Page 18 of Property of Whiskey

The nameless club bunny pouring bourbon into my glass is wearing a Property of No One shirt like she invented the damn idea. White cotton, black marker, big uneven letters dragged across her tits.

Legend started that shit, and now every woman who spends more than ten minutes inside the old jail thinks scribbling it across a shirt makes her mysterious.

This one ain’t mysterious.

She’s a redhead, twenty-something, and smells like Axe body spray, cigarettes, and whichever brother dragged her through the Lockup doors before sunrise. She leans over the bar far enough to make sure I can see down the shirt while bourbon glugs into my glass.

“Breakfast,” she says.

I look at the drink, then at her. “You trying to kill me?”

“You’re the one drinking whiskey before eight in the morning.”

“It’s bourbon.”

She blinks. “Same thing.”

“Get out of Kentucky.”

A prospect groans from the floor behind her like even half-dead he agrees with me.

She laughs like I said something charming instead of threatening exile.

The bar inside the old county jail sits where the booking desk used to be, back when this building belonged to men who wore badges and pretended the cells could hold anybody worth catching. The Kings took it over years ago, knocked holes through walls, welded old cell doors into tables, and turned the holding area into a clubhouse.

Most mornings, the Lockup still looks like a crime scene.

A prospect is passed out beneath the stairs with one boot missing and a bra looped around his neck. Dried blood marks one knuckle and lipstick marks the other, which about sums up his night. Somebody left half a biscuit on top of the old fingerprinting machine, and three empty bottles sit inside a row of barred cells nobody bothered unlocking after last night.

Waylon Jennings plays low from the jukebox in the corner, probably so nobody wakes the dead. Unfortunately, half the men in here ain’t dead. They’re just hungover. I lift the glass and take a drink.

The bunny props both elbows on the bar. “So how’d you get the name?”

I swallow. “What name?”

She smiles. “Whiskey.”

I glance down at the patch over my chest like I forgot it was there. “Oh. That.”

“Yeah, that.”

“Don’t remember.”

“You don’t remember getting your road name?”

“Nope.”

She leans closer. “You were drunk?”

“Nope.”

“Got into a fight?”

“Nope.”

“Stole a whiskey truck?”

I roll the glass between my palms, ice knocking softly against the sides. “Nope.”