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Aidan chuckled. “Yeah, I have that effect on people, or so I’ve been told.”

Sean groaned. “What are you doing here?”

“If you mean what am I doing out, I’m trying to get laid because I need it. If you mean why am I in here, it’s because I like bars since they have cheaper drinks than clubs.”

Sean looked around at the other patrons. “You’re going to get laid in here?”

“No, I’m going to pre-game and get my starter drinks cheaper in here. Then I planned to go to one of those expensive clubs, so I don’t have to pay an arm and a leg to get drunk.”

Sean grunted. “Smart.”

“I have my moments.”

Sean looked up. “Then why are you talking to me? Trying to get laid still?”

Aidan’s eyes glittered in amusement. “So, you do have a sense of humor.”

“Aidan,” Sean growled.

Aidan sighed. “Maybe I saw you sitting here, by yourself, drinking, and I thought, wow, that’s not a good sign. And maybe I thought I would see how you were doing in case you needed help or something.”

“This is your idea of helping someone?” Sean demanded.

Aidan squinted. “What?”

Sean rolled his eyes. “You are the most ridiculously frustrating person I have ever had to deal with. This is not how you help someone. This is how you continue to frustrate them like you’ve been doing for two weeks now.”

Aidan sighed. “No, this is how I try to lighten the mood. A mood you keep trying to bring down every time you talk to me.”

Sean closed his eyes, and a pang of guilt, followed swiftly by pain, shot through him. It reminded him too much of Ricardo’s outburst. Sean knew he’d been difficult to deal with for everyone during the past few months. He’d done his best to keep the growing anger locked inside, and sometimes, he was a little toocranky and irritable for anyone to handle. And maybe that did make him unpleasant to be around, but damn it, his team was still by his side, and he didn’t need Aidan rubbing more salt in his wounds.

Sean looked up, looking Aidan over. “Well, you did your good deed.”

Seeing Aidan in civilian clothes was a little bizarre, and with the same look of outrage and anger Sean had seen flash over the man’s handsome face ever since the last Gauntlet run. Sean felt another jolt of guilt as it occurred to him that Aidan was out by himself, out trying to have a night to himself, to have a good time.

“You know what, you’re absolutely right, Sean. I’ll just fuck off,” Aidan said, turning away and making for the door.

Sean closed his eyes, rubbing his forehead as he tried not to let his guilt get the better of him. There had been no need for Aidan to approach him like that, especially considering they weren’t even close to being friends. The more Sean thought about it, the more Ricardo’s angry words came back to him.

Had Aidan been trying to make a friendly gesture?

“Damn it,” Sean growled, pushing himself out of the booth to hurry after Aidan.

“Hey!” the bartender yelled at him.

“You’ve got my card. I’ll be back,” Sean snapped at him as he hurried out onto the street.

Glancing around, he searched for Aidan, not even sure what he was doing. It wasn’t like he and Aidan would ever be friends. The two of them seemed to mix like water and oil. But, either because Ricardo had primed Sean to feel guilty or because some part of him believed Aidan had been trying, even for that one moment, to reach out, he couldn’t let things stay the way they were.

He spotted the man walking down the sidewalk and hurried toward him. “Aidan!”

Aidan stopped at the mouth of an alley, turning on one heel to stare at Sean. “What the hell do you want now, Sean? You wanted me to fuck off, so that’s what I’m doing. Or is this your way of getting me to have another fistfight with you? Is that what you want? Well, there’s a nice dark alley over here we can have it out in; no one has to know.”

Sean watched him walk past the mouth of the alley and gesture around dramatically. Sean groaned, following after him, wondering why Aidan had to make everything so damn difficult.

Aidan scoffed. “Jesus, seriously?”

“Would you shut up for one goddamn minute?” Sean asked, temper bubbling.