Page 2 of See You Again

He could have been nicer—should have been nicer—but with an almost crushing weariness, he just wanted to be left alone.

“Fine!” Lexie said with an angry huff, but then she hesitated, obviously thinking he was playing some sort of game.

James kept his eyes on the antique mirror behind the bar and watched her eyes narrow in the reflection.

“Asshole,” she muttered before turning to saunter over to the group.

James nodded in agreement. He didn’t used to be. Lately, it had become his default setting.

“I thought that was a sure thing,” Annie murmured, as she wiped the bar near him.

It had been.

James wasn’t sure why he had sabotaged it. Until a few minutes ago, he’d been set on his plan for the evening. Lexie had been clear about what she was after, and it wasn’t as if James was interested in anything more than a few pleasurable hours upstairs… Suddenly, being another famous name on a beautiful woman’s roster wasn’t enough anymore.

This is Luke’s fault, James thought bitterly.

If his identical twin hadn’t fallen so ridiculously in love right on the heels of their younger sister Cara’s whirlwind marriage, James wouldn’t even be thinking about sappy things like that. For years, one-night stands had worked perfectly, but after seeing how happy his siblings were, the brief encounters had begun to feel empty.

He took a healthy swig of his drink. “Not interested.”

“Bad day in court?”

“No, I won.” He avoided her eyes. James grabbed a sandwich at the bar most nights, and the bartender and he had struck up a friendship of sorts. But not one where he was going to open up to her.

Annie crossed her arms across her chest, her tattooed forearms flexing. It was how they first connected—their love of tattoos. She arched a pierced eyebrow.

“I decided I’d rather have some peace and quiet.” James punctuated the statement with a hard stare.

Before she had a chance to respond, the sound of breaking glass made both their heads swivel.

“Shit. I don’t care how talented that dude is. He’s a pain in the ass.”

A barback rushed to clean up the broken remains of a pyramid of glasses around the small table.

“If he’s got his own place in town, why is he here?” Bothering me, James wanted to add.

Annie wrinkled her nose, but didn’t answer.

The barback’s eyes were shining when she straightened from dumping a dustpan full of shattered glass in the trash. “Do you know who’s over there?” The young woman’s voice trembled with excitement.

James fought the urge to roll his eyes.

“Kip Jordan. I can see and hear him from here,” Annie replied, unimpressed.

“No! Madison Amherst.”

James’s ears perked up. He knew that name. She was one of the hosts of the popular cold case podcast Murder She Spoke.

Hosts. Plural.

James rolled his shoulders against a sudden tightness. The barback had said Madison.

Not her.

Several months ago, Luke’s girlfriend Dahlia brought it to the Bloom family’s attention that the Murder She Spoke podcast had covered a poisoning that shared several similarities to his father’s death almost two years ago. James had volunteered to look into it, hoping they would find something to help prove their stepmother Courtney had killed David Bloom, thereby nullifying the new will that left everything to her.

James still remembered the gut punch of seeing the photos of the hosts on the podcast’s social media. What were the odds? Only after his brother Declan persisted did James swallow his pride and reach out to the show, asking if they would share their research.

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