Page 11 of Christmas with Brother's Best Friends

Guilt churns in my stomach as I hear the warmth in his voice. The five of them have been close for years, and it feels like I’m spitting on a good friendship by fantasizing about the guys. It’s just wrong.

They should be family to me! Not parts of a fantasy.

“Thanks,” I say before handing them each a cup of piping hot coffee. “It’ll be a fun project. Challenging, but fun.”

They’ve always believed in me, even when our parents were trying to get me to choose another field to work in. No matter what, they have my back, but I guess that’s what older brothers are meant to do. They’re the best ones that I could’ve ever asked for.

Once we all fix our coffee, we linger in the kitchen, keeping an eye on the time as we chit chat about what’s been going on lately. It actually takes my mind off things until Andrew drops a bomb on me.

“Oh, yeah. Before we go,” Andrew says as I walk them to the foyer, “we wanted to tell you that Mom and Dad are doing a family dinner on Friday.”

My eyes widen. “What? Family dinner?”

Ethan nods and gives me an encouraging pat on my shoulder. “It’ll be fine. They just want to hear how everything is going and what you have in mind for the future.”

I love my parents, but I hate talking about the future with them. They already have something in mind that I don’t even want. I’m going to be up to my neck in work, and the last thing that I want to deal with on top of that is pressure from my family.

“You know that you have to go,” Andrew reminds me.

I sigh and nod. “Doesn’t mean that I’ll be happy about it.”

Andrew chuckles and hugs me goodbye. “Take care of yourself.”

Ethan takes over and squeezes me tightly. “Hang in there.”

That means don’t do anything risky to get myself hurt or put in jail. They don’t want to see me in their places of work, and I’d rather not end up there anyway.

Once they leave, I practically run to the shower to get ready for work. The guys are relaxed when it comes to start and end times, but we have deadlines to meet. We only have a few weeks to revamp everything, and we can’t afford to waste time.

When I arrive at the office with snowflakes adorning my hair, I’m immediately waved over by Max at his desk. “Sorry, I’m a little late. Andrew and Ethan swung by this morning.”

Max tenses a little. “Oh, they did? Everything okay?”

Interesting reaction. “Yeah, they just wanted to check in and let me know that there’s a family dinner this Friday.”

Max relaxes and nods. “I’ve been meaning to see them. Might be hard while we’re still working on the update.”

“Speaking of which, did your UI guys get back to you about my notes?” I ask him.

“Yep, let’s go over them together.” Max pats the top of his desk. “Pull up a chair.”

I barely even hear what he says. The moment his hand touches the desk, my mind goes back to the dream and how he had me laid down on mine. Naked. Begging for him to finish me off.

“Emma?”

I snap out of my thoughts and lower my head to hide my burning red cheeks. How am I supposed to function like this? It’s fun and easy working with them, but I’m constantly hit with a barrage of inappropriate thoughts and accompanying guilt.

It’s a torturous cycle that I don’t know my way out of. Maybe there is no escape until the project is over with.

In that case…this is going to be the longest few weeks of my life.

Chapter six

Chapter Six: Josh

“That wraps up this meeting. Good work, everyone.”

Emma checks the time on her phone as I shut down the weekly update call that everyone at the company tunes in for, whether they’re in office or working remotely. Today, it’s just me, the guys, and Emma.