Page 1 of The Drummer

PROLOGUE

2015 - ONE YEAR EARLIER

Rain pelts my skin. The icy bullets sting with sharp precision before sliding over my body to soak the ground beneath us. I squint over at Luke, who’s motionless on his side, facing me. Drops of water slip down the dark strands of his hair and skim over his closed eyelids.

At least, I think that’s what I’m looking at. Everything is so blurry, fading. I don’t know where my vision ends and the darkness of night begins.

"Luke?” I croak out, and I don’t recognize my voice.

The body beside me doesn’t respond, just mirrors what I must look like as the steady downpour presses us into matted grass and thick mud. It’s probably cold, but I don’t feel a damn thing.

The cloying smell of fresh flowers bites my nose as I struggle to pull air into my aching lungs. Vases and bouquets crowd the ornate monument at our heads, a grim wall of decaying beauty.My sister has been dead for almost three months, and still her grave lives and breathes with the constant flow of tributes from people who believe she didn’t deserve what she got. They understand she was a good person with a bad husband and a worse illness.

I already know her death will be remembered for all the wrong reasons. And now, the man everyone accuses of “killing her” has seemingly determined to follow.

I’ve made it my mission not to let him.

Luke Craven is my best friend, my brother. And maybe part of me is selfish enough to knowIwon’t survive if I lose him too.

I’ve followed him into hell to keep him tethered to life. To do for him what I wasn’t able to do for my sister. But pain is a sneaky infection, the way it quietly spreads and feeds off itself until it’s too late.

Tonight was a mistake. Tonight, we went too far.

“Luke…”

I try to lift my arm, but it’s lead at my side. I blink through the curtain of rain and shadows, licking cool drops from my lips.

He’s deathly still, and a trickle of fear seeps through me when I realize I’m paralyzed as well.

I can’t list all the drugs we’ve pumped into our bodies tonight. I’m not even sure all were voluntary as we sought distraction in every hedonistic trap we could find. All I know for sure is that after hazy days of clubs, bars, women, fights, and substances, we’ve ended up sprawled on Elena’s grave like two corpses intent on joining her.

I don’t want to die, though—not like Luke does—and somewhere beyond the thick barrier of chemicals holding me captive, the fear becomes panic. Is the damage done? Was that last hit the one that will transform me from a loving brother into another tragic story for the Barrett family archives?

“Forgive us,” I whisper to my sister. “Please forgive us.”

Elena would hate everything about this.

I can almost hear her screams from wherever she is. Pleading. Commanding me not to follow her into death. I’m betraying her with every beat of my heart as that organ pumps more toxins through my veins.

God, she loved us so much. And we loved her. But her sick brain wouldn’t let her believe it. It lied to her, poisoned her, tortured her. Until she felt like she only had one choice.

It convinced her an eternity beneath this soggy ground was better than living a few decades above it.

It’s not Luke’s fault, but his many transgressions have made it his guilt to carry. Tragedy needs a villain, and Luke was branded and sentenced with violent conviction.

No voice screamed the insidious accusations louder than his own. And that will be the voice that kills him.

If it hasn’t already.

“Luke…”

My mouth won’t even open now. I give up, focusing instead on the cocoon of mud forming around me. The serene calm on Luke’s face is the most peaceful I’ve ever seen him. In a cruel twist, he finally looks like the man I’ve been fighting so hard to find. Maybe whoever discovers our lifeless bodies tomorrow will believe what I do about him—that he was a good person who’d been dealt a bad hand and wasn’t strong enough to overcome his demons.

I’m the only one who’s stood by him. The only one who knew him well enough to know the man everyone hated—including himself—was the lie. That somewhere locked inside was the person my sister loved so fiercely. The person she thought she lost and couldn’t live without.

I want to tell him this now. I want to assure him he’s still needed. That it’s not his fault in the way everyone is saying. That joining her in the ground solves nothing.

But my mouth won’t move. Nothing will. Even my thoughts are becoming a tangled web of incoherent fragments.

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