Twenty
Chapter One
The light streaming through the cheap metal miniblinds was blinding. Austin Wright discovered if he squinted his eyes and turned his head a little to the left, he could almost stand it. Now, if he could only find a way to deal with the sickly, sweet sensation of needing to vomit.
Why the hell hadn’t he stopped after those first three shots of Cuervo Gold?
Because you’re a drunk, a stinging, no-holds-barred voice whispered into his ear. Whispered being the key phrase. Anything louder was going to cause him to run—not walk—to the bathroom and divest himself of the remaining contents of his stomach.
He almost remembered the events of last night, but wasn’t quite sure. Most of those memories were forever lost in a blackout. Austin gingerly propped himself up on his elbows and began looking for evidence. He’d done this before.
Too many mornings, the voice declared, making him wince. Only the threat of spending the rest of his morning washing soiled sheets kept him from lying back down and praying for oblivion. He’d done that before, too.
Warily, he glanced to his left. His Wranglers lay in a wad on the floor. Both his ropers were there, too.
He was just about to test turning his head to the right when a Gary Allan song started blaring from his cell phone.
Shit.
Scooting to the edge of the bed, he carefully bent down and reached a shaky hand toward his jeans. In one carnival-contortionist move, he was able to inch the denim closer, pull his cell out of the back pocket and finally punch the phone. Blessed silence.
“Yeah?” he rasped.
“Austin?” The girl’s voice was as sweet as it was sinful. “Honey, you okay?”
“I’m okay,” he muttered, doing his best to recall the lady’s name on the other side of the phone. Sandra? Cindy?
Finally, the name clicked. Stacy.
“I’m okay, Stacy,” he said, emphasizing her name. As though it was a real special thing for him to remember.
“Oh, good,” she replied with a breathless sigh. “I was a little worried last night. After, you know…”
No, as a matter of fact, he had no idea what the “you know” referred to. Biting his lip, he turned to the other side of the bed, looking for any sign that a woman had slept there.
Luckily, all he saw was a Hanes T-shirt long faded to a dingy gray and a wrinkled button-down. Not a pair of panties or a lacy bra in sight.
By turns disgusted with his behavior and bolstered by the evidence that he hadn’t completely gone crazy, Austin cleared his throat and went about lying with the best of them. “Stacy, I’m fine. Real fine.” Suddenly worried, he added, “And you?”
A light laugh fluttered through the phone. In another time, it would have stirred up his blood pressure. “Oh, I’m fine, Austin. I enjoyed every moment of your company,” she purred.
He almost relaxed. Maybe he hadn’t been that big of a jackass?
“That is, I was just super—until you cashed it in all over my Ariats.”
Cashed it in? It took a half second, but he finally figured out what she was referring to. Ah. He’d vomited on her boots.
Way to connect the dots, Austin.
Damn. Sitting up straighter, he ignored his pounding head, his sour stomach, the dry feeling around his tongue. Ariats were nice boots. Easily over a hundred a pop. “Listen, Stacy, about your boots. I’ll pay—”
“They were just my old ropers. You and I know I’ve had worse than that on ’em,” she said with a laugh. “Nothing to worry about.”
He exhaled in relief. Because, well, he didn’t have a spare dime to pay for a new pair of boots.
Because you had to go buy the whole bar a round of tequila, the voice said nastily.
“Austin, I didn’t call to give you grief about my boots. I just wanted to check on you.”
“Check on me?”
“Well, yeah. I was worried. I just wanted to make sure that you were, you know…okay?”
Alive, she meant. His shame was reaching new levels. She’d called to make sure he’d made it through the rest of the night. “Don’t worry about me, sugar. I’m always fine.”
“You sure?” she said a little hesitantly. “Because by the time we got you cleaned up and the clock struck three…you were sounding a little blue…” Her phone clicked. “Oops. I gotta go. That’s Daddy. Church today, you know.”
She hung up before he could respond to his blue mood or Sunday services. After clicking off his cell, too, he gripped it hard in his hand. For a moment, he was tempted to toss it across the room, but all that would do was ruin a perfectly good phone.
And he’d already ruined plenty over the past year.
His cotton mouth got drier as memories flashed. The times he’d driven home drunk, the times he’d woken up beside women he didn’t remember meeting.
The time he’d lived on ramen noodles for two weeks because he’d had to borrow money for gas in his truck. Because he’d spent every last dime at a rowdy bar in Sheridan.
With a groan, he pulled off his sheets and made himself put both feet on the floor. It was time to greet his new day.
Padding to the bathroom, he looked in the mirror. Caught himself in all his naked glory. He paid no notice to the lean muscles of his arms or the light line of hair that ran from the middle of his pecs to his belly.
He ignored the scars on his side and hands and forearms from too many falls and a whole lot of idiocy.
Instead he concentrated on the greenish-gray pallor of his face. His dry, chapped lips.
Then he looked beyond the bloodshot eyes to what he saw in them—the complete look of hopelessness.
He’d hit rock bottom, at least as far down as he was willing to go. He knew all about living with a drunk and a disappointment. He had become his own worst nightmare, and he didn’t know how he was ever going to recover.
Wrapping a towel around his waist, he padded back into his bedroom, grabbed his jeans and pulled out his wallet from the back pocket.
And there, sure enough, was a business card of a tire distributor. But that wasn’t what was important. Flipping it over, Austin stared at the name and phone number scrawled in a black felt-tip marker. The guy, who’d only said his name was Jack, had been in Austin’s store shopping for gear, said he’d known Buddy, Austin’s dad.
Further conversation revealed that Jack was a family man. He’d shown off a photo of him, his wife and two young boys posed in front of a Christmas tree. Austin had been wondering what the heck Jack had in common with him until Jack relayed that he’d almost lost it all—his business, his wife…even his kids.
When