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Emmett comes down the stairs just as I’m about to put my shirt on. He stops and stares at my chest unabashedly. I grin at him and pull the soft t-shirt over my head. He grunts something that sounds like acceptance, then finishes his walk down the stairs. I hear Hunter in the kitchen and all my men are accounted for.
All my men.
I don’t know where Preston ended up last night. For the first time in my life, I don’t care. He could have gone home, he could have stayed in the barn, and either choice is none of my business. He isn’t mine. Not anymore. That knowledge gives wings to the delight I feel in my chest, and I walk into the kitchen beaming.
“Morning, Hunter.” I go over to the stove where he’s cooking and kiss him on the cheek.
“Morning, Goldilocks,” he says, turning his head at the last second to kiss me on the mouth. It delights a laugh out of me. “Your coffee’s poured.” He gestures at the counter with the spatula he’s using to flip pancakes.
“Perfect as always,” I say with a grin. I breathe in the strong aroma and let the warmth settle in my senses. I feel magical today. Powerful, creative, and beautiful. It’s in the way they’re all looking at me. It’s in the thing we did last night, the act of desperation that turned into defiance that turned into connection. It was amazing. I feel amazing.
Hunter serves up the food. Beau brings two plates to the table, his and mine. Hunter brings the other two. Our coffees are all poured and waiting. Beau sits down and immediately steals a piece of bacon off my plate. I slap his hand and he grins. Hunter is already eating, his glasses fogging up a little as he pauses to take a sip of coffee. Emmett has his chair tipped back, one boot on the crossbeam under the table, chewing slowly and watching me with those quiet eyes.
Nobody is performing. Nobody is trying to impress anyone. There’s no dress code, no reservation, no careful conversation about somebody’s mother’s feelings. There’s just food and warmth and the sound of forks and the smell of coffee and three men who know how I take it without asking. I didn’t know mornings could feel like this. Easy. Ordinary. Mine.
I take a bite of pancake and it’s perfect. Not restaurant perfect, not drizzled-with-something-I-can’t-pronounce perfect. Just butter and syrup and a little bit of crisp on the edges because Hunter always leaves them on a beat too long. I know that about him now. I know Beau will eat his bacon first and save his pancakes for last. I know Emmett drinks his coffee black and doesn’t talk until his second cup. These are small, stupid things. They’re the kind of things you only learn by sitting at a table with someone over and over, morning after morning, until their habits become part of the furniture of your day. Preston and I ate out almost every morning. I couldn’t tell you how he liked his eggs. I don’t think he ever asked how I liked mine.
Just as I’m about to cut into my second pancake, there’s a thundering knock on the door.
Beau snorts. “Guess he didn’t get the message last night.”
We move as one, heading for the front door. The last time I went to face Preston, I walked across the yard alone in borrowed boots that were too big for me, my heart slamming against my ribs, the cabin getting smaller behind me with every step. Now I’m walking through the living room with Beau’s shoulder brushing mine and Emmett’s heavy footsteps behind me and Hunter falling in on my other side without a word.
Nobody told them to come. Nobody asked. They just stood up when I stood up, like it was obvious, like there was no version of this where I went to the door by myself. God only knows why Preston didn’t come to the back; it’s closer to the barn. Maybe he’s too good for back doors. In the living room, Beau gives me a look as the pounding continues, letting it be my decision whether we open the door or ignore him until he gets tired. I nod. He opens the door.
Preston looks rough. Yesterday’s clothes are wrinkled around him. His eyes are wild with fury. His jaw is tight and his hair is scruffy, evidence of broken sleep. I’m just astonished that he actually slept here last night after what he witnessed. He looks around Beau, dismissing him like he doesn’t exist, his eyes boring into mine.
I look back at him and wait for the old feeling. The tightening in my throat, the locked jaw, the urge to shrink and apologize and smooth things over. I wait for it and it doesn’t come. My hands are still. My breathing is even. I can feel Beau’s shoulder beside me and hear Emmett’s boots on the floor and I’m just standing here, steady, looking at a man I used to be afraid of disappointing. He looks smaller than I remember. Not physically. He’s the same height, the same build, the same expensive coat. But something about the way he’s standing on the porch in yesterday’s wrinkled clothes, furious and uncombed, makes him look like a man who lost something and still doesn’t understand what it was.
The last time I faced him, I couldn’t make my mouth work, and I walked back across the yard so frustrated with myself. That was just yesterday, but it feels like I was a different woman.
“Jesus Christ, Josie! Is that why you’re here? You ran off into the woods to get railed by three mountain men? All three of them? At the same time?!”
He says it like it should humiliate me, like I should be ashamed. I would have been, at one point. Another day. An earlier version of myself would have collapsed under the weight of my shame, but I’m not her anymore. I’m me, and I like me. I’m pretty good company, and I have nothing to feel ashamed of.
I hold his stare. “That’s none of your business,” I tell him. “We’re not together anymore. I ended things when I walked out of the church.”
The words come out whole. Not breathless, not whispered, not choked off at the end. I said them and my jaw didn’t lock and my throat didn’t close and the bricks that were piled behind my teeth yesterday are gone. I don’t know when they left. Sometime between the barn and the firelight and the feeling of three men on their knees asking me what I wanted. But they’re gone, and my voice is mine again, and it sounds like me. The real me. The one I’ve been looking for.
He opens his mouth, his eyes sharpening like a hawk that’s just found fresh prey, but I hold up a hand before he can speak.
“Now, I’m sorry I did it that way. I really am. But I’m not sorry I chose not to marry you. It never would have worked out between us.”
He looks like he’s about to say something scathing, then stops himself. He always did have good self-control. He grits his teeth, his gaze falling to the snow as he regroups. He obviously wasn’t expecting me to stand up for myself like that. He shakes his head and sighs.
“Honey, you can’t be serious.”
I open my mouth to tell him not to call me honey, but he talks right over me. His voice fills the space where mine was supposed to go, and the words I was about to say just evaporate, replaced by his. There it is. That’s the thing. That’s the thing he’s always done. Not yelling, not threatening, just filling every silence before I can get to it, so smoothly that I used to think I was the one who had nothing to say.
I spent four years thinking I was quiet. I wasn’t quiet. I was full of words. He just never left room for them. I feel my anger rise, but it’s a different anger than the kind I used to feel. It’s not the helpless, swallowed kind that turns inward and becomes shame. It’s the clean kind. The kind that knows exactly what it’s looking at. My jaw locks, but not from fear this time. From the effort of not interrupting him the way he’s always interrupted me.
“Think about it,” he says. “Think about what you’re throwing away. Saturday nights at Michelangelo’s.”
Beau leans over and mutters to me. “Who’s Michelangelo?”
“Fancy restaurant,” I murmur back.
Preston isn’t pleased by the interruption. He sets his jaw and keeps going. “The condo. You love that condo, Josie, you told me you did. The designer clothes. These guys don’t have the connections I do, do you think they’ll get you limited-edition dresses? The luxury of your work-free life. Sundays at my parents’ place for brunch. They miss you too.”
