Busted

She wasn’t ever going—

Well, scratch that. Some sort of blurry amusement worked its way free in his mind as somebody sidetracked to their table, shooting the woman across from him a hard look. “Yeah?”

That look was meant with an equally hard smile. “Get him something that isn’t going to kill his gut,” she said, her tone all sugar. Sugar, but the gaze was steel.

Too many undertones there for him to process.

Trying to juggle his way through all of that and deal with the noise in his head was making his brain hurt. He still wasn’t drunk enough. Maybe what he should do was hit that liquor store he’d passed . . . yeah.

He liked that idea. He could grab himself a bottle of whatever was closest to the door, lock himself in his room, and get plastered. The headache he’d have in the morning would keep him focused on something other than what he’d done today—

Something thunked down in front of him, hard.

Blinking, he stared at it.

He went to reach for it but before he could, a hand tugged it out of reach.

“Give me that,” he demanded.

She kept her hand over it as she slid into the booth next to him. He’d settled in the middle and he wasn’t exactly a small guy, so that didn’t leave her a lot of room. She didn’t seem to care.

Alarms started to screech in his head.

“You wa

“No.” He took the glass and the scent of it hit his nose before he took the first swallow. He almost sighed in appreciation. That was more like it. He couldn’t quite recognize it—some sort of bourbon, he thought, but a damn sight better than whatever swill he’d been tossing back. Slumping in the seat, he rested his head on the back of the booth.

The fog in his head crept in closer.

“So what has you looking so miserable today, handsome?” Her hand settled on his thigh, dangerously close to his crotch.

He picked it up and slowly, carefully, deliberately settled it on the table. That right there was enough to have the fog in his head clearing.

Even when she started to lean in closer, Trey found the energy to get his leaden legs moving, forcing his too-fogged brain to function. Her eyes—he studied her eyes through a haze of alcohol and realized something was off.

“I buried my wife,” he said. His gut went slippery cold as he said it, and then, he said it again. “I buried my wife. She went into early labor and died during the emergency C-section. My son almost died, too.”

She went to open her mouth and he leaned in, ignoring the absolutely lovely breasts she displayed as she reached out to touch his arm. “I’m not interested. You’re better off looking elsewhere.”

Something flashed in her eyes and then she inclined her head. “Pay for your own whiskey, then.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way.” He nodded toward her and looked around, tried to figure out where the fucking hell he’d put the damn whiskey. He’d had a drink, hadn’t he?

“Son of a bitch,” he mumbled, barely even noticing that he’d banged into the wall on his way out of the bar. Lights blurred together and shadows swayed in and out of the focus, coming alive on him.

There were voices.

Then a shout.

The one last clear thing he remembered was trying to remember where the hell he’d put his damn phone.

*   *   *

A harsh pounding noise split through his head, like a cleaver striking through bone.

Trey jerked upright and immediately wished he hadn’t so much as moved.

Nausea churned inside and his belly revolted.

He shuddered, braced an arm over his gut as he looked around.

No light.

Couldn’t see—

“You awake there, sunshine?” Lights flashed on.

He flinched at the sound of that voice, as familiar to him as his own. It was quiet—logically, he knew that, but it sounded as loud and booming as a fucking gong.

He groaned and rolled over, grabbing for his pillow so he could drown out the too loud sounds and the too bright lights.

Hearing his twin’s sigh, he thought maybe Travis would take pity on him and let him sleep off this hangover from hell. Trey couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this wasted.

“Come on, man,” Travis said a moment later. “You need to wake up.”

The sound of his brother’s voice was too loud, too harsh and he groaned pitifully.

“Mr. Barnes?”

He jerked at the sound of the new voice.

A hand pressed down on his shoulder.

“Easy there, Trey. I’ll take care of it. You just . . . try not to fall out of the bed.”

That made him crack open one eye—immediately, he wished he hadn’t, because the lights were harsh and bright and unforgiving. Anybody who had ever painted hell as a dark and smoky place was out of his mind. Hell was pure, unrelenting, blinding light and there was no escape from it. Trey flinched away from the searing brightness, feeling like his eyeballs had been singed.

He heard low voices, a hushed, hurried argument and he decided he was going to have to brave that hell. Cracking open his eye once more—just a slit—he looked around.

The place was disturbingly familiar.

Too bright. Yeah, he didn’t like that. Aseptic smells—

That tugged at something—immediately, his mind went on a sideways lurch and he rolled into a seated position and found himself on the edge of a bed that was most certainly not his own. He was bare-chested but wearing pants that he thought probably were his, although they were torn at the knee and dirty. His knuckles were bandaged—bruised.

What the—

“You okay there?”

He flexed his hand as Travis came around to stand in front of him.

Looking up, he found himself looking face-to-face at a disheveled mirror of himself. Then he glanced down at his wrecked trousers, his bare chest and his torn-up fists. Maybe he was the disheveled reflection this time around. Swallowing the nasty taste in his mouth, he eyed the wrinkled button-down Travis was wearing with a pair of trousers. He looked like he’d slept in them.

Then he looked down at himself, eyed the identification bracelet on his wrist. His head was an endless void—nothing but black stretching back—an awful pain settled at the base of his head and he slid from the bed, half stumbled, half shoved his way past his twin.

“Why am I in the hospital?”

“You . . .” Travis paused, taking his time before he said anything else. “You were at a bar. There was a fight. The bartender ended up calling the cops—you were all but unconscious in the parking lot.”

Trey ran his tongue across his teeth. “A bar.”

“Yeah. Ah . . . you lost your wallet. Whatever cash you had. I already shut down the credit cards, although I think whoever had them might have already tried to use them—I heard some talk from the cops. You can . . . we can talk about this later.”

“There was a woman,” he muttered as he flexed his aching hands. “I . . . I almost remember.”

“The doctors here, they ran a few blood tests. Ah . . . nothing happened. Just so you know—apparently you defaulted to fight mode and some . . .”

“What aren’t you telling me?” Trey asked, studying his brother’s face.

Travis came to stand closer, only a couple of feet away. “It looks like somebody slipped you something in your drink, Trey.”

“Slipped . . . what?”

He stared at Travis, confused.

“Somebody gave you drugs—you’ve got Xanax in your bloodstream.” Travis’s mouth went tight.

Trey’s head continued to pound and it only got worse as he studied his brother. “You didn’t need to come here for this, man. I can . . .” He swore and reached up to rub at his head, hoping it wouldn’t fall away. A memory tried to work free.

Voices . . . shouting . . .

Misery.

Abruptly, his throat started to ache.