Read Better (Stark Ink Book 2) for Free Online Page B

manner.
    But Dalton had pissed them off. He’d been too far inside the bottle to realize he hadn’t made a payment in a while, and although he’d technically still had some time to pay back the loan, every day that he spent drunk on his couch and not at work saw the possibility of getting clear of it slip further and further away. They’d come looking for the cash, but they’d gone to the wrong address. They’d roughed up Adam instead, tore up Stark Ink, and threatened to do worse if they didn’t get their money. Dalton had a long list of people that he’d screwed over when he was screwed up, and Adam’s name was at the very top. Dalton was steadily working his way down it.
    Tonight he was starting a new list though, a shit list, and the only person on it was named Patrick Grant.
    “You sure he’s at home?” Dalton asked, glancing in the rear view just in case.
    Zoey nodded. “I’m sure.”
    Dalton gripped the steering wheel tightly. As fast as he’d driven to get to her, now he kept it slow and steady, for her sake. “What happened?”
    She didn’t answer.
    He sighed. God forbid that fucker had cheated and God help him if he had and then hit Zoey over it. Dalton thought he might actually kill the man. Even as he thought all of this, in the back of his mind he was totally aware how hypocritical it was to be so pissed off if Grant had stepped out on her. Either way, whatever had happened, they had to be done. Zoey wouldn’t stand for this. She might not have been capable enough to stop it from happening in the moment, but he knew she wouldn’t put up with this bullshit.
    “So,” he said cautiously out of concern for her, “does this mean the wedding’s off?”
    Zoey’s head turned and she stared at him.
    “What?” he asked. “Zoey, he hit you. You can’t stay with him. You can’t marry a guy who’d-”
    “We are married,” she said quietly.
    Dalton’s jaw dropped. He shook his head, unable to come up with anything to say.
    “We got married in June.”
    June. He would’ve been in that little white room at that point, puking and shaking and asking God or the Devil (whoever would answer faster) to make it all stop. Mom had already been put in the ground. Zoey’d gotten married and he hadn’t even known it. Every day felt as though she had just left, he guessed because he hadn’t ever really moved on. When he thought back, he realized she’d been gone nearly a year. Ten months and twenty some odd days. He’d counted the days, weeks, and months of his sobriety meticulously, but had never done the same with their breakup, it had just… existed— past, present, and future all rolled into one.
    Zoey had been gone, was gone, and would be gone forever. Except she was here now, but for all the wrong reasons. Feeling overwhelmed, he decided to just focus on driving instead. He turned twice and waited for two lights in silence before he finally pulled into his own driveway. Zoey seemed nearly as distracted as he was. She suddenly looked up and out the window.
    “Where are we?” she asked.
    “My place. My new place. It’s closer to Pop’s house,” he replied. And I don’t have any memories of you making pancakes in the kitchen. He briefly wondered if he’d have to move again after this. Even one night with her under this roof would be tough on him, to tell the truth, especially since nothing was going the way he wanted it to.
    He unlocked the front door and let her inside. He turned on the lights revealing his (mostly) bare apartment. He had a couch and a television and a dining room table. The table he’d made— before the accident— and it was his favorite piece of furniture. He was building a coffee table in the garage with plans for an entertainment center to match, but it was slow going these days because it was just him, though, he didn’t mind.
    Zoey looked around, not saying anything. He’d tossed a lot of stuff in the move: an old chair that had seen better days, barstools