2. Drew
Drew
T he neon sign flashes in the window as I hesitate outside the door of Riley’s Bar and Grill. The person on the other side of that door may be my best friend, but I can already feel the ass chewing he’s about to serve up.
I take a breath and hold it before exhaling and going inside. It’s best to get this over with.
As soon as I enter, I spot Jace. He’s built like a linebacker and impossible to miss. He always attracts the ladies, and at first, I think today is no different as a brunette drapes herself over the bar. On second look, I realize it’s our friend Jett trying to reach the ketchup bottle there.
I slip behind the bar unnoticed and grab a glass and a bottle of whiskey before pouring two fingers and taking a seat on the other side of the bar, closest to the jukebox that hasn’t worked since we were kids.
Jett still hasn’t noticed me, and I’d usually give her a hard time about her lack of awareness, but there’s too much on my mind today.
“Hey, man.” Jace’s deep voice startles me as it booms across the empty bar. “I’ll be there in just a second. Gotta get this shipment put away real quick.”
I wave him off, but his words pull Jett from her current fixation.
“Hey, Drew,” she says, her voice tentative as she eyes the glass in my hand. “Everything okay?”
The sentiment in her voice is a gut punch, but I do my best to ignore it. If I accept her compassion right now, I’ll spiral. “Just a lot on my mind,” I say as I gently swirl the brown liquid in my glass, wondering why I poured it to begin with. I quit drinking this shit eleven months ago.
“I’m always here to listen. You know that,” she says as the energy in the air shifts.
Jace’s bulky frame moves towards us, his eyes immediately taking in the whiskey.
Without a word, he reaches into the cooler under the bar and pulls out a soda, sliding it over and slipping the still-full tumbler from my fingertips.
“On that note, I’m heading back to work.
Kelsey needs to duck out in a bit, and there’s a new frozen coffee recipe she wants me to try,” Jett says, already backing her way through the tables to avoid the impending confrontation.
“Tell Noah I’ll see him at home when he finishes helping you.
” She runs into a table corner but doesn’t flinch as she waves at us, her focus already on the little bookstore and café she and Jace’s twin own across the street.
They opened it a few months ago, and the place has taken off.
Kelsey runs the café side, creating off-the-wall coffee drinks and pastries, while Jett runs the bookstore and author services side.
Once she steps through the door, Jace turns his focus back to me. “Rough day riding ponies?”
I nod. “This heat is going to be the death of me,” I say before taking a sip of the cool drink in my hand.
Jace chuckles. “You’ve lived here your whole life and you still aren’t used to August in Georgia?”
I roll my eyes, my lips quirking up on their own accord. “Being used to it doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
The humidity has been its own version of hell lately. Imagine taking a hot shower and then putting on long sleeves and jeans without drying off first. That’s what Georgia humidity feels like.
“Well, look what the cat dragged in,” says another voice from the back room.
I glance up to see Noah Slater, our other best friend and Jett’s boyfriend, coming from the back and drying his hands with a towel.
His eyes slip between me and the glass Jace hasn’t emptied yet before settling on my face, studying me.
Noah isn’t one of many words. In fact, most of this town thinks he’s an irritable grump.
Since Jett came into his life at the beginning of this year, he’s been much more pleasant, but his demeanor is still questionable at times.
And he sees way too damn much. The dude reads people like his girl reads romance novels.
“Noah, cover the counter for a bit, yeah? My bartender should be here any minute.”
“Got it, boss,” Noah says as he falls into the regular routine of wiping down the bar. He’s an elevator mechanic but fills in whenever Jace needs help. Or when the ranch needs an extra hand. Or when Kelsey and Jett need help at the café. You get the point.
If he’s asking Noah to cover, it means he’s about to drag me out and demand answers. Answers that I don’t have. Panicking, I reach forward and snatch the glass from the bar and bring it to my lips.
Before the amber liquid can make contact with my tongue, fingers land on the rim, gently pushing it back to the bar top. Jace’s eyes burn a hole through me.
“Bro, what’s goin’ on?” he asks, his head cocked to the side as he studies me.
“Don’t know what you mean.” I look around the bar. Anywhere but Jace’s questioning gaze seems like a good option. There’s no crowd yet, but the regulars will start trickling in within the hour.
“Bullshit,” Jace shoots back. “Now, I wouldn’t care if you’d come in and asked for a beer.
That’ve been fine. But you quit drinking for a reason, bud, and you know damn well I won’t serve you liquor.
If this isn’t a cry for help, then I don’t know what is.
” He starts to walk toward the back hallway where his office is, motioning me to follow.
“Forget it. It’s fine,” I mumble as I push off the stool, suddenly too nervous to talk to my best friend about the thoughts suffocating me. Before I can blink, Jace’s six-four body is blocking my path, his hand on my shoulder.
“Don’t do that man.” He shakes his head, messy curls going everywhere. “Don’t downplay. You came in for a reason. Let’s go talk about it.”
I flick my eyes to the door, still halfheartedly thinking about bolting.
Until Jace pulls out his best trick. He knows it, too, by the way he widens his stance, his arms crossing over his massive chest.
“Talk to me, or I call big brother in to get you talking.”
I internally groan at the threat of Declan getting involved in more of my shit and grudgingly follow Jace to his office. He stops at the kitchen window and hollers to the cook.
“Hey, Buck. Can you whip together some loaded fries for me? To go?”
“Got it, bossman.”
He slaps the counter in thanks and continues down the hall while I follow like the obedient little puppy I am, grumbling all the way.
“Jump off one roof at sixteen, and they baby you for eternity.”
Jace turns and gapes at me, his hand twitching. I know he wants to hit me but is scared of hurting my shoulder. The minute I’m one hundred percent cleared is the day Jace Riley lays me out flat.
As he shuts the door behind us, he says, “You know that’s not what this is about, man.
But if you want to go that route, then what about the motorcycle through the barn door at nineteen?
Or the time you tried to go bungee jumping off the roof of the barn that same week?
Or how about the time you jumped on that stud colt and nearly died? How about that one, huh?”
Irritation finally snuffs out any of the anxiety I had a moment ago, and I snap. “I get it, okay? I do stupid, reckless shit when I drink. It’s why I quit. I just…” I look at Jace, trying to muster the courage to admit this.
I didn’t go to the barn this morning expecting to find myself in this situation.
But Jace is my person. My best friend. He’s who all of us go to for comfort, for reassurance that we aren’t beyond saving. But this? I feel myself ripping apart at the seams.
“Jace…” My voice catches in my throat before I drop onto the couch in here and struggle to take a breath.
Jace’s entire demeanor changes, his hand that was tapping out a rhythm on his desk now frozen mid-beat. He leans forward, watching every little movement I make, reading into every breath before saying, “Empty your pockets, brother.”
I blanch, the panic setting back in tenfold. “All I did was say your name.”
“You’ve been fiddling with that pocket since we started talking.
You came into my bar and poured yourself a drink when you know that shit don’t fly with me.
” He shakes his head, irritation and concern clearly warring with each other.
“You just got your struggle with pain pills under control a few months ago. Are you really willing to sit here and lie to me right now?”
I sink deeper into the worn couch cushions, unable to make eye contact. “I haven’t taken any. I swear.”
Jace expels a harsh breath of relief.
I continue before he has time to ask anything. “But I had the pills in my hand.”
Faster than I can react, Jace grabs the red and blue stress ball off his desk and chucks it at my good shoulder, hitting his mark with force.
A curse slips out as I rub the injured spot, but I don’t say anything else.
He’s entitled to his frustration. Jace witnessed the development of the issue and my recovery firsthand.
After my accident, the doctor had prescribed acetaminophen-oxycodone.
The pain was so intense, the damage to my shoulder and back so bad, that I never once questioned taking something stronger than over-the-counter pain killers.
Before anyone realized it, my body was hooked. Not long after, so was my mind.
Jace continues staring at me, waiting for me to find the courage to say the rest.
“Just wanted to knock off the edge. I’ve been restless, like my skin’s too tight. Shoulder’s been burning again.” I almost tell him why I’ve been restless, but it’s been a secret for so long at this point and I don’t want to give him another reason to be disappointed in me.
He rakes his hands over his curls and sighs. “Where did you even find any? I thought we went through your apartment and the barn cabinets.”
I watch as the gears turn. He’s too intelligent to not piece it all together. The silence is deafening, indecision playing in Jace’s eyes. I hate the looks of concern and pity that keep flashing across his face.
“You hid them.”