“No can do,” he chuckled.
I hated when people laughed at me when I was serious– it felt degrading. “Um, yes, you can do that. Give them to me,” I said indignantly.
He rolled back on the balls of his feet and his face cracked in disapproval. “Jeez. Stop being such an uptight bitch.”
That felt like a slap in the face. I looked at him cruelly. I knew it was just the alcohol, but what the fuck. Like today wasn’t enough, now I had to deal with this?
He started laughing at something one of the hockey guys said then, and that brought my rage to the surface.
I walked closer to him and gave him a cold stare while I roughly snatched his keys from his pocket.
I turned on my heel and quickly took my phone out of my pocket to dial up Duke. He answered on the first ring.
“Griff is here at O’Malleys on fifth being a real drunk jackass. I have his keys… but can you come get him? If I stay here, I’ll say something I’ll regret.”
36. Griff
Fuckinghell.
Hazes of last night started coming back to me as I stared up at the hotel ceiling.
Did I really call Savannah a bitch on the day of her husband’s funeral?
Did Duke really have to come find me in the bathroom of O’Malley’s where I was puking up my guts.
Oh God…
“No,” I groaned. I turned onto my stomach and held my pounding head.
How did I make such a mess of things?
Nick died.
Things already were a mess, I reminded myself.
The thought of him being gone was the first thing that popped into my head each morning since it happened… and it made me want to drink again…
I needed to fucking stop though.
Didn’t last night prove that? I didn’t give a shit about who I hurt when I was like that, and I hated that numb version ofme.
Just like my father.
No. Fuck.
I felt like I was standing at the edge of a cliff.
My minor league team released me for a week to come up here to Detroit for the funeral… but did I even want to go back to California? Hockey suddenly felt a whole hell of a lot less important.
I didn’t want to do anything except lay here.
But fuck. How could I even be thinking about myself? The image of Savannah’s small body racking with tears while throwing up against the tree played like aloop in mymind.
And I called her a bitch.
Fuck.
I needed to find her today and apologize for last night.
