The Pact (Winslow Brothers #2)(23)

I still fucking hate these things, but a smile almost cracks through the fatigue a weekend in Vegas with my three brothers has created on my face, and I find myself feeding the slot a twenty-dollar bill.

I’m credited immediately, and as any guy with balls would, I hit the max bet button and take my chances with a spin of the reels.

They’re off to the races, dinging and calculating and loading into the most random fucking line pattern in the world with buffalo and sunrises and wolves and all kinds of shit that shouldn’t have any part in real gambling. There’s no science to it. No figuring it out. No skill. It’s all blind luck based on the spin of a digital machine.

Nevertheless, something evidently good happens in my favor, the lights and sirens firing wildly into the otherwise silent cacophony of the Las Vegas airport. I can practically feel the sneers from hungover passengers, their bloodshot eyes finding me from behind the solace of their big hats and dark glasses to gift me with a glare.

That part of it, I’ll admit, gives me a little bit of joy. So much so, that I find myself nearly grinning when my brothers Ty and Jude gallop over like a couple of lost puppies on an exploratory adventure.

“What the hell? Are you playing the fucking slots?” Jude remarks, his gestures just about as grand as his jubilant words. I roll my eyes at his obvious observation and hit the button to bet again.

“Oh my God, you are,” Ty concludes, every bit of the PhD he holds clearly having been earned.

“I never thought I’d see this. This is like a unicorn. A leprechaun at the end of the rainbow. A glitter fairy in a neon forest,” Jude rambles, taking out his phone to get a picture of me.

I pay him no mind as I push the button again, the buffalo making a wholly obnoxious running in a stampede kind of sound when I hit the correct combination to win a bonus game.

“I’m putting this in my wedding scrapbook,” Jude continues, pulling his phone to his chest and hugging it like an idiot. Ty laughs, which only encourages his behavior. “In fact, I’m going to text it to Sophie now so she can add it to the rehearsal dinner slide show. This is like getting a candid shot of Bigfoot without the photo looking like you snapped it with a potato.”

A lesser man might cave to their bullshit—might snap verbally or physically by leaving—but I’m more than used to my brothers by this point in my life. For God’s sake, it’s always been like this, even when we were kids. They’re rowdy and mouthy, and if it weren’t for the distinct line of all our jaws, I’d swear I was birthed from a different set of loins. Or, at the very least, the mailman’s son.

But we are definitely blood related, that fact known by all four of us and our baby sister and muddied by the reality that our biological father peaced out on his family when we were kids.

I spin again, and another bonus round pops up. Once again, I’ve managed to double my money. I smile a little, thinking of how excited this would make Daisy and picturing the expression on her face when she realized it was even more thrilling when my tongue was spinning her reels.

Fuck, she makes a good face when she comes. Pretty and memorable but not off-puttingly over the top like some women I’ve been with. She’s uninhibited without dramatizing her reactions like some kind of act. I don’t need the moans of a porn star from my partners—just undeniable acknowledgment that I’m making them feel good.

And Daisy knew just how to acknowledge. Instantly, I’m struck with the regret of taking a shower this morning, effectively rinsing off her scent and replacing it with my own.

“Sophie’s adding it to the queue now, Flynnbot,” Jude announces with a toothy grin. “Not to worry.”

I shake my head in amusement.

“See, Flynn, this is why all the ladies flock to us,” Ty interjects. “Just like last night, you insist on being, like, the world’s greatest mime or something. I don’t even think I heard you say one thing last night.”

Jude scoffs. “Like you remember anything about last night, bro.”

“Hey, man, I was just celebrating you! My baby brother is getting married! That’s huge.”

“Come on,” Remy announces, his face completely pinched in annoyance and all of my brothers’ bags hanging from his shoulders. “They’re boarding our flight, assholes. Time to get home and not drink for an eternity.”

I smile a little at Remy’s pain. He’s two years older than me, so I know, at his age, he has to be feeling this shit pretty good.

“Bullshit,” Jude denies. “You’re drinking at my wedding, bro, because that’s what you do at all weddings. You dance, you celebrate, and you drink like a fish in the name of the happy bride and groom.”

Not all weddings end with a happy bride and groom, I think to myself, and when I look over at Rem, I note his face has already shifted. No doubt going to a dark, nearly fucking morbid place as he remembers his almost-wedding of nearly a decade and a half ago, and all three of the rest of us see it. It’s like a pin in a shrieking balloon—just like that, pop, all the shit-talk is done.

Jude and Ty step forward and take their bags, and without a word, Remy stalks in the other direction, headed for our plane.

“All weddings? Why’d you have to say it like that?” Ty whispers harshly to Jude as we all hustle along behind Remy toward the gate.

I smack Ty on the back of the head and pass them. “Just drop it.”