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Jacey frowns, her nose turned up at me like I’ve offended her as she stands at the kitchen counter. Let’s face it, offending Jacey is pretty much impossible. “What in the hell would make you think it’s cocaine?”

  Shrugging, I close the door and kick off my shoes. Owen’s a few steps ahead of me and does the same but doesn’t even make it to his bedroom before he passes out on the floor in the living room. He can literally lie down and be asleep in the next second. I’ve never understood how that’s possible, but it is for him.

  Not me though. I can’t wait to get into my bed. I can already imagine the softness of the sheets and my head hitting the pillow. “It’s white . . . and you have it in a neatly cut line. We also live in Seattle so it’s a very real possibility it’s cocaine.”

  “Seattle’s not known for cocaine use . . . meth sure, but cocaine, not really,” she points out, wiping her hands on a towel. I live in a three-bedroom apartment with Jacey, Owen, and my brother Gavin. I know what you’re thinking, three bedrooms? Who shares?

  They all have their own rooms, and I sleep in the loft upstairs. At first I thought I was the lucky one. The loft has more space than the bedrooms, but I quickly learned it actually sucks sometimes. There’s no door. And the walls don’t go all the way up, so there’s really no privacy.

  Another lesson learned the hard way.

  I flop myself on the couch, the trek to my bed seeming to get further and further as the minutes pass. I’m so exhausted it’s totally possible I may not make it up there at this point. The odds are leaning toward me falling asleep right here. “What’s the point of this conversation?”

  “Got me.” Jacey shrugs, reaching for the remote as she moves from the kitchen to beside me on the couch. “You’re the one who asked if it was cocaine.”

  “What is it?”

  She hands me a cookie I eye suspiciously. She once made pot brownies and then Owen and I had to work a tour after eating them. Worst three days of my life. Or should I say, worst three days of everyone else’s lives because Owen and I didn’t have a fucking care in the world.

  “Powdered sugar. It’s Christmas Eve, thought it’d be good to make some cookies to take over to your parents’ tomorrow.”

  Satisfied with her answer, I put the entire cookie in my mouth at once. It’s some kind of lemon cookie and reminds me of those lemon bars she makes at Easter. “Nice.”

  I know what you’re thinking, I just finished telling you how basically all women are ruthless fucking whores and most are, but Jacey’s the exception. Don’t get me wrong, Jacey’s hot, and yes, we’ve hooked up before, but she’s one of my best friends. She’s never been and never will be just a hookup. I actually dated her for two years when we were younger, and then she ripped my heart out and lit the fucker on fire.

  Why am I still friends with her?

  You can’t stay mad at a girl like her. You can try, but she’s like an infection that won’t go away. As soon as the redness and swelling disappear, she comes back and reminds you she’s there, always.

  She’s also madly in love with my oldest brother, Evan. Remember when I said she ripped my heart out and set it on fire? She slept with Evan.

  Yep. Exactly.

  “Any good calls today?” Jacey asks, her pale blue eyes on the television as we search for something to watch, and she ties her black hair up in a bun.

  “Couple car accidents last night and one this morning where a guy ended up in telephone pole wires. We had to wait for the utility company before we could get him out.”

  She laughs. “No shit?”

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure he was high on more than powdered sugar last night.”

  “Sounds like it.” Curling her legs up on the sofa, she faces me. “Hey, if I was trapped in a burning building, do you think Evan would rescue me without his shirt on?”

  I quirk an eyebrow at her, not understanding her obsession with my oldest brother. “I’ll never understand why you chose him over me.”

  “Well, if we want to get technical about this, I didn’t choose him. It just happened, and he took my heart the same day and kept it like a treasure that’s not his to have. I only occasionally sleep with him when he needs to forget life. Which if we want to get technical about it, that’s pretty fucking sad for me. And technically, you broke up with me.”

  I stare at her in disbelief, kind of disgusted she doesn’t find the obvious as alarming as I do, or did. “Technically you fucked my brother when I was at baseball practice.”

  “Here we go again.” She waves her hand around, smacking my temple in the process. “We’ve been over this. I was sixteen and not smart. He was seventeen. Totally took advantage of me.”

  “Shut the fuck up. I don’t want to talk about this.” Running my hands over my face, I groan. “I’m going to bed.”

  Sure, I eventually forgave Jacey and Evan for what they did. It was like ten years ago, but still, it’s not something I want to think about either.

  Jacey grabs my hand before I can leave. “The fuck you are. I’m working tonight and it’s Christmas Eve. You’re coming out to keep me company. It’s the least you can do.”

  The least I can do? She’s talking about cheating on me with my brother, and it’s the least I can do?

  But then her smile fades and I understand why. She hates to be alone.

  Jacey hates working holidays at the bar she bartends at, mostly because it’s full of drunken idiots and she insists me or one of my brothers keep her company. I have four brothers—Evan, Gavin, Kellan, and Taylor—all firefighters aside from Kellan, who’s a cop. Our dad’s a firefighter, his dad was a firefighter and his dad before that . . . a firefighter. And here Kellan goes and becomes a fucking cop. If we’re being honest, I think it’s just because he’s always been that one brother who likes to set himself apart from the rest of the Ryan boys. If we all agreed on pizza for dinner, he’d have a bowl of cereal. Never liked to go with the flow.

  “After I take a nap.” Despite Jacey wanting me at the bar tonight, I know the real reason as to why she wants me to go out with her. We’ve been over this many times. “You realize when Evan’s girlfriend finds out he’s still messing around with you, shit’s gonna hit the fan.”

  She stares at me blankly. “I’ve never understood that expression.”

  “Why?”

  “Have you ever thrown shit at a fan? I doubt with the heaviness of shit—it would actually do anything but flop on the ground.”

  I scrub my hands over my face. “Can we talk about something else?”

  “You’re the one who brought up shit.” She slaps my thigh. “Go take your nap so you can take me to work.”

  “I just worked forty-eight hours straight. I don’t want to go out tonight,” I argue, hoping she understands how exhausting that is.

  “I know, I know. You want your bed and pussy in it. So let’s go out tonight and find you some.”

  See, that’s a bad idea. “I still don’t want to. Kellan’s off tonight. Ask him to take you out.”

  Jacey frowns and swallows heavily, as though the idea of Kellan going with her is scary. “No way. Last time I went out with Kellan, he tried to get me to let him handcuff me and some other chick together.”

  “Like he wanted—”

  “Yep,” she says immediately before I can finish my statement. Kellan’s my younger brother. He also has an obsession with banging two chicks at once. Hence why he was trying to handcuff them together I suppose. Not sure.

  “I’m tired,” I tell her again, but I still don’t get up from the couch. It requires too much energy to lift myself up. “I need a nap.”

  “I’m amazed there’re five Ryan boys.”

  “Why?”

  “Heath works the same hours as you do. Or he did back before he was Battalion Chief. With as tired as you are all the time, when do you think he and your mom had time to make five of you?”

  I gag at the thought of my parents making babies. “Stop talking about my parents like that. And besides, you
’re never too tired to fuck.”

  “So then why won’t you go out tonight?”

  “Going out requires effort. It’d be a lot easier if one was in my bed already.”

  She raises an eyebrow. “Are you asking?”

  I toss a pillow at her head. “No, I’m not.”

  Jacey groans. “Come on, Caleb. The holidays depress the shit out of me. Please come to the bar tonight.”

  “Why do the holidays depress you?”

  Her expression tells me I shouldn’t have asked that. Mostly because I know. “Hello?” Her eyes widen as she tosses her hands up and lets them fall to her lap. “Dead parents . . . no family?”

  Though I feel for her, I’m always giving Jacey a hard time. “Oh please. They died when you were eight and you have us. Ever since then, you’ve spent every Thanksgiving and Christmas with us.” I stand up and step over Owen on my way to the stairs. “Don’t tell me you don’t have family.”

  “Shush.” She throws a pillow at me. “Go take your nap and then take me to work. I’ll give you free drinks all night.”

  That gets my attention. Free beer? Who wouldn’t take up that offer? “Okay, fine. But only one drink.”

  Famous last words. Never say “only one” because those are the nights that usually end with you beside the toilet praying to the porcelain gods, or in handcuffs.

  Exposure

  Property near fire that may become involved by transfer of heat or burning material from main fire, typically little or no outside logistical support.

  Christmas.

  It’s the most wonderful time of the year. My ass it is.

  Anyone who really believes that never walked in on their boyfriend fucking the neighbor two days before Christmas.

  And to top it all off, when I went to break up with the bastard, he dumped me before I could get a word in and asked me to move out.

  What the shit?

  How does that even happen?

  To make matters worse, I’m standing in the lobby of the hotel I work at wondering what the fuck I’m doing here on Christmas Eve. I could have stayed home, or rather at Scarlet’s apartment, because as I said before, cheating, bastard boyfriend equals homelessness for me.

  But, unfortunately, being part of the hospitality industry means we’re never closed, so here I am going to work on a holiday.

  I’m still pretty new at my job, not to mention the owner’s daughter, so I figure it’s better to be here and prove I’m dedicated to my job.

  Standing in the lobby of The Wellington Plaza, I’m reminded of the fact that my dad doesn’t go halfway on anything, and he certainly didn’t half-ass anything when he built this hotel. The Wellington Plaza is a five-star luxury hotel consisting of thirty-one floors, one thousand guest rooms and suites, eight restaurants, three bars, four pools, a salon and spa, eight meeting rooms and two convention centers.

  When you walk into the lobby, rich, bold colors greet you. Pops of red and black walls—my father’s favorite colors—meet sleek polished black marble floors. It sits in the outskirts of the city on Capitol Hill and boasts breathtaking views of the Space Needle, Elliott Bay, Lake Union and Union Bay.

  Turning to walk toward the front desk, my heels click against the marble and I can’t help but think even though I’ve been walking through these doors since I was a little girl, I still find myself stopping to appreciate the visual impact this place has on a person when they enter.

  It’s pretty damn spectacular.

  “What are you doing here?” Tom asks, standing to the side of the front desk with two sets of keys in his hand and running his hand over his scruffy cheek. There’re some people who shouldn’t be a valet driver, and Tom Chase is one of them. Not to mention he’s too pretty for his job and he’s wrecked like four cars in his five-year employment here. “I thought you had the weekend off for Christmas?” he asks, looking at the keys in his hand like he’s trying to figure out what keys go to what reservations. If it wasn’t for Stevie, the other valet attendant, Tom would be lost. Actually, most of the time he’s lost.

  I choose not to say anything because Tom is a friend, a friend who knows about my relationship with Judah and more importantly, he knows Judah so if I answer him, it will be glaringly obvious something is wrong. Soon after, he’ll put two and two together and come up with the fact that I got dumped by an asshole who cheated on me.

  Keep in mind this is not natural for me. I have to physically purse my lips not to say anything because one of my major flaws is me not being able to keep my fucking mouth shut.

  I’m not someone you want to share a secret with. It’s a curse I have.

  “I did . . .” I catch myself, digging through my bag for my cell phone as it’s ringing, again, always. “I do. Or I should, but I just . . .” I can’t come up with a good enough lie, so I shake my head and give up.

  Turning quickly, I avoid eye contact with him, toss my phone on the counter and pick up a folder in an attempt to at least appear to be reviewing the upcoming reservations for an investment firm looking to book fifty rooms for their employees. It’s also an attempt to distract myself from saying any more to Tom.

  A quick glance from the corner of my eye and I notice Tom staring at me like he’s trying to solve a puzzle. After a couple of minutes, I turn so I’m still not looking at him, but I can see him looking at me and notice what seems to be understanding taking place in his inquisitive stare.

  Stupid intuitive ass.

  “I take it you and Judah are having problems?”

  Having problems? Oh, isn’t that cute. He’s trying to pass this off as a simple misunderstanding? I think the only misunderstanding involved in what happened with Judah is him misunderstanding he wasn’t supposed to have stuck his pierced dick in someone else.

  “Well, gee, Tom if you mean ‘misunderstanding’ in the sense that Judah fucked our neighbor, and then told me I should move out before I could tell him to kiss my ass then yes, yes we had a big fucking misunderstanding!” The moment the words are said, a sharp pain hits my heart. Oh God, does my pride hurt admitting this.

  I think it would have been better if I broke up with him first, if for no other reason than my dignity, but the asshole beat me to it, which is just so Judah Prince. If nothing else his timing is always on and he takes orders from no one.

  Tom’s face twists slightly, and he swallows, hard, the kind of swallow where you’re wondering if he’s choking down a peanut without chewing.

  I think he’s having this type of reaction and hesitation because he’s in a band with Judah, which is how I met the bastard in the first place. Tom’s attempting to gauge whether I blame him for this whole mess.

  Well, the answer is yes. I definitely hold him responsible for bringing that dick lick into my life but unfortunately, there’s no one to blame but myself for moving in with him after only a few months of dating, but let’s not dwell on my bad judgment and get back to blaming Tom.

  In Tom’s defensive, he did warn me before I started my so-called relationship with Judah that it was a mistake, but I was being thoroughly fucked by the hot drummer in a band, so any warnings were heard about as clearly as Charlie Brown’s teacher in every damn cartoon, “whaa whaa, whaa.”

  “Shit, Mila, I’m sorry, girl.” He’s cut off from any other conversation when something over my shoulder catches his eye. Tom shifts his stance, nodding toward the lobby behind me while he pulls at his dark gray button-down shirt trying to smooth out the wrinkles and then zips his black jacket up.

  It’s then I realize he notices my father in the distance hovering near the lobby doors. Tom is deathly scared of my dad. Not for any other reason than he owns this hotel and can fire his car parking ass at any time. “I gotta go.”

  “Yeah, yeah, whatever, Tom. Run away.”

  “I got cars to park, woman.” With his hands buried in the pockets of his black slacks, he doesn’t turn back around. Not that I expect him to.

  He’s not sorry. At least I don’t think he
’s as sorry as he should be. Remember how I said Tom’s in a band with Judah?

  Well, he’s not just in the band, he’s the lead singer. When I heard from some of the other staff at the hotel his band was playing at a local club, one highly intoxicated night I decided to go check them out. I told myself I’d go and listen, but that I wouldn’t fuck the singer. Made an actual pinky promise to myself. You see, Tom being said lead singer of this particular band, and well let’s face it, singers in any band are bad news, and there’re about twenty or so hostesses and maids here at The Wellington Plaza who can attest to Tom’s reputation.

  He’s a dirty motherfucker who likes to spread his love.

  So what do I do? I’m sure you can guess. I go for the drummer because in my drunk-ass mind as long as they’re not the singer, how bad can they be?

  Wrong. Dead fucking wrong. Dating a guy like Judah was cool, until he wasn’t. Sure, the sex was good. Who am I kidding? It was amazing. Though his fetish with anal play was a bit alarming at times, and he wasn’t exactly what you’d call boyfriend material. Didn’t stop me. I still moved in with him.

  When I graduated college a year ago, I slept on Scarlet’s couch and at a few other friend’s places. I refused to move back home. Essentially homeless, it left me in Judah’s bed every night. One night after we’d fucked for like four hours straight, he suggested I could you know, keep some things at his place. So I moved in. Didn’t even think twice about it.

  Maybe he didn’t mean all my stuff. Maybe he just meant my toothbrush or a few articles of clothing. I didn’t ask. I just moved in and started sleeping over every night like the bed jumping whore I’d become.

  This was one of those times where you wished you knew someone who had lived your life before you so they could warn you before you did stupid shit. So appreciate any advice I give you. You don’t have to thank me, just appreciate it.

  Also, do yourself a favor, don’t date a drummer. Hell, stay away from the whole fucking band! I’m living proof. That old saying, drummers hit it harder yeah, well, my ass is definitely proof of that. There’re marks down there I’m sure will never go away. He wasn’t abusive by any means, just, how do I say this . . . Actually, let me rephrase now that I’m giving this some thought. Have sex with drummers, do that a lot and you won’t regret it, but do not under any circumstances “date” them and for fuck’s sack, do not move in with them.