“I can’t do this.” I shoved the sales materials back to my brother. “I know pretty much nothing about sales.”

My brother had signed his artisan craft beers up for a stupid contest to get a spot at The Fallen Nut’s prestigious tap line-up for the next year. Ike was sure that just because two beers from last season’s line up had gone national, propelling those small breweries onto the national scene, that all beers chosen would reach the same success.

He was delusional.

The Fallen Nut was a fun bar—or so I’d heard repeatedly from people trying to get me to go out and “have a little fun.” Some people just didn’t understand that loud, smelly places weren’t everyone’s idea of fun. Especially mine. I preferred a nice night in with a book or a movie. Possibly a quiet restaurant meal. Bars were not my thing. They just weren’t.

Neither was beer, which made my brother’s request extra ridiculous.

“It has nothing to do with selling. You just hold the information should they ask for it. It’s a voting thing. The product will speak for itself.”

“If that were true, which I highly doubt, you’d send Bryant.” Bryant was one of the guys who worked production. Super nice, considered hot by many, but not one of the more eloquent people I’d met.

Ike gave me the eye, the one he reserved for when he was done playing nice. Sometimes working for your brother, even as a subcontractor, sucked monkey balls. This was one of those times.

“I don’t see why you can’t do it.” He was going on a golf trip of all things. Not only was it pretentious to fly to another state for a golf weekend just to say you did, but he’d already entered the contest by then. It was just plain rude.

“You know I have plane tickets.”

“But you—” I just closed my mouth.There was no need to keep arguing, not when he got like this.

Brothers.

Arrgggg.

“Listen. I’ll owe you one, okay? I know it sucks that I’m leaving. But I have—reasons. So please. Take care of this for me.” His sincerity had me taken aback. I thought he was pulling a “keeping up with the Joneses” bullshit thing, but the way he said reasons told me otherwise. Something was up.

Ike wasn’t one for sharing, so instead of bothering to ask, I simply said, “Fine.”

How horrible could one night in a bar be?

Turns out...fucking horrible.

When I walked in, the place was bustling with people, most of whom I imagined there for the free beer. Earlier in the day, Bryant had delivered and set up the station where our beer would be served. Of course, that was only after I offered him a paid day off to do so. I needed to remember to tell Ike about that when he got home.

The beers were all lined up along the back wall where the dart boards hung. Thoughts of all the things that could go wrong bounced through my mind, the insurance actuarial side of me processing the increase in risk unbidden.

Insurance underwriting paid my bills and was far from a passion, yet there was comfort in the way it broke things down to numbers, and I often found myself using it in times of stress. And those times of stress were usually connected to loud, crowded, smelly places.

Working for my brother and keeping his books wasn’t a passion either. But it kept the two of us communicating, and given that he was the last of my family left, that mattered far more than the paycheck it provided or the added stress it put on my shoulders. I might get frustrated with Ike more often than not, but he was my brother and I loved him to death—even if I wanted to kill him from time to time.

Clenching my folder to my chest, I wove my way through the hoards of people. Fine, it wasn’t hoards. Heck, the tasting and voting hadn’t even started yet, but it was enough people for me to feel overwhelmed. At least I knew once I made it to the wall in the back, I’d have the table as a barrier between myself and said people.

Ike had completely underestimated the importance of the Nut Bowl. While our table had beer and cups with some coasters I’d found in the storage closet from a promotion Ike ran last year, the other tables had gone all out.

One of the six of us would get placement at the bar, and if table design meant anything, that would not include Tapped, the brew Ike had been perfecting for years.

The first table, aside from a fabulously hilarious name, Pass Me Another, was giving away bottle openers that had flashlights on them that lit up when you clapped so you could find it in your drawer—or more likely, under the couch after a night of a few too many. The second table had a raffle for season tickets to the college hockey team who had won their division championships four years running. Those things were worth a mint. The third table was where my lackluster display was. At least it was in the center...

Alongside me was both a sexy omega and a stunning woman with their clothing painted on—literally. An artist had painted their clothing, giving them not only something to talk about when they flirted with the customers who fancied them, but it also gave the patrons something to talk about as they returned to their seats. I imagined footage of the unique artwork would be viral by the time I got home, especially if someone “accidentally” spilled their beer on them.

Which was a very real possibility.

The next two tables pulled out all of the stops. Between the scratch off tickets that could win you a year's supply of beer, however much that might be, and the opportunity to win a cruise, both tables already had lines and it wasn’t even time to start yet. There was no way my numbers, facts, or even our really good beer were going to be enough to get to round two. As much as I tried to pretend I wouldn’t care if we made it or not as I snaked behind the tables to my seat, the truth was, I didn’t want to let my brother down.

Ike had worked really hard for many years on his brew, going so far as to apprentice in some small breweries in Europe to learn the old world techniques. He might be annoying most of the time, but I wanted this for him, and I was going to do what it took to get it for him.

Even if the chances of me puking from anxiety increased exponentially with each passing moment.