Colton Baby Rescue. Marie Ferrarella

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       Chapter 1

      He really did not have time for this.

      Detective Carson Gage frowned as he drove down the darkened streets to The Pour House. He had more important things to do than attend his older brother Bo’s bachelor party at a second-rate dive bar in the sketchy part of town.

      Hell, he would have rather stayed home and spent the evening talking to his K-9 unit partner, Justice. Granted it would have only been a one-way conversation, but the German shepherd was probably more intelligent than half the people who were going to be at the bachelor party anyway.

      This whole thing was a joke, the Red Ridge police detective thought. Bo shouldn’t be getting married anyway, not to a woman who he’d only known for a total of three months. This was way too sudden.

      The whole thing seemed rather strange to him, not to mention ironic. Bo’s bachelor party was being thrown at The Pour House, which just happened to be owned by Rusty Colton, who was the father of Bo’s last girlfriend, Demi—the woman Bo had been engaged to for one month, then dumped when he took up with Hayley Patton, his current bride-to-be.

      More than likely, Carson thought dourly, given who was being invited to this party, the evening was going to end up in a huge brawl—which was why he intended to stay for just one drink, then get the hell out of there.

      Besides, he had work to do. His burning obsession was to find some piece of irrefutable evidence he could use to finally put away the Larson brothers, the cold-blooded twins who fancied themselves up-and-coming crime lords intent on building up a vast criminal empire and destroying everything and everyone in their path.

      The Larsons were behind at least two murders that he knew of and they were at the center of a rash of drug busts, but because the thugs who worked for the brothers were more afraid of them than they were of the police, he hadn’t been able to find anyone willing to testify against the twins.

      But he would. Come hell or high water, he would, Carson swore, his hands tightening on his car’s steering wheel. All he needed was to find that one elusive piece of evidence that would start the process of nailing the Larson brothers’ coffins shut.

      Carson picked his way through the streets, driving slowly. The area seemed even more unsavory at this time of night than it was during the day.

      “If you have to marry this one, why couldn’t you just run off and elope like a normal guy?” Carson asked out loud, addressing the brother who wasn’t there. “Why all this need for fanfare and hoopla?”

      It almost seemed, what with having the bachelor party at The Pour House, like Bo was deliberately rubbing Demi’s nose in his wedding.

      Yup, fireworks were definitely going to be on the agenda tonight, Carson thought. One beer and he was out of there, he promised himself again. He had no burning desire to break up a bunch of drunken men who should know better, doing their damnedest to knock each other’s heads off. Bo had said he was inviting both Coltons and Gages to this party. Gasoline and fire, Carson thought.

      He swore under his breath. No, he definitely didn’t need this.

      With a sigh, he pulled into The Pour House’s parking lot. Because he wanted to be able to drive off the lot with a minimum of maneuvering—and make sure that his car didn’t get dented by some celebrant who had overindulged in liquid courage, Carson decided to park all the way in the back of the lot. It would be a bit of a trek to the bar’s front door, but it was between that and his peace of mind, and his peace of mind definitely made it worth it.

      So he guided his vehicle all the way to the last row of the lot. The lot happened to back up against a grassy embankment.

      Pulling up the hand brake, he sat there for a while, trying to get into the right frame of mind.

      It wasn’t happening.

      With a sigh, the police detective got out of his car and locked it. Carson was about to start walking toward the entrance of the bar when he thought he saw someone lying facedown at the very far edge of the lot.

      Carson paused, squinting. That part of the parking lot was pretty dark. What streetlights there were didn’t reach that far.

      “Looks like someone’s already been partying too much,” he muttered under his breath.

      Some people just couldn’t pace themselves accordingly and this guy obviously couldn’t hold his liquor, Carson thought. With a resigned sigh, he changed course and headed toward the drunk instead of the bar. If he didn’t wake the guy up and get him out of the way, Carson had no doubt that during the course of the evening, someone was liable to run the drunk over.

      The lot wasn’t all that full yet, he observed. This guy must have got a really early start. From what he could make out, the man was half on the edge of the lot, half on the grass at the very perimeter of the parking lot.

      Drawing nearer, Carson saw that the man, whose face was obscured because it was turned toward the grass, had one arm stretched out with his index finger raised, like he was trying to draw attention to something.

      That’s odd.

      And then, despite the fact that it was pretty dark there, Carson saw that there was writing on the ground just above the man’s head. It looked as if he had written something—

      In blood?

      Taking his phone out, he hit the flashlight app, then squatted down. Using the light from his phone, Carson looked at the ground just above the man’s head more closely.

      “It looks like you wrote Demi C,” Carson murmured, half to himself. The last letter was barely finished.

      Demi C? Demi Colton?

      Carson’s eyes widened. What was this guy doing, writing the name of his brother’s former girlfriend on the parking lot asphalt? And where had the blood come from? Had the guy hit his head?

      “Hey, fella, wake up. The parking lot’s no place to take a nap.” He shook the man’s shoulder but couldn’t seem to rouse him.

      Blowing out a breath, Carson rose to his feet and circled the man’s body so he could get a look at the drunk’s face.

      “C’mon, fella, you can’t sleep it off here. You’ve gotta get—”

      The rest of the sentence froze on Carson’s lips.

      The man he was trying to wake up was his brother. Bo’s eyes were wide-open and unseeing.

      There was a black cummerbund stuffed into his mouth. And he wasn’t breathing.