Best Friends Don't Kiss

by Max Monroe

  Then, he deals the turn—a fucking jack.

  “Ha! Who’s laughing now?” Cap hops up from his chair and starts pelvic-thrusting the air.

  “Slow your roll, son,” Thatch says. “We still have the river.”

  Cap keeps grinning like a loon, and Harrison slowly, so slowly, lifts the final card. And when he turns it over onto the felt? A queen.

  “Ha! Oh yes!” Trent laughs like a hyena. “I’m laughing now, Cap! I’m motherfucking laughing now!”

  “Fuck you, Turner.” Cap flips Trent off. “And you too, Luke.”

  I just grin. “Sorry, man.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” he mutters and takes a puff from his cigar. “You just swaggered in here and took all my money, you bastard.”

  “Pretty sure you mean my money,” Kline comments with a pointed look in Cap’s direction.

  Cap just smirks, puffing on his cigar some more, and Trent gets ready to deal this round, gathering all the cards back up and shuffling them.

  “Hey, Luke, have you heard anything from NASA?” Milo asks, taking a sip of the amber-colored liquid in front of him.

  “Uh…” I pause, faltering a bit, but then quickly respond with, “Nope. Nothing yet.”

  His eyes search mine, and I have a feeling, with his contact on the board and the way he’s staring at me with unsaid words, Milo knows the truth. He knows I got the call.

  But still, I haven’t told anyone. I haven’t told Ava. And there’s no fucking way I’m going to say it out loud right now.

  “Did you decide on the galleries?” Harrison pipes up with an unrelated question to Theo, and I’m thankful for the domino effect—grabbing Milo’s attention from looking at me curiously, along with everyone else’s.

  I breathe a discreet sigh of relief.

  Theo smiles. “Actually, I signed the contract over a week ago. Officially a fifty-percent owner.”

  “What’s a tasteless, uncultured bastard like you doing investing in fluffing art galleries?” Thatch teases, and Theo just smirks.

  “Well, for one, my wife Lena loves art,” he responds, and his voice warms at the word Lena. “And two, art is always a good investment, my man.”

  “You invested in art galleries?” I question, and Theo nods.

  “One in LA and one here in New York.”

  “Really?” My mind starts to swirl with all sorts of ideas.

  “You interested in buying some art, Luke?” Theo asks, his eyes curious.

  “Not buying per se, but I might know of an artist who, once you see their paintings, you’ll want them in your galleries.”

  “Is this a known artist?”

  I shake my head. “No, but they should be.”

  “Well, fluffing hell, now I want to know who this artist is, too,” Thatch chimes in, but I just shrug.

  “Sorry, man, but they are wanting to remain anonymous for right now.”

  “Hmmm…” Theo pauses and taps his chin with a smile. “Now I’m curious. How about you give me a call Monday, and I’ll get you connected with the director of the galleries.”

  I can’t hide my smile. “Will do.”

  “Uh, T-bag?” a female voice chimes from the doorway, and everyone at the table looks up to see Thatch’s wife Cassie standing there, a hand on her hip. “Were you guys throwing a rager earlier or what?”

  “No rager, honey,” Thatch replies. “We were just watching Cap get his ass handed to him by Luke.”

  Cassie grins at that. “Well, I’ve been instructed by Georgia to come in here and make you guys shut the hell up or else she can’t concentrate on the sweet potatoes.”

  “My Georgie doing okay in there?” Kline asks.

  “It’s Friendsgiving, Big Dick,” she replies with a shrug. “She’s running around my kitchen like a lunatic. But she’ll be fine once we’re sitting down to eat. Also, I might’ve given her a teensy-tiny bit of liquor and told her it’s lemonade.”

  Kline quirks a brow. “How tiny?”

  “Like half a glass?” She waves him off. “No big thing.”

  “Great,” Kline mutters on a half laugh, half sigh and runs a hand through his hair. “Dinner should be interesting, I guess.”

  Thatch smirks. “Drunk Georgie is the best.”

  “Uh-huh…but do you know who’s also the best?” Cassie points her smile in my direction. “Luke’s girlfriend, Ava.”

  In an instant, everyone at the table looks at me.

  “I’m sorry…what?” Cap questions. “Did I hear you right, Cass? Did you just say Luke’s girlfriend Ava is here?”

  “Pretty sure she said girlfriend,” Trent agrees, his mouth forming into a grin. “Not friend, but girlfriend.”

  “As in, they’re dating?” Thatch questions, putting on a real fucking show. “But I thought you said Ava was just your friend?”

  Well, son of a bitch. I probably should’ve remembered that whole conversation in LA at Prime before I agreed to take Ava’s and my fake relationship show on the road, huh?

  “Luke?” Cap persists. “Mind sharing with the class?”

  A laugh jumps from my lungs. I can’t help it. With the way Cassie is grinning at me like a loon and Thatch is pretending he doesn’t know what’s going down, it’s too fucking amusing.

  “Yes, Ava is here,” I eventually respond. “And, well, she is, in fact—”

  “His girlfriend.” An all-too-familiar voice fills my ears, and I look up to see Ava standing beside Cassie in the doorway.

  “Well, I’ll be damned. I feel like a real-life book club is happening before my very eyes,” Cap replies with a smirk, wasting no time standing up to shake Ava’s hands. “I’m Caplin Hawkins,” he says. “And can I say it’s a real pleasure to finally meet Luke’s girlfriend? He’s already told us so much about you.”

  “Honestly, he never shuts up about you,” Trent agrees, and before I know it, every single guy at the table has taken it upon himself to introduce himself to my Ava.

  Your Ava?

  I mean Ava. Not my Ava. Just…Ava.

  Uh-huh…keep telling yourself that…

  “How’s it going out there, Ace?” I ask, and Ava giggles.

  “Well, Cassie here is teaching me the fine art of sneaking alcohol into people’s drinks and how to avoid ruining dinner.”

  “And how exactly are you managing that, Crazy?” Thatch asks, his eyes grinning at his wife.

  “Like I’d tell you my secrets,” she retorts with a roll of her eyes.

  “You mean the very secrets that you use on me?”

  “Exactly.” Cassie nods, unfazed. “Now, if you don’t mind, Ava and I have some more non-work work to do.”

  But before they head back to the kitchen, Ava walks toward the table, leans down in front of me with the cleavage of her gorgeous breasts directly in my face and presses a soft kiss to my cheek. “Have fun, boyfriend,” she whispers into my ear, and her warm breath brushes the skin of my neck and the smell of her sweet and flowery perfume fills my nostrils.

  Fuck, does she always smell this good?

  And because I must be in an alternate-fucking-universe, my cock threatens to take notice.

  Goddamn. What the hell is happening?

  Ava

  Stick a fork in me because I am done with a capital D. I swear, if I try to eat even one more bite of turkey, of dressing, of pumpkin pie, I’ll explode.

  Which, with the way everyone else is relaxing on the sofas and the lux loungers in the Kellys’ massive living room, I’d say I’m not the only one feeling more stuffed than the delicious turkey we consumed a few hours ago.

  “You really outdid yourself, Georgie. I ate so much food it looks like T-bag knocked me up again,” Cassie comments as she steps into the room, holding a glass of wine and a bourbon in her hands. She hands one off to her husband Thatch and proceeds to make herself cozy in his lap.

  “God, I know,” Winnie agrees with wide eyes, patting her stomach, and her husband Wes wraps his arm around her shoulders and kisses her forehead
. “But damn, the food was so good. Seriously, Georgie. Kudos to the chef.”

  “Pretty sure my darling wife is otherwise occupied sleeping off the booze Cass gave her,” Kline teases, his voice quiet as he glances down at a sleeping Georgia in his lap.

  “Crazy, is that a challenge?” Thatch asks, kissing Cassie’s cheek and resting a free hand on her knee.

  “Is what a challenge?”

  He waggles his brows. “Knocking you up again.”

  “Um…no. Pretty sure I’m all set with your two mini-me heathens you already bestowed upon me.” Cassie snorts. Then not-so-discreetly slaps him in the crotch.

  Thatch groans, but then he grins. “Yeah, but you know, what if we have a girl this time?”

  “Aw, a mini-Cassie!” Ruby exclaims from the other side of the room where she’s currently cozied up with her husband Cap, who instantly starts cracking up when he takes in Thatch’s wide, terrified eyes.

  “Never mind,” Thatch mutters.

  “What’s that supposed to mean, Thatcher?” Cassie retorts and turns to glare at him.

  “It means I literally cannot handle two Cassies in the same house.”

  She sits up and glares at him. “Are you saying I’m high-maintenance, Thatcher?”

  “Uh oh…” Both Lena and Theo tease from across the room, grinning at each other with amused eyes.

  “Oh boy,” Greer, Trent’s wife, comments. “I think shit is about to go down.”

  Instantly, Maybe giggles and hides her face into her husband Milo’s chest. “I’m afraid to look. I think she might really turn into a praying mantis and bite his head off.”

  Emory and her husband Quincy watch on in fascination like they have popcorn in their laps, and Rocky and her husband Harrison pretty much do the same.

  “Thatcher,” Cassie snaps, eyeing her husband with the kind of glare I think might actually singe skin.

  “No, honey, I’m not saying you’re high-maintenance. I’m saying you’re a lunatic,” Thatch eventually answers, and everyone in the room just stares with wide eyes. “A beautiful, fluffing amazing lunatic whom I love dearly. But a lunatic, nonetheless.”

  The room goes quiet.

  But then, Cassie just shrugs and presses a hard kiss to her husband’s lips. “Yeah, I guess you have a point. Two Cassies in one house would probably be a disaster.”

  If I’ve learned anything in the past few hours at the Kellys’ Friendsgiving dinner, it’s that Cassie and Thatch’s relationship is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. They bicker and flirt and bust out the most random, inappropriate but hilarious shit I’ve ever heard.

  Hell, just during dinner prep alone, Cassie told more about her sex life with her well-endowed husband than one person should ever have to know.

  How do I know he’s well-endowed? Because she legit calls it his Supercock.

  Frankly, they’re crazy. But somehow, it works for them.

  And the rest of their friends are…pretty damn awesome. Welcoming and friendly, they make you feel like you’ve always been a part of their little group.

  “How you doing there, Ace?” Luke whispers into my ear, and I glance up to meet his eyes.

  “Like I ate one too many pieces of pumpkin pie. You might have to carry me home.”

  He grins down at me and gently pats my stomach. “I don’t know… I think you might still have some more room, and I’m pretty sure you didn’t try—”

  “Shh!” I lift my hand to cover his mouth. “Don’t say it. My stomach can’t handle any more food talk.”

  Luke smirks, and when he acts like he’s going to lick the palm of my hand, I quickly remove it from his face on a giggle.

  “Aww…new love,” Lena comments. “Isn’t it the cutest, Maybe?”

  Maybe nods in agreement. “The blessed honeymoon phase.”

  I look at them both, confused, but when all the other girls start chiming in and I realize they’re staring toward us, it hits me.

  They’re talking about us. Luke and me.

  I almost open my mouth to correct them, but then I remember, tonight, he’s my boyfriend. Well, we’re pretending he’s my boyfriend.

  Though, it kind of seems like you’re just being your normal, usual self with Luke…

  No, I’m pretending. We’re never this physical with each other. I don’t think.

  I don’t usually act this affectionate and cuddly and flirty with Luke…right?

  News flash, sister, you actually do. All the freaking time.

  December 4th

  Luke

  In the background, Mariah Carey sings about what she wants for Christmas, and I count fifteen Santa Clauses on the dance floor and another ten standing at the bar—trying to wave down the bartender for more booze. And I can’t forget Trevor, the other jolly red-velvet-suited bastard sitting across from me at our high-top table.

  Christmas season is officially upon us, and Harry’s Bar is encouraging the (drunk) holiday spirit by hosting their annual Santa Claus night. Everyone inside this place is dressed up to celebrate. Hell, even Ava convinced me to wear an ugly Christmas sweater with the Golden Girls front and center and the words Stay Golden embroidered across the chest.

  Well, more like, forced me to. She bought the damn thing off Amazon and all but shoved it over my head before we came here.

  “Happy fucking holidays,” Trev cheers, raising his shot of tequila toward my beer and downing it without delay, his white beard slipping halfway down his chin in the process.

  “Cheers, man.” I return the gesture and take a sip from my pint of Guinness.

  He slams his shot glass onto the table with a groan and wipes the remnants of tequila from his beard while simultaneously adjusting it back into place. “It’s hard to believe that next year at this time, you might be in Houston.”

  All I can do is nod. Fact is, I will be in Houston next year. This morning, I received my official packet in the mail—a thick, NASA-embossed envelope, filled with my acceptance letter, along with a lot of other material that I need to know about the program and moving to Texas.

  But I still haven’t delivered that news to anyone. Not Uncle Gary. Not Trevor. Not even Ava. For the past few weeks, every time I’ve opened my mouth to tell her, it’s like my throat locks up and I can’t get the fucking words out.

  This is everything I’ve worked my ass off for, and now that it’s officially here, now that I’ve actually achieved what, at times, felt like the impossible, the realization of leaving New York—leaving my friends, leaving Ava—for good makes me feel like I’m losing my family for a second time. I guess I never realized how much I latched on to them in the absence of my parents.

  “Have you heard anything from NASA yet?” he asks, and like a coward, I shake my head.

  But instead of perpetuating the lie, I switch the topic of conversation. “I’m taking a leave halfway through December. You’re going to be flying with Barry through the holidays.”

  “What?” he nearly shouts. “What do you mean, I’m going to be flying with fucking Barry?”

  If it isn’t obvious already, Trevor isn’t Barry’s number one fan.

  “I mean exactly what I said. I’m going on a trip. Leave the 21st and won’t be back until after New Year’s Eve.”

  Everything is true about the coming back part. Though, after the 21st, I won’t be flying with Trev ever again. When Ava and I get back from Vermont, I’ll have to pack up my apartment and head to Houston.

  I’m going to tell him the full truth soon, but I have to deliver this news to Ava first.

  And yet, even though you’ve been with her nearly every day since you found out, you still haven’t told her…

  He narrows his eyes. “Where are you going?”

  “On a trip,” I answer, purposely teasing him with the details.

  “Yeah, I got that,” he retorts. “But where is said trip?”

  “On the East Coast.”

  “We are on the East Coast, you fuck.”

  I just grin. “I
know. Talk about convenient, right?”

  “Luke!” Ava’s voice fills my ears, and I turn on my barstool to find her standing at the bar with Desi and Claire, gesturing toward me. “Do you guys need a refill?”

  I look back at the table and take a quick inventory of our drinks and turn back toward Ava. “Two more Guinness and another shot for Trev!”

  She gives me a thumbs-up and turns back around to face the bartender.

  But my eyes take it upon themselves to take in the view—her view.

  My eyes follow the length of her legs, moving up the candy-cane-striped socks that stop just below her knees, to the luscious view of trim legs that are revealed until they meet a little green velvet skirt that feels as if it just barely covers her ass when she’s leaning over the bar like that. And long blond hair falls down her back and over the tight white shirt and overalls that complete the holiday look.

  Goddamn, Ava the Elf is quite the vision.

  Truthfully, it should be illegal for her to make something as innocent as a fucking elf look that sexy.

  I don’t know how long I sit there, staring—at your best friend’s perfect ass—but it takes the sounds of someone calling my name to pull me out of my trance.

  “Luke? Bro, what’s with you?” I hear Trev say. His voice changes slightly. “He’s not normally like this, I swear.”

  I look up to find a woman standing over us, and apparently, she’s been trying to get my attention.

  “Sorry,” I apologize. “Hi.”

  “Luke, this is Gina,” Trev introduces. “She was just telling me how she hasn’t been able to get anyone to join her for a dance.”

  I nod.

  “How about you join me?” Gina says, fluttering her eyelashes and moving her body a little too close to mine. “What do you say?”

  “While I appreciate your offer, Gina, I’m sorry, but I can’t,” I say, trying to let her down gently.

  But she turns brazen, placing her hand on my bicep. “Oh, c’mon, Luke. I promise, me and you will have a really good time tonight.”

  Translation: I want to fuck you.

  And then she turns even more brazen by placing her breasts all up in my space.

  Personally, I’m not a fan. If anything, it just makes me feel uncomfortable. For a brief moment, my eyes dart to where Ava still stands at the bar, trying to order our drinks.