Back to You: A Hudson Family Series- Book 1- Synclair and Reece (7 page)

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Hangovers suck. When a bartender breaks a rule about drinking, there are always consequences. This point was evident when I woke up, naked and suffering from a pounding tequila headache. That wasn’t the bitch of it though, the bitch of it was watching Ridge try to crack the safe in my hotel suite in the pitch dark. I mean it was dark to me, Ridge, however, was wearing what looked like night vision goggles and had some electrical equipment attached to the face of the in-room safe. Rolling my eyes, I reached over the night stand to my right. Ridge was so busy with his 007 gadgetry that he didn’t even hear me open the nightstand to retrieve my handgun. What? This was Vegas after all. He did, however, hear me cock the gun, and when he turned he saw me point it straight at his head, the lower one.

Flipping on the light to my right I got out of the bed butt naked. It seemed while I was dozing off my exhaustion and alcohol, stud boy had gotten dressed in black on black sweats, and had gotten a bag full of toys. Safe cracking toys, I would guess. Normally, this would make me laugh. In Vegas, everyone had an angle, and if someone was telling me this tale and it was about a tourist, I would chuckle. But I wasn’t a freaking tourist, this was my story, and I wasn’t laughing. Nope, this was the cherry on my shit sundae of a week.

“I can explain,” He replied sheepishly putting his palms up in the air in surrender.

“You know, every time a man starts a sentence with ‘I can explain’ it generally means he’s done something so shitty that he probably warrants a bullet in his ass.”

I let my irritation show. The bastard tried his bewitching grin on me. He took in my naked form and grinned bigger.

“How about you put the gun down and I explain using my tongue?”

I almost gagged. He thought I was going to let him fuck me after I found him trying to rob me? Damn, he was a freaking gigolo and his friend and probably co-worker Matt had tried to warn me.

He was a good-looking guy that brought a woman upstairs and then robbed her when she was asleep. It was a known con, the hookers did it to tourists a lot. It was brilliant because prostitution was technically illegal, so what were you supposed to tell the cops when they showed up? The hooker I took upstairs to participate in unlawful activity stole my money? No, I hadn’t paid for the sex but he was going to try to rob me all the same.

Pissed I smirked and waved him away from the safe using the gun. I kept about a good 10 feet between us. If he lunged at me, I could get off a shot before he could get anywhere near me.

Watching me with his hands still in the air he shuffled toward the bathroom door to his left.

“While your tongue was adequate I want to get a look at that body one last time. Strip.” I ordered.

He smiled, he really thought he was going to get out of this. Idiot.

He slowly peeled off his sweatshirt, then came his sweatpants and boxers.

When he was finally naked, he grinned at me smugly. His smile fell when I raised the gun to the level of his smaller head. I practically giggled when he placed his hands tentatively over his limp prick. I couldn’t believe I had found this guy attractive, what the hell was I thinking? Oh, that’s right, I wasn’t, and I’d had lusty tequila goggles on. Sigh, I was absolutely done with one-night stands, I was going to invest in the best vibrator on the market and be done with this crap.

“While impressive that you might be. You overlooked one of my rules.”

Yep, now he was concerned. I started walking him backward toward the hotel room door.

“Baby, come on what rule was that?” He chuckled nervously.

“You were supposed to leave when we were done fucking,” I retorted. I yanked open the door never letting the gun waver in my grip. Waving him in front of me, I shoved him out the door, naked as the day he was born.

Caught off guard, he stumbled into the wall across from my hotel suite door. When he twisted toward me, I could see the moment when he realized he was nude. “Oh and don’t call me baby.” I finished slamming the door in his startled face.

Throwing open the shower door I pushed all of Ridge’s equipment inside and turned on the hot water. It was a little dramatic but it made me feel better. The clock read 7 a.m., feeling the effects of the tequila and too many sleepless nights, I trudged back to bed and resolved to go back to sleep so I could start my day over.

After what only seemed like minutes, I heard my annoying alarm blasting on my phone. Normally after working in the bar till about 3 or 4 in the morning, I would sleep until about 2 p.m., clumsily grabbing for the ringing phone on the nightstand, I accidently knocked it to the ground.

Forcing myself to open my eyes before I beat the offending phone to death, I peered down and saw a ton of text messages. They were all from Rachel.

Shit, I grasped the phone, shut off the buzzer and began to scroll.

11:45 p.m. I’m so sorry about the bar and Uncle Jack, plz call.

12:05 a.m. Synclair, they’re coming to get me, they’re pissed about the bar. Please you gotta talk to them for me

1:00 a.m. Syn!!!! I know you care, please don’t let them take me!

1:15 a.m. Where are you?

1:56 a.m. I’m freaking out, what do I do?

The next message scared me to my core.

8:30 a.m. Sorry Patrick, Rachel can’t play anymore.

Holy fuck, my sleep clouded brain struggled to process what was taking place. Who was coming to take Rachel? She sounded frightened, she sounded like she feared for her life. Was it Luis? No, I dismissed that idea, he wouldn’t have told her he was coming and I doubt he would go after my barmaid.

My head was pounding, and I was still desperately fatigued. I fought off the beginning of another migraine. I couldn’t deal with one of my migraine episodes where I would pass out or have to lay in the dark until it passed. The last few days of no sleep were still pulling at me, despite the few hours I had just gotten. I wasn’t the kind of person who could run on no sleep, my uncle Jack would say it made me, ‘wonky.' Which means I made poor decisions and lacked general tact and good judgment. Shit, a case could be made that I was ‘wonky’ a lot.

I studied the messages again, the last one was about 5 ½ hours ago. Hitting Rachel’s number I waited for her to answer. Damn, it went directly to voicemail. I quickly tapped out a text telling to her to call me. Not waiting to see if she would, I forced myself to the shower. Crap, I had left it on this whole time? Sighing, I kicked Ridge’s, now worthless, burglar equipment out of my way and stepped in. The water was barely tepid, but it was sufficient to clear my foggy mind. Using the shampoo and conditioner I had bought at Target, I washed up and toweled off in record time. Pulling my red curls back into a ponytail, I skipped the make-up. I grabbed my new t-shirt and jeans from the Target bag that still lay on the floor next to the bed. Pulling on my shoes, I checked my phone, nothing from Rachel. Whomever she was scared of had a substantial lead on me and judging from the last text message they were already with her.

Throwing everything into the light duffel bag, including my handgun, I rushed down to the valet to pick up my car. Moments later, the valet held open the door to my red, Mustang baby. Smiling, I pulled my sunglasses from the visor and headed to Rachel’s dorm.

I made the trip in record time, I pulled into the lot. There weren’t many cars there today, that made sense since it was the weekend. The odd thing was, I didn’t see Rachel’s car either. I ignored the dread that was building in my stomach and walked toward the dorm units. I wasn’t sure if it was worry for Rachel or the memory of the last time I was here all those years ago that made my stomach sick.

Deciding I was not going to think about the latter, I focused on getting to Rachel’s dorm. After finding some college kid with a nose ring and a Metallica shirt, I got directions to Rachel’s room. Finding the room wasn’t hard, it was ignoring the orange carpet that hadn’t been changed since I had roamed these halls, it was the cream-colored walls with posters about upcoming events that I tried not to look at, but it was the slightly ajar dorm room that really got me nervous.

I swung open the door and looked around. Her bed looked disheveled, her Victoria Secret comforter flung back as if she had jumped out of bed. It was a small room, it held a desk, a bed, and a community bathroom. I knew the layout, I had a similar one when I had attended the University. I went to a small dresser and pulled it open, I wasn’t surprised that it was empty. There was no closet, so I started looking at the books and papers on the floor. Some were textbooks on animal science, others were math and other basics. What captured my attention where the birthday cards. The first one I opened up was covered in pink glitter. It read Happy Birthday Sis, it was signed “Your bros.” Off to the side, written in red ink was, ‘’you ready to come home yet? Who the hell is this Patrick you work for? A Bar?

It didn’t take long to figure out that Rachel’s extremely, overprotective older brothers hadn’t known she worked at a bar. What was more puzzling is why they had addressed me by my last name? Did Rachel tell them that I was a man? Shit, they found out about the bar burning down, that she worked in a bar and had apparently dragged her kicking and screaming back to the small town up North.

I studied the other two items on the floor. They were unopened cards, looking at the back of the envelopes they both had the same address. Great, Carson City.  Of course, Carson City was only about 400 miles north of Vegas. As the capital of my great state, it had about 60,000 in population. No wonder she wanted to come here to go to school. I couldn’t imagine what one would do in Carson City for fun. Not to mention the weather. I was not a snow person. I liked the heat, and I had no desire to be anywhere that required a jacket.

Still not certain what I was doing, I took a picture of the Carson City address with my phone. I don’t know why this bothered me. Rachel was with family. I’m confident they wouldn’t hurt her.
You don’t know that people often hurt the ones they love the most.
Came the annoying voice in my brain. Wonderful, now I was talking to myself.

Sighing, I set down on her soft bed. Nothing positive could come from tracking down Rachel. I should just google her family and see if I could get a number, then I could text her. Putting my throbbing head in my hands, I groaned. This was not my problem.
But she sounded scared on the text message, and whoever sent the last one was a douchebag, who thinks your name is Patrick.
The voice scolded. I was about to tell the voice in my head to shut the hell up when I spied Rachel’s cell phone under her desk. It looked like it had been chucked there. I immediately crossed the small room in two strides and reached down for the small IPhone. The screen was cracked, and the phone was off. Turning the phone on I thumbed through her contacts, it’s not like I was breaking into it, she didn’t even have a password, I reasoned with no one in particular. I stopped when I came to my number. No wonder her brothers were pissed. She had my contact information under ‘My Patrick’.

Now, I don’t know how her brothers found out about the bar or why she didn’t tell them where she was working. I sure as hell didn’t know why she had me in her phone under my last name? Was she trying to give the impression that we were involved? I had nothing against women, I just didn’t dig them sexually. Shaking those thoughts away, I recalled seeing Rachel date, at least, a handful of guys since I had known her.

Still struggling to wrap my head around the recent turn of events in my life, I glanced around the small room. It reminded me of Rachel, it was warm and pink and feminine. It reminded me of when I was younger when I thought my whole life was going to change. A time when I thought I could be anyone I wanted to be if I just wanted it bad enough.

Reece Hudson had cured those fantasies. No, he hadn’t done it alone, Amber and his friends had been right there to help. I closed my eyes against the memories. Looking backward is useless, I told myself. What’s done is done. Still, I could almost feel Reece’s powerful arms around me. It was one and only time I had felt safe with anybody. I could practically smell his musky cologne and if I concentrated I could feel his lips on my neck.
Wait? What?

I jumped up off the bed and stalked out the door, pulling it shut behind me. I slipped Rachel’s phone in my pocket and tried to shut out the images that were flooding back. I needed to get out of this dorm. I could still hear Amber taunting me, I could feel my cheeks flush when I remembered being led by Donny to his patrol car and the humiliating jail experience after.

I liked Rachel, but this was not my problem. I had a shit load of my own issues right now and this was not one of them. Practically running to my car, I threw open the door and tore out of the parking lot like the devil himself was chasing me. But Rachel had reached out to me, she had begged me to not let them take her. Guilt began to seep in. I helped women at the shelter all the time, here was a girl, a good kid who had only ever tried to be my friend and I was a shitty person because I wasn’t there for her. And where was I when Rachel needed me? Getting laid and then almost robbed because I was feeling sorry for myself.
Jesus Syn, when did you turn into such a pussy?

I am not going, I told myself. “
Yes you are, you care,”
I responded. Oh wonderful, my crazy was complete.