Chapter 11
Brandon
The paperwork in front of me was a complete blur as I stared down at it. The words jumbled into an unreadable ménage of nonsense that made less sense the longer I looked at it.
I’d been at this for hours now, with the pen pressed to the same damn line that I’d re-read probably a hundred times. My mind was elsewhere. Far, far away from my shop where I was tucked inside of my tiny little office pretending like this morning never happened.
The memories were like a punch to the gut, leading me to drop my pen and slap my hands over my face in an effort to drown out the groan of despair that tumbled past my lips.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
How the hell was I stupid enough to have a goddamn wet dream about the man that I’d inexplicably let into my bed?
To the point where I’d been humping the shit out of him in real life and had almost come right before I’d manage to wake myself up out of it.
Avery had trusted me to take care of him after I’d taken him home—not expecting me to come onto him while he’d sought comfort from me after what had been a very troubled few weeks for him.
The poor man was looking for a friend in his time of need, and what did I do to repay him?
Practically cream my own fucking jeans while I’d dreamed of him sucking me off and telling me that he’d been waiting do that since high school.
Slumping over my desk, I let my head smack down onto it, relishing the pain that followed. He was never going to talk to me again. There was no way we could come back from this.
What was I even supposed to say in defense of myself?
Sorry, Avery. I’ve been in love with you since we were fifteen, please forgive my horny brain in thinking that you were a part of my wet dream. Oh yeah, and I still have those about you, too.
Oh my god. I was lucky he didn’t punch me the second I let him go. Hell, I was lucky he wasn’t showing up to the shop right now with a towing company behind him ready to load up his dad’s cars to be taken to another shop where he knew the owner wouldn’t try and make the moves on him.
A hand clapped down on my shoulder, causing me to jump right out of my own skin.
“Jeez!” Charlie launched himself back from my chair, both of his hands held up in defense. “You didn’t hear me callin’ ya?”
“No.” Slumping back in my chair, I said, “What’s up?’
“That black Bel Air’s got a rusted out exhaust system. I found the parts online but you gotta authorize it since it’s comin’ from a specialty dealer down in Michigan.”
I held in another sigh. On top of that, I was also going to have to contact Avery about it, too.
Scrubbing a hand over my face, I asked, “You got a total already?”
Thankfully, Charlie pulled a folded up piece of paper out of the pocket of his uniform and handed it over to me.
It was several sheets of printed out pictures of the parts that we’d need to order, along with totals scribbled in the margins of each one and a phone number for the shop located at the very top of the bunch.
“Thanks. I’ll handle this while you get back to the other ones.”
“Right on, boss.”
Watching him slip out the door and down the hall, I spun back around to my desk and tossed the papers down over the payroll sheets. There was no way I was at all ready to face the music in calling Avery up and trying to talk shop while pretending that this morning was all a bad nightmare.
I had a slim chance of him even getting him to answer my phone call in the first place, and if I did end up actually getting him on the other line, I was petrified to hear the disgust in his voice.
I knew controlling myself around him would be difficult; I just never took into account that my own body would betray me so heinously.
Sighing, I grabbed my phone off of the desk and flipped it over, noticing that I had a missed call from one of my brothers—Jonah. Curiously, I tapped on his contact and let the dial tone pick up.
“Hey, he’s alive!”
Unfortunately. “What’s up?”
“Wanted to check in on you.”
That was fishy. The only time anyone was ever worried about me was when I’d go AWOL for a little while in order to get my own mental health back in order before I accidentally made it everyone else’s problem. But that hadn’t happened in months.
“I’m fine,” I said, slowly. “Something going on?”
“Lila called me.”
I groaned. “No.”
Jonah laughed. “Oh, come on. You didn’t think she would blab to the whole family that she’s been trying to set you up for weeks? You underestimate her ability to keep a secret.”
No, what I really underestimated was how big of a deal she was going to make this whole me going stag to her wedding. Apparently, not taking her seriously the first time she’d threatened to get our whole family involved was my first mistake.
The second being calling my brother back without acknowledging his own ridiculous nature when it came to encouraging Lila’s over the top behavior.
“Maybe I’m just not feeling it,” I answer back, petulantly.
“You don’t really mean that.”
I didn’t, but no one else had to know that. “Why is it that I’m the one getting singled out here? Both Marie and Reece are single right now. And I’m pretty sure Jace just broke up with his girlfriend.”
“I’m pretty sure they just got back together,” came Jonah’s quick response.
That had me rolling my eyes. “Can you focus? Who cares about that. Don’t you see the unfairness to this situation?”
Jonah sighed. “Bran, we’re just worried about you. You’ve been perpetually single for your entire life. Lila wants you to find happiness.”
“Through a matchmaker?”
“What?” He laughed. “Crazier things have happened. Look at Sara. She got married to Tom after knowing him for three weeks.”
Okay, that was probably the worst example my brother could’ve ever given me. Not only was my half-sister a hapless romantic, but she was impulsive as hell.
Taking a trip up to the mountains after getting fired from her big-wig job in the city, she’d ended up getting herself snowed in in this little remote village out in the middle of nowhere for three entire weeks until the county next door to them had enough manpower to plow everyone out.
In that time, she’d ended up bunking with the manager of the motel she’d been staying at, getting a little more than just cozy by the fireplace with him. By the time she’d come back to Edgewood, she’d had a ring on her finger and a damn baby in her belly.
Five years later and those two were still crazy in love with another little one on the way.
“That’s not the point.” I forced the words out.
What I really wanted to say was that there was no point.
To any of this.
I wasn’t going to magically get matched up with my soulmate and fall madly in love with him and run off into the sunset while we laughed and canoodled the entire way to our honeymoon destination.
My soulmate wasn’t some man that sought the help of a matchmaker and had hope of one day finding their true match. Or even really believed in the power of love at all.
Honestly, my soulmate probably never existed in the first place. I’d been cursed to forever fatefully find myself obsessed with the one man I could never have. Therefore, denying me of a soulmate for being stupid enough to let myself fall into this trap in the first place.
It was my own dumbass fault for getting my emotions too entangled with Avery’s at such a young age. Imprinting on him to the point that infatuation paled in comparison to the kind of obsession I felt for him.
By now, I was in too deep.
If after an entire decade of having not seen each other had done nothing to dull these feelings, then nothing ever would.
Not some matchmaker setting me up with a handsome guy who was determined to sweep me off my feet. Not some man trying to talk me up at one of the bars downtown while hoping to convince me to come back to his place with him for a nightcap and a quick roll around in the sheets.
And certainly not some poor son of a bitch who had already buried his demons in the past and healed himself of the kind of future that eventually awaited me.
“Okay,” Jonah’s voice drawled. “Then what is the point?”
“Never mind. It’s not important. Look, if Lila’s actually that dead set on forcing me to go with this guy she picked out, then whatever. Fine, I’ll do it.”
“Don’t sound so morbid. You’re not walking the plank here.”
That’s exactly what it felt like, though. A proverbial gun being held to the back of my head while my sister chanted ‘kiss him!’ in the background.
Or worse: fall in love.
“Just... try it, Brandon. One date. That’s all we’re asking. Mom’s also worried about you, you know.”
Ugh, I hated this guilt trip. Mainly because it always worked.
Jonah knew that. I knew that. This was the pain about having older brothers.
They knew how best to push your buttons and get you squirming enough to agree to whatever crazy plan they’d concocted.
Which, in this case, was apparently to get me back into the dating world.
Or, I guess, into it in the first place?
My casual hookups weren’t exactly counting as a defense for me at this point. If anything, they made my life seem that much sadder.
The only silver lining to any of this was that none of my brothers knew that Avery was back in town. That information was something I’d like to keep hidden for as long as possible. The second the rumors of that got to floating around my family, I was done for.
My brothers knew how devastated I was when he left and they’d waste no time hesitating in trying to force us back together again, especially under the excuse of for old time’s sake.
No amount of protesting would change any of their minds, either, so there would be no point in fighting them on the matter, regardless of how awkward things were between Avery and me now.
It wasn’t like I could explain, hey so I might’ve sort of accidentally came on to him and now I think he hates me without there being a million questions followed right after.
With no way to defend myself, I was merely digging my own grave at that point.
Why hand any of them the shovel to then bury me?
“Brandon?”
Clearing my throat, I said, “Yeah. I’ll give it a try.”
“Atta boy. Tell me how it goes.”
“You want a play-by-play in the group chat, or...”
“Ha, funny. But now that you’re offering, yeah. I do. Everyone will be stoked to hear about your date.”
I really needed to keep my mouth shut. “Fine.”
“Good luck, little brother.”
As soon as the other line disconnected, I tossed my phone down onto my desk.
Agreeing to a date wasn’t that big of an issue, but leading him on was. Max was a nice guy and wasn’t screaming any kind of red flags at me so far.
If anything, I was the red flag in this scenario.
He’d seemed eager to take me out. Something that I should find flattering.
Yet all it did was make me want to dig my heels into the ground more so than usual.
I hated that about myself—any man showing me an ounce of interest outside of just sex, was automatically dismissed and put in the ‘do not trust’ category with no hope of getting out, no matter how much they showered me in gifts and affection.
It was a tiring process that seemed never-ending in my mind, with few ways to stop it.
Eventually, I did want a family of my own. A big one like the one I’d grown up in. I’d never been shy about that fact to anyone, especially with my siblings, which was probably one of the many reasons I was being pushed to date in the first place.
They meant well. They always did.
I needed to trust the process.
What other hope did I have in trying to wring Avery out of my system?
Spending time with him wasn’t helping and seemed to only make my obsession with him worse.
If there was a slim chance that I could potentially find a sliver of that same feeling with someone else, then I needed to take the plunge regardless of my own hang-ups about it.
Because, at this point, I had nothing left to lose.
Grabbing my phone again, I scrolled through my contacts until I found Lila’s matchmaker and the number that she’d forwarded me into order to get in touch with Max.
Typing out a quick message to him, I hit send before I could think twice about it and then set my phone face down on my desk again. Within seconds, it buzzed, causing me to flip it over once more.
Max: Hey, Brandon! Yeah, I’d love to :) Are you free tomorrow night?
Ellington Heights has that local band performing at the park.
I think it’s some kind of festival going on.
There are supposed to be a bunch of food trucks and things to do while walking around.
I’d love to take you, if you’re up for it.
Actually, that sounded kind of fun.
Sending my response back to him, I folded myself back into my chair and let a long breath leave me.
Guess I had a date tomorrow.
Hopefully, I wouldn’t fuck it up.