Foolish Games: A Brothers Best Friend Fake Dating Romance

twenty-five

Sebastian Swift

“Hot damn,” I say, letting out a low whistle as Vivienne enters the sitting room where I’m waiting with Robert. He gives me a sour look but doesn’t say anything. Vivienne beams, holding her arms out and doing a little twirl. I want to get up and pull her into my arms and kiss her, but of course I can’t. Her brother is sitting right there.

Her brother, who’s supposed to be my best friend, who I’m fucking over every damn day.

But I’m in way too deep to save that relationship.

“Good thing I came over early,” I say. “If I saw you at the party, I’m not sure I’d recognize you.”

Vivienne’s wearing a tight black dress with silver threads sparkling in the fabric, a pair of red heels, and a black lace mask wrapped around the top of her face, little jewels inset around her warm brown eyes. Her caramel hair falls around her shoulders in big, soft waves. Bright red lipstick colors her lips and matches her shoes, bringing the whole thing together in a gorgeous, sexy, classy package.

“You’re not wearing a tux,” she says, her smile faltering.

The look of disappointment on her face is a knife to the fucking sternum.

“I already had a suit.” I paste a grin on my face, though this lie tastes more bitter than the others.

I didn’t have a suit.

I scraped together enough to buy one and have it cleaned so it doesn’t smell like the secondhand store where it came from.

“It’s fine, man,” Robert says, standing and clapping me on the shoulder.

“Yeah, totally fine,” Vivienne says, graciously hiding her disappointment.

Their awkward attempt to make it okay only makes me feel shittier. Rob knows I don’t have money for a tux, but his sparing my dignity only makes me feel about as big as a flea sucking the lifeblood out of his family. That’s what the rest of the town is to the elite families. Parasites that feed off their generosity. After all, Vivienne didn’t have to invite me to this. She could be going with Nerd Boy, who probably owns a tux, and if not, definitely has the money to rent one. I’m the only thing standing in her way.

“Want to ride together?” Robert asks as we step into the garage. He hits a button on the wall, and the doors slide up, revealing the grey, rainy day outside.

Vivienne snorts. “Are you going to sit in the back with your date?”

Robert gives me a resentful look before turning to his sister. “You’re leaving with me, though.”

“I’m fine,” she assures him, rolling her eyes.

“Yeah,” I say. “I’ve been your sister’s fake boyfriend for months now. Why the sudden suspicion?”

“It’s been months,” he says. “I think it’s gone on long enough, don’t you?”

He glowers as he climbs into his Lamborghini and backs out of the garage, leaving us standing in an unusual, awkward silence.

“Shit,” Vivienne says, climbing into the driver’s seat of her car. “Do you think he knows something?”

I climb in too. “I haven’t said anything. But hey, I’m glad he’s gone, so I can do this.”

I lean in and press my lips to hers, and for a second, everything is okay.

Then she pulls away and starts the car, still fretting. “We have to be careful,” she says. “If he thinks there’s something going on… Maybe he saw something between us?”

She peeks at me as she backs out of the garage into the cold drizzle.

“Like what?” I ask carefully.

“I don’t know,” she says. “Nothing. You’re right. I’m being silly.”

“There’s one advantage to you driving,” I say, giving her a wicked look and sliding a hand up her thigh.

“Seriously, Sebastian?” she asks as we pull out through her gate.

“It makes finger fucking easier,” I say. “Since someone’s opposed to road head.”

“We’ll be at the party in less than ten minutes.”

“Then I better hurry,” I say, pressing my fingers between her thighs.

She slaps my hand away. “I’m not just a piece of ass,” she says. “I have other things going on in my life than to be here for you when you’re horny.”

“I know that,” I say, leaning against my door and glaring at her. “Do you?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Come on, Vivienne,” I say. “For the last time, I’m not fucking stupid. You think I can’t see what this is?”

She swallows and stares at the wipers moving back and forth across the windshield. “What is it?”

“You have everything,” I point out. “The brains, the money, the looks… You even have this fucking car.”

“What about it?”

“Oh, and the ‘good family,’” I add. “Let’s not forget about that.”

She sighs and turns onto a narrow, winding blacktop road, the double yellow line in the middle freshly painted and glowing in the headlights. “I can’t do the riddles tonight, Sebastian. Just tell me what you’re getting at.”

“If someone’s getting used for sex here, it’s not you.”

“What are you talking about?” she asks, gaping at me as she downshifts before pulling onto a narrower, older road. A minute later, we pull onto a narrow, one-lane bridge. Exposed beams crisscross over it like a hulking white skeleton, and the drizzle catches in the beams of the headlights. We’re silent as the little car slides across, and a shiver climbs my arms like a premonition. I’ve lived in Faulkner for four years, but I’ve never seen this bridge before.

“You think I’m using you for sex?” Vivienne asks at last.

“What am I supposed to think?”

“I didn’t even want sex to be part of the arrangement,” she points out. “You’re the one who insisted on that part.”

“Right,” I say. “Because I’m supposed to be a monk while you use me to make your boyfriend jealous.”

“I told you I didn’t expect you to stop sleeping with other girls,” she grits out, pulling up to a gate at the end of a long, narrow driveway made of white gravel.

“Fine,” I say. “If you don’t care, I guess I’ll go fuck someone else tonight.”

She flinches, her chocolate eyes pooling with hurt. I wait for her to argue that since I’m fucking her, that changes things. For her to tell me she doesn’t want me with anyone but her. For her to give me something, anything, a reason to believe any of it’s real. But she turns away, punches in the code on the gate, pulls her arm back inside the car and shifts, the tires spinning on the wet ground. “Fine,” she says. “You do that.”

“If you don’t care, then I guess I will.”

“Why would I care?” she asks, pulling up into a gravel lot behind a huge garage with six double doors. “You’re not my boyfriend. You can do whatever you want.”

She climbs out of the car, pulling out a huge black umbrella and opening it. I circle around and hold it over us, walking her to the door like the dutiful boyfriend I’ve become. I hate her for what she’s made me. I’m tired of pretending to be her lapdog. It’s time to go back to being the kind of dog I really am.

Inside, an honest-to-god butler takes our umbrella and coats, then ushers us up one of the wide sets of stairs leading to the second floor. Another servant opens the doors at the top of the stairs, and we enter a long, open room with windows all along one side. Along the opposite wall, tables are set up with fancy hors d’oeuvres that I probably can’t even identify. Two entire tables are topped with gleaming, delicate champagne flutes waiting to be filled with the sparkling gold toast at midnight.

Beyond them, at the far end of the room, a bar is set up in front of another door, and two bartenders continuously pour drinks and set them along the bar for people to grab as they pass. I could use a drink, so I grab Viv’s hand and pull her in that direction.

“Let’s party,” I say, snatching up a martini glass with hot pink liquid in it. I hand one to Viv, tap my glass against hers, and down mine in two swallows.

“Sebastian,” she hisses.

“What?” I ask, wiping my mouth on the back of my hand. “Am I embarrassing you with my slovenly drinking habits? Sorry, not everyone was taught to raise their pinky and sip like a gentile lady.”

“You know what?” she says. “I think I’m going to go talk to my other friends and let you be an asshole all by yourself.”

“What friends?” I ask. “You mean Nerd Boy Chad?”

She lifts her chin and looks down her nose at me. “At least he’s not so miserable that he feels the need to intentionally make everyone else the same way.”

She turns on her heel and walks away.

“Why don’t you just fuck him while you’re at it?” I call after her.

A few people look at me, but I don’t care. I turn back to the bar and pick up another one of the fruity cocktails. Then I step off to the side and glare at Vivienne as she walks straight over to one of the dickhead blonds I saw her dancing with at the Founders Ball, joining them like she belongs there and not with me.

She does belong with them, and it pisses me off.

It’s my own fucking fault I’m left standing alone and out of place, reeling from her parting shot. It didn’t just hit close to home—it was a heat-seeking missile that crashed right into the middle of my home and blasted it to bits. The fact that she knows me that well after only a few months scares the fuck out of me. She may not know why I’m being such a dick, but she knows that’s what I’m doing.

Imploding.

Some self-destructive bitterness has risen in me, the culmination of months of being with her and years of being friends with Robert, going to his house, seeing that he has every fucking thing. Knowing I could never get too close to his hot sister, not just because she’s his sister, but because I’m not good enough for her.

I always thought I was pissed about it because they see me that way. But the truth is, maybe it’s because I know they’re right. No matter what I do, I can’t change who I am or what family I was born into. I don’t belong at this party. I don’t belong with these fancy people in their custom fit tuxedos, their champagne that’s undoubtedly the real stuff that came all the way from France, not the sparkling wine from the bottom shelf at the liquor store. And if I’ve got any shot at being a good person, I’ll walk away right now and leave Viv to get back together with Chaz, the guy she belonged with all along.

The thought sends me spiraling further into the dark place I’ve been paddling away from for days, weeks, maybe years. It’s slowly pulling me down, though, circling like a whirlpool under me. I finish my drink and take another. I should walk out. If Vivienne wanted me here, she’d be with me, not over there laughing at something a founding son is saying.

“Should’ve known I’d find you by the bar,” says a familiar voice.

I turn to see Billy’s grinning face as he grabs a drink from the bar and tips his glass at me. Seeing someone else out of a tux takes the edge off, and I’m instantly more comfortable. Billy has that effect on people—probably why they first hire him as their pool boy and then tell him their secrets. Behind him, all four of the Dolce brothers, Theo, and Lexi are grabbing drinks and downing them with more gusto than I did. Vivienne will freak when she finds out I’m responsible for the party crashers.

“I didn’t know if you’d make it in,” I say, knocking my glass against his. “Did they check for invites?”

“No, they fucking pimped me out,” Lexi says with a scowl, guzzling a fruity pink martini. “I can still taste his slimy tongue and feel his stubble.”

She gives a dramatic shudder and reaches for another drink.

“Whoa, slow down there, sis,” Billy says, taking the drink from her hand. “I don’t want you passing out and getting taken advantage of by some rich asshole who will send me to jail when I kick his ass for it.”

“You’re worth an ass kicking,” Tony says, handing Lexi another drink. “Bottom’s up, sweetheart. I’ll be saying that again later, once you’ve gotten enough vodka in you to stop being a tease.”

“Thank you,” she says, smiling at him and giving Billy a bratty look. “Glad some people know how to party.”

“Go ahead, get taken advantage of by the Dolces,” he says. “I got no problem kicking all their asses, and I won’t do a lick of jail time for it.”

“How’d you really get in?” I ask.

“We snuck by while Lexi was making out with the butler,” he says, then slaps the bar and laughs. “Never thought I’d hear those words coming out of my mouth.”

“Glad you made it,” I say, clapping him on the back before grabbing a couple glasses of rum and coke. “Here’s to partying like rich folks in the new year.”

“I’m getting some food,” he says. “Lex, let’s check out that chocolate fountain.”

She turns and spots it, then squeals before skipping over to something that looks like a smooth, five-tier chocolate cake surrounded by strawberries. She pokes her finger through the chocolate, and it parts like a curtain around it. With a delighted giggle, she sticks her finger in her mouth and sucks it off.

“Dude, I’d be so fat if I was rich,” she says. “I’d have one of these in the living room and sit there eating it while I watched TV all day.”

She doesn’t seem to notice a few people giving her funny looks and stepping away, but I do. I’m embarrassed for her, and that I gave them the idea to come, and most of all, that everyone’s probably looking at me the same way, and I’m just as oblivious.

I glance over to see if Vivienne’s still talking to the Darling boy, but she’s settled onto a stool at a table with Chaz and Chiclet. He’s talking to her, but she’s watching us behaving exactly like what we are—servants who just snuck into a party thrown by royalty.

When our eyes meet, she just shakes her head, disbelief and disappointment written all over her face. Then she turns back to Chaz and nods politely at whatever boring thing he’s saying to her. Tonight, the divide between us that’s usually a line carved by a sharp blade has widened to a chasm carved by an earthquake.