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  Matter of Fact

  Double Blind Study, Book 8

  A Novella

  By Heidi Hutchinson

  Smashwords Edition

  MATTER OF FACT

  ©2019 Heidi Hutchinson

  All Rights Reserved

  Cover Photos purchased from Adobe Stock

  Cover designed by Heidi Hutchinson

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review. Please do not participate in encouraging piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author's rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locations, are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, dialogue, and events are drawn from the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real.

  To Cap

  You make me believe in miracles

  Prologue

  Cologne, Germany

  Luke’s gentle guitar strum was joined by the lead singer’s soft hum as the melody came to him.

  Carl had had the privilege of witnessing the man write songs before, but never like this.

  The emotional weight of their circumstances contrasted with the hopeful lightness of the new song being created. The combination had kept Carl’s heart in suspense. In anticipation of a musical cure for the ugliness that they were now all faced with.

  And the greatest weight—the one of responsibility—hung on all of them.

  Though no one more than Carl.

  Because he’d known.

  He’d recognized the signs and had chosen to not confront the drummer.

  His friend.

  Addiction was a monster that thrived in shadow and secret.

  And now Mike lay in a hospital bed hooked up to machines whose sole purpose was to keep him alive.

  Three days.

  It had been three days since Carl had brought Mike into the ER in Cologne, Germany.

  He would never forget the moment he found him on the floor of his hotel room.

  The door had been left hanging open, kept from closing by Mike’s limp body crumpled on the floor.

  Carl’s phone vibrated in his pocket, making him jump.

  He stepped out of the room as he frowned at the display.

  All it said was “Unknown.”

  If a journalist had gotten ahold of his number, he was gonna lose it on them. Ilsa’s unseemly press conference hours after the overdose and before Lindy had a chance to write up a statement had left all of them jumpy and suspicious.

  “Hello,” he growled into the phone, spotting a stairwell at the end of the hall and heading that direction.

  “Carl?”

  The sound of her voice sent an unexpected rush of emotion through his body and he gripped the phone tighter.

  “It’s me. It’s Miranda.”

  Carl let the door to the stairwell close loudly behind him.

  After that he stopped.

  Stopped moving, stopped breathing, stopped thinking.

  “Carl?” she asked carefully. “Are you there?”

  He cleared his throat. “Yeah.”

  She sighed softly through the phone. “If you’d rather not—”

  “No,” he cut her off. “Please don’t hang up.” He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Please.”

  “Okay,” she agreed gently.

  Carl took a deep breath and sat down on the top stair.

  “I saw the news,” she said after a minute.

  Of course she had. The music world had been rocked within the past 72 hours.

  Double Blind Study drummer hospitalized. Drug overdose suspected.

  It had been everywhere.

  Ilsa, Mike’s girlfriend, hadn’t shut up since the moment it had happened. She was all sorts of tearful with the press.

  And yet she hadn’t made one attempt to come to the hospital to see the “love of her life.”

  “I’ve always said women are trouble.”

  “You’re usually right.”

  The connection between them took hold over the phone and he felt it in his gut. An anchor. A center amidst the chaos that had always been his life.

  “I was the one who found him,” Carl confessed. A fact that he had relayed to the authorities but one he hadn’t been able to process on his own yet.

  “Oh, Carl,” she whispered.

  He had no fears of telling her the things he would never want the press to know. Miranda was a safe place. As the older sister of Harrison O’Neil, the band’s lead guitarist, and also Carl’s first love, Miranda knew the ins and outs of band life in a way most of the world never would. She’d seen it from its inception. Been there for the rise.

  And now the fall.

  “I failed them,” Carl said, voice thick with fear and regret.

  “Why would you say that?”

  “My job—my entire purpose for taking off with them all those years ago had been to keep them safe.”

  “You didn’t do this, Carl.”

  “Didn’t I?” he argued. “I saw the signs. They were all there. And I didn’t do anything.”

  “Okay…What could you have done?”

  Carl pressed his lips together because he knew what she was doing. And truthfully, even though it sucked, it helped.

  Because he had no idea. And having that reminder, while it should have alleviated his guilt, even a little, made him feel that much worse.

  “I don’t know,” he growled. “But not doing anything sure didn’t help, did it?”

  He instantly regretted snapping at her.

  For three days he hadn’t talked to anyone about what he was thinking or feeling. Sure, he’d talked to Lindy and the nurses and the boys. But that was all work stuff. Keeping-it-together stuff.

  Miranda was personal.

  “I’m scared too, Carl,” she said, reminding him of all the things he’d promised and all the promises he hadn’t been able to keep.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice rough. He cleared his throat and breathed deeply through his nose. Crying had never been Carl’s emotional outlet. The closest he’d ever got was at his dad’s funeral but that was only because he’d had so much whiskey he’d nearly pissed himself.

  But he was scared.

  The center of his gut was in a never-ending freefall.

  “I shouldn’t snap at you.” He patted the pocket on his chest, feeling the familiar pack of cigarettes. Miranda hated it when he smoked, that’s why he’d tried to quit years ago. And he almost had. But then they’d fallen apart and soon after so had his convictions.

  He stood and made his way down the stairs to the exit.

  As he wrestled with his lighter and a smoke, Miranda cleared her throat and her voice went up an octave. A sign she was nervous.

  “I, uh. I was thinking about flying out there.”

  “Out where?” he asked, sitting down on the curb.

  “To where you are.”

  Pain shot through his gut and he closed his eyes.

  “You know, to be there for the guys.”

  Carl took another slow drag of the cigarette, drawing the smoke and nicotine deep into his lungs.

  “Right,” he murmured, releasing the smoke into the air around him. “For the guys.”

  “And for you.” Miranda inhaled audibly and she rushed out, “Unless you have someone there for you. I don’t want to… ”

  Across the parking lot a bird swooped down into a space and pecked through what was le
ft of food that had been tossed. It was just crumbs. But the eagerness with which the bird gobbled them up make Carl hurt in old places.

  “No, I’ve got it,” he said, sounding way more casual than he felt. But that had always been his gift. He sucked hard on the cigarette and burned his throat. “I’m sure you have work anyway.”

  “Dammit, Carl,” she said softly. “Please. Let me care about you.”

  He shook his head even though she couldn’t see him.

  Hope was a dangerous thing to give a man.

  As long as he was away from her, he could maintain the façade of being all right. He could put on his grumpy face and say his swear words and no one would know he was only half alive.

  But being around her, seeing her, hearing her… his incompleteness would be apparent.

  “Carl?” she asked when he hadn’t spoken for a couple minutes.

  “Yeah,” he acknowledged, putting the little that was left of his cigarette to his lips and lifting his eyes to where the bird had been. A pair of legs blocked his view and he followed them up to brown eyes.

  He froze, still pressing the phone to his ear.

  Miranda stood before him, worry in her eyes and wrinkles in her clothes.

  She shrugged in frame and expression.

  Carl slowly removed the cigarette butt from his lips and dropped it onto the concrete. He swallowed, trying to figure out if the combination of stress and sleep deprivation was causing him imagine things.

  “You’re here?” he asked.

  She nodded, sliding the phone away from her ear and ending the call.

  “I didn’t want you to be alone,” she said after a beat.

  He shook his head once as he pressed his lips together and eyes closed.

  And then she was there. Beside him on the curb, her arms wrapping around him, cradling his head to her chest, pressing her lips to his temple.

  He dropped his phone with a clatter and curved his arms around her waist, crushing her to him, letting himself feel her warmth and her peace and her life.

  “I can’t believe you’re here,” he whispered harshly, clinging to her. “You’re actually here.”

  “I got here as fast as I could.”

  He knew he was holding her too tight, but she didn’t make moves to leave or loosen his grip. Instead she soothed the urgency of his touch by lightly scraping her fingernails through his hair and scalp with one hand, while the other made circles on his back and shoulder.

  The past three days had been the most terrifying of his life and it wasn’t until he collapsed into her arms that he could really grasp the magnitude of what had happened.

  Mike could die.

  Or he could be fine.

  Or something in between where he was damaged but breathing.

  None of them really knew what to expect or even hope for. The doctors had been careful about misleading any of them.

  But what if Mike came out of it and he was fine?

  That didn’t actually mean he was fine.

  He had a problem. One that couldn’t be ignored anymore.

  And none of them could do a damn thing about it.

  All of their lives hung on whatever happened to Mike next.

  It was such a heavy realization that Carl groaned out loud and he continued to burrow into Miranda’s softness.

  “I found him, Ran. He was just lying there in the doorway like a rag doll. All alone and out in the open like that.” He clutched at her, wishing her nearness would expel the memory from his mind. “You don’t know. He looked so young. Just a kid.” It wasn’t until he’d picked him up that he had realize how thin Mike had become. He shuddered as the sensation flooded through him anew.

  They were all kids, the entire band.

  That’s why Carl had taken it upon himself to be their ship’s captain.

  A lot of good it done them.

  “I failed them.” His chest ached because the confession went deeper than the surface. He had failed them in a way he hadn’t known was possible.

  “Oh, Carl.” Miranda continued her ministrations but didn’t offer meaningless words of consolation. She knew him. She knew those things wouldn’t do him any good anyway.

  But she was there.

  She was right there.

  With him.

  Alive.

  Chapter 1

  Long Road to Ruin

  MIRANDA

  “So your brother is a rock star?”

  Miranda raised her eyes to her date, a one Nathan Presley, Channel 34’s Weather Wizard.

  His black hair was probably the most remarkable feature about it him. It was striking in its depth of black. She couldn’t remember ever seeing hair so dark that it looked like it went on forever.

  His face was fine.

  Not like oh, he’s fine.

  It was just… fine.

  Classically handsome. Very Cary Grant. He wore tailored suits with an ease that should have made her heart pitter-patter. Square jaw, straight nose, symmetrical features, perfect teeth, nice smile, etc.

  Miranda really didn’t know why she couldn’t seem to muster more attraction for him.

  It was their second date. And only because she didn’t have one and didn’t want to be a third wheel for…reasons.

  He was a meteorologist at a local news station in Kansas City, not an actual wizard. A very sought-after bachelor. He even did those bachelor auctions for charity once a year. He really was quite a catch.

  And he seemed to like Miranda quite a bit.

  Iris, Miranda’s best friend, had been the one to set them up.

  Miranda wasn’t interested in dating while she’d been living in Kansas City since she knew she’d be leaving after six months. But Iris had made a somewhat compelling case about “keeping her options open” and “having fun.”

  Miranda was fairly certain Iris just wanted her to have a date so that they could double. Iris liked group activities and she felt bad when she asked Miranda to be the third wheel.

  Miranda also didn’t enjoy being a third wheel so dating had taken place.

  Not many. Miranda usually called it quits after date four just so that neither one of them ended up wasting their time.

  But most of the dates hadn’t been so bad. Just not for her.

  And maybe that was okay.

  Maybe Miranda just wasn’t the kind of person who got to fall in love a whole bunch.

  Maybe the once was enough.

  And this was her last week in KC before heading back to Boston. Trying to find a new date for one-night event seemed tedious and misleading.

  When she’d called Nathan and asked if he wanted to go to a rock concert with her for Iris’s birthday, he’d sounded a lot more excited than she’d expected.

  But she couldn’t tell if that was for her or for the event.

  “Miranda’s brother plays guitar for Double Blind Study,” Iris chimed in.

  Miranda nodded in confirmation. “But I don’t really think of him as a rock star.”

  “That’s how we ended up with such great tickets,” Iris went on. She nudged Miranda’s shoulder with her own. “Are we going to get to go backstage?”

  “Mm-hm,” Miranda confirmed.

  Iris made a strangled squeal and clapped her hands together once.

  Excited was an understatement.

  Iris had always loved the band. Even when they were just making noise in the garage. She’d probably been their first fan.

  Which was why it made sense for Miranda to surprise her with tickets and backstage passes to see DBS on the last night of their States leg of their tour.

  Though making that call had taken way more courage than she’d anticipated.

  Iris’s reaction had made it worth it.

  And was still making it worth it.

  “This is my favorite band of all time. They are musical gods. I own multiple copies of all their albums and I’ve seen them more times than I can count.”

  It did somewhat strike her as comical the wa
y Iris gushed about the band.

  Miranda got it. She really did.

  And she was proud of her baby brother for all his success. But to her, the band was always going to be her dorky brother and his annoying friends. She couldn’t relate to the star struck way others viewed them. But she understood it.

  “Aren’t they the band that had someone die a few years ago?” Nathan asked.

  Miranda bristled but smoothed her features before replying.

  “There was an incident once a long time ago, but no one died,” she corrected calmly.

  Nathan frowned and shook his head. He wasn’t looking at her, instead he was focused on his plate so he didn’t see her expression cloud over.

  “I could swear it was drugs in Europe or something. I think I have a colleague that covered it. I’ll have to check with him.”

  Maybe this had been a bad idea after all.

  Miranda briefly wondered if Nate knew how to cover a black eye with makeup since he had to work the next day.

  Technically “meteorologist” didn’t fall under the umbrella of “journalism.” Which was why she’d agreed to the date the first time.

  Miranda didn’t date anyone connected with the press.

  Exactly because of where this dinner conversation had gone.

  She was protective of her little brother and his friends. It didn’t matter that they were mostly idiots. They were her idiots. And she didn’t respond well to others and their “misunderstandings.” That’s what Iris had taken to calling it every time another potential relationship fell apart. But it was actually because Miranda didn’t respond with a lot of patience when the band was casually thrown under the tour bus, so to speak.

  Iris patted Miranda’s thigh under the table and Miranda loosened the death grip on her fork.

  It wasn’t handsome Nathan’s fault. He was just another product of the machine.

  And therefore this was not and would never be a love connection.

  Still. She could give good date.

  “Do you get to see a lot of their concerts?” Nathan asked, trying to draw her back into conversation.