The Bourbon Kings Read online

  BY J. R. WARD

  THE BLACK DAGGER BROTHERHOOD SERIES

  Dark Lover

  Lover Eternal

  Lover Awakened

  Lover Revealed

  Lover Unbound

  Lover Enshrined

  The Black Dagger Brotherhood: An Insider's Guide

  Lover Avenged

  Lover Mine

  Lover Unleashed

  Lover Reborn

  Lover at Last

  The King

  The Shadows

  NOVELS OF THE FALLEN ANGELS

  Covet

  Crave

  Envy

  Rapture

  Possession

  Immortal

  New American Library

  Published by the Penguin Group Penguin Group (USA) LLC, 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014

  USA | Canada | UK | Ireland | Australia | New Zealand | India | South Africa | China penguin.com

  A Penguin Random House Company First published by New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) LLC

  First Printing, July 2015

  Copyright (c) Love Conquers All, Inc., 2015

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  REGISTERED TRADEMARK--MARCA REGISTRADA

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA: Ward, J. R., 1969—

  The Bourbon Kings/J. R. Ward.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 978-0-69819303-1

  1. Families--Kentucky--Fiction. 2. Family-owned business enterprises--Fiction. 3. Bourbon whiskey--Fiction. 4. Domestic fiction. I. Title.

  PS3623.A73227B68 2015

  813'.6--dc23 2015008759

  PUBLISHER'S NOTE

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Version_1

  CONTENTS

  By J.R. Ward

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Invitation

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  THIRTY-NINE

  FORTY

  FORTY-ONE

  FORTY-TWO

  FORTY-THREE

  FORTY-FOUR

  FORTY-FIVE

  FORTY-SIX

  FORTY-SEVEN

  FORTY-EIGHT

  FORTY-NINE

  FIFTY

  A SNEAK PEEK AT WHAT'S NEXT IN THE BOURBON KINGS SAGA

  Acknowledgments

  Dedicated to my beloved Southern Gentleman, John Neville Blakemore III, without whom this, and so much else, would not be possible.

  ONE

  Charlemont, Kentucky

  Mist hung over the Ohio's sluggish waters like the breath of God, and the trees on the Charlemont shore side of River Road were so many shades of spring green, the color required a sixth sense to absorb them all. Overhead, the sky was a dim, milky blue, the kind of thing that you saw up north only in July, and at seven-thirty a.m., the temperature was already seventy-four degrees.

  It was the first week of May. The most important seven days on the calendar, beating the birth of Christ, the American Independence, and New Year's Rockin' Eve.

  The One Hundred Thirty-ninth running of The Charlemont Derby was on Saturday.

  Which meant the entire state of Kentucky was in a thoroughbred racing frenzy.

  As Lizzie King approached the turn-off for her work, she was riding an adrenaline high that had been pumping for a good three weeks, and she knew from past experience that this rush-rush mood of hers wasn't going to deflate until after Saturday's clean-up. At least she was, as always, going against the traffic heading into downtown and making good time: Her commute was forty minutes each way, but not in the NYC, Boston, or LA, densely packed, parking-lot version of rush hour--which in her current frame of mind would have caused her head to mushroom cloud. No, her trip into her job was twenty-eight minutes of Indiana farm country followed by six minutes of bridge and spaghetti junction delays, capped off with this six - to ten-minute, against-the-tide shot parallel to the river.

  Sometimes she was convinced the only cars going in her direction were the rest of the staff that worked at Easterly with her.

  Ah, yes, Easterly.

  The Bradford Family Estate, or BFE, as its deliveries were marked, sat high up on the biggest hill in the Charlemont metro area and was comprised of a twenty-thousand-square-foot main house with three formal gardens, two pools, and a three-hundred-sixty degree view of Washington County. There was also twelve retainer's cottages on the property, as well as ten outbuildings, a fully functioning farm of over a hundred acres, a twenty-horse stable that had been converted into a business center, and a nine-hole golf course.

  That was lighted.

  In case you needed to work on your chip shot at one a.m.

  As far as she had heard, the enormous parcel had been granted to the family back in 1778, after the first of the Bradfords had come south from Pennsylvania with the then Colonel George Rogers Clark--and brought both his ambitions and his bourbon-making traditions into the nascent commonwealth. Fast forward almost two hundred fifty years, and you had a Federal mansion the size of a small town up on that hill, and some seventy-two people working on the property full - and part-time.

  All of whom followed a feudal rules and rigid caste system that was right out of Downton Abbey.

  Or maybe the Dowager Countess of Grantham's routine was a little too progressive.

  William the Conqueror's times were probably more apt.

  So, for example--and this was solely a Lifetime movie conjecture here--if a gardener fell in love with one of the family's precious sons? Even if she were one of two head horticulturists, and had a national reputation and a master's in landscape architecture from Cornell?

  That was just not done.

  Sabrina without the happy ending, darlin'.

  With a curse, Lizzie turned the radio on in hopes of getting her brain to shut up. She didn't get far. Her Toyota Yaris had the speaker system of a Barbie house: there were little circles in the doors that were supposed to pump music, but they were mostly for pretend--and today, NPR coming out of those cocktail coasters just wasn't enough--

  The sound of an ambulance speeding up behind her easily overrode the haute pitter-patter of the BBC News, and she hit her brakes and eased over onto the shoulder. After the noise and flashing lights passed, she got back on track and
rounded a fat curve in both the river and the road . . . and there it was, the Bradfords' great white mansion, high up in the sky, the dawning sun being forced to work around its regal, symmetrical layout.

  She had grown up in Plattsburgh, New York, on an apple orchard.

  What the hell had she been thinking almost two years ago when she'd let Lane Baldwine, the youngest son, into her life?

  And why was she still, after all this time, wondering about the particulars?

  Come on, it wasn't like she was the first woman who'd gotten good and seduced by him--

  Lizzie frowned and leaned forward over the wheel.

  The ambulance that had passed her was heading up the flank of the BFE hill, its red and white lights strobing along the alley of maple trees.

  "Oh, God," she breathed.

  She prayed it wasn't who she thought it was.

  But come on, her luck couldn't be that bad.

  And wasn't it sad that that was the first thing that came to her mind instead of worry over whoever was hurt/sick/passed out.

  Proceeding on by the monogrammed, wrought-iron gates that were just closing, she took her right-hand turn about three hundred yards later.

  As an employee, she was required to use the service entrance with her vehicles, no excuses, no exceptions.

  Because God forbid a vehicle with an MSRP of under a hundred thousand dollars be seen in front of the house--

  Boy, she was getting bitchy, she decided. And after Derby, she was going to have to take a vacation before people thought she was going through menopause two decades too early.

  The sewing machine under the Yaris's hood revved up as she shot down the level road that went around the base of the hill. The cornfield came first, the manure already laid down and churned over in preparation for planting. And then there were the cutting gardens filled with the first of the perennials and annuals, the heads of the early peonies fat as softballs and no darker than the blush on an ingenue's cheeks. After those, there were the orchid houses and nurseries, followed by the outbuildings with the farm and groundskeeping equipment in them, and then the lineup of two - and three-bedroom, fifties-era cottages.

  That were as variable and stylish as a set of sugar and flour tins on a Formica counter.

  Pulling into the staff parking lot, she got out, leaving her cooler, her hat and her bag with her sunscreen behind.

  Jogging over to groundskeeping's main building, she entered the gasoline - and oil-smelling cave through the open bay on the left. The office of Gary McAdams, the head groundsman, was off to the side, the cloudy glass panes still translucent enough to tell her that lights were on and someone was moving around in there.

  She didn't bother to knock. Shoving open the flimsy door, she ignored the half-naked Pirelli calendar pinups. "Gary--"

  The sixty-two-year-old was just hanging up the phone with his bear-paw hand, his sunburned face with its tree-bark skin as grim as she had ever seen it. As he looked across his messy desk, she knew who the ambulance was for even before he said the name.

  Lizzie put her hands to her face and leaned back against the doorjamb.

  She felt so sorry for the family, of course, but it was impossible not to personalize the tragedy and want to go throw up somewhere.

  The one man she never wanted to see again . . . was going to come home.

  She might as well get a stop watch.

  *

  New York, New York

  "Come on. I know you want me."

  Jonathan Tulane Baldwine looked around the hip that was propped next to his stack of poker chips. "Ante up, boys."

  "I'm talking to you." A pair of partially covered, fully fake breasts appeared over the fan of cards in his hands. "Hello."

  Time to feign interest in something, anything else, Lane thought. Too bad the one-bedroom, mid-floor, Midtown apartment was a bachelor pad done in nothing-that-wasn't-functional. And why bother staring into the faces of what was left of the six bastards they'd started playing with eight hours ago. None of them had proved worthy of anything more than keeping up with the high stakes.

  Deciphering their tells, even as an avoidance strategy, wasn't worth the eye strain at seven-thirty in the morning.

  "Helllllloooo--"

  "Give it up, honey, he's not interested," someone muttered.

  "Everybody's interested in me."

  "Not him." Jeff Stern, the host and roommate, tossed in a thousand dollars' worth of chips. "Ain't that right, Lane?"

  "Are you gay? Is he gay?"

  Lane moved the queen of hearts next to the king of hearts. Shifted the jack next to the queen. Wanted to push the boob job with mouth onto the floor. "Two of you haven't anted."

  "I'm out, Baldwine. Too rich for my blood."

  "I'm in--if someone'll lend me a grand."

  Jeff looked across the green fleet table and smiled. "It's you and me again, Baldwine."

  "Looking forward to takin' your money." Lane tucked his cards in tight. "It's your bet--"

  The woman leaned down again. "I love your Southern accent."

  Jeff's eyes narrowed behind his clear-rimmed glasses. "You gotta back off him, baby."

  "I'm not stupid," she slurred. "I know exactly who you are and how much money you have. I drink your bourbon--"

  Lane sat back and addressed the fool that had brought the chatty accessory. "Billy? Seriously."

  "Yeah, yeah." The guy who'd wanted to go a thousand dollars into debt stood up. "The sun's coming up, anyway. Let's go."

  "I want to stay--"

  "Nope, you're done." Billy took the bimbo with the self-esteem inflation problem by the arm and escorted her to the door. "I'll take you home, and no, he's not who you think he is. Later, assholes."

  "Yes, he is--I've seen him in magazines--"

  Before the door could shut, the other guy who'd been bled dry got to his feet. "I'm out of here, too. Remind me never to play with the pair of you again."

  "I'll do nothing of the sort," Jeff said as he held up a palm. "Tell the wife I said hello."

  "You can tell her yourself when we see you at Shabbat."

  "That again."

  "Every Friday, and if you don't like it, why do you keep showing up at my house?"

  "Free food. It's just that simple."

  "Like you need the handouts."

  And then they were alone. With over two hundred and fifty thousand dollars' worth of poker chips, two decks of cards, an ashtray full of cigar nubs, and no bimbage.

  "It's your bet," Lane said.

  "I think he wants to marry her," Jeff muttered as he tossed more chips into the center of the table. "Billy, that is. Here's twenty grand."

  "Then he should get his head examined." Lane met his old fraternity brother's bet and then doubled it. "Pathetic. The both of them."

  Jeff lowered his cards. "Lemme ask you something."

  "Don't make it too hard, I'm drunk."

  "Do you like them?"

  "Poker chips?" In the background, a cell phone started to ring. "Yeah, I do. So if you don't mind putting some more of yours in--"

  "No, women."

  Lane shifted his eyes up. "Excuse me?"

  His oldest friend put an elbow on the felt and leaned in. His tie had been lost at the start of the game, and his previously starched, bright white shirt was now as pliant and relaxed as a polo. His eyes, however, were tragically sharp and focused. "You heard me. Look, I know it's none of my business, but you show up here how long ago? Like, nearly two years. You live on my couch, you don't work--which given who your family is, I get. But there's no women, no--"

  "Stop thinking, Jeff."

  "I'm serious."

  "So bet."

  The cell phone went quiet. But his buddy didn't. "U.Va. was a lifetime ago. Lot can change."

  "Apparently not if I'm still on your couch--"

  "What happened to you, man."

  "I died waiting for you to bet or fold."

  Jeff muttered as he made a stack of reds and blue
s and tossed them into the center. "'Nother twenty thousand."

  "That's more like it." The cell phone started to ring again. "I'll see you. And I'll raise you fifty. If you shut up."

  "You sure you want to do that?"

  "Get you to be quiet? Yup."

  "Go aggressive in poker with an investment banker like me. Cliches are there for a reason--I'm greedy and great with math. Unlike your kind."

  "My kind."

  "People like you Bradfords don't know how to make money--you've been trained to spend it. Now, unlike most dilettantes, your family actually has an income stream--although that's what keeps you from having to learn anything. So not sure it's a value-add in the long term."

  Lane thought back to why he'd finally left Charlemont for good. "I've learned plenty, trust me."

  "And now you sound bitter."

  "You're boring me. Am I supposed to enjoy that?"

  "Why don't you ever go home for Christmas? Thanksgiving? Easter?"

  Lane collapsed his cards and put them face-down on the felt. "I don't believe in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny anymore, goddamn it, and turkey is overrated. What is your problem?"

  Wrong question to ask. Especially after a night of poker and drinking. Especially to a guy like Stern, who was categorically incapable of being anything but perfectly honest.

  "I hate that you're so alone."

  "You've got to be kidding--"

  "I'm one of your oldest friends, right? If I don't tell you like it is, who's going to? And don't get pissy with me--you picked a New York Jew, not one of the thousand other southern-fried stick-up-the-asses that went to that ridiculous college of ours to be your perpetual roommate. So fuck you."

  "Are we going to play this hand out?"

  Jeff's shrewd stare narrowed. "Answer me one thing."

  "Yes, I am seriously reconsidering why I didn't crash with Wedge or Chenoweth right now."

  "Ha. You couldn't stand either of those two longer than a day. Unless you were drunk, which actually, you have been for the last three and a half months straight. And that's another thing I have a problem with."

  "Bet. Now. For the love of God."

  "Why--"

  As that cell phone went off a third time, Lane got to his feet and stalked across the room. Over on the bar, next to his billfold, the glowing screen was lit up--not that he bothered to look at who it was.

  He answered the call only because it was either that or commit homicide.

  The male Southern voice on the other end of the connection said three words: "Your momma's dyin'."

  As the meaning sank into his brain, everything destabilized around him, the walls closing in, the floor rolling, the ceiling collapsing on his head. Memories didn't so much come to him as assault him, the alcohol in his system doing nothing to dull the onslaught.