Page 208 of Sin Bin

Hunter muttered under his breath in French.

They steered Logan to the massive bed, where Hunter picked him up and deposited him in the middle of the mattress. Meadow unlaced his huge Timbs and pulled them off. Then she tucked him in, pulling the covers up over his body. She leaned over him, tenderly kissing his forehead.

When she stepped back to gaze down at him, he suddenly rolled over onto his stomach and mumbled into his pillow, “Gone. Just…gone…”

She and Hunter exchanged bewildered glances.

“Let’s let him sleep it off,” Hunter murmured.

She nodded and took one last worried look at Logan, then followed Hunter out of the room. She left the door cracked open so she would hear Logan in case he woke up and needed help.

Returning to the living room, she and Hunter went to work righting furniture and sweeping up broken glass, trying to repair the damage Logan had wrought. They talked quietly as they worked. Hunter told her everything he could about his friendship with Logan, and she shared stories from their time together at the group home.

By the time they finished cleaning up, Meadow felt like they’d formed a special bond.

A bond forged by their connection to an utterly broken man.

It took logan several hours to sleep off his drunkenness.

After sharing takeout with Meadow, Hunter went home to finish a class assignment. Before leaving, he asked her to let him know when Logan woke up.

After he left, she returned to the bedroom to check on Logan. He’d thrown off the covers and lay sprawled across the bed, eating it up with his sheer size. As she stood there watching him in the moonlight, she was struck by the contrast between his boyish sleeping face and the tattooed arms bulging out of his undershirt.

Her heart ached for him, this troubled manchild of hers.

Suddenly he groaned and rolled to his side.

She sat on the edge of the bed and gently stroked his hair.

He opened his eyes and blinked up at her, his black pupils glittering in the moonlight. “Jupiter?” His voice was gravel.

She smiled softly. “Hi.”

He looked toward the floor-to-ceiling windows and frowned. “What time is it?”

“Just after nine o’clock. You’ve been out for a while.” She turned on the bedside lamp, causing him to wince and groan. “Sorry.”

He sat up gingerly, ropes of muscle moving beneath his undershirt.

She stared at him in concern. “What happened, Logan?”

He shook his head, pressing the heels of his hands against his eyes.

“I was so worried about you,” she said quietly. “I didn’t know what to think when I couldn’t reach you.”

Without responding, he swung his long legs over the edge of the bed and held his head in his hands.

She eyed him sympathetically. She didn’t have much experience dealing with drunk people. She’d tended to her adoptive mother when she got sick, but hangovers were a different story.

Logan pushed himself into a standing position, then swayed like a punch-drunk boxer.

When she moved to help him, he waved her off and growled, “I got it.”

She watched in helpless frustration as he stumbled to the bathroom, making it just in time to hurl into the toilet.

Cringing in sympathy, she grabbed her phone and sent off a quick text to Hunter. Then she tossed her phone down and hurried into the black marble bathroom. The toilet was in an enclosed area with opaque glass doors. She couldn’t see Logan, but the stench of vomit hit her as soon as she stepped into the private space.

He was bent over the bowl puking his guts out. She felt bile rising in her throat, but she forced it down as she rubbed his back and murmured soothingly.

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