Stay the Night Read Online Free Page B

and told tall tales all night. Quoting Shakespeare, Rowdy had said, “For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother,” and that’d been the start of their long friendship.
    Rowdy was large and powerful, the same as he’d always been. In his mid-thirties, he still had a full head of hair, the tone and speed he had ten years earlier, and the irrepressible urge to cause havoc.
    Then what Rowdy had said registered. Ian shook his head to clear the whiskey’s fog. “What do you mean you came to stay? How did you find out where I lived?”
    “I called your dad.” Rowdy jerked out of his jacket and tossed it on his bag before sprawling on a chair. “Not that it’s a secret, because there was some kid out front trying to get a hold of you. I figured you weren’t in.”
    Kid? Ian frowned. “Did he have sandy hair that flopped in his eyes and freckles?”
    “Yeah. You have a child out of wedlock?” Rowdy raised his eyebrows. “You’d have to have had this one when you were like fourteen.”
    “Not my kid,” he said, hoarse. “He’s the one who ran into me.”
    “Ah.” Rowdy nodded. “You talk to him?”
    “No.” And he wasn’t going to. He crossed his arms, trying not to hate the kid for making a mistake. Anyone could have crashed into his car. It was just dumb luck that this kid did and it had ended his career.
    “The kid seemed sincere,” Rowdy continued. “You need to forgive him.”
    He didn’t need to do anything. He glared at his so-called friend and willed him to spontaneously combust.
    “You also need to call your folks. They’re worried about you.”
    “You know what I don’t need?”
    Rowdy frowned in confusion. “What?”
    “For you to tell me how to deal with my life, and I don’t want you to stay.”
    “Tough, buddy, on both counts.” He looked around the apartment. “Swanky. Looks a little like a hotel, doesn’t it?”
    Like he cared. It came furnished, so he hadn’t had to unpack any of the items his manager had brought from his last place. He swallowed another mouthful of whiskey.
    “I’ll take that.” Rowdy snatched the bottle from his hand and looked at it as he sat down. “Your dad’s whiskey?”
    He grunted.
    Rowdy tipped the bottle to his mouth and hummed as he took a swallow. “ Nice . Your dad should sell this stuff.”
    His dad made whiskey as a hobby. It was an expensive, encompassing hobby, but it was a passion nonetheless. Ian held his hand out. “Give it back.”
    “No.” Rowdy shook his head. “You’re done with this.”
    “I’m plain done.” Ian sat up and glared at the other man. “Give it back.”
    “No.” Suddenly frowning, Rowdy lunged forward and grabbed the book from the table. “Crikey, dude, I had no idea you were this far gone, or I’d have come sooner.”
    Ian looked dispassionately at the romance novel in his friend’s hand. “I’m reading that.”
    “ Tempted by Fate ?” Rowdy turned it around, as though it’d be different in the back. “Did you have head trauma in the accident, too?”
    “Bugger off.”
    “You’re repeating yourself.”
    He leaned forward enough to grab the book back before he collapsed back on the couch. He’d started reading romance novels in the hospital; one of the nicer nurses gave them to him. At first, he’d scoffed, but she began to read one to him and he’d gotten hooked. They were full of hope, and his life had looked especially hopeless from the hospital bed.
    It didn’t look much better now, but the habit of reading romances had stuck.
    Rowdy sprawled on the couch across from him. “Your dad told me you went to the doctor last week.”
    Donald MacNiven was a magpie. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
    “I know, but you’re going to anyway.”
    He wanted to throw the book at his friend’s head. “Don’t tell me what to do. You don’t know anything. You have no idea what it’s like to have your career ended because of an accident.”
    “Is that what the doctor