How My Brother's Best Friend Stole Christmas - Molly O'Keefe Page 0,37
Some of those bottles cost hundreds of dollars, and there were a lot of them.
“The company was going down the gutter and your dad was drinking top shelf booze?”
“What can I say? He’s an asshole. And a lot of this stuff might be top shelf, but it tastes like garbage. Once Sophie and I drink all of this, I’m throwing out this cabinet.” He looked at the bottle in his hand. “What kind of throwback has a liquor cabinet in his office, anyway?”
“The kind who embezzles money, I guess.”
Wes grinned at me. “Look, I’m making the choice. You’re drinking scotch.”
“Perfect.”
My old friend sat back down with a sigh and splashed very old, very good scotch into two gold-rimmed glasses. Honestly, when I thought about Sophie and her casseroles and the potlucks and the trivia nights, I thought for the millionth time that their father did not deserve his kids.
“So,” I said sipping my scotch. “I take it you’re not getting divorced, as planned.”
His smile made me pause, the glass halfway to my mouth. I’d seen my friend drunk for the first time and I’d seen him the first night he got laid, and I’d seen him the night his father got arrested for embezzlement, but I’d never seen him like this. Happy. Like someone had put a lightbulb up his butt. “Nope. No divorce, though thanks for the idea. We’re staying married. I’m telling you man, my parents, your parents, no one gave us any idea how good it could be.”
“What?”
“Love. Marriage.”
“I imagine it’s the love that makes it good. And our parents never had that.”
“Your dad still sniffing around?”
“A little. He’ll get bored and leave soon enough.”
“Your mom?”
“Rattled, but resolute. I keep telling her to get a restraining order.”
“Oh, man,” Wes said. “I’m sorry.”
I raised my scotch in a mock salute. “Dads. What are you gonna do?”
“Well, mine’s going to jail and it’s not half bad,” Wes said, and suddenly we were laughing like we used to and it all felt pretty good.
“That’s a sound I haven’t heard for a long time,” Sophie said, coming into the office like a whirlwind. “You two laughing.”
I gave myself a second to take her in, to soak her in and hold her for just a second, and then I buried my face in my scotch glass.
“Wes is very funny,” I said.
“No, he’s not,” Sophie said with a big wide smile.
“I’m sitting right here. Scotch?” Wes asked his sister.
“Gross. Is there any of that bourbon from last time?”
“You drank the last bottle.”
“Rats. How about that red wine?”
“I took it home to Penny. She likes red.”
Oh, Sophie was so quietly hurt. So carefully trying not to show her brother that she was. “She should come to these Thursday nights.”
“She had some work to do. But…we were hoping you’d come spend New Year’s with us. Both of you.” Wes pointed his finger at me. “And don’t say you can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’ll be lying and you shouldn’t do that to your only friends.”
Sophie laughed. “I’ll be there,” she said. “But I expect you to feed me. Something good. Expensive. Like the kind of food I’d be served at a wedding.”
“I will,” Wes said. “And I’m sorry. It just happened. We went to City Hall, and—well, I’ll tell you the whole story if you get me drunk enough. We’re talking about doing a thing in the summer.”
“A thing with dancing? Speeches?” she asked, her eyes narrowed.
“You will have your moment to publicly embarrass me. Both of you.”
“I get to tell the story of him falling asleep on the BART in San Francisco,” Sophie said, smiling at me.
“That’s fine. I have the one of him getting nailed in the junk by Annabeth—”
“All right. I can already tell this is a huge mistake. So?” he said, looking between us. “New Year’s Eve. Steaks. Booze. Cheesecake. Some auld lang syne.”
I was trying not to get myself any more tangled up with Sophie, but there was no way to say no. “Of course, man.”
There was another knock on the door and suddenly W.B. was standing there. I’d met him a few times. Good guy. I’d had a sergeant like him on my first tour; he thought he could control the world with meetings and plans and discipline. But the world loved to turn that kind of guy on his head. There were rumors that W.B. had been turned on his head by the beautiful glass artist who’d been hired to create new ornaments.
“W.B.,” Wes said. “Come on in and have a