Luke:
The phone’s vibration clawed through the dark before the ring ever reached me. I surfaced from a bourbon-thick sleep, heart hammering against a skull-splitting headache. The screen pulsed on the coffee table, white light strobing across the living room like a warning flare.
I look at the caller ID.
UNKNOWN.
That can only mean one thing.
My throat went dry. I’d been waiting for this—every hour since the alley, every drink I’d poured to drown the waiting.
I fumbled the phone to my ear. “Alex?”
Silence. Then a jagged breath, sharp enough to cut through the static.
“You sound drunk, Luke....” she said, voice low and ragged.
I pushed upright on the couch, the room spinning. “Been a long week.”
“Long week?” A bitter laugh. “You don’t get to drink it away, Luke. Not after what you
