1001 Dark Nights: Bundle Forty-Six by unknow

Author:unknow
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: 1001 Dark Nights Press
Published: 2024-12-10T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Two

And the award for

Chump of the Year goes to…

—T-shirt

Don’t do it.

Jason’s words hit like a forty-five-caliber round to my chest. Emotion seared across my skin and burned the backs of my eyes. A bit dramatic, maybe, but holy shit. Not only had I been duped, tricked into coming to Idaho—a fact that stunned me more than I cared to admit—but I’d also been lured into an impossible situation.

Don’t do it.

Part of me wanted to rip my best friend’s head off. He had no right to lay this on me. But I quickly made a mental U-turn. Out of every man in the bar—short, tall, beefy, small—Jason Vigil was the only one who could very likely take me in a bare-knuckle brawl. We’d both been boxers in high school, trading off championships like a baseball fan trades cards. We’d graduated to mixed martial arts soon after. Even then, I’d hated fighting Jason. We were too close, brothers, and I’d always wondered if he pulled his punches.

I didn’t want to find out. Not now. And I didn’t want to discover which of us had weathered our respective years best. If things didn’t go as planned, I would be humiliated for the second time that day, and my self-esteem could only take so many hits.

Not to mention the fact that I couldn’t throw a punch anymore to save my life. I couldn’t fight if I wanted to. I was absolutely useless.

Don’t do it.

Despite my best efforts, my gaze flitted to the girl. Her haunted expression didn’t sway me. Didn’t even nudge the needle. I didn’t care if she’d been terrorized for years. That she looked as thin and frail as a paper doll. That she’d tried to take her life. I was done. Done with ghosts. Done with hellhounds. Done with demons—especially demons. Fuckers. None of it mattered. None of it was my problem. Not anymore. Even when she looked up from her book, her gaze meeting mine, and I found myself treading frantically just to keep my head above the murky depths I found there. I didn’t budge.

Don’t do it.

“You seem upset.”

I turned back to Jason and quickly reassessed my chances of getting in a kidney punch before he took me to the mat. If I was certain I could take the shot, which I wasn’t, I may have tried. “You think?”

The muscles in Jason’s jaw tightened, and he leaned forward onto his elbows. “I’m sorry.”

“About which part? The luring me here under false pretenses bit, or the fact that you’re ruining my vacation?”

“Neither.” He pointed over my shoulder. “I think she recognized you.”

I whirled around.

She was headed our way, carrying the mug and her book.

“That’s my cue.” Jason flew out of his chair and booked it to the kitchen. Cowardly bastard.

The seat he’d vacated didn’t stay empty for long. Before I could get up and run myself—I said he was a cowardly bastard, not that I wasn’t—she sank into Jason’s chair, folding her long legs as gracefully as a fawn settling onto a forest floor.

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