“Some of us don’t have any luck,” he slurred as he got up to go get another bottle, but he’d gone only a few steps when the room began to whip around him so fast that he couldn’t get his bearings.

He sat down in the foyer with a thud. After a few minutes, he started to get back on his feet, but his legs wouldn’t cooperate. Finally, he stretched out on the floor with intentions of shutting his eyes for only a few minutes. In an hour what he’d drunk would be out of his system, and he’d get up and go to bed before Jolene got home from the bar.

Jolene slipped on the ice once as she made her way from the bar to her truck, but she was able to right herself before she fell flat on her fanny. She got inside her vehicle and started the engine and then got back out to scrape the ice from the windshield. Freezing rain stung her face as she worked, but neither a knight in shining armor nor a big strong cowboy on a white horse appeared out of the darkness to do the job for her.

Her teeth were chattering by the time she finished and hurried back inside the truck. She’d almost warmed up by the time she’d gotten out of town, but neither the windshield wipers nor the heater could keep up with the freezing rain. She pulled off the road into a closed service station. The awning over the gas pump gave her enough shelter that she could remove the buildup again, but she was already thinking ahead to other places where she could repeat the process.

“Dammit!” She realized that she hadn’t switched the heat to the windshield. “No wonder it wouldn’t warm up and melt the mess.” She sat there several minutes until the heater melted the last of the ice.

What was usually a five-minute trip to the inn took fifteen just to get to the turn down the lane. The trees glistened with ice, and the ground crunched beneath the tires. Sleet still peppered the windshield and the top of the truck.

The foggy outline of the inn was in sight when suddenly a deer jumped right into the road in front of her and stood there, staring at her with big eyes. She braked and whipped the steering wheel to the right. The deer ran off and the truck slid right toward a big pine tree, coming to a gentle stop against it. Her heart raced and her pulse pounded in her ears. She laid her head on the steering wheel for several minutes until she could catch her breath, and then put the vehicle in reverse. The wheels whirred and spun out on the ice, but she couldn’t get traction. She swung the door open and got out, only to see that the back wheels had dropped into a ditch about six inches deep. There was no way she’d be able to get the truck out that night, and maybe not until things thawed.

She dug her phone from her purse and called the inn. Surely that party for Melanie hadn’t lasted until three in the morning. After ten rings she hung up and tried again. Still no answer. She called Tucker’s cell phone, and it went straight to voice mail.

She grabbed her purse, shook her fist at the sky, and trudged the rest of the way to the inn. She was hungry, angry, and chilled to the bone with sleet hitting her in the face all the way to the door. Lord, even her eyelashes were frozen. A rush of welcome warm air greeted her when she unlocked the door and pushed it open. She took a step forward, reached up to feel for the string to pull on the light, and tripped over something on the foyer floor.

The fall knocked the wind out of her, but when she could catch her breath, she realized that she was lying on top of a person. Visions of a dead body flitted through her head as she pushed away from it. Then she got a whiff of whiskey, and a fresh rush of anger filled her heart and soul.

“Dammit, Tucker,” she yelled as she stood up.

The last time she’d come home to a sight like this was the day before she’d kicked Johnny Ray out of her apartment. He’d taken her debit card and managed to wipe out her bank account, but even at that, it was worth getting rid of him. She’d decided right then that she might only be a bartender, but she deserved better.

“And I do,” she said as she stepped over Tucker’s curled-up body.

She made herself a sandwich and poured a glass of milk. She walked around him on her way to her bedroom. “Evidently, you like wallowing around in misery. Well, I might be your partner, but I’m not cutting you one inch of slack. You can sleep on the floor all night.”

She flipped the light switch in her bedroom and heard a moan in the foyer, but Tucker Malone was on his own. If he didn’t remember the hangover cure, then he could damn well suffer.

Sassy had followed her to her bedroom and curled up on the foot of the bed. “I don’t blame you, girl. I wouldn’t sleep with someone that reeked like he’d fallen into a barrel of whiskey, either.”

The adrenaline rush from swerving to miss the deer settled down. The chill of the walk home also eased when she got into a pair of sweats and an oversize T-shirt and crawled beneath the covers. The hunger subsided when she finished the sandwich. She fell asleep before her head hit the pillow.

Sassy was sitting right beside her when she awoke at noon. “I bet you’re hungry and needing to find your litter pan.”

The cat meowed pitifully.

“Well, darlin’ girl, I will feed you, but scooping the litter pan belongs to your master. Let’s get you taken care of, and then I’m diving into a warm bath.” Jolene crawled out of bed with Sassy right behind her.

Tucker was still on the foyer floor, in the same position as before. Jolene didn’t feel a bit sorry for him. She fed the cat, took a long, hot bath, and washed her hair. When she finished, she went back downstairs and stepped over Tucker again. He groaned and grabbed his head. She ignored him and went straight for the kitchen, where she made coffee. While it perked she put three sausage patties in a skillet to cook and made a stack of pancakes.

She heard another groan around the time she sat down to eat, but she still had a big ball of anger in her heart. Seeing him like that caused her to remember the anger, pain, and disgust connected with her mother all over again. Sassy hopped up on the table, and Jolene fed her little bits of sausage as she ate.

Her cell phone rang, and she dug it out of her purse. “Good mornin’, Dotty. Are you survivin’ this ice storm?”

“I’m fine, but the regular phone lines are down. We’re lucky we’ve got electricity. I’m just checkin’ in to see that you got home all right. It sounds like shotgun shells goin’ off all over town as the ice breaks down tree limbs. I tell you, it’s going to be a real mess to clean it all up,” Dotty said. “They’ve called off church services, and school has already been canceled for tomorrow. I guess we’re all iced in for the duration. How’re things there?”

Jolene told her about the deer, having to walk home, and falling over Tucker right inside the door. “I’m not so sure your fate thing was right. After living with a drunk, I’m sure not lookin’ to hook up with this one.”

Tucker staggered into the kitchen. His eyes were bloodshot and his hair was a fright. The only thing missing was the rancid smell of vomit on his breath.

“Hangover cure?” Both his hands went to his head.

She gave him a dirty look and crooked her finger for him to come closer. “Figure it out for yourself,” she yelled right into his face, and then turned her attention back to Dotty. “Sorry about that.”

“What’s goin’ on?” Dotty asked in her ear.

“Why are you so mean? You fixed me the cure last time,” Tucker said.

She poked him in the chest with her free hand. “It’s called tough love. If you want to wallow around in the past, get drunk and pass out on the floor, and make me fall when I come home, that’s your business. But I’m not your nurse or your mama.”

“But you’re my partner,” he protested as he poured a cup of coffee.

“That’s right, and right now your partner is talking to Dotty. When I get done, I’m going to turn on some music and start laundry. Then I’m going to vacuum my room. Lots of noise fixin’ to happen. You might want to start that cure.”

Dotty’s laughter echoed across the room before Jolene even got the phone back to her ear. “I guess you’re not going to be an enabler again, are you?”

“Nope. If he can’t stay sober enough to help his partner out so she doesn’t walk the equivalent of two city blocks in sleet and freezing rain, then his partner isn’t going to mollycoddle him because of a hangover.”

“And we all thought he was getting better,” Dotty sighed.

“Drunks are professionals at fooling people,” Jolene said.

“Looks like you got your hands full. Call me later today and don’t back down,” Dotty said.

“Will do. I’ve been through enough of this to last a lifetime. You stay warm now.” Jolene ended the call and poured herself a second cup of coffee. She carried it to the table and sat down to finish the last few bites of her breakfast.

“You are evil,” Tucker groaned. “So I fell off the wagon. I had a good reason.”

“No, you had an excuse. It’s pretty plain that you like this misery that you put yourself through, so you’re not getting a bit of sympathy from me,” she told him. “You know my past, but if you want to talk about reasons why I feel this way, we can go over it again. And just so you know, my truck is out at the end of the lane. I had to walk in freezing rain and sleet all the way to the inn at three o’clock in the morning, only to fall over your drunk ass when I tried to turn on the light. I’m plumb fresh out of sympathy, so make your own eggs and toast.”

“That was real? I thought I was dreaming,” he muttered. “You wrecked your truck? Why?”

“Look outside.” She carried her dirty dishes to the sink, rinsed them, and put them in the dishwasher.

He shielded his eyes and glanced out the window. “Good God! You drove home in that? Why didn’t you call me?”

“I did. You were passed out. And now I’ve got things to do.” She left the room with Sassy right behind her. “Your cat doesn’t even like you this morning.”