Page 4 of Never Say Yes To Your Brother's Best Friend

“Yeah.” Patrick runs a hand through his hair, which is light auburn shot through with gold and copper streaks that make it so much more than just brown. It’s longer than I first thought. He has it combed back without the slicked-back greasy look. It does look thick and kind of nice. I’ll give him that. He has good hair. “Aspen.”

“That’s right.” How much has he heard about me? What did Jace tell him? It would never have been anything bad, but it might as well have been because this guy was definitelynothappy to see me. He has got the most resting asshole face I’ve ever seen on anyone before.

“Aspen, you need to go back home. What your brother wrote…it’s just…it’s never going to happen.”

“I’ve just flown across the country to meet you. I think we should at least talk.” I stare pointedly past him. Now, he’s doubly not what I expected. He’s frank to the point of rude, and his face looks like it will crack in half if he ever smiles. He’s not a laugher, not like Jace was. It seems like this man and my brother have zero in common. He’s way more of the scary Special Forcespersonality that you see on shows and movies. Jace didn’t fit the bill. Physically, yes, but in any other way? No. This guy? He’s about as cheerful as getting smushed by a freefalling pickle launched off a really tall bridge.

I had this picture of Patrick McDonald in my head, and this guy isn’t it. His name is very Irish, but it’s clear by his total lack of an accent of any sort that he was raised here. There’s more, but I’m caught off guard when he rolls his rich brown eyes at me and sighs like I’m the spider he keeps shooing away, but I keep coming back, making webs all over his front door or his favorite car. And spider poo. I think that’s a thing. I’ve heard people complaining about that before. I’m basically spider-pooing all over his life.

Well, feck a deck on that. I’m more than a spider that shits everywhere, and even if this man isgloweringat me, I came all this way to accomplish something. It’s not for me. It’s forJace, and that matters more than anything.

“I quit my job to come out here.”

Patrick blinks. His eyes aren’t just dark. They’re smoky. Like barbequed pineapple. I shouldn’t make myself want to laugh. He’ll think I’m laughing at him, and Patrick McDonald doesn’t do the smiling or laughing thing, and the last thing he looks like he’ll ever do is enjoy being insulted.

“That was rather…silly of you.” He says it. Even though he paused like he wanted to not say it.

If Jace could have told me more about his bestie, it would have been nice. I imagine him sitting me down and telling me that Patrick McDonald acts like an asshole, but really, under all of it, he has a ton of redeeming qualities.

Maybe Patrick thinks this is the worst kind of practical joke. Perhaps I’m the wrench gumming up his work. Maybe that’s why he’s so grouchy. Or it could be he’s got a resting asshole face because this is the way he expresses grief. Maybe he misses Jaceso much, and the letter picked open a wound that had barely even closed up.

I guess I can see why he’s less than thrilled to find me here. I’m the pesty little sister, the one he’s just been charged with looking after. As in, getting married to. Or like taking care of. And he very clearly doesn’t want the obligation. I’m the promise he never wanted to put his name to. The millstone around his neck.

“The letter we both got…I’m assuming it’s basically the same,” he snaps. His voice is deep, raspy. He doesn’t have an accent, but his words are still somehow musical, in a death metal sort of way.

“I don’t know. Maybe I should come in, and we can discuss it.”

“The idea of marriage seemed optional to me. As in an option that neither of us are going to take. Your brother wants me to look after you? I can do that.” He’s obviously doing okay if the house is anything to go on. “That’s fine. Yeah, I’ve got money now. I’ll give you some. You won’t want for anything again. That’s how I’ll look after you.”

No can do, doodly doo. I raise a brow. “He also wantedmeto look afteryou.”

His jaw ticks. His beard is one of the most epic ones I’ve ever seen in person. It’s auburn, like his hair, and also like his hair, it’s shot through with copper and gold strands. It’s a beautiful beard, if slightly shocking, as it’s so bushy. Maybe he wants to teach bushcraft and live in the wilderness too, and this is just temporary until he can start living his dream, but he wants to look the part.

His beard is so epic that it kind of makes me want to stroke it like one would pet a very bushy cat.

Back to the picture I had in my head of Patrick McDonald…he was kinder, taller, and darker with jet-black hair. Freshly shaven. Kind of like the rugged, handsome men from moviesand books. I imagined his eyes would dance. That he’d be funny. I thought he’d be a few years younger than Jace, so the age gap between us wouldn’t be huge. I imagined him slightly serious on the surface, but underneath, he was always ready to burst out with laughter.

My brother also had the best heart.

I thought it should follow that any friend of his would be the same.

I didn’t think this man would open the door to find me here and be immediately cold, rude, and dismissive.

His eyes rake over me now, and there’s absolutely no emotion in them. He doesn’t need emotion. His scowl is more than enough.

“It’s not going to be a thing. The marriage bit. I’d very much like it if you’d accept my offer of money and head back home.” He’s repeating himself now, and he’s not happy to have to do it. He passes his hand back and forth between us like he’s trying to swat me away, not just indicate me, the letter, the marriage part, and himself all in one sweep. “The letter is pure nonsense.”

Oh, really? He’s going to gothere?

My eyes fill with hot, angry tears, but I blink them back. I’m too pissed to cry. It’s not going to happen, I swear. But no, that’s not the thing that’s not going to happen. The thing that’s not going to happen is this man telling me I’m not going to fulfill my brother’s last wishes. He’s not going to take a shit all over that. If he was truly his best friend, and I think I might actually be at the wrong house here, he would never say something like that.

Everything about this is all wrong. He’s all wrong.

He’s not the tall, dark, handsome, gallant, sweet, kind, brave, good man I imagined. He might be tall enough—around six feet—but he’s way too broad, too muscular, too powerful. He’smenacing, not handsome. With all that coppery hair and huge Viking-style beard, he’s not dark either. He’s not a beautifulman. He’s not classically handsome. He’s not ruggedly gorgeous. His face isn’t…well, I don’t know what it is, but I guess itisinteresting. It’s the kind of face that maybe won’t be attractive until you look at it a few times and then a few times more. Until you get used to looking for the stuff that no one else will see at first, and then finally, it hits you. Even if you can’t fully put your finger on what is actually doing the hitting.

“What the nuts? It’snotnonsense, you butthole! The letter was Jace’s last wish. He wrote it knowing full well that if we were living it, then he wouldn’t be here, yet he still did it anyway. He arranged for us to get it a year later. He thought all of it out, and how painful would that have been, planning for your own death like that?”

There is zero change. Zero sympathy. Zero compassion in this man’s eyes. “I burned it.”

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