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I shoot my older brother a glare, and before I can tell him to come up with his own fucking solutions, Wyatt drops back to the table with a round of shots.
Beef, a burly bartender with a shaved head and a long black beard, leans across the bar. He waves a bottle of vodka around like a mallet. “Wyatt, you see this sign?” He gestures at the chalkboard hanging on the wall next to a signed photo of Clint Eastwood. Scrawled across it in threatening red chalk is DAYS WITHOUT A FIGHT—50. The exact amount of time Wyatt’s been on the rodeo circuit. “I’m warning you, you ruin my streak and I’ll kick your ass myself.”
It’s the law of the land every weekend. Riotous and violent living. We drink. We fight. We do it all over again. We’ll be doing this till the day we die.
Here, in Resurrection, the Wild West still lives.
Rowdy and rough and situated at the end of Main Street in an old building that used to be a pharmacy, Nowhere is the local’s bar. The last stop before you raise hell. You want to drink someplace safe and secure, you hit up the Spur which is located in the historic Butterworth hotel.
Outsiders are unwelcome.
A fact I know from experience. My brothers and I were met with resistance when we moved here. Now, ten years later, we’ve paid our dues and we’re as local as can be.
“No fights tonight.” Settling in to play town bouncer, Davis points a finger at Wyatt before swinging it to me. “That means you, too.”
Wyatt and I exchange a smirk. While Wyatt’s the first one to start a fight, I always back up my little brother. Which gives Ford and Davis no choice but to join in. Not that Davis puts much heart into it. His grumpy ass usually looks bored swinging a fist.
“We’re in enough trouble with that video anyway,” Ford adds.
Wyatt arches a brow. “Sounds like ayouproblem, Ford.”
Ford scowls at the reminder. It’s the last thing my older brother needs. More bad press. Another video to haunt him.
“We’re all in the shit with the fucking ranch.” Davis scrapes a hand over his dark hair before rubbing his shoulder, where he took a bullet in the Marines. An injury that left him unfit to serve and sent him straight to Resurrection to babysit my sorry ass.
“You hurting?” I ask in a low voice.
“Not too bad.” Davis crosses his arms, refusing to let even an ounce of emotion slide across his face.
“I’ll say it once, I’ll say it again,” Wyatt says. “What’s good getting shot, if you can’t talk about it?”
Davis scowls at Wyatt’s never-ending curiosity of his injury. Our brother never told us what he went through in combat. Not that Davis would open up to any of us.
“Drink this,” Ford insists, brown eyes clocking his twin. He slides a shot of tequila Davis’s way. “Best kind of medicine.”
Davis grunts and accepts the shot.
I can feel them communicating in their secret twin language.
Wyatt knocks back a shot. “I was good for two damn months,” he grouses. He may be a party animal, but when it comes to the rodeo, he doesn’t fuck around. It’s the only thing in his life that gets him to heel.
“Now I’m not saying I’ll be a saint. Because if the Wolfington brothers show their ugly faces, I’m gonna knock their loud mouths out.” Anger flashes in Wyatt’s eyes. “I know my horse is on their goddamn property.”
Davis and I let out the same long-suffering sigh.
The Wolfington brothers have been the bane of our existence since we moved to Resurrection. They’re pissed Stede McGraw sold his land to a boy from South Georgia when the locals were chomping at the bit to get it. In retaliation, they stole a roan of Wyatt’s worth more than a small fortune and never returned it. Now we’ve entered some petty rivalry that, if Wyatt has his way, will last longer than the Hatfield’s and McCoy’s.
Ford groans in exasperation. “Let the horse go, Wy.”
Wyatt ignores him and rubs his hands together in wild glee. “This is gonna be my twentieth bar fight, man.”
“Didn’t you hear?” a husky, familiar voice drawls. “These days, Wyatt has a new setting called Neanderthal.”
An irritated expression overtakes Wyatt’s face as Fallon McGraw approaches the table. Feisty and venomous, Fallon’s the wild child daughter of ex pro bull rider, Stede McGraw.
“Better than your setting.” He ticks off a checklist on his fingers. “Unbridled mayhem. Hell on wheels. Shit stirrer to the nth degree. Category five bi—”
Davis pounds on the table with his fist, ever the moral barometer. “Knock it off, dipshit.”
