Page 8 of Single Malt

“At least take your temperature.” She might’ve been right about my hands being cold, but I didn’t want to take any chances. “I can keep an eye on the soup.”

She sighed but headed for the bathroom.

“The last thing you need is to start off your last semester sick,” I called after her.

Aline didn’t like to acknowledge that she had a delicate constitution. Our mom’s pregnancy with her had been extremely risky, and she’d been born six weeks early. Both Mom and Aline had almost died. While my sister hadn’t experienced any real long-term issues, she wasn’t someone who could afford to be lackadaisical about her health.

“Ninety-eight exactly,” Aline said as she came back into the kitchen. “It’s a cold.”

“You still need to take it easy.” I reached for the bowls. “Even a cold can be dangerous if you get too run down.”

“I’ll spend the rest of the evening on the couch with hot tea and honey, and I’ll turn in early. Okay?” She retrieved silverware from the drawer and set the utensils next to the bowls.

I brought the still-hot rolls to the table. “After dinner, get me your book list, and I’ll get them tomorrow when I pick up mine.”

“All right,” she said. “Can you get me a new thumb drive while you’re there too?”

I didn’t understand Aline’s need to have a new thumb drive for every semester or why she kept every single one of them, but it wasn’t as if either of us were hurting for money. Our parents were well-off and had established trusts for both of us to use for our education and the pursuits of our respective careers, so if a new drive each semester was what she wanted, who was I to argue?

I agreed, even as my mind was already shifting my schedule around to accommodate spending more time in the bookstore. My own books would be waiting, but I’d need to actually go through the store to find the ones Aline needed.

I couldn’t get to the store any earlier unless I wanted to cancel my dentist appointment, but that would mean I’d have to reschedule, and I doubted they’d have an opening before classes started again. I’d still be able to get the grocery shopping done, but the time would have to come from somewhere. If the leftovers from tonight would keep, I could take the time from dinner preparation, but if not, I’d have to either ask Aline to make dinner again or pick something up on my way home.

At least when the stress of the next few months got to me, I had some scorching memories to call on for relief.

Five

Brody

I breatheda sigh of relief as I walked through my door and tossed my keys and mail on the table. When I’d left Palo Alto after Freedom and I had finished, I hadn’t come back to San Ramon. I’d gone to San Jose.

My oldest brother slash step-cousin, Austin, lived there and had heard of a new hotel that would be perfect for Shannon’s. I’d stopped by to see him, but it hadn’t been a long visit. Not surprisingly, he’d been busy, and I’d been there on business.

The meeting had gone well, and I was confident that, once the hotel’s lawyers had a look at the contract, I’d add them to my list of clients. Hopefully, I’d be able to take care of the details in a single trip.

San Jose wasn’t far, but any time I met with a client for the first time or when I knew I’d be drinking, I got a hotel room. I could hold my liquor, but I wasn’t willing to risk anyone’s safety if I misjudged myself. Because of that, I was used to being away a great deal, but right now, I was looking forward to being home.

As it always did after I spent the holidays with family, my own place seemed bare. In the six years I’d lived here, I’d never decorated for the holidays or put up a tree. Not because I was the Grinch or Scrooge, but because I really didn’t see the point. I lived here alone and didn’t have many visitors.

I’d made a point of getting an apartment with three bedrooms so I could have a guest room and one specifically for Evanne, but my niece had only stayed here once. With Alec living in Seattle and his own time with Evanne being limited by his custody arrangement with his ex, I didn’t get to see my only niece as much as I would’ve liked, and most of the time I did see her, it was at my parents’ house, or when I went to Seattle on business. Still, the room was here.

I smiled as I remembered how excited she’d been on Christmas to see everyone. Almost everyone had made it this year, and the ones who hadn’t been able to come had at least been able to video call, including my younger brother, Eoin, who was overseas with his unit. He’d enlisted in the army right out of high school, and it’d been the best thing in the world for him.

Once I dumped my dirty clothes into my hamper and changed into shorts and a t-shirt, I headed for the kitchen to grab a sports drink from the fridge. I’d eaten lunch in San Jose so that, by the time I got home, I could get in a workout before crashing for the rest of the day.

My building had a nice communal fitness room that made paying for a gym membership pointless, especially since having one here meant I didn’t have to get back in my car and drive to yet another place. All I needed to do was go downstairs. In fact, the only drawback came during the first few months when I’d had to turn down advances from a few women. My first year out on my own, I’d made the mistake of hooking up with a neighbor who hadn’t taken me seriously when I’d said that I wasn’t looking for anything serious.

I now had hard and fast rules about the sort of women who were off-limits, and ones who lived in my building were right under women I worked with in terms of “hell no.” And “worked with” included ones whose business I was trying to get. I’d been propositioned a time or two that way, but at least that hadn’t been an area where I’d needed to learn the hard way.

I frowned as I made my way across the room to the rowing machine. Did Freedom count as a business contact since she obviously was involved at Stanford?

No, I decided. I hadn’t pitched my product to her, and she hadn’t been at any of the meetings I’d attended. Plus, neither one of us had talked about what we did for a living or our connection to the university. Although, if I was being completely honest, I wasn’t sure if I would’ve chosen work over her if it’d been an issue.

I’d thought a second round would get her out of my head, but it hadn’t. It didn’t help that I’d been in my damn car after we’d fucked in it, the scent of sex and her all around me. Not to mention the memories that had been playing through my mind all weekend.

As I moved from the rowing machine to the weights, I let myself consider something I’d been trying to push out of my head ever since I’d left the shopping center.

Stanford was about an hour away from San Ramon, but maybe that wouldn’t be too far for a casual fuckbuddy or friends-with-benefits kind of relationship. I didn’t do serious, but I also believed in taking opportunities when they came up.