Carnage by Ker Dukey Release and Review

Another bar. Another drink. Another job.
Shifting my gaze around this hovel, a grim line tugs at my lips. The floors are sticky. The mirror behind the bar is cracked and missing pieces. There’s a fucking dog that looks like a rat licking out of a man’s beer glass on the bar top. Cigarette smoke fogs the air, and the reek of piss invades my nostrils. I got a text to meet a brother here. My gut instinct tells me I’ve got the wrong place. This shit hole is in the middle of bum fuck nowhere and looks like it’s run from the cast of The Hills Have Eyes. Lights flicker toward the back where a pool table is situated, making it impossible for anyone to fucking use it. I’ve been in some hell holes, but this one takes the cake.
Finding a table, I begrudgingly sit my ass in the torn-up booth. The green leather seat looks like Freddie Kruger got into a fight with it, half the insides pushing through tears.
A couple guys in the booth next to me share a pitcher of beer while hashing it out in a heated conversation. A barman who looks ready for the grave hobbles up and down, clearing shit away. A man propped up by the bar is either passed out or dead.
I’m about to text the bastard and check if this is the right place when a woman walks in from the back, making me pause. It’s like someone dropped a diamond into a pile of dog shit. A pretty little piece so out of place immediately sends up red flags. Her dark blonde hair spills down her back, ending at a perky ass crammed into a pair of jean shorts. Her face is innocent all for the pouty red lips that scream, “Insert cock here.” Her tits bounce with her movements as she slips behind the bar.
Our eyes clash across the room, her brow puckering as she nods to the barman. He gives her something, and she saunters toward me. Dumping her ass in the seat opposite me, she places a shot in the center of the table between us.
Her pouty lips part, concern drawing down her brows. “You’re a bastard,” she breathes. I half expected her to be toothless—something that would make her fit in here—but she has a full set of pearly whites.
“A little too soon to be determining that. That’s usually reserved for after sex.” I smirk, but she doesn’t even twitch.
Tough crowd.
“A royal bastard,” she clarifies in a hushed whisper. Reaching forward, I take the glass and knock it back as she reaches for my arm to stop me. “You shouldn’t have come,” she says, slightly shaking her head and shifting her eyes to the men in the booth next to us.
Was this a setup? My thoughts melt like plastic over a flame, the room expanding then shrinking in quick succession.
“What the fuck did you give me?” I slur. Fuck. She drugged me. I knew she was a huge red fucking flag.