joint from side to side.
Tim was napping in the backseat at this point between Kyle and Rob, totally checked out. That’s what happened when you had to pay child support to two different women and held onto three jobs.
“Hell yeah.” Rob chuckled. “Nessy still has a killer body, a sassy mouth on her, and she is the mother of my son. Bonus points—she pays her way through life, which can’t hurt in my financial situation. Figure if she hasn’t come for my throat financially yet, she’s not going to.” He cackled, shaking his head. “Though I mean it about helping her out. I’m going to start paying for Bear’s stuff. In the meantime, I’m going to play the tortured saint for a few months and hopefully crawl back into her bed for a bit, at least. Think she’ll have me?”
“Sure,” Wyatt said.
“Maybe.” Kyle cocked his head.
Snorting out, I said, “She’s not stupid or desperate, you know.”
“What’d you say?” Rob’s hand found my shoulder.
I shook him off.
“Nothing.”
We got into a swanky sports bar twenty minutes later.
There was a black vinyl booth reserved for us. Country music blasted through the speakers, football games were playing on huge flat screen TVs on the walls, and there were people grinding and dancing a few yards from the bar, which connected to some sort of a dance club.
I had the acute sense of being the only responsible grown-up in this bar, with the average IQ in the place equating to that of a half-eaten sub. Wyatt was my brother, so loving him was part of a package deal, but I never understood his decisions.
Especially the one to invite one of my ex-best friends to his bachelor party.
The waitresses—who wore even less than Tennessee’s diner uniform—served food in black thongs, a matching bra, and a white silk tie. We started with a round of drinks and some tequila slammers, ordered food, and then more tequila slammers.
Everyone downed their alcohol like it was a competitive sport while I watched and prayed no one puked in the Mercedes on the long drive back home. The car wasn’t mine, but the headache of getting it cleaned afterwards would be.
Seven shots and four beers later, my brother and his friends were treading close to disaster territory with a side of alcohol poisoning. They were about half a step away from getting matching, horrible tattoos they’d definitely regret later.
Wyatt, Kyle, and Tim—the latter seemed visibly more awake after drinking his own weight in shots—dragged their nearly-middle-aged asses to the dance floor, grinding their crotches against college girls to the sound of Sam Hunt and Blake Shelton.
Rob stayed behind. Didn’t take a genius to know it was because he had a bone to pick with me. I studied my glass of water like it was the most interesting thing in the universe, wondering if I could make him drown by pushing his head into it.
“So,” Rob said.
