Present Day
Get the hell out!” Brant roared as he threw a vase across the room. It landed with a crash on the tile floor, where it exploded into hundreds of blue glass shards.
Bentley stared at the mess, then stepped over the shattered pieces, and continued to make his way over to Brant. “A vase, man? Did you somehow transition into a chick? Is this our first fight? You might as well have thrown a bra. Oh, also”—he walked around the couch while Brant retreated—“you missed.”
“I’m drunk.”
Bentley’s clear blue eyes flashed. “You’re always drunk.”
Brant’s ass collided with the wall. Trapped. He was completely trapped.
In his own apartment.
With the most annoying man on the planet.
Who just so happened to look exactly like Brant minus a few key muscles and with a very unsavory personality flaw.
“Just go.” Brant wiped his hands across his scruffy face. “I’m fine. I just need to sober up.”
Bentley snorted. “And if I had a dollar for every time that phrase came out of your mouth.”
Pain—raw, familiar, all encompassing—wrapped itself around Brant’s throat until he felt like he was going to choke. “Why are you here?”
Bentley slowly turned his head and looked around the apartment. Brant knew what his twin saw. Empty pizza boxes. Beer bottles littered across every flat surface. A few empty fifths of whiskey. Clothes strewn across the couch, and white powder on the coffee table.
“It’s not mine,” he said quickly as guilt stabbed him in the chest at his brother’s disappointed look. “I swear.”
“Would it matter anyway?” Bentley asked in a quiet voice before he slowly walked over to the table, grabbed one of the small plastic packets, and then disappeared down the hall.
A toilet flushed.
When he returned, a tense silence crackled through the air as Brant waited for the yelling, the accusations, more pain.
Because if there was anything he knew without a shadow of a doubt, it was that there would always be more. A human’s capacity for pain was limitless.
He would know.
Damn it, he wasn’t drunk enough if he could feel the pain, if he could conjure up images of her jet-black hair and red pout.
If the air still smelled like her skin no matter how many times he told himself it was a trick of the imagination.
God, he hated her. But not as much as he hated himself.
Nobody hated Brant Wellington as much as he hated himself. He had that market cornered.
And he wore the title with pride. Most days. At least when he was drunk. And not sobering up enough to sense the shattering truth of his reality.
“I’ll clean up.” Bentley went over to the large gourmet kitchen, grabbed a trash bag, and began tossing bottle after bottle. The loud clang of glass hitting glass jarred.
And Brant just stood there.
What was the point? He’d have another party tonight, and the apartment would get trashed again. Why clean up? Why do anything?
“I’d shower if I were you,” Bentley said, interrupting his thoughts. “Grandfather’s on his way over, and I think you’ll want to hear what he has to say.”
Brant clenched his teeth so hard his jaw ached. “I’m not doing it. I don’t care if that woman won me in an auction. I’ve sent her a check to pay back her donation, and every time she sends it back, I send it again. It’s not my fault she doesn’t cash it.”
“Hah!” Bentley barked out a laugh as the clank of glass hitting glass grew louder. “You’re an idiot, you know that, right?”
“Says the man who’s living with his childhood best friend—and a dog you adopted together. Now who’s the idiot? You had it all!”
Bentley froze, the whiskey bottle brushing the top of the trash bag as he shook his head. “You’ve got it backward, man. I used to have nothing. Now I have everything.”
Raw pain sliced through Brant’s chest—and just like that he was transported back to the hospital.
“I have everything.” He kissed Nikki on the forehead. “Everything.”
She grinned. “I hope he looks just like you.”
“And I hope she looks like you,” he countered, just as the doctor walked in, his expression grim.
Brant stood.
The doctor took a deep breath and whispered, “I’m sorry, but, there isn’t a heartbeat.”
Nikki gasped, then started crying softly into her hands. Brant shook his head. It was impossible. The baby was healthy. They were already halfway through their second trimester.
“No.” Brant charged toward the doctor. “Look again! She has a bump, I felt, I felt.” His voice wavered. “I felt our baby yesterday, it kicked and—”
“I’m sorry.” Dr. Jones placed his hand on Brant’s shoulder. “It’s rare, but sometimes these things happen.”
I have everything.
I have everything.
“And because of how far along you are”—the doctor’s face hardened—“you’re going to have to deliver.”
“My baby?” Nikki choked on her sobs. “I have to deliver my dead baby?”
“He isn’t dead!” Brant roared. “It’s not true!”
The doctor sighed. “I’m sorry. I’ll give you a moment.”
Brant turned to Nikki.
I have everything.
I have everything.
I’ve lost everything.
“Hey.” Bentley was suddenly bracing Brant’s shoulders. “Did you hear me? You smell like shit. Go shower before Grandfather shows up and decides your future. You’ll feel better if you don’t smell like old pizza, cocaine, and prostitutes.”
“Well, that was an uplifting speech,” Brant said in a hollow voice, as the memory of Nikki’s face haunted him. Like it always did. Like it always would.
“Go.” Bentley shoved him toward the hallway. “It wouldn’t kill you to shave!” he called just as Brant slammed the bathroom door behind him, slid to the floor, and let out a hoarse yell as he pounded his fist against the cold tile, once, twice—it was going to bruise.
Maybe it would eventually look like his heart.
Beaten.
Bloody.
Fucking broken.