by Lori King
“I was planning on staying with Rachel and her husbands, but they just had a baby, and then Sawyer had to have surgery on his knee—“
“Wait, husbands? Did you say Rachel and her husbands? Rachel Morgan had a baby. With Sawyer? As in Brooks?” Clint’s mouth hung open in surprise and even Tanner laughed at his expression.
“Yes she did, now shut your trap before the bees start building a hive in there,” Tanner said shaking his head.
“Holy shit, it’s like I’ve died and gone to heaven. I come home to find a sexy angel is sleeping in my bed and people are embracing group love! Why did I ever leave Stone River?”
“To be a star!” Dalton answered with a dramatic wave of his arms.
Clint snorted, “Yeah that didn’t work out so well.”
Zoey frowned at him, “But you were in several commercials. I even saw the dog food one a few times.”
Suddenly the cocksure man was a sad and dejected little boy, and Zoey’s heart broke a little. She had to scoop food into her mouth to keep from putting an arm around him to comfort him.
“Unfortunately that is my only claim to fame. I never managed to break into the biz. I spent more time bussing tables and mowing lawns than acting. So tell me about Rachel and Sawyer and her other husbands.”
“Rachel legally married Rogan Brooks, but they had a commitment ceremony between all four brothers and her. She just had a baby girl a couple of months ago, Juliet.” Zoey explained, she felt Tanner’s eyes on her as she chatted with Clint, but she made no move to acknowledge it. Her pride was still stinging from his rejection earlier.
“How in the world did that happen? And why?” Clint asked with a frown.
Zoey giggled, “I’m pretty sure it happens the way all relationships happen. They fell in love. Actually, I think they fell in lust first. They invited her to have a weekend fling with them one Friday night, and by Sunday, the guys were pledging their undying love. Rachel took a bit more convincing, but once she accepted her own feelings, it was like they were always meant to be together. Those four guys make great dads too.”
“I never pictured Parker Brooks cooing at a baby, but trust me, he does,” Tanner said, with a wry grin on his face.
“He’s not the only one,” Zoey said, and when Dalton and Clint looked at her in question she gestured to Tanner with her fork, “Your big brother is wrapped around that baby girl’s finger too, trust me, I’ve seen it in person.”
“Things sure have changed around here,” Clint said, shaking his head.
The conversation turned to less personal questions. Everyone seemed to avoid talking about the past and the future. Preferring to stay on fluff topics like town gossip and the tasks that had to be done over the next week on the ranch.
By the end of dinner the three brothers seemed to have made a silent agreement to ignore the past between them, and start fresh. Zoey was the only outsider.
As usual, she was the one with no links to the past, and no solid leads to her future. The three brothers continued their easy conversation and insisted on cleaning up the kitchen since she cooked, so she silently slipped away leaving them to it.
Her legs carried her outside and down the road a ways before she stopped and took a seat on a tree stump to stare up at the sky. Worries bounced in her brain making her stomach tight and her heart heavy.
She still had no idea where her mother was, or if she was okay. Eve’s cell phone number had been disconnected, so even if she wanted to leave a message she couldn’t. Tomorrow she had to return to work and admit that she was at the bottom of the dung heap, and she still had absolutely no idea where she was going to live permanently.
How had things spiraled out of control so quickly in her life? It seemed like just days ago she was graduating, celebrating the successful completion of her life’s goal, and planning a brilliant entry into the career world. The reality sure paled in comparison to the fantasy she’d had in her mind back then.
Staring up into the inky black sky, she searched instinctively for specific constellations. There was Orion, and the big dipper, Cassiopeia, and Andromeda. It was a soothing ritual she had when she needed to think, and she was thankful the night was clear and warm.
When movement drew her attention and she turned to find Dalton standing a few feet away, he held two beer bottles in his hand. “Are you alright?”
Forcing a smile she nodded, “Sure. Just enjoying the stars.”
He moved closer, handing her a beer and then taking a seat on the ground so his back rested against the stump she sat on and his shoulder pressed against her leg. “Enjoying the stars, or escaping the testosterone?”
She snorted, and then giggled, “Maybe a little of both.”
“I can’t believe Clint came back. I know he promised mom, but I was stunned to see him today.” Dalton’s words were quiet, and Zoey had to strain to hear him.
“You? I was the one he scared half to death. He’s lucky I had a bowl of icing and not the bread knife in my hands, or you would have been planning a funeral,” she said sarcastically. He turned to look up at her, his gorgeous smile lit by the moonlight, and she sighed with longing. Her hand itched to run through his blonde hair, loosening if from where his cowboy hat had pressed it down. Instead, she began picking at the sticker on her beer bottle.
“That’s just it, huh?”
“What do you mean?”
“The planning. We’re all at a stage where we’re supposed to be planning our futures. Laying out a course for ourselves, a flawless path to happiness if you will. We should be capable of overcoming the skeletons in our closets and forgiving all of the hurts from the past, so we can have a bright future. Instead, you and I are drinking beer in the moonlight in the middle of a Texas ranch, and neither of us knows what the fuck tomorrow will hold.”
“Amen,” she said, laughing just a little. They sat in silence for a while, enjoying the quiet and their own thoughts. “So what kind of plan have you come up with, Doctor?”
“Hmm…I still think my first step should be seducing you into my bed, because then it will be much easier to convince you to spend the rest of your life cooking your delicious food for me, and driving my brothers crazy that they don’t have you.” He responded to her glare of disapproval with a wink, and then shrugged, “Or, I can head back inside to obtain more beer and we can sit here until morning watching the moon move across the sky.”
She couldn’t help but laugh. He was as big of a flirt as the other two, but there seemed to be something deeper in him tonight. There was a missing piece to the puzzle that was Dalton Keegan, and she grew more intrigued every minute she spent with him.
“I could spend hours staring at the sky searching for answers and still have no idea what’s next.” She could hear the wistful sadness in her own voice, so she knew Dalton could too.
“What’s holding you back?” he asked, without moving a muscle to look away from the sky.
She sighed, “My past I suppose. Or maybe my fear of the past repeating itself. I wanted my degree so badly because I wanted to be able to help other kids. I need to make sure they know that it gets better, and that their circumstances when they are young don’t define them when they are adults.”
“A lofty goal. I know you and I haven’t spent a lot of time together, and we weren’t close before I left, but somehow I just know you can achieve that if you are determined to. Skeletons can be pretty motivating.”
The fact that he understood what she was saying without her having to explain it made her relax her guard a little more. It was as sure sign she should stand up and walk back into the house as quickly as possible but instead, she heard words coming out of her mouth. “So what skeletons are you trying to overcome?”
“Do you really want to know?” he asked, tipping his head and looking at her thoughtfully. When she nodded, he slowly rose to his feet, and held out his hand. “Come on, I think better when I’m moving.”
She let him help her up, and they left their half empt
y bottles on the stump to retrieve later, before slowly walking down the road away from the house. It was several moments before he spoke, but when he did the sadness in his voice strangled her heart.
“I know you didn’t have a great childhood here. It’s a small town, so I heard the rumors, and after your mom’s recent stunt, I have a pretty good idea of what life has been like for you. For me though, Stone River was a great place to grow up. I was lucky enough to have a great family, and a lot of freedom. Part of that freedom was that I could run wild with my best friend, Ben White. We were double trouble, believe me. I can’t even tell you how many times the Sherriff picked us up causing problems for one of the local businesses and took us home. One of our favorite things to do during the summer was to go swimming at Devil’s Drop.”
“Devil’s Drop? That place is a national park or something, isn’t it?” Zoey frowned at him, and tucked her hair behind her ear.
“It is now, but it wasn’t back then. You were probably only 4 or 5 when it happened…God that makes me feel old.” He stopped moving and his head dropped dramatically.
“When what happened?”
“Ben and I went swimming one afternoon, just like always. Jumping off the rocks into the pool. You know, the thing about Devil’s Drop is that it’s spring fed from an underground cave system. The pool itself is almost fifty feet deep, or so I’ve been told.” He started walking again, but he seemed to have forgotten she was with him. She stayed quiet, listening to his story, and fearing she knew how it ended. “Ben was a great kid. He got straight As, he was the star of the little league team, and he was a loyal friend.”
There were several more breaths between them, where the only sound was the crunching of grass under their feet. Dalton’s tone changed when he spoke again, dropping an octave and filling with emotion. “He jumped off the rocks one last time. We had to go home because his mama was going to take us shopping for fireworks. We were eleven-year-old boys, so we loved shooting off fireworks and the stands had just opened for the season. Before we could go, Ben wanted to jump just one more time. I climbed out and I was drying off when he went in. He slipped as he got to the top of the rock, and fell. His head cracked against the granite before he tumbled into the pool. I could see the blood spray from his forehead when he hit, and then he was gone. Disappeared under the water. Just like that. I panicked, and took off for help when he didn’t come back up. I never even went in the water to see if I could save him.”
Dalton stopped moving and stared up into the dark sky. His body was so tense he looked like he would snap like a rubber band if she touched him, but she chanced it. Wrapping her arms around him, she held him against her, trying to absorb his pain. He tensed only for a moment, before his arms came up to clutch her to him. He pressed his face against the top of her head and continued his story.
“It took divers to find his body, and the autopsy said he died of blunt force trauma. He was dead before he went into the water, but I didn’t know that. He was my best friend and I never even went into the water to try to help him. I ran away. What kind of a coward runs away and leaves his best friend behind?”
“Dalton, you were only a kid. You couldn’t have gotten him out alone even if you had been able to reach him.”
“Oh I know. I’m a doctor after all. I know that it was a hopeless situation, but in my heart, I can’t forgive myself. After that, every time I ran into his mom, Minnie, she would see me and start crying. She couldn’t even stand to speak to me. His dad, Walt, would move to the other side of the road to avoid me. So I knew when I was eleven that I would have to leave Stone River behind. There was no way I could face what I had done, or make Walt and Minnie relive it for the rest of their lives. I left. I went to med school and after med school I found the program that would send me the furthest possible distance from Texas. Like any good coward, I kept running hoping I could outrun my past. I feel like I’ve been running for twenty years, ever since I turned away from Ben. Until two weeks ago, when my program was shut down and I was shipped back. Now I’m just trying to figure out how to take it all in, and what to do next.”
They held each other in silence. Zoey tried to put all of the compassion she had in her heart into that hug, and Dalton seemed to absorb it readily. His hand stroked her hair gently, as though petting her to calm her, but she knew he was really doing it to soothe the turmoil inside of himself. She began running her own hands up and down the hard line of his back, trying to give him the comfort he sought. When he leaned back to look down at her, she gave him a small smile. “How about we go in and get that second beer you promised me, then maybe we can see how good you are at the seduction part of your plan?”
“I don’t want you to sleep with me out of pity, Zoey. I like you, and you mean more than that to me,” he said, shaking his head.
“How can you say that? You barely know me,” she argued, pulling her arms away and crossing them over her chest protectively. She couldn’t help but feel stung by the rejection.
“I know more than you think. You’re a brave, strong woman, with a big heart, and a huge capacity for love. You’ve been hurt in the past, but that doesn’t stop you from helping the ones that have hurt you, and you’re in love with my brother.” His last words were like a slap to her face, and Zoey took a step backwards.
“What?”
He shrugged, “It’s plain as day to me, and a few days ago, I would have never considered making a play for the woman my brother wants as his own, but hearing about Rachel, and the guys, well…it just has me thinking.”
“Stop it. Right now. Don’t start getting it in your head that just because I’m living here with the three of you, that we’re all going to suddenly fall madly in love with each other. You three are mostly jerks, who are cocky and a pain in my neck. Why would I ever want to be saddled with one of you, much less all three of you?” She was breathing hard, but she wasn’t sure if it was because what he said made her nervous or turned on.
“Why? Oh that’s the easy part. Because, Zoey, sweetheart, we can give you this…” His head dipped, and she had a second where she knew exactly what he was going to do, but she couldn’t stop it. She wanted him to kiss her. In fact, she had almost a desperate urge to fuse her mouth to his to prove to both of them that there was no chemistry.
Her plan backfired, because the moment their lips met, electricity sparked in the air and coursed through her body. She moaned as he took the kiss deeper, cupping her jaw with his hands to hold her in place and making love to her mouth. Her body melted into him, and she moaned when he nipped her lip before pulling back with a deep sigh.
“Yep. I knew it. You taste like the perfect sin, woman. Now, are we going to take this up to my bed and continue it, or are you going to walk away?”
He was challenging her. Fire lit the depths of his blue eyes, and she could feel the flush that covered her own neck and chest. Her body wanted his, there was no doubt about it, but she couldn’t take the next step with Dalton, until she resolved her feelings for Tanner. Polyamory might work for the Brooks family, but everyone around knew that Zoey Carson was better off alone.
Pushing away from him, she shook her head to clear the lust, and then glared at him. “I’m going to walk away, because like you said, I don’t want to be wanted out of pity or some misplaced desire for a future. In a couple of weeks I will move out, and in a couple of months you will leave Stone River, so there is no point in starting something neither one of us have any intention of finishing.” She turned and took a few steps toward the house before his voice stopped her for a moment.
“You can run, Zoey, but you can’t hide. There is something special between us, and I know it’s there between you and Tanner too. I don’t know about Clint, but something tells me that fate wouldn’t have brought the four of us together in this moment in time, if it weren’t for a damn good reason. Good night, Zoey.”
Doubling her speed, she let the dark swallow him up behind her as she booked it for the well-lit ranch house.
She wasn’t sure what she needed right now. Space, time, a good hard fuck? Maybe a little of everything. Dalton’s words hit too close to what she herself had been thinking, and it scared the hell out of her.
She wasn’t like Rachel. There was no happy ending in the future for broken Zoey. Hadn’t she had that proven a dozen times over in just the last month? Besides, once Dalton and Clint spent more time in Stone River they would find someone else to catch their fancy. Some other woman who was prettier and had a lot less baggage. She just needed to focus on finding a new place to live as quickly as possible…and keep her hands off the Keegan threesome.
Easier said than done, a small voice in her brain taunted her as she flew through the front door and straight down the hall to her room. Locking the door behind her, she dropped onto the bed and let her emotions take over. Her heart broke for Dalton and his dead friend, Ben, for Clint and his broken dreams of acting, and for herself and Tanner, what might have been, but they would never know. It was just one sadness after another, and she found herself sobbing herself to sleep.
Chapter Seven
The next week flew by, and Zoey barely had time to think about her situation, much less lament it. She had always been a morning person, so every day she woke with the sun and made breakfast. It seemed to surprise Tanner that she would meet him in the kitchen for coffee and breakfast. Clint and Dalton would wander in right before she had to go to work, and all three men took the time to wish her a good day. If she didn’t know any better, she would almost feel like she belonged there with them.
Work consisted of filling out paperwork, answering phones, filing, and running errands for her bitchy boss, Helen, who she nicknamed, Helga the Hooker. Helen was in her early fifties and a bitter biddy who seemed to have no compassion for the students she worked with. How she ever got a job as a children’s social worker was anyone’s guess. Zoey knew she was stuck if she wanted to stay in Stone River. Small towns weren’t exactly the ideal place for someone in her career, so she forced herself to grin and bear it. According to some of the other staff, the administration was watching her closely to see if she could ultimately be Helen’s replacement. It wasn’t much, but it was a sliver of hope in her dismal world.