The bar is starting to fill in like it used to on Friday nights, but she doesn’t see me. I don’t want her to see me. Shit, I don’t even want to look myself in the mirror right now.

Alec and I make our way out the front doors, the sliding glass opening to let the cool October air swirl around us. There are signs up now that weren’t here a year ago saying we can’t smoke within fifty feet of the property, so we go around the side where no one can see us before I light up.

“Can I get one of those? Jess won’t let me smoke in the house anymore. She doesn’t like me smoking at all,” Alec says.

“How’s the baby?” I pinch the end of a cigarette by the filter and hand it over to Alec, flicking my thumb against the ignitor on my lighter and cupping a hand around the end of his cigarette to shield it from the wind.

“She’s absolutely wonderful.” A grin travels across Alec’s face and lights up his eyes. “She’s starting to talk now. It’s amazing. She calls for me in the middle of the night when she needs something.”

A heavy silence descends on us, and I can see what he’s thinking.

“Look,” he says, sucking on the end of his cigarette and exhaling into the air above us. I cross my arms in front of my chest and lean back on the brick wall behind me, knowing what he’s about to say.

“Don’t. You’ve been there for me more than enough times for things to already be right between us.” I suck in a mega-dose of nicotine into my lungs, feeling the warmth of the smoke radiate through my chest before opening my eyes as it hits my brain. My mother would be so fucking disappointed in me for willingly ingesting this shit.

“Man, that’s what I want. For things to just be right.”

I tried to make things right. I tried to tip the scales so everything would be even. And maybe it is now. Daisy’s at the bar right now, and she doesn’t need me anymore. Maybe that means everything’s right in the world.

I glance behind me, through the big window on the side of the building. Daisy isn’t smiling anymore. This poseur has his arm swung over the shoulder of my girl, and he isn’t saying much of anything. He isn’t crossing any lines, either. And even though I know Daisy can deal with this herself, she doesn’t look so happy anymore.

I watch the two of them closely as this asshole’s eyes trail down my Daisy’s face to her collarbone and then her neck. She’s all covered up, but her curves are even more accentuated in that black dress than they would be if she was all bare-skinned. His fingers land on the back of her neck, and I see her throat contacts as she swallows, a nervous glint in her eyes, moving back and forth from the bartender to the stranger touching her.

A sick possessiveness rolls through my chest and I stamp out my cigarette. It’s irrational, but I want to make sure she’s okay. I hear Alec behind me, telling me to stop. But I don’t stop. I’m not going to do anything rash, though. Just make sure she’s okay. Because I can’t stop myself.

I enter the building and stride over to him like I’m running into a burning building, about to put out a blazing fire.

“This guy bothering you?” I spit out as I come up behind him.

Her blue eyes flash beneath the dim lights, brightening up her face. A wave of emotion crashes through her eyes, passing from shock as they widen to excitement as she bites down softly on her bottom lip.

“We’re fine over here, bro,” the guy says, stepping between me and Daisy.

Anger flashes in my chest as I look around the bar, trying to pinpoint who he’s here with. I spot a few young guys who look exactly like him in the corner, laughing and pointing at us, and I know he’s with them.

“Don’t you have somewhere else you need to be right now, bro?” I push my finger into the guy’s chest. “Like laughing over there with that group of assholes in the corner?”

The guy’s jaw clenches up, and he takes his hand off Daisy’s neck. She lets out of relieved sigh and turns her body toward the bar, but looks up at me and mouths thank you.

“Just go,” I say.

My voice surprises even me as he puffs up his chest, looks me straight in the eye, and then walks away from me and Daisy.

Daisy’s head hangs down over the bar as she breathes heavily, and she puts a hand on the back of her neck, as if she’s trying to rub away the skin where this guy put his hand on her.

“It’s okay. He’s gone.”

I put my hand over hers, and for an instant her stiff fingers relax under mine, unfurling the tension that guy put into her. But just as fast, she pulls her hand away.

“Thanks.” She stiffens up, her breathing coming in more even now, and she looks up at me with eyes that could take away anyone’s pain in an instant. “But I could have handled that on my own.”

Her words wrap around my heart and sting it. I want to think that she could have handled it on her own, but sometimes guys can be pretty fucking awful.

I know first-hand.

“I’m not saying you couldn’t have.” I toss a glance over to where that guy’s retreated to his group, but they aren’t there anymore, and I’m relieved. I don’t want to know what I’d do if that guy tried to intimidate Daisy again, give her attention she didn’t want. “But from the looks of it, I thought you could use some help.”

She looks up at me again, a cool expression taking over her perfect, heart-shaped face. “Help? That’s what you were trying to do?”

Daisy pulls her purse toward herself on the bar with one hand and pushes her beer away with the other. She slips her hands carefully inside the purse, and I hear a faint zip mixing with the pop or dance or whatever the hell it is music now coming from the speakers tucked into each corner on the ceiling of the small bar.

My heart leaps into my chest when I see what she pulls out.

It’s the ring I gave her a year ago.

But it looks dull. Like it hasn’t had a chance to sparkle at all.

She told me she would start wearing it when she had the chance to sit down with her parents and tell them our plans.

I never did ask her father for permission, because I knew I wouldn’t have his blessing.

She looks down at it, the stone and band sitting perfectly inside her cupped palm. I wait for her to say something. To give me a signal.

Daisy reaches down and takes my hand in hers, letting me lace my fingers through hers. The air between us holds electricity and fire, and then she goes cold.

Looking up, her forehead pinching with an emotion I can’t read, her eyes go down again to our hands locked between us, but there’s no feeling in hers.

She drops the ring inside my hand and closes my fingers around it.

“I needed your help a year ago,” she says quietly.

The stone digs into my hand as my fingers crush around it, wishing this wasn’t really happening.

She turns away from me slowly, and walks away.