17. Declan
Declan
The front door opens, and my whole body turns toward it before my brain can stop it.
Not Shay.
Just a couple of grad students, laughing too loud. Relief hits first—a nasty, cowardly little pang. Then disappointment slams in right behind it, heavy and thick.
“Table or bar?” Tessa asks from the beer taps.
“Bar,” one of them says, shaking rain from his hood. They take stools at the far end, and Tessa gives me a look while she grabs menus. A look that says, We’re talking later.
I pretend I don’t see it. It’s a skill, owning a bar. Knowing who wants to talk and who needs their drink set down without a word. Who needs a double instead of their usual.
Apparently, I’m also great at pretending I’m not waiting for one specific omega to walk through that door.
The bar’s quiet for a weeknight. The air smells like fried onions, lemon cleaner, old wood. It smells like Byrne’s. It smells like mine.
But it’s wrong without him. It’s missing sandalwood and dark chocolate.
I pick up a glass and start polishing. It’s already clean. The green bar towel is folded under the counter where no one can see it. I brought it down from the apartment earlier. Leaving it in the nest felt wrong. I told myself I’d use it for work.
I haven’t touched it.
The door opens again.
My head snaps up.
A couple of townies. Not Shay.
That stupid lurch in my gut. He doesn’t owe me a visit. He doesn’t owe me a damn thing. I grip the glass tighter.
Tessa glances over. “You’re gonna rub a hole through that.”
“It’s a slow night.”
“Mm-hm.”
She plants her palms on the bar. “Did you eat today?”
“Yeah.”
“Liar.”
“I had eggs,” I say.
“This morning?”
I keep polishing. She stares at me for another second, then pushes off with a muttered, “You’re impossible,” and goes to drop off drinks.
She’s been here three years. She knows when to leave me alone.
She also knows I’m one bad decision away from being sat down with a basket of fries like a problem child.
The front door opens.
My body betrays me again.
Not Shay.
A guy in a suit walks in, looks around like he regrets every choice that led him here, and heads for the bathroom. I almost laugh.
“Rough one?” a voice says from the end of the bar.
I look over. Ruth Rowe is on the stool nearest the register, her red lipstick perfect. Her jacket is buttoned up despite the warmth in here, her purse hooked over one wrist like it might contain a weapon.
“Evening, Ruth.”
“Is it?”
That gets a real smile out of me, small and tired. “Not particularly.”
“Thought so.” She doesn’t order. That’s how I know something’s up. Ruth orders rye whiskey, one cube of ice. Tonight, she just watches me. “You look like shit, Declan.”
Tessa makes a choking sound near the taps.
“Good to see you, too.”
“I mean it affectionately.”
“Somehow, that doesn’t help.”
“It shouldn’t.” She slides onto the stool properly, folding her hands on the bar. “Pour me my whiskey. Not the cheap stuff.”
“I’d never.”
“You did once. In 2019.”
“You remember that?”
“I remember everything that inconveniences me.”
I set her drink down, one clean cube of ice clicking against the glass. She takes a sip, her eyes still on me over the rim. The silence stretches. Ruth is good at silence. She doesn’t fill space to make anyone comfortable.
I break first. “Benji send you?”
“No.”
“Jude?”
“No.”
“Milo?”
“He texted me a picture of soup yesterday, if that’s what you’re asking.”
I blink. “Why?”
“Apparently that’s how young people communicate concern now. A photograph of lentils.”
That sounds exactly like Milo. My chest gives a stupid little pull. At least Shay’s not alone.
Ruth puts her glass down. “Nobody sent me.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Because I’ve been drinking in this bar since you had the bad sign and the worse stools. And I know what you look like when you’re trying to disappear in plain sight.”
I look down at the polished wood. Shay spent days insisting the lighting mattered. He’d stood right where Ruth is sitting, tapping through a presentation on his laptop, explaining sightlines and color palettes. He was right about all of it.
“You know,” Ruth says, “most men your age buy a motorcycle for their midlife crisis.”
“I’m thirty-five.”
“Exactly. You’re too young to be this grim.”
“I’ll put that on a T-shirt.”
“Put it on the damn menu. ‘Byrne’s: Good whiskey, decent burgers, and an emotionally constipated owner.’”
Tessa snorts. “I’d buy one.”
“Traitor,” I mutter.
“You’re bad at being pitiful, boss.”
“I’m not being pitiful.”
Ruth raises a brow. I glance toward the door before I can stop myself.
She sees it. Of course she does.
“There it is,” she says quietly. “The kid.”
I don’t answer.
“You’re waiting for him.”
“I’m not.”
“Declan.” The way she says my name isn’t loud. It doesn’t have to be.
My hands flatten on the bar top. “I don’t deserve for him to come back,” I say, the words low and raw.
Ruth’s expression doesn’t change. “That wasn’t what I asked.”
“But it’s true.”
“Probably.”
I let out a harsh, humorless laugh. “Thanks.”
“You want me to lie? I’m too old for that kind of emotional labor.”
The door opens again.
I look. A woman in a Ridgemont hoodie. Not Shay.
The bond keeps reaching, a low, restless ache under my skin.
Ruth watches the whole thing.
“I made a mess,” I say, forcing myself to look back at her.
“You did.”
“I hurt him.”
“Looks that way.”
“I tried to fix it and made it worse.”
“You seem to be good at that part.”
“Jesus, Ruth.”
“Oh, don’t ‘Jesus, Ruth’ me.” She picks up her whiskey.
“You run this place like it’s a ship going down in a storm, and you’re determined to be the only one holding the wheel.
You remember everyone’s birthday. You cover shifts.
You loan out money and pretend it’s an advance.
You feed half the campus when they’re broke. ”
“That’s called running a business.”
“That’s called caring. You just only know how to do it when there’s a cash register involved.” The words sit there between us. “You built a fine place here,” she says. “A real fortress.”
I glance around the bar. The booths. The long counter.
Every bit of it paid for twice over—once with money, and once with the years I spent telling myself I didn’t need anything outside these walls.
Byrne’s wasn’t a fortress. It was proof I could do it right.
Somewhere along the way, proof became all I had.
Ruth taps a finger against her glass. “But a fortress is just a prison if you’re the only one living in it.”
The bar noise fades. I see Shay upstairs, standing in my oversized Henley, his curls a mess. I see him at this bar with a binder tucked under his arm, pretending he was just rescuing my business.
I see his face when I offered him the key. The bank account.
You don’t have to worry about money, or work.
Like work was a burden I could lift. Like he hadn’t just saved the place I’d spent a decade protecting. Like I was giving him a life instead of asking him to build one with me.
I didn’t offer him a home. I offered him a cage.
My stomach turns over.
Ruth goes on, her voice gentler now, which is somehow worse.
“Taking care of someone is a lovely thing. My late husband used to warm my side of the bed with a hot water bottle because my feet get cold. That’s taking care.
But asking a capable young man to give up every piece of himself so you can feel safe?
That’s not taking care of him. That’s just taking. ”
“I wasn’t asking him to give anything up.”
“You told him he didn’t need to work.”
“I wanted him to know he was safe.”
“And what he heard,” she says, her gaze sharp and certain, “was that you didn’t trust him to be.”
I shut my eyes. There it is. Clean and brutal.
Tessa comes over with a basket of fries and sets them in front of me. “Eat.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You’re eating anyway.”
Ruth takes one. “Good staff.”
“Best staff,” I say, my voice thick.
“Then act like you know it.” She points a fry at my chest. “You don’t run this place alone, Declan. You never have. So why did you forget that when it came to the person you love?”
The word hits hard enough that I have to look away.
Love. I’ve said it. Buried inside him, where he couldn’t do anything but take it.
Again while he was packing a bag, like the words were a hand grabbing his sleeve.
I’ve never once said it slow, in daylight, where he could turn it over and decide for himself what to do with it.
Ruth’s expression softens. “You do love him, don’t you?”
I manage a single nod. “Yeah,” I say, my voice rough. “I do.”
Tessa’s eyes get shiny for a second before she turns away and starts aggressively wiping down bottles.
Ruth pats my hand. Her fingers are small and dry. “Then quit sitting here looking like a man waiting for a pardon. Figure out what you’re actually offering him.”
“I can’t just show up and expect him to take me back.”
“No, you can’t.”
“Then what do I do?”
She gives me a look that says she’s disappointed I even had to ask. “You listen to what he’s been telling you since he walked in here with that damned binder.”
The binder. The plan. The way his eyes lit up when he talked about the bar’s potential. He never wanted a handout. He wanted a seat at the table. His name next to mine because he earned it.
Because Byrne’s is better with him in it.
Because I’m better with him in it.
The thought lands whole and sharp, cutting through every excuse I’ve been hiding behind. “I know what to do,” I say.
Ruth leans back. “Good.” She slides off the stool. “Finish your fries.”
“You’re leaving?”
“I came here to have a drink and insult you. Mission accomplished.”
I catch her wrist. “Ruth.” She looks down at my hand, then at me. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Fix it first.”
“I’m going to try.”
“No.” Her voice goes firm. “Trying is what men say when they want credit before they’ve done the work.”
A real laugh breaks out of me, surprised and sharp. Ruth smiles.
“There he is.”
She heads for the door, stopping to say, “Tessa, make sure he eats.”
“Already on it.”
The door closes behind her. For a minute, I just stand there.
Tessa comes back over. “You okay?”
“No. But I know what I need to do.”
She watches me for a beat. “Is this the part where you storm over to Shay’s apartment and make a dramatic declaration in the rain?”
“It’s not raining.”
“Thank God. You’d catch a cold and somehow make it my problem.”
I pick up a fry. It’s cold. “I’m not going over there tonight.”
“Smart.”
“I need to get something right first. A contract.”
Tessa stares.
“A real one,” I keep going. “Partnership. Half ownership. Decision-making power. All of it, laid out, with his name on it.”
For once, she doesn’t have a smart comment.
Rhys sent me the number for the university legal clinic days ago.
It’s been sitting in my phone like a dare.
Tomorrow I use it—for the partnership papers, and for a counteroffer on the lease.
The landlord wants an answer by the end of the month.
He can have two. We’re not selling, and we’re not paying that number, either.
The bar door opens. My head jerks up. Not Shay.
The disappointment stings. But it doesn’t flatten me this time. Because I’m not just waiting anymore.
Tessa’s mouth curves into a slow smile. “You’re serious.”
“I’ve never been more serious.”
“He might say no.”
“Yeah.”
“And you’re doing it anyway.”
“I should have done it before he ever had to ask.”
She nods, a little hard. “Close up early.”
“We’ve got customers.”
“We’ve got six customers, and I can handle them.” She points toward the back stairs. “Go write the damn thing before you talk yourself out of it.”
“I need to close out.”
“I can close out.”
“It’s my bar.” The words catch in my throat.
No. Not if I mean what I’m about to put on paper.
I take a breath.
“It’s our bar,” I say quietly.
Tessa’s face changes. She looks away fast, pretending the register needs her full attention. “Go,” she says. “Before I get emotional at work and ruin my reputation.”
“You have a reputation?”
“Get upstairs, Byrne.”
I do.
The third stair creaks. I’ve been meaning to fix it.
Upstairs, the apartment is dark except for the light over the stove.
It still smells like him. Sandalwood, dark chocolate, rain.
The ache under my skin pulls toward it so hard I have to brace a hand on the kitchen counter.
His toothbrush is still in the cup by the sink.
His hoodie is still hooked over the kitchen chair. The nest is still on my bed.
I stand in the doorway for a second, looking at it. The blankets, my shirts. The green bar towel is missing.
I go back downstairs for it.
I don’t know why. It just belongs here. Because Shay put it there.
When I come back up, I set the towel on the bed, right where I found it. Then I pull my laptop from a drawer, sit at the kitchen table, and open a blank document.
The cursor blinks.
My hand shakes once, a hard tremor over the keyboard.
I don’t stop.