Better (Stark Ink Book 2) Read Online Free PDF

anyone. Dalton had grudgingly picked her up that night, paying to get into a ball game that he couldn’t even stay to watch. As he’d searched for Ava, he’d wondered if that’s what kids were doing in the stands while he’d been sacking quarterbacks all those years ago. Probably.
    He was pretty sure Adam, while being well-intentioned and trying to attend Dalton’s home games, had never actually made it past the parking lot. Adam, though, had been too busy doing girls in the backseat of Mom’s car to do much of anything else. Dalton had to admit that he’d had his own fair share of post-game partying. Not too much, though, because he hadn’t wanted to fuck up his game. He’d eventually accepted that Ava was no different than he had been at that age and had agreed not to rat her out to their parents provided that she knew her limit, stayed safe, and always called him.
    While he was dealing with his own shit over the summer, he’d forgotten about their arrangement. Ava hadn’t called him in a long time. He briefly wondered who had taken his place. Adam would tear her a new one, especially now with Mom gone, he suspected. So it wasn’t the oldest Stark brother who was covering for her. Maybe she usually called Jonah and he was busy tonight, though it was difficult to imagine a piercing emergency this late.
    Dalton pressed the button to answer the call and tried to ignore the impending awkwardness of the conversation. As uncomfortable as it would be, who better to be your designated driver than your sober older brother, he supposed.
    “Ava,” he said into the phone. “Listen, I’ll come pick you up, but we need to talk. I… I don’t think this is appropriate anymore, especially since you’re still in high school. I know I let it slide before, but I don’t think I can anymore.”
    It was difficult to find the words even though his vocabulary had expanded considerably over the last few months. It now included words like ‘enabler’, and that was the last thing he wanted to be. Maybe it was time to put his foot down with Ava.
    “Where are you and I’ll-”
    “It’s not me,” Ava said quietly into the phone.
    Dalton’s insides now felt as cold as his skin. “Is it Pop? Where’s Adam? Can he handle it until I get there? I’m just a few blocks away.”
    He started to jog to the truck and then Ava responded.
    “No,” she said again, still half-whispering. “It’s not us.”
    “Ava-”
    “Dalton, it’s Zoey.”
    Dalton came to an abrupt halt, his black work boots crunching the salt that had been laid down in case the temperature dropped too far overnight. Zoey? Zoey was gone. She didn’t even live in Rapid City anymore. She’d moved on. In fact, she was so far gone she was engaged, or so Mom had told him. He supposed it was even possible she was married by now. Mom had been his only source of updates and when she’d passed, so had his ability to hear even the slightest bit of information about her. He’d come to assume that was the best thing. It had been hard, damn hard, to hear that she’d met someone else and so soon after Dalton had run her off. But what did he expect?
    Zoey had put up with his shit for a long time, even before the drinking had gotten beyond his control. There had been surgeries on his hand, he’d missed work, his income had all but dried up. All of that contributed to him not being the easiest bastard to live with those last several months. Zoey had finally left and met someone better, which wouldn’t have been difficult, honestly. He’d been an ass and that was putting it kindly.
    “What do you mean Zoey?” he demanded. “Where are you? Where’s she ? Ava, what is going on?”
    “Hang up , Ava!”
    Dalton’s fingers tightened on the phone. Hearing her voice after all this time tore at him, especially since he’d been resigned to never hearing it again. “Zoey,” he whispered. His breath came out in a fog.
    “We’re at the drugstore,” Ava told