Elf Against the Wall: A Holiday Romantic Comedy (The Wynter Brothers Book 2)
Elf Against the Wall: Chapter 36

“Someone sounds like he just got laid.” Hudson was acerbic when I answered the phone.

“No.”

“Liar.”

“I mean, yes, but I just won a poker tournament.” I let the door to Bianca’s house slam behind me.

After playing poker with Aaron, the Murphys were laughably easy. I’d won table after table, beating Evie’s mother, wiping the floor with her father, then finally, in what my sister Elsa would call karmic justice, I’d faced Henry—and won the pot.

“You used to be better at this,” I’d told him before pocketing the stack of cash while Evie’s aunts fawned over me.

“Really? Was the pot eighty-seven thousand dollars?”

“No, but it did enable me to clean out the data of a woman who is the source of fraud on the Bergeson account.”

“So you’ve crossed off the last item on the ledger? Aaron wants to send you to Idaho. It’s a big contract.”

“Not yet,” I backtracked, lowering my voice. “I’m going to review the data over the next couple of days and cross-reference it, but I think we’re close to closing it out.”

“I’m concerned by the timetable.”

“Worry about your own shit, and stop calling me just to chew me out.”

“I need you in New Jersey. All hands on deck for the Svensson PharmaTech account.”

Evie was standing on the porch, waiting for me to come back inside, jumping up and down, arms crossed over herself to keep warm.

I leaned in to kiss her, savoring the taste. If I got what I needed off these files, this was it. She and I and her shitty family were done. “Have to head out for a job.”

Her face fell. “Do you think you’ll be back for Braeden and Felicity’s engagement party? Please?” she added at the expression on my face. “I know I’m supposed to be getting more evidence, but I can’t be there by myself. Not with him.”

“Just skip it.”

But her big brown eyes dissolved my defenses.

“Fine. I’ll be there. I promise.”

“You’d better not fuck this up,” Hudson warned me.

I’d been on my hands and knees on a giant tarp, sifting through mountains of trash for the last five hours.

“It’s picking through trash.” I tossed a slimy banana peel aside.

“No, the thing for Aaron.”

“I’d be able to finish it up tonight, except you have me here, cleaning garbage.”

Hudson kicked the banana peel at me. “Just hurry the fuck up.”

I would have gone through the Bianca files tonight, should have, but Evie needed me at the engagement party.

I’d stay a few hours then start the mind-numbing task of analyzing the data. Then that was it. It was over. I was going to Idaho, and this holiday with the Murphys would be the memory of a nightmare.

That was what it was, right? Evie was a nightmare, right?

The snow fell softly around me as I walked up to the Murphys’ house.

“You’re here!” The front door slammed, then Evie flung herself into my arms.

I spun her around as she kissed my face, giddy. Snowball jumped around us, barking.

“Of course I’m here. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I don’t know.” She beamed then hugged me again.

I kissed the top of her head, drawing her under my arm as we headed into the warm house.

“Did Felicity seriously allow your parents to host her couples’ shower?”

“My mom offered to make it up to her for my ruining her surprise engagement announcement.”

“Felicity’s not worried you’ll poison the guests after being locked in the kitchen all day?”

“It wasn’t all day. I also submitted a job application to Target.”

The living room and dining room were packed with Murphy family and with Felicity and Braeden’s friends.

“Evie,” her mother called.

“Keep an eye out for Aunt J. She just dumped her boyfriend,” Evie whispered.

I kissed her one more time before she ran off to the kitchen.

Her uncles and cousins were huddled together, talking hockey.

“If you haven’t been playing together regularly, keep it simple.” I interjected the suggestion as, with sleight of hand, I returned the phone I’d swapped at a previous family party, putting the broken one in my pocket. “Hard offense, keep the puck down low, and crash the net for rebounds. Keep it up, and wear them down.”

Evie’s uncle clapped me on the back. “This man hockeys! We’re putting you on our team.”

“Something tells me your sister’s probably not going to like that, Todd,” his brother-in-law quipped.

“It’s my hockey game at my lake house.” Todd sniffed.

“I’ll pass. I don’t want my balls eaten on Christmas morning, thanks.” And I sure as fuck wasn’t spending my free time playing hockey with the Murphys. They probably couldn’t even play.

I headed over to the table to grab a scotch.

Several frat boys who’d aged out of their fraternity but still wanted any excuse to relive their glory days were already smashed. They loudly brayed to each other about how much they hated their bosses and who had attractive coworkers.

I half listened to them, running my plan for analyzing the Bianca Murphy data. And trying not to think about how I was going to have to leave Evie forever after tonight.

Would she hate me?

Of course she would. I’d seen the way she looked at me. I was going to break her heart.

It’s her own fault for falling for me.

One of them gave me a bleary-eyed look.

“You Felicity’s friend? Never seen you before.”

“This guy looks like he fucks.” Another of the frat boys slapped me on the shoulder.

“Bet you were one of Felicity’s old hookups, weren’t you?” One of them swayed.

“She’s not putting out for Braeden. Probably because you’re banging her, I bet.”

“Like Braeden isn’t cheating on her,” I sneered before I could stop the words.

But Braeden’s friends weren’t offended.

“Oh, he knows everything!” More braying laughter came with slaps on the back.

“Braeden’s a beast! He always has more than one girl at a time.” His frat brother guffawed.

“Gotta respect the hustle, bro.”

“How does he have the time?” I sipped my scotch casually, slipped my hand into my pocket, pulled out my phone, pretended like I was just checking my text messages, and hit record on the phone. “Especially when he’s about to get married.”

“He makes time. He’s got one in the works right now,” the frat brother confided.

“Seriously?”

He nodded. “It’s this girl he was with last year.”

“Is it some lot lizard he dredged up?” I mimicked their mocking laughter.

The frat brother with a beer belly whipped out his phone. “I took a video of her. She’s not bad-looking. Nice tits. Young. Impressionable.”

He flipped through video on his phone then hit Play.

There, as I suspected, was a video of Evie centered in the frame.

The frat boy and Braeden were talking as the video, slightly shaky, zoomed out from Evie. They were in some off-Broadway theater.

She glanced toward the camera. She looked so happy and in love.

“See?” The phone video picked up Braeden’s voice. “Look at her. She wants me. She’ll do anything. I’ll keep her as a sidepiece. Felicity won’t replace out.”

The phone camera panned. Braeden’s face appeared in the frame briefly. “She’s some barely legal college dropout. I just have to buy her some cheap shit, and she’s so impressed.”

“She have any friends?” another guy not in the frame asked.

It took everything in me not to yank the phone out of the guy’s pudgy hand, stalk through the room to where Braeden was giving some embellished story to his relatives, and kick the phone through the back of his throat.

“Hm.” I took a sip of my drink to keep the disgust off my face. “Respect.”

“She looks even better without her shirt.” The frat idiot snickered, swiping to another app to open up a photo, the photo, of Evie topless.

I was pretty sure I could get Jake to help me bury their bodies if I bought him a cheeseburger.

I smoothly took his phone. “Let me get a copy?”

“Knock yourself out.”

Three taps, and I had the video sent to my email.

Case closed. That was it. Braeden was done. And I was going to skin him alive in front of his family.

“Thanks.” I toasted the frat guy.

Evie was in the kitchen, scooping whipped cream into a bowl. I didn’t want her here, didn’t want them anywhere near her.

I grabbed her hand. “We’re leaving.” I ignored her protests.

“Why?”

“Because I’m about to burn this place down.”