Page 19 of Claimed By the Cowboys

“Okay. Well. If I’m hearing you right, it sounds like maybe a test tube would be the only option. But do you want to try something else a little more… urgently?”

I look at her. Blaire shrugs.

“You want to have a kid. It’s going to be with your friends. With one of them, at least, unless you have some kind of logistics planned to not know whose it is. All of that stuff that happens under the doctors… I don’t know, but from what I’ve heard, it’s hard, Pipes. Harder than it seems. If it were me, I’d want to at least try the natural way first. It could be…” Her voice trails off.

I snort. “Fun?”

“Exactly.”

Tapping the table, I nod. “I see your point.”

“I mean, would it be so bad to have sex with the guys?”

Oh, lord. The words ‘sex’ and ‘the guys’ are bringing up all kinds of thoughts that I simply just don’t want to have. I shake my head. “No. I think that’s part of the problem.”

“What is it?”

I huff, leaning back. “I mean, I’ve been friends with them my whole life. I moved here to be near them. But lately, I’ve been… um… well… okay, so I know they’ve always been hot, right?”

Blaire waves a hand. “Objectively hot. Go on.”

“But right now, it’s like… they’ve hit another level. Before, they were jalapeño hot. But they’ve recently moved up to habanero hot. Maybe even Carolina Reaper hot,” I admit.

A little smile ticks across Blaire’s lips. “Piper, are you rating men on a pepper scale?”

I giggle. “Nuclear hot?”

“So you’re definitely attracted to them?”

“Yeah. Unfortunately, I’m definitely, one hundred percent attracted to them. All three of them.”

If anyone can understand my attraction to multiple men, it would be my sister. She found herself falling for three cowboysduring her time with the rodeo circuit., and their relationship is still going strong.

“So what’s the problem, then?”

This is the part I’m not really sure about. I take a deep breath. “Well… um… remember Finance Bro?”

“That sleazy trust fund baby in San Francisco?” Blaire spits. “What does he have to do with this?”

“It’s not just him, I guess. It was him. And Patagonia Vest Guy. And Startup Sandal Guy. And Surf Dud. It was all of them.”

“Piper, I’m not following,” Blaire says.

I sniff. “They were all good. Until they weren’t. I believed them about everything, you know? I believed that they wanted me. That they were interested in the same thing I was. That they wanted something serious. Then, the second we started to move forward, things got… weird.”

Blaire gives me a look. “You are not responsible for the fact that Finance Bro literally had another family.”

“I know. But it just feels like… I have no idea what to look for. Like my ability to screen men just… sucks.”

“It doesn’t,” Blaire adds.

“But what if it does? What if I’m making a huge mistake? What if they find someone else and then try to get custody of my child? What if?—”

“Then I’ll beat them up, and you and I can figure out how to raise a baby in a trailer with three rodeo cowboys,” Blaire interrupts. “Piper. The guys have known you forever. You think after all this time, they’re pulling some kind of elaborate prank on you?”

It sounds silly when she says it out loud. But I’ve always been like this. Too open. Too trusting. I was friends with everyone in high school, whether they talked shit about me or not, simply because I couldn’t figure out who would or wouldn’t betray me.I just can’t read people. Not like Blaire can, or literally anyone else.

“Pipes. Sweetheart. I promise you, your guys are not trying to totally screw you over,” she says softly. “They might be pretty excited to screw you, but I don’t think they’re being dishonest.”

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