Heartbreak Hotel (Dark Friends-to-Lovers) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Epilogue

  Heartbreak Hotel

  by

  Kenya Wright

  ZachEvans Publishing

  Tampa, FL

  Heartbreak Hotel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Kenya Wright

  All rights reserved.

  Published in the United States by ZachEvans Publishing, an imprint of ZachEvans Creative, a division of Jessica Watkins Presents, LLC.

  To my kids

  Rich: You should write a book about Key West, since the hurricane just hit it.

  Lily: And everyone is in love.

  Banyan: And there’s yummy food and singing and…kissing (*giggles).

  Lily: And there’s an artist.

  Rich: And a crazy person.

  Lily: And a love spell.

  Banyan: And ninjas!

  I love you three.

  (Sorry, I didn’t include the ninjas.)

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Well, since my baby left me,

  I found a new place to dwell,

  Down at the end of Lonely Street at Heartbreak Hotel

  Well I get so lonely, baby,

  I get so lonely,

  I get so lonely, I could die…

  Prologue

  Hawk

  News reporters shoved microphones in front of my face and barreled me with questions.

  “Hawk, over here!” a cameraman yelled.

  A reporter jumped in front of me. “Now that the Black Widow has been caught, what will you do?”

  I walked around him.

  Another came from my right. “Will you still be running Rebel Media?”

  A reporter showed up on my left. “You’ve been adamant that the Black Widow had an accomplice. Do you believe the authorities will catch this person?”

  Putting on my sunglasses, I walked through the crowd. My lawyer and brother, Brett kept my pace, yelling out “no comment” here and there. People crowded us, almost blocking the path. Most held their cellphones up, recording my walk out of the courtroom. Many cameras flashed.

  Others held signs with my face on it.

  “Hawk: An American Hero!”

  “And then the Hawk ate the Spider!”

  My brother and I approached our limo.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Barron.” My driver held open the door.

  Nodding, I dove in. My brother followed, probably just as ready as I was to get away from the circus.

  Six months of court had finally ended. Six months of witnesses going over the gory details of the Black Widow’s murders. Six months of horrific crime scene photos and the sick fascination on her face as she gazed at them, chained to her chair. Six months of my having to relive the two nights she’d captured me. The pain. The broken memories. The nightmares that haunted in dark silence.

  My phone beeped. There were over thirty missed calls. Most were from my mother. The rest were from faceless women.

  A text message came in.

  Sonya: Congrats on the case. U must feel good. Do U want to fuck?

  Neither her name nor the text gave me any indication of who she was or what she looked like. I didn’t even know when I’d fucked her.

  I put the phone back in my pocket and looked out the window. Hundreds of people had crowed the courthouse with signs. This week it was the Black Widow murders. The next week they’d be out here for some other gory high-profile case.

  My phone beeped again.

  Sonya: I miss that big dick. Give it to me, daddy.

  I shut it off.

  My brother turned to me as the limo pulled away. “Are you okay?”

  “No.”

  “Lisa is in jail now,” Brett said. “It’s over. You should feel better.”

  “They have her, but that’s not it. There had to be someone else helping. There’s no way she carried all of those bodies by herself.”

  “I’ve told you over and over. Let it go, man. No one else has been murdered since she’s been caught. The cops are done. The state found their killer. You have to move on.”

  “I can’t. I won’t stop. I’m going to get new investigators.”

  Brett let out a long breath. “You’re obsessed.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Look. At least take a vacation and then come back to start this investigation afterwards.”

  I eyed him. “A vacation?”

  “You know? One of those fun things people take to remind them about the joy of living.”

  “After what we’ve saw in court, you still think there’s joy in living?”

  Brett frowned. “I don’t like when you talk that way. Have you had suicidal thoughts?”

  “Does it matter?”

  Brett’s frown deepened. “We need to get away from New York.”

  I undid my tie and opened the top button on my shirt. “You’re my lawyer, not my psychiatrist.”

  “I’m also your brother and I’m telling you that you need to talk to someone.”

  “No, I need to end Lisa’s games for good.”

  “She was just put in jail for five lifetime sentences. I think you ended it, bro.” Brett looked out the window. “We’re going on a vacation. I’ll give you a week to get your things together and make sure someone’s overseeing Rebel Media while you’re gone.”

  “I’m not going—”

  “Do you want my help with these investigations?” Brett took it there. “Or do you plan on doing this all by yourself? Because I’m telling you right now, I need a break from this shit.” He rubbed his face with both hands as if massaging stress from his temples. “All the blood. The dead bodies. We’ve been digesting this shit for two years. It’s all we talk about. It’s all we’ve done. I need a fucking break.”

  “Fine,” I muttered.

  “So, do you want my help or not?”

  I sighed, knowing that I needed him. He’d been right by my side the whole time, keeping my head in order and helping me find the clues we needed to get rid of my murdering ex-wife. In fact, he’d always stood by my side, from the time I met her until the time I put her away. While everyone else talked about their worry and tried to help me, Brett was the one who’d truly been there, making sure I got out of bed and ate food, giving me a mission to do to keep me walking on this earth another day.

  “Yes,” I said. “I need your help.”

  “T
hen, we’re going on a vacation.”

  I gritted my teeth. “Where?”

  He leaned his head back and shut his eyes. “You pick since you’re so excited to go.”

  “Fine.” I ran my fingers through my hair, happy that my hands weren’t shaking. “I’m open to going away for a while.”

  “What about out of the country?” Brett asked.

  “No. I don’t want a long flight.”

  “Hmmm.” And then a grin spread across Brett’s face. My own spirit rose. It had been a long time since either of us smiled.

  “What are you thinking?” I asked.

  “Key West.”

  There was something about the Florida Keys that turned my black-and-white world into Technicolor. My family’s main home was in Manhattan, but during the chilly seasons we snow-birded to the Keys. It was the best way to grow up as a kid. New York was a concrete jungle of skyscrapers, melting pots bubbling over, and wild creatures that looked human, but acted like beasts. It was good to get a break from the city’s coldness and bask in the sun.

  Our time in Key West always was a dream. There, it was a marriage of land and sea, featuring a necklace of pearl islands linked together by forty-two curved bridges. They stretched southwest from Florida’s mainland and lay 100 miles from Cuba.

  And it was a flamboyant community made up of Floridians descended from Bahamian and Cuban settlers. A land of dreamers living the easy life. I closed my eyes and images flashed in my head—coconuts and angelfish, sour key limes and golden sunsets over turquoise waters. In Key West, the party never ended. Colorful bars stayed open all night. One could get lost for days as they dived in the ocean, searching for lobsters or exploring captivating coral.

  It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a proper sunset.

  Key West owned the sun. There, dawn revealed the massive fireball escaping the ocean. In the twilight hours, tourists and residents rushed to watch the blazing orange ball ooze back into cool waters.

  I haven’t had a proper fish dish either.

  But I hadn’t been back to our family home in years. I looked out the window, hiding my shock from Brett. “Why Key West?”

  “If you’re worried about Yasmine, there’s no need. She’s not there.”

  “Why would I be worried about Yaz?”

  Mocking me, he batted his eyes. “Because you were in love with her.”

  “It was a childhood crush.”

  “Dude, you still had pictures of her in your college dorm.”

  “That was the past.” I thought about the court case. “So much has changed.”

  “Yeah... it has.”

  Silence filled the limo for several minutes.

  “I keep up with her sister all the time,” he said. “Yasmine is in LA, engaged to a movie producer.”

  I did my best to keep the bitterness out of my words. “That’s great.”

  “Basically, she won’t be in the Keys.”

  “Good.”

  “So, what do you think? Should we head off to Key West?” He made a big show of checking his watch as if there was a calendar on it. “It’s almost October. Fantasy Fest will be in a few weeks. I wouldn’t mind being surrounded by thousands of naked women.”

  Fantasy Fest ran for nine days and was Key West’s biggest party of the year. Similar to Mardi Gras in New Orleans and Carnival in Brazil, over 70,000 people came from all over to celebrate citywide. It was an adult Halloween festival with partygoers stomping down Duval Street in elaborate costumes. Many times, people wore nothing but body paint.

  “I haven’t been to a Fantasy Fest in six years, or got a good blow job like the one I had the last time I was there.” Brett continued talking, but my mind had already gone somewhere else.

  Memories of Yasmine faded out my brother’s statements. I’d called her Cherry Bomb when we were young. Such a brown beauty, she had the most beautiful flame-red dreadlocks—silky twists that fell to her hips and candy-curled at the end. She thought her mane was a messy pile of strands, I thought it was the fire that kept me warm.

  Back then, I’d been shy and a hundred pounds overweight. She’d never seen me as anything more than the cool snowbird boy. We spent many years, soaking up the sun and skinny-dipping within the moonlight. Just friends. Nothing more. When we lost touch, it was more me than her. It was hard to hear her stories about boyfriends. Each of her confessions stabbed me in the heart.

  How could she know that I’d loved her so much, when I’d never told her?

  “Eh. Hawk?” Brett waved his hand in front of my face. “Did you just blank out on me?”

  “Yeah.” I unbuttoned my suit jacket, ready to get out of the stuffy clothes and into something more comfortable. And for some reason, the desire to disappear was stronger than usual.

  Brett’s right. I should get out of here for a while.

  As if hearing me, he asked. “What do you think?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “We had some good memories in Key West,” Brett said. “Lots of clear blue water and powder white sand. Mom bought some new jet skis last winter and left them there. Plus, we could probably buy a yacht or something. Sail somewhere. Fish and swim.”

  “Yeah.” I did my best to focus on what he was saying, but I couldn’t get that flame-red hair out of my mind. “Fishing sounds good.”

  Had Yasmine heard the news? The Black Widow and my face had been on every popular paper on the East Coast. She lived in a popular city in the west. I doubted the killings had been Los Angeles’s top news—a city brimming with Hollywood stars, hungry paparazzi, and celebrity gossip trending each day.

  “Hawk? Is it Key West or bust?”

  “Yeah.” I blinked that beautiful red hair out of my mind and blew out a long breath. “Key West or bust.”

  “Good.” Brett clapped his hands together. “We’ll leave in a week. I’ll handle everything.”

  Chapter 1

  Yasmine

  Heartbreak was like death.

  Both stripped away the soul and left the body as an empty shell.

  And I was broken. Torn apart. Soul shredded, and spirit ripped into tiny pieces.

  Heartbreak sliced away at the inner peace of life. Due to my major and public break up with my ex-fiancé, the past year had been a cycle of darkness.

  And every time I tried to write, my fingers hovered over the keys in mid-air. No words ever came out.

  A continuous blank screen was the ultimate demise of a writer. It symbolized the emptiness within. Nothing was more lonely than white space dominating a page.

  And Los Angeles was the last place to help me out of depression. It was already a lost world full of fake surgically stitched smiles and friendships that came with an Appropriate Times to Backstab clause. The LA streets served as a drug-induced fashion runway, showing off the beautiful people—artificial creatures that were hollow on the inside.

  Basically, I hated that city. The only reason why I’d stayed there for so long was because of Greg, and now... we were done.

  And so, I returned to my second home to heal and mend myself back together again. This was the third time I’d ran back to the Keys, due to a shattered relationship. I’d even dubbed my room—Heartbreak Hotel.

  Welcome home.

  I looked out the window. The sun began to set over my sister’s bed and breakfast.

  The place was named Dolphin View because it was the best spot to watch those lovable creatures. Sitting on its own secluded white strip of sand, it was a massive structure of four levels.

  We lived in Key West’s Old Town. Settled in the early 1800s, the area was characterized by its large wood-frame houses. My ancestors had been among the Bahamian settlers that arrived here along with the Cubans and West Indians. Here, people fished, harvested sponges, and traded tools with Cuba.

  But my great grandparents didn’t make a living from fishing. They’d been used to cultivating land on limestone islands. In no time, they farmed and sold pineapples, key limes and sapodillas. My
great grandfather built the first part of Dolphin View. My grandfather continued construction. My parents expanded it.

  And my sister, Cindy took it to a new level.

  This is amazing.

  When I was young, the property had been an ancient, broken-down business with barely one reservation each month. Cindy and I had a seventeen-year age difference. Growing up, she was more my mother than a sibling. And then my parents died in a car accident, leaving Cindy the family business and custody of me. I’d been an eight-year-old kid at the time. Victor and Cindy had just been dating.

  But he was a good man. They married a week after my parents’ funeral. He dumped all his savings into the property, sold everything he owned, and was the main person that took me to school and helped with my homework.

  In their early twenties, they should’ve been doing anything else but raising an eight-year-old and budgeting a failing business. But they were the best. Champions. And with that type of fire in their hearts they made a success out of Dolphin View.

  I can’t believe how much things have changed.

  Now Dolphin View was an elegant Key West getaway. Forty rooms featured king-sized beds. There was high-quality linen, high-definition flat-screens, and private bathrooms stocked with luxury products and jacuzzi bathtubs. Most rooms had balconies. Some had fireplaces. Guests enjoyed use of kayaks, bicycles, snorkeling gear, and barbecues grills.

  The new chef delivered gourmet cuisine. Cindy kept the library stocked with recent bestsellers and leather-bound classics. And there was an in-ground courtyard pool in the back just in case a person didn’t simply want to walk a few feet to the beach.

  The attic had been renovated into an apartment for me—my own little getaway when things got heavy. I’d written a lot of books in this space.

  Everything is so high-end now.

  Still, I couldn’t ignore the haunted quality of Dolphin View, especially in the attic. Up there, the floorboards didn’t just creak throughout the night, they groaned like an animal in pain. Cold spots lingered. Shadows slithered along corners. Ancient ghosts danced within the freshly painted walls.