“I thought we were working.”
“No,youare working. This is a PR disaster. I’m going to be in a video with your recently reanimated ex-fiancé.”
“I can’t make a big stink about this video. Brock was trying to prank me. He’s not going to put you in it. You make him look bad,” she says.
“Like I trust your judgment.”
She huffs out a sad laugh. “I’ve worked with Brock. I know what sells on his channel. He’s not going to show someone who looks like a reformed Viking prince in a suit, throwing his weight around and being all heroic.”
“Heroic, huh?” I stroke my chin.
“From a cinematic standpoint,” she says quickly. “IRL, you’re an asshole.”
“And here I was going to offer that you could put dessert on the tab as well.”
“I’m doing that anyway!” she yells after me as I head to the private dining room upstairs.
When I reach the room where my brothers are eating, I say, “Since when do they allow children here?” I mess up the hair of Faulkner, the youngest, earning a swipe from his oyster fork.
I steal an oyster from the plate of Whitman, the next oldest, and toss it back with ease.
“Don’t let him eat that.” Fitz, the oldest after me, drags the platter away.
“Yeah, you’re supposed to be on punishment,” Hawthorne, the second oldest, says mildly.
We’re all byproducts of our father’s polygamist cult. In an irony of ironies, he seemed to be able to create sons only. Not what you want when you’re running a patriarchal doomsday cult. Boys are a liability for obvious reasons.
Our meager handful of sisters lives in Manhattan, our roach tank of younger half brothers upstate.
The little ones aren’t my problem, though. Except when they randomly wash up like decaying seaweed for various holidays. I’m a CEO, not a babysitter.
Salinger, my oldest brother, is staring me down from the head of the table.
I reach for the bottle of scotch.
Hawthorne’s hand shoots out to grab the bottle.
“Honestly, McCarthy—”
“Here it comes…”
“It’s the fact that youlostthat fight today that makes this so infuriating.”
“Lost the—are you fucking kidding me? I won that fight.”
“You would have had your ribs kicked in if you didn’t get saved by the dog…” The words linger in the air, then Fitz hastily changes the subject.
“So, did you sleep with her yet?” Whitman smirks.
That really sets our eldest brother off.
“You better fucking not have. What the hell is wrong with you? Whitman,stopthat.”
Whitman is dissecting his crab cake and assembling a makeshift sandwich with the free bread. Hawthorne throws a fork at him.
“I don’t complain when you drink those disgusting old-fashioneds with a whole dripping slice of lemon in it.” I grab a clean glass from the table.
“I offered. She refused. Not because she’s not attracted to me, obviously…”
