Page 5 of Enemies with Benefits
On the other side of Marcus stood our other adoptive brothers. Arlo, the son of my mother's best friend before she and her husband had died in a plane crash in Jamaica, was giving his normal smile that would make you swear he knew more than he was telling. His hair flopping into his eyes as he gave that secret smile didn't help. Beside him was our other adoptive brother, Dominic, who’d technically come into the family after Moira and me but before Milo. Dom was a product of my mother and father adopting when they thought they wouldn’t be able to have another child and wanting an 'even three' as my mother had put it.
Milo was the youngest, even though he’d come into the family before Arlo and Dominic. It was an interesting family dynamic and had caused some raised eyebrows over the years that I had mostly ignored. These were all my brothers, and Moira was a sister to all of us. Of course, there was the unspoken agreement that Moira and I had a special bond because of sharing a womb, but also a spoken understanding that Milo and Elijah had formed an equally close bond, though no one had quite figured out why. Maybe it was their similar age, maybe it was just their personalities, the timing of our families being brought together, or...Well, I don't know, those two were absurdly close, and I was glad they had each other at least.
I felt a slight tug in my chest as I stared at the picture, wondering how my brothers had been. I could claim that I’d tried my best to keep in contact over the years, but we all knew that wasn't true. Life got in the way, and all too often, I foundmyself caught up in events in my life, their twists and turns. My mother had been fond of her phrases over the years, and as I'd grown older, some had started to make sense.
"The days are long but the years are short," had been one of her personal favorites, said with a wistful sigh and sometimes a distant look that was equal parts sad and happy. It had taken me a while to understand that one, but I finally got it, especially as I stared at the picture and realized it had been five years since it was taken. That had been the last time we'd all come together as a family. Otherwise, we just saw one another in spurts and moments, nothing coordinated, and not all at the same time.
Moira cleared her throat. "You good?"
I blinked, looking up at her as I tried to remember what we'd been talking about, but couldn't. "Uh, yeah. Just got lost in my thoughts, I guess."
"Don't hurt yourself, thinking hard like that."
"Hilarious. You missed your calling on the stage."
"I have been told my charm and magnetism were made for the stage."
"You're either lying, that person was lying, or they were extremely drunk, and high...and concussed."
Moira rolled her eyes. "And you say I should have been the comedian."
"It's not nearly as funny as the new sign out front," I said, slapping the desk and turning to walk toward the bar.
Moira groaned. "I knew it."
"Nothing to know," I said, walking away.
Had my sister been right about me being bothered by the change? Absolutely. Was there any way I would freely admit that to her face? Absolutely not.
What I was going to do was help myself to the bar. It was shut for the night, but seeing how I wasn't a paying customer, I had no issue grabbing one of our better bourbons and lookingfor everything else I might want. Owning my own club upstate meant I was used to being up late into the night, and saying good night to the sun shortly after it rose. I was also used to pouring myself a few drinks in the middle of the night if I felt like it, and after the good part of the night, and now the annoying part, a few drinks couldn't hurt.
"Please," Moira said from behind me, and I didn't bother turning around because I knew she'd follow. "Help yourself."
"That I shall," I said, pouring bourbon and following it up with a dash of bitters before going on a hunt for the sweet vermouth. "But thank you, that is exactly the kind of customer service you should aspire to give."
"You're not a customer."
"Think of it as good practice."
"She kept the old name for ages. Thought it was time."
"Time to change it to her new last name."
"Her and Marcus have been married for years. If anything, the change was overdue. It's not the first time. It changed when she and Dad took over the place. So it was bound to happen."
"Hmm," I said as I poured the vermouth into the bourbon along with some ice and began stirring. "And what will you change it to when you take over?"
"Who said I was going to?"
"None of the rest of us have stuck around to manage this place."
"Just about every single one of us picked up enough when living here to figure out how to run it if they needed to. And then there's you, who?—"
"Runs a club, not a hotel," I pointed out, pouring the drink into a glass and setting the shaker aside for the next one I would inevitably make. "Two different businesses. And, if I wanted to run the hotel, I would have stuck around like you did."
She sighed, eyeing the shaker. "Really?"
I smirked, pouring the rest of the shaker into another glass and sliding it to her. "C'mon, you know I wasn't just going to make me one."
