Wright with Benefits

“No one,” I said with a laugh as I stood and buttoned my suit jacket.

“No one,” Austin mimicked with an eye roll. “David, do you believe him?”

He grimaced. “I mean, I might have heard who the girl is from Sutton already. It’s not entirely fair.”

Austin’s eyes glimmered. “Spill.”

“It’s Annie,” I said as I pushed my chair in. “We’re just friends.”

“Just friends,” Morgan said with air quotes to punctuate the words.

“Is this like just friends, but you’re really dating?” Austin asked, slinging an arm around my shoulders. “Or like just friends, but you’re fucking?”

I shook my head, pushing him off of me.

“Leave him be,” David said, jostling Austin. “Imagine if everyone had treated you like this about Julia.”

“They did!” he insisted.

Morgan scoffed behind them. “They did not. I was the one who got shit about Patrick, you ass.”

“Well, yeah, you were dating my best friend. What did you expect?”

Morgan swatted him on the back of the head. “Why are you the worst?”

I laughed. It had been three years since I moved, and still, I wasn’t used to having this much family around. I had friends back in Vancouver who I’d always been close with but nothing like this. Nothing unconditional. It still baffled me.

We took the elevator to the bottom floor and spread out as we headed to our cars.

“Have fun,” Austin said with a wink.

Morgan laughed and squeezed my arm. “Don’t let him bother you. If you want to keep you and Annie a secret for longer, I don’t blame you one bit. Our family is pretty intense.”

She didn’t let me respond before hiking across the parking lot in her four-inch heels to her new black Tesla Model S. After driving mine, she’d immediately gone and purchased one. We were still in negotiations with Tesla to get a Supercharger in Lubbock now that it was becoming a hot commodity.

I tried to let everyone’s comments fall off of me. Maybe Morgan understood what was happening with Annie. But still, not quite. She and Patrick had been a secret. Annie and I weren’t a secret. We just weren’t…together either.

Thai Pepper was packed by the time I arrived. I was glad that I’d put in an order earlier this morning, so I just walked up to the counter and picked up our two pad thais. I drove them to the hospital and found her in the cafeteria, seated next to Cézanne, with her head buried in a book. She looked half-asleep.

“Superman!” Cézanne cheered. “Please tell me one of those is for me.”

“You can have mine,” I offered.

Annie’s head tipped up. She had dark circles under her eyes. Even though she’d claimed to be sleeping more since staying at my house, I wasn’t sure how she’d been functioning before. Still, she was beautiful. I couldn’t deny that I liked her just as much in scrubs, a messy bun, and no makeup as I did when she was all done up, snakeskin heels and all.

“Hey,” she said with a smile that lit up her face and dropped all of the exhaustion. “I hope you got it extra hot.”

“They thought I was crazy for asking for it, but I managed.” I pulled the food out of the plastic bag and passed one to her.

She opened it and shuddered just at the smell of the heat. “This is going to burn.”

“I don’t even know you,” Cézanne said, wrinkling her nose. “That looks like a powder keg.”

“Exactly. Just how I like it.”

I offered mine to Cézanne. “I still have time to find something else.”

She waved her hand at me. “Boy, sit down. You should eat lunch with your girl.”

Annie looked up at her with fire in her eyes. “Stop it.”

Cézanne grinned like she had no idea what Annie was talking about. I was about to make an excuse. I sometimes brought her lunch, but we didn’t eat together. She was too busy and usually only had a few minutes for lunch. I didn’t mind getting her something to eat, but I didn’t think that she wanted me to interrupt her day.

Then Annie looked up at me and smiled again. She patted the seat next to her. “Don’t let your lunch get cold.”

I decided not to second-guess her and sank onto the bench. Cézanne and Annie kept up a steady stream of conversation about their current rotations. I knew next to nothing about what they were going through. So I let the easy conversation drift over me. Even as out of place as I was in a business suit next to these doctors in white coats, they never let me feel left out.

“How’s the winery going?” Cézanne asked.

“Well, it’s not going anywhere yet,” I said with a shrug, pushing away my empty pad thai. “We put in an offer to purchase one. At first, the owners seemed excited, and then they asked for an extension while someone else looked at it. It’s frustrating since it didn’t seem like anyone else had even known about the property.”