Page 55 of Snowed In with Three Mountain Men

She cocks her head to the side, screwing up her face as though she doesn’t quite believe me.

“You sure about that?” she remarks. “Because I’m pretty sure turning up in a wedding dress crashed out at the side of the road wasn’t exactly the least burdensome thing I could have done…”

“I just couldn’t believe that I had you back,” I admit. “I know I shouldn’t have been thinking about it like that, but shit—all this time, I had been thinking about you, and then there you were, out of nowhere. Like I had just magicked you up for myself.”

“Maybe I was looking for you when I drove out here,” she remarks, a smile creasing the corners of her mouth. “I mean, when I ran away from that wedding, I didn’t have a damn clue where I was going. I don’t even remember picking a direction. I think a part of me wanted to find you out here, in this place. It was the last trip I went on before…before I met James. Maybe the last time I was really happy before he got his claws into me.”

“Well, whatever the reason,” I reply. “I’m just glad you’re here. And that you’re not going anywhere.”

She pauses for a moment when I say that part, and I can see an edge of doubt on her face—my brow furrows.

“You thinking of going somewhere?” I ask, trying to keep the surprise out of my voice.

“No, no, it’s not that,” she replies quickly. “It’s just…it’s just that I know how much of an imposition I’ve been. And I know that your brothers weren’t exactly sure about me being here in the first place. And now that everything with James is wrapped up, it feels like—well, I don’t have anything to be running from anymore, right? I should just go back to my life. Go back to what I knew before him. Try to rebuild.”

“Is that what you want to do?” I ask softly.

She sighs, her shoulders drooping downward. “I’m—I’m not sure,” she confesses. “I mean, the life I had before James, it doesn’t really exist anymore, not in the same way it once did. He pushed away all of my friends, and the people that I knew through him are hardly going to be welcoming, are they, knowing what I did to him. My career, it’s not where it should be, I don’t have any savings to fall back on. I always dreamed about getting out from under him and starting over, but I don’t know if that’s what I want anymore.”

“And what do you want?” I ask softly, reaching up to cup her face.

She chews her lip, and looks up at me again.

“I—I think I want to be here. With you. And your brothers.”

It’s the first time she’s said that out loud—and the hit of relief that it gives me is more than I can even begin to express. I wouldn’t have blamed her if this place was tainted by everything that’s happened and she wanted to get out and go back to the city where she could start over again, but the thought of letting her slip through my fingers when she has already been through so much doesn’t sit right with me.

“You know you’re welcome here, right?” I tell her. “For as long as you want.”

She eyes me for a long moment, falling silent.

“I just don’t know if I can ask for that from all of you,” she mutters. “I know how hard you worked to make this place a sanctuary for yourselves, and there’s no reason I can’t strike out on my own now, not after everything that’s?—”

“It’s not about what you can do,” I tell her firmly. “It’s about what you want to do. And if you want to stay here—then we’re happy to have you. More than happy.”

“You sure Dax and Chuck agree with that?” she asks. Her voice is light, but I can tell there’s real weight behind what she’s saying. She clearly doesn’t entirely believe, even now, that we’re capable of loving her the way we do.

I nod. “Yeah, I am,” I reply. “Triplet stuff. You always know what the others are thinking. Plus, they told me how they feel about you when we were putting our plan together. I don’t have to guess.”

She smiles slightly, and sinks her teeth into her bottom lip.

“I just don’t want to make your lives harder,” she confesses. “I don’t want to mess up what you’ve worked so hard to make here?—”

“And you won’t,” I assure her. “We’ll teach you everything you need to know. Besides, you can cook, right?”

“Well, mostly pastries…”

“That’s better than any of us,” I reply. “We’ll get you in the kitchen before you know it.”

She laughs—God, I love the sound of her laugh. It feels like the whole world lights up for a moment when she’s happy, and I know I’ll never get tired of it.

“Oh, I see how it is,” she shoots back. “You’re just keeping me out here to get my nose to the grindstone, aren’t you?”

I chuckle, winding my arms around her again.

“Damn right,” I agree. “We can’t let all your skills go to waste. We need to have you hard at work, if you’re going to be living here with us.”

I drop a kiss on the top of her head, and she leans into me—and I know that there’s nothing else we need to say. Threshing out the details of another person staying here with us, that can come later down the line. For now, all that matters is that she’s here, and that she knows none of us want her to go anywhere.

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