Page 1 of The Bad Brother
THE SHRILL WHISTLE THAT ERUPTS FROMthe dance floor picks my head up and tightens the back of my neck.
Shit.
Can’t go a single fucking night in this place without someone trying to bust it up.
“You want me to handle it, boss?” Austin, my bouncer shouts over the din from the front door where he’s checking IDs.
Planting my hands on the bar top, I vault over it, landing in the wide patch that opened up when the people crowded around it saw me coming. “I got it.”
“Want me to call Colt?” Cade, the other bartender on duty shouts at my back. Colt Montgomery is Cade’s twin brother. He also happens to be the sheriff. “Nope.” I toss it over my shoulder before I wade into the crowd.
Even though the place is big and packed closeto capacity, getting from the bar to the dance floor doesn’t take me more than a couple seconds. Most of the people in here are from Barrett. They know me. Know I own this place. That I’m not someone you want to mess with.
When I get to the dance floor, I find the source of the whistle, Sera—Colt and Cade’s sister and one of my waitresses—using her empty tray as a shield while two of my regulars circle each other on a cleared-out dance floor. Would-be dancers crowd around the edges of it, watching the spectacle these two asshats were stupid and / or drunk enough to start in my bar.
One of them is brandishing a broken beer bottle while the other has his fists raised, not willing to be called a coward and back down—a sure fire sign that whatever the hell is going on, it started over a woman.
Jesus wept.
Picking up a chair, I push my way through the tight knot of looky-loos and lift it like a baseball bat, just as I step onto the dance floor behind the asshole with the beer bottle. When he sees me coming, his dance partner’s eyes widen and he drops his fists, a split second before I swing for the fences, bringing the chair across Mr. Beer Bottle’s back. He goes sailing before he lands on his face, cowboy hat flying in one direction while his broken beer bottle flies in the other.
Chair in a one-handed grip, I use the other to jab a finger at his opponent’s ashen face. “Don’t you move, Jake,” I tell him while I cross the dance floor to where his dance partner is still sprawled out, face first. “Not onefuckinginch.”
“Yes, sir.” Jake bobs his head while he relaxes his fists,shooting a quick look at a curvy little redhead in a tight pair of jeans. “I’m not going anywhere.”
Satisfied that Jake’s staying put, I stop in front of his opponent and use the toe of my boot to roll him over before dropping the chair over his wheezing chest. Straddling it, I sit, glaring down at Mr. Beer Bottle over its bent back while trapping his arms under the hard press of my boots. “Want to tell me what the fuck you’re doing, Billy?”
As soon as Billy sees who’s staring down at him, his face goes from beet red to ghost white so fast, I’m suddenly sure he’s going to pass out without giving me my answer. Darting a quick look in the redhead’s direction, the muscle in Billy’s jaw clenches before he re-aims his bloodshot gaze in my direction. “He was dancing with my girl.”
I look at the woman in question, giving her awell?sort of look.
“We broke up,” she answers defensively, lifting her arms to cross them over her chest.
Sighing, I swipe a heavy hand over my face. “When?”
Eyes narrowed down to slits, she glares at Billy. “Just now, when I caught him in the parking lot, getting blown by some creeker.”
Creeker—shorthand for the people who live in Clearwater Creek, the affluent town on the other side of the river Barrett was built on.
There are very few places in Barrett that a creeker would stoop low enough to go.
Unfortunately, my bar is one of them.
Nailing her with a hard glare that makes her squirm in her boots, I refocus my attention on Billy who’s still trappedunder my chair. “Sounds like she’s not your girl anymore, Billy.”
“But—”
Lifting my index finger, I press it to my lips. “Shhh…” Dropping my hand, I shake my head. “I said,sounds like she’s not your girl anymore, Billy.”
His face goes red again. “Yes, sir.”
“That’s better,” Giving him a grim smile, I shake my head.
“Now, what’s the rule about fighting in my bar?”
Billy swallows hard and looks away. “Take it downstairs.”
Downstairsis the Mill’s dirt-floored basement. Back in the day, it was used to load timber into the mill for processing. Now it’s used for illegal, bare-knuckle grudge matches that people can pay to watch or bet on if they have a mind to. But that’s not the only way to get things done around here. “Or?”
