Don't Date Your Brother's Best Friend

“No, you will not throw me out of my house. This is my family home too and you have no right to tell me to leave. We’ll see who Dad thinks should leave, eh?”

“No, you will not bother him with your selfish, childish bullshit anymore Ryan. And you’re not going to bully me. I don’t know what the hell has gotten into you, but you are not the same brother I grew up with. You are selfish and self-absorbed, and callous, and cold. I don’t even recognize you anymore and it makes me sad. It makes me so sad to see you like this Ryan.”

He looked taken aback and I thought maybe I’d finally gotten through to him, but his stubbornness won out. “Don’t change the subject Sarah Jo. Don’t turn this around on me.”

I threw up my hands walked out the back door into the yard with Ryan close on my heels.

“Don’t walk away from me little sister,” he called after me.

“I spun around and jabbed my finger in his chest. “I’ve had about enough of you for one damn day Ryan. Are you going to stay and help with Dad? Are you going to run the lumberyard? Are you going to cook and clean and take Dad to all of his appointments?”

“You know I can’t do that, I have a job,” he retorted.

“Then shut up and go away.” I turned and went back into the house, closing and locking the door behind me.

22

Luke

Even though it was killing me to stay away, I kept in touch with Sarah Jo by text and call. I knew Ryan was pissed about us being seen together, and I didn’t want to make it worse for her by hanging around the house. I needed to deal with Ryan directly, for myself.

I stopped by the grocery store and picked up a six pack of Vanilla Coke, which was his favorite in high school. I went to Ryan’s house over in the next town. It was brick, two stories with a horseshoe drive and a pool out in back with those nice wood loungers that have cushions on them and an umbrella over them. He had a whole room in that house for his custom pool table with a stained-glass light above it, and another room he called his study that had huge mahogany desk and a bar cart with crystal decanters of liquor on it. It was like he had watched Dynasty when he was a kid and decided that was how he was gonna live his life. He might have been born a Winters, but he was Carrington material in his heart.

I knocked on the door, knowing he could see easily who it was thanks to the cameras. He made me wait, which I expected. When he opened the door, he looked annoyed.

“I brought you something. Remember when we used to cut Algebra and go buy cokes and Reese’s at the gas station? We thought we were so gangster,” I chuckled.

“I grew out of that,” he said grimly.

“I want to talk to you. Can you give me five minutes for old time’s sake?”

“Fine,” he said grudgingly, opening the door wider. I went to step out of my shoes just inside the door.

“You don’t have to do that. Whitney’s gone. She was the one who was psycho about the floors,” he said, “sometimes I wear my shoes all through the house now, just to let freedom ring.”

It was the first time in months he’d said something that registered hurt in his voice instead of anger. I left my shoes on and followed him in. I set the sodas on the quartz countertop in his kitchen.

“I should’ve told you,” I said, getting right to the point. “I should have trusted you to have whatever reaction you wanted and then think of things fairly. I should’ve known you’d be smart enough to figure it out sooner or later. I was a coward not to tell you.”

“You’re not a coward. You’re a lying son of a bitch,” he said evenly.

“I wouldn’t go that far. I slept with your sister. Not your wife,” I said.

I saw anger and something else flash in his eyes then. Maybe I shouldn’t have brought up the cheating wife.

“I’ve told you time and again to leave her alone. But you couldn’t stay away. I thought I could trust you. I was an idiot.”

“Oh, you’ve been an idiot all right,” I shrugged.

He gave a mirthless laugh. “You just come to insult me or to apologize for fucking my little sister?”

“Careful what you say about her, man. You’ve been my best friend most of my life, but if you start talking shit about Sarah Jo, I’m knocking your teeth out.”

“So why are you here?”

“I came to apologize and bring you some cokes. And this card.”

“You got me a fuckin’ Hallmark? Then they really do have a card for everything. Is there a poem?”