The Bet (Winslow Brothers 1)

But my truth doesn’t stem from things like love. It’s more of a blanket statement about life in general.

“Do you think I’m in love with her?” Jude asks so quietly I almost don’t hear him, but Rem is quick to volley that question right back.

“Do you feel like you are?”

“I don’t know,” he mutters and stares down at his clasped hands. “I’ve never been in love before. How would I know what it feels like?”

“When it’s good, it feels like you’re fucking flying.”

Jude quirks a brow at Remy. “And when it’s bad?”

“Like someone rearranged your insides,” he repeats Jude’s earlier words, and by the outright shocked look on my youngest brother’s face, it’s safe to say they hit the nail on the head.

“Fuck,” he mutters, and Rem looks over at me, his eyes silently communicating what I’m already thinking—Jude’s in love.

The poor bastard.

“I definitely need a drink now,” Jude grumbles. “You guys want anything?”

I shake my head, but Rem says, “I’ll take a bourbon.”

And once a cocktail waitress Jude waved down brings them their drinks, the mood lightens enough for Rem to ask, “So, how did you meet Sophie, by the way?”

“Oddly enough, it all started with a bet with this dancer Mav—” Mid-sentence, Jude just stops talking, and his face scrunches up in a combination of terror and shock.

“Jude, buddy? You good?” I ask, and he shakes his head.

“I…I have to go.”

“What?”

“I have to go,” he says and hops up from the couch. He starts to walk away from us but turns back around to say, “Tell them to put your drink on my tab.”

“Where the fuck are you going?!” Rem shouts toward his retreating back.

“Somewhere important! I’ll call you tomorrow!”

And then he’s gone, disappearing into the crowd without any further explanation. Leaving Rem and me with gaped jaws and puzzled eyes.

“Well, shit, I guess he’s done for the night.”

I glance at Remy, and a shocked laugh hops out of my throat. “Yeah, but I guess it’s better than seeing him walk around this club like an angry lunatic.”

“I hear that.” Remy chuckles. “You think he’s heading in Sophie’s direction?”

“No fucking clue.”

“Do you want to stay here any longer?”

I smirk. “Hell no.”

“Same.” Rem grins and lifts his glass in the air. “What do you say, after I finish this bourbon, we head out of here and grab something to eat?”

“I’m down.”

But as we sit there, I can’t stop myself from asking him something that’s been bugging me since I heard him trying to talk our brother off the ledge. “So, tell me, did you believe all that stuff you were saying to Jude? About how if you were in his shoes, you’d be trying to make it work with Sophie?”

“Fuck no,” Remy mutters. “No offense to Sophie, because she seems like an awesome girl, but love has never done me any favors. And I don’t plan on being a fan of it anytime soon.”

I grin. And also, I can’t find it in me to disagree.

Jude

“Jude?” Tommy, one of my favorite bouncers at Club Craze, calls out toward me as I dash through the door, past the velvet ropes, and onto the pavement like a madman. “You all right, bro?”

“I need a cab.”

“On it.” He nods and, thankfully, doesn’t question me any further.

I have no real plan, just a semblance of a plan, and I’m sure my brothers are currently sitting in the club wondering what in the hell just happened.

But I didn’t have time to explain the crazy shit rolling around inside my head.

I pace the sidewalk while I wait for Tommy to get me a cab. The whole time, my back feels rigid with tension and my eyes can’t focus on anything.

I can’t believe I didn’t fucking see it. Remember it.

But then again, who would really think that some wack job fortune-teller would even be able to predict my future? Certainly not me.

“Yo, Jude!” Tommy calls my name, and I look up from my boots to see him standing there, holding the back door of a cab open.

Thank fuck.

I’m offering Tommy a quick thanks and hopping into the damn thing in record time. And once I tell the driver an address in Manhattan, he puts his foot on the gas and gets us rolling.

Like always, though, traffic in New York on a Saturday night is a nightmare. Especially since spring is starting to make its debut, and people actually want to be outside doing shit.

Which means, we hit every red light. Get delayed by two fire trucks and another three ambulances that temporarily bring traffic to a halt. And I feel like I age a thousand years by the time the cabbie is pulling onto the street and coming to a stop in front of the address I gave him.

Neon lights of a strip club shine from the top of the building and reflect off the windshield of his taxi.