The Bet by Max Monroe

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.

“All riiiight,” he says with a waggle of his brows in the rearview mirror. “Looks like you’re about to have a good night.”

I ignore his commentary and toss him two twenties beneath the plexiglass divider.

“Thanks,” I say, and I get out before he has time to say any weird shit about strippers or tits in my face or god knows what else.

And the instant he pulls away, I spot the Taco Bell my brothers and I dined at the infamous night of Rem’s bachelor party, right after a stripper tore his boxers with her stilettos.

But when I move my eyes across the street, expecting to see the Fortune Teller sign shining like a beacon, that’s not what I see at all.

A well-known sign with a little cartoon redhead in pigtails taunts me.

Wendy’s.

A Wendy’s? What the fuck?

I look around the street, my eyes pinging back and forth on everything I can make out, thinking it’s possible that my memory has me a little confused. But when I don’t see anything besides a convenience store and a parking garage, I know that what I’m seeing is real.

The fortune-teller is gone. And she’s been replaced by a goddamn fast-food restaurant.

Son of a bitch.

Both hands in my hair, I yank at the strands and try to figure out what in the hell I should do now.

All the while, Cleo, the apparently retired or out-of-business fortune-teller’s words repeat over and over again inside my head. “There will come a bet. One that will change the course of your life. One that will mold the shape of you as a man. Be careful, though, child. It won’t be a period of easy choices. But if you handle it right, it could lead to a great deal of happiness for you.”

I shouldn’t be able to remember all of that after thirteen years, but it’s like it got stored in the deep recesses of my head until my brain deemed it the perfect moment to torture me with it.

Obviously, now is that absolute perfect moment. After I’ve fucked everything up.

And right on cue, the proverbial cherry on top of this shitty sundae, the sky chooses that exact moment to open up and let the rain come down. Literally. Giant drops of rain pelt me from above and drench my clothes until my white shirt is practically see-through.

Well, this is wonderful. Really wonderful.

And I stand there for the longest moment, just letting my misery and the rain soak me to my core.

Soon, though, my mind starts to clear, and there’s only one person in my life that I know could help me figure all this shit out. If I can figure it out.

It’s not even a full second before I’m in motion.

First, I try to hail a cab, but then, when the first five taxis I see are already occupied, I don’t wait any longer.

Feet to the pavement, I run. Away from that fucking Wendy’s and straight to the one person who can hopefully help me fix everything.

After three knocks to the door, I stand outside on the front porch, and the sky still hasn’t let up. It keeps assaulting me with big beads of rain, but I’m now numb to the cold and to the way my clothes stick to my body and my boots slosh with each step.

When no one answers, I pound my fist against the wood again.

Footsteps sound from the inside, and the front porch light flips on.

“Who the fuck is it?”

I grin when I make out Wes’s figure through the windows that run along the side of the door.

He swings it open and just stands there, looking at me like he’s not sure what to make of the situation.

“Hey, man.” I try to play it cool, you know, like I’m not a man in the middle of a nervous breakdown. “Is Winnie around?”

“Well, she is, but she’s sleeping,” he answers and tilts his head to the side when he starts to recognize my current state. “You okay?”

“Sort of.” I shake my head. “Actually, nah, not really.”

“Who is it?” my sister’s faint voice calls from behind Wes, and the breath I didn’t realize I was holding escapes from my chest.

“It’s one of your crazy brothers.”

“Jude?” Winnie asks, the instant her confused and sleepy gaze meets my face. She steps closer to the door, and her eyes go wide when she looks me up and down, taking in every inch of my drenched attire. “Holy hell, did you run?”

“Cabs were taking too long.”

“What are you doing here?” she questions and tightens her robe around her body. “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

Truthfully, no. I don’t have a clue. And I don’t really care. All this shit in my head. All these racing thoughts and regrets and visions of Sophie’s torn-up face when I left her apartment are eating me alive. I have to tell someone, and I need that someone to help me fucking fix it.

And I know if anyone can help me, it’s Winnie.

“Jude?”

“The fortune-teller is gone, and her shop is a fucking Wendy’s now.” It’s the first thing that pops out of my mouth, and Winnie’s face morphs into concern.

“Why don’t you come inside, Jude?” Wes acknowledges the fact that I’m still just standing outside in the rain. “You can dry off, I’ll grab you a beer, and you and Winnie can have a chat.”

He holds open the door and Winnie steps to the side, but the second I’m in their entryway, she’s wrapping her arm around mine, completely ignoring that I’m probably getting her wet, and leading me into the kitchen.

Wes hands me a fluffy cream bath towel and a beer, and I sit down at the table, across from my sister. My brother-in-law, though, doesn’t hang around. Instead, it appears, he goes back upstairs for the night.

“All right, Jude,” Winnie says, and her eyes peer into mine. “What on earth would make you run, like, I don’t even know how many miles in the rain at one in the morning?”

Normally, I would play it all off and joke around the truth. But I can’t tonight.

“Sophie.”

“Oh boy.” She inhales a deep breath and blows it out through pursed lips. “I had a feeling you were going to say that. Although, I’m surprised you spilled the beans without more pushing on my end.”

“I’m in love with her, Winnie.” I just blurt it out, and my sister’s brows nearly hit her forehead.

“And I definitely didn’t expect you to say that. Holy shit, Jude!” She reaches out to shove a hand into my arm. “You’re in love?”

“Don’t get too excited, sis. I fucked it all up.”

Her shoulders sag.

“But I’m hoping, fucking praying, that you can help me find a way to fix it.”

She reaches out her hand and gently covers mine. “We’ll figure it out. I promise. But you’re going to have to give me all the details. You can’t leave anything out. And before you get that look, it’s not because I’m being nosy. It’s because I need to have the full picture of what we’re working with here.”

A sharp laugh pops from my throat. “A fucking disaster. That’s what we’re working with.”

“It can’t be that bad.”

“Oh, but, sis, it is.” I eye her knowingly, and then I lay it all out there for Winnie—minus all the very intimate details that I know she doesn’t want to know and I sure as shit don’t want to tell her—I give her the rundown of everything.

How I met Sophie. How I ruined her date with that one dude but ended up taking her on a date to make up for it. How she became this irresistible force in my life, and I just wanted more of her time. More of her.

How we went to Vegas.

How things were after I took her to Lexi’s Mathletes competition.

And I tell her how things ended. How badly I messed up. How badly I hurt Sophie.

Winnie just listens, taking it all in, and only occasionally asks me a question to clarify something or simply just nods as she follows along.

Once I’m done, I have to lift the full bottle of beer that Wes left on the table for me and chug half the thing down.

My sister just sits there quietly, like her mind is still trying to wrap itself around everything I just revealed. But then, the teeniest hint of a smile touches the corners of her lips.

“Are you…smiling right now?” I ask, and she shakes her head, but that smile of hers only grows. “Winnie? What the fuck? Are you enjoying my misery?”

She shakes her head again, and a laugh bubbles up from her throat. “I’m sorry! None of this is funny to me, I swear!”

“Then why the happy fucking face?”

“Because I just thought about the conversation we had at the lake house last summer, and how you were saying you were never going to fall in love, and I told you that you were going to eat those words one day.”

“Are you really going to play the ‘I told you so’ game? Right now? While I’m sitting here at your kitchen table, feeling like I’m bleeding out?”

“In my defense, I haven’t said I told you so, even though I probably should tell you I told you so since we both know that I was right, and your mouth is pretty full at the moment with the giant bite of bullshit you spewed at the lake house.”

“You just said it!” I point at her. “Twice!”

“No, I didn’t. I said the words I told you so, but I didn’t say the words directly to you.”

“You keep saying it!”

She laughs. And for the first time all night, I find myself laughing too.

Damn, my baby sister is a trip.

But then, once the laughter subsides, the acute, undeniable pain is the most prominent sensation I can feel.

Fuck. I put my head in my hands.

“So, was I hearing things when you were at my door, or did you say that the fortune-teller was gone?”

I sigh and look up at her. “Her shop is now a fucking Wendy’s.”

“And how, exactly, do you know this?”

“Because I went there first.”

Her head jerks back. “But I thought you didn’t believe in shit like that?”

“I didn’t. Until I made a fucking bet that led me to a woman named Sophie Sage, and I’m now sitting here like a miserable bastard at your kitchen table at one in the morning.”

“So, the infamous fortune-teller from Rem’s bachelor party was right?”

“About me?” I shake my head on a harsh laugh. “Apparently, she hit the future-predicting nail right on the head.”

“What did she say about Rem, Flynn, and Ty?”

“I already told you this last summer. It was thirteen years ago. I don’t fucking remember.”

“Well, you need to think about it, Jude. Because this feels pretty damn important.”

I groan. “Winnie, just because it came true for me doesn’t mean it will for the rest of our brothers.”

She eyes me knowingly. “You mean it came true for you and Remy.”

Well, shit.

“Seriously, what did she say about everybody?” Winnie asks again, and when I just sit there, trying to recall what happened that night, she gets impatient. “Jude? What did she say?!”

“I’m trying to remember!” I answer back. “You’ll have to excuse me for the foggy head, considering I ran to your place in the rain because…you know…I feel like I’ve made the biggest mistake of my fucking life. But no big deal.”

She nods, but she doesn’t give it up. “I get that, Jude. And I promise, we’re going to fix all that. But right now, I need to know what else that fortune-teller said.”

“You’re so stubborn, you know that?”

“I do,” she retorts and reaches out to tap the side of my head. “So, think with that brain of yours and figure it out.”

“Damn, sis,” I complain and pull away from her annoying finger. “Just give me a minute here…” I pause and rack my brain for what Cleo the fortune-teller told the rest of my brothers. It’s all hazy at best, like trying to figure out the time on an hourglass that’s aged a hundred years in the dirt.

But eventually, a few things do pop up in my mind.

“I think I remember Ty’s,” I announce, and Winnie stares at me, her eyes damn near trying to pry it out of my head by sheer force. “It was something about him taking a bite of forbidden fruit and a big secret that he’d have to keep. A secret that would cause turmoil or some shit.”

“That doesn’t sound too good.”

I shrug. “Well, she did tell Remy his wedding wouldn’t happen a week before his wedding was supposed to happen, so I don’t think Miss Cleo gave a flying fuck about giving people bad news.”

Winnie snorts. “And what about Flynn?”

I shake my head. “I can’t remember his.”

“What?”she questions, her voice rife with disappointment. “But you remembered Ty’s!”

“Barely.”

When Winnie just sits there, looking at me like a woman who won’t move past this whole stupid thing until she knows, I decide to give it one last shot.

“I’ll text Ty,” I say and pull my phone out of my still-damp pants. “Make the fucking professor use that big brain of his for something that doesn’t revolve around getting into someone’s panties.”

Me: Remember that fortune-teller we went to at Rem’s bachelor party?

His response comes in a minute later.

Ty: Of course I fucking do. That woman was insane.

Maybe not as insane as we originally thought,I think to myself, but I also keep that to myself.

Me: What was Flynn’s fortune?

Ty: Why the fuck do you want to know that?

Me: Just wondering. I know mine was like a bet or something. Yours was a secret. She didn’t finish Rem’s because he fucking hightailed it out there after the first part kicked him straight in the dick. But I can’t remember Flynn’s. Do you?

Ty: It was something about a pact. A wild night with a stranger and a pact.

I turn the screen of the phone to show Winnie.

“So, a bet, a pact, a secret, and poor Remy just got told his wedding wouldn’t happen?”

“He was out the door before she could say anything else.”

“He should’ve waited.”

I laugh. “Win, I’m sorry that this is a big inconvenience for you, but I can tell you, Rem didn’t look good when she said the wedding wouldn’t happen. Pretty sure he left because it was fucking with his head. Not because he wanted to inconvenience his baby sister over thirteen years later.”

A guilty smile consumes her lips. “Gah. Sorry. I just can’t help it! I want to know!”

All I can do is shrug. “Well, I did my best, sis. And now, you know, I’m kind of hoping we can get back to the whole reason I came here in the first place.”

She cocks her head to the side, almost like she fucking forgot why I’m even here, and then she sits up straight and blurts out, “Right! Right! Sophie!”

Just hearing her name, even from my sister’s mouth, brings everything right back to the pain. Back to the regret. Back to the reality that I might’ve lost the best thing that’s ever happened to me.

“Fuck, Win, what am I going to do?”

She reaches out both of her hands and clasps them over mine. “We’re going to fix this. Together. That’s what we’re going to do.”

“But is it even fixable?” I question. “I mean, Win, I hurt her so bad. I was a total bastard.”

“That you were, but it’s because of all that Winslow baggage you’ve been carrying around.”

I want to tell her that’s bullshit, but even I know that’s a lie. All the crap I’ve seen my mom and Rem and even Winnie go through over the years when it comes to love and relationships has done nothing but make me put up some kind of wall or some shit. Out of self-protection more than anything else, I think.

“Just tell me this, Jude. How far are you willing to go for her?”

The Jude of the past, before Sophie, would’ve had a real prick answer to that question.

But the Jude of now? Well, his answer is easy.

“Anything and everything. Nothing is off-limits.”

Winnie’s eyes and mouth go wide. “For real?”

I nod.

Then her mouth quirks up into a grin, and she leans over to wrap her arms around my shoulders tightly. “I love you, Jude. And I promise you, everything is going to work out.”

God, I hope so. Because not even a week has passed, and life without Sophie is proving to be the most-painful, un-fun, miserable time of my existence.