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

I maneuvered around the hole in the attic where Anderson had laid out new plywood. I didn’t trust it.

My three sisters stirred. They were sleeping in the bed while Ian and I slept curled up like hamsters on the broken settee Anderson had carried up to the attic before he’d disappeared out of my life.

“Are you making French toast?” Alana asked sleepily.

“Uncle Jaime really likes fried chicken, biscuits, and gravy. Since I kind of wrecked his life, I figure we should cater to him in his time of need.”

Ian unfolded his long legs off the couch and lifted one ankle up to his neck, stretching. “I should have just slept on the floor.”

Yep, Uncle Jaime had refused to return home with Aunt Bianca. His children had stayed for moral support, and two of his type A, mildly sociopathic attorney older sisters had stayed to “plan the execution,” as they put it. As such, we’d all lost the downstairs bedrooms. Not to mention, my parents’ room was uninhabitable. We were tight on space at chez Murphy.

Snowball zoomed down the steps in front of me, looking around, ears perked by the time we reached the kitchen.

“Sorry, I don’t know where he is,” I said, letting Snowball out into the yard.

Was my father right? Had I driven him off?

Anderson hadn’t responded to my increasingly unhinged text messages. I refused to believe he was gone for good. He’d come back. He had to. He’d said he loved me.

But so had Braeden.

At least I didn’t have to see my ex again.

The sausage for the gravy browned in the pan, filling the kitchen with meaty, spicy smells.

“This asshole,” Ian complained as he checked his email on my old laptop since we still hadn’t found his phone. “This is my last shot to dance the Nutcracker Prince. At this point, do I even want to still work at the Starlight Theater?”

“Aren’t you guys doing Swan Lake next? Maybe the director will let you be Prince Siegfried.”

“Watch him cast his latest boyfriend with the terrible turnout.” The keys clacked rapidly as Ian wrote an angry email.

I dropped the battered chicken into the hot oil, jumping when it spattered.

The house smelled like fresh biscuits when my family started piling into the dining room. Fresh sprigs of evergreen boughs and sprays of red holly berries made the dining room festive. Not that the atmosphere was all that cheery.

“Jaime doesn’t need herbal tea,” Granny Doyle insisted as I ferried out the platters of piping-hot chicken. “He needs alcohol, a hooker, and some of that experimental heart medication that drug salesman Jennifer was sleeping with used to run around trying to pimp out.” She dumped half of Uncle Jaime’s orange juice into the pitcher and poured a generous glug of vodka into his cup.

“Is your big-dick boyfriend coming?” Aunt J asked me as one of Uncle Jaime’s sisters assembled a biscuit for him and the other tried to force-feed him hashbrowns.

“I think he might be busy,” I said weakly.

“Does he know you made fried chicken?” Uncle Todd asked.

The buffet was piled with food. I even had some homemade jam left from my ill-fated job at an artisanal jam store that had turned out to be a money-losing vanity project headed by some tech billionaire’s wife.

“You need to get her out of the house,” Aunt Steph, the lawyer, was telling Jaime, slamming her knife down on the table for emphasis.

“I bet Anderson could get her out.” Uncle Hugh chuckled.

“They wouldn’t get me to leave anywhere if he was living there,” Aunt J declared.

“Move Aunt Trish and all those cats in,” Declan joked.

“I have to get the rest of the fruit salad.” I scuttled back to the kitchen.

Your girl was already on thin ice. I did not need to be associated with the breakup of Uncle Jaime’s marriage. Better to stay in my safe space and pray that Anderson showed up to whisk me away to our future.

The doorbell rang.

It was him! He’d come back.

I raced through the house, yelling, “I’ll get it!” Hands trembling, I opened the front door. “Is someone expecting a delivery?”

The pudgy, red-faced man sputtered, “A delivery? Out of my way. Where is he? Where is Ian? Ian!” he bellowed, going first into the living room, surprising my cousins, then to the dining room.

“Winston?” My brother stood up.

Grandma Shirley screamed as the heavyset man bullied up to Ian, grabbing the taller man by the front of his shirt.

“Get the hell off my grandson!” Granny Doyle put up her fists.

Winston shoved Ian. “You imbecile.”

“You never gave me the Nutcracker Prince role. You said you were, and you fucking lied.” Ian was indignant.

“You didn’t have to tell Van de Berg Insurance about…” He lowered his voice and furtively licked his lips. “What we did.”

“I didn’t tell them shit.”

“They raided the Starlight Theater!” Winston wailed. “We’re being shut down. They’re investigating. They’re crawling all over my poor late father’s dream.”

“Sounds like karma.”

“Don’t you understand?” Winston shouted. “We’re going to prison.”

“I’m not going to prison. You are.” Ian crossed his arms.

“You were colluding. You knew all about what I was doing, and you didn’t report it. It’s a criminal offense.”

Ian’s eyes widened with shock. “But they can’t prove anything.”

“They have copies of your text messages, your emails. There’s a warrant. It’s a felony, boy.” Winston shook him. “We’re ruined.”

“I’m going to prison.” Ian pressed a hand to his throat. “I can’t go to prison.”

“No, you’re not.” My aunts jumped into action.

Ian leaned heavily against the table. “I didn’t tell them. I don’t understand how this happened.”

“Don’t say anything,” my aunt instructed him.

Ian started babbling. “I didn’t do anything. They couldn’t know. I just wanted a lead role. I just wanted to be the Nutcracker Prince. How did they know?”

“They probably hacked your phone, and now we’re ruined.” Winston sobbed.

“You might be,” my aunt said coolly. “But Ian, we are going down to New York City. Keep your mouth shut, boy.”

“The phone,” I whimpered before I could stop myself.

“The phone.” Ian was breathing heavily. “He took my phone. That’s why it’s missing. Oh my god, Evie, your fucking fake-ass boyfriend is sending me to prison.”

“Wait, your fake boyfriend?” Aunt Steph pounced. “Fake how?”

“Er… semantics?”

“She was blackmailing him,” Ian said bitterly. “Anderson was here in Dad’s study the night of Aunt J’s party. Evie caught him and blackmailed him to get back at Braeden. He’s been hacking all of your phones.”

My family was in an uproar.

“It wasn’t really hacking. He just memorized the pin numbers. It’s more social engineering,” I said faintly.

“I knew it!” Henry snarled, slamming his hands on the table. “I knew he wasn’t here because he loved you. He planned this whole thing to get back at us, to get back at me, and you invited him here, Evie, invited him into our family.”

“Henry’s right, Evie,” Ian spat, “and you know how much I hate to admit that. This is your fault.”

Ian, my favorite brother, the Murphy sibling who was always in my corner, shook with anger.

He was mad at me. Me—Evie. His little sister. He’d always been there for me. When my mom had been more concerned with taking care of the newborn triplets, Ian had taken care of me. He’d cheered me up when the girls in middle school teased me, made me feel better after my mom and dad yelled at me after another detention, had come out as gay to take the heat off me when I flunked eighth grade and had to do summer school, and had let me crash at his place when I didn’t have rent money.

Ian couldn’t hate me.

“I’m sorry, Ian.” My voice sounded small. “I didn’t mean to. Sawyer?”

My cousin just shook her head.

“Dad’s right,” Ian spat. “You never mean to. You just make terrible decision after terrible, ill-thought-out decision, and the rest of us have to live with the consequences. You ruined my life, Evie.”

Tears, hot and fat, rolled down my cheeks.

Outside, a motorcycle roared.

I slipped out of the dining room while my family shouted over each other, comparing notes about missing phones, about my weird behavior, about Anderson. All while Aunt Steph and Aunt Virginia made calls to their attorney friends, trying to glean more information about the case.

“Pass the collection plate for Ian’s bail money,” Sean joked, carrying his hat around, which earned him a swat from an aunt.

“Anderson saved my life.” Granny Doyle was still in my corner. “That has to mean something.”

“That’s the most egregious offense, in my book.” Grandma Shirley was shrill.

My mother sobbed. “My son is going to prison. What will the neighbors think?”

I intercepted Anderson on the porch.

He took one look at my tear-stained face and knew.

“Evie.” He cupped my face. “I am so sorry. I—”

“I don’t care!” I raged at him through the tears. “My brother’s going to prison because of you.”

“No.” He shook his head. “I’ll fix it. I’ll talk to Aaron.”

“Aaron?” I screeched. “You set this whole thing up. Henry was right. You were trying to ruin us.”

“I didn’t want to. It wasn’t my intention.”

“Of course it was. My family was right about you. You’re a liar. You used me. You said you loved me.”

“It wasn’t a lie, Evie. I do love you.” He took my hands in his gloved ones. “I never thought I was going to be anything other than a fucked-up man wandering from one horrible, soul-destroying job to the next. You made me feel like I was normal, like I was home.” His grip tightened. “I love you, Evie. We’re meant to be. Don’t you see?” He pressed my hands to his lips. “I think I can make you happy. I can at least love you more than you’ve ever been. We’re made for each other, Evie, just two fuckups in a fucked-up world. Let me take you away. Let me rescue you. I want the farmhouse with you, the kids, and the dogs.”

I wrenched my hands away. Behind me, Snowball growled.

“You went after my brother. You hurt Ian.”

Anderson looked crushed. “I’ll fix it. I promise. I believe in our future. You and me, together. And Ian can come too.”

Angry, I wiped away my tears. “Ian isn’t coming. Ian hates me. You sold him out. You used me so you could get back at us.”

Anderson’s gray eyes flicked up to the angry faces of my family watching from the windows and open doorway then back to me. “Your family doesn’t appreciate you, but I do. I see the real you, Evie, and I love her more than anything in the world.”

“My parents were right about you,” I forced out. “You are evil. You’re a bad person. I should have called the police when I saw you in Dad’s study and let you rot in jail. You’re a liar and a thief, and you almost killed my brother. I hate you, Anderson Wynter. I will never be with you. I will always, always choose my family over you. You mean nothing to me.”

The planes of his face froze, and his eyes chilled.

“And my parents were right about me too,” I added. “I’m immature, I make bad decisions, I’m a loser and a screwup, and I’m not worthy of being in this family. But I’m going to make better choices, starting now. And that means I’m removing you from my life.”

He made a disgusted noise. “Seriously? You’re going to choose them over me? Them.” Anderson pointed at the spectators. “They don’t care about you, Gingersnap. You want to talk about people using you? Look around. These people aren’t your family. They don’t like you. They don’t respect you. They wouldn’t toss a grenade into a lake to free you from the ice. Not you, Granny Doyle—I know you’re cool.”

My grandmother gave a little bow.

“The rest of them?” His gray eyes pierced into me. “They despise you, Evie. They laugh about you behind your back. They think you’re useless, worthless, and they’d be more than happy if you disappeared for Christmas. The Murphys are shitty, horrible people. They drag you down. They keep you from being who you were meant to be.” He gave me a longing look. “I would do anything for you. I love you. I know you. I can make you happy, really happy—no strings attached. Evie, choose me. Choose us. We are meant to be.”

I squared my shoulders. “You’re wrong, Anderson. They are my family. I am a Murphy, and you will never be good enough for me. Now, get off my porch.”