Page 99 of Nine Month Contract
Calder’s eyes flash nervously to me as he responds, “It’s not important.”
“Tell me,” Wyatt thunders.
“No.”
“Just tell him,” I exclaim, stepping between them, desperate for this madness to stop.
Calder and Luke exhale heavily as they struggle with what to say to me, but Luke finally answers. “They said the whole town is saying you don’t know whose baby you’re carrying.”
I inhale sharply.
“They said it could be any of ours,” he adds, pointing at the three of them.
“They’re calling you our concubine.” Calder’s eyes are harsh and menacing like he wants to march right back in there and finish the job he started. “Everyone thinks you’re fucking all three of us, and we’re paying you to do it. They’re calling you a whore, Trista.”
Wyatt’s face looks positively murderous as he growls and turns to storm back into the bar. I grab him by the arm and stop him in his tracks. “Wyatt, stop. It’s not worth it.”
“The hell it’s not,” Wyatt thunders.
Calder takes my breath away when he steps in close and grabs my shoulders instead of Wyatt’s. His eyes are grave and serious as he says, “We won’t let anyone besmirch your good name, Trista.”
“Besmirch my good name?” I repeat, my lips parted in complete shock and confusion. Is this a joke?
“You’re family now,” Luke adds with a heavy breath, no signs of humor on his face whatsoever. “Your reputation won’t be tarnished over this.”
I step back and blink rapidly, my mind processing the words coming out of their mouths. These two got into a bar fight because of me?
Tears burn in my eyes, and I feel pissed off at the traitorous, salty assholes as they fall down my cheeks and turn all these angry mountain men into puddles of goo right before me.
The knot in my throat is thick as I struggle with what to say tothat. What do you say to three grown men who just got into a fight to defend your honor?
What do you say to someone who’s only known you for a handful of months and has done more for you than your entire family ever has?
What do you do when the world shows you it’s not as broken as you always thought it was?
“Trista, please don’t cry. We will fix—”
Calder is cut off when I reach up and pull him down for a hug, my arms cinching tightly around his neck, my shoulders shaking with silent sobs as I reach for Luke behind him and pull him into the hug as well. I watch Wyatt stare at me open-mouthed as I hug his brothers as tight as I possibly can, muffling my sobs into Calder’s shoulder as I squeeze the life out of him and Luke for somehow putting life back inside me with one punch.
Okay, maybe a few punches.
And a flippy thing that Wyatt did that was really impressive.
I reach my hand out to my mountain man, and he moves in, wrapping his arms around all three of us, completing this concubine group hug. I don’t give a shit what the town says about me. I don’t even know any of them. But I care what these three Fletcher brothers think of me. And to know they’d go to these lengths to protect me feels better than I ever would have imagined.
“Let’s go home,” I murmur, pulling away from them to wipe my nose.
They nod and help me to the car, watching over me like I might fall apart into a million pieces. And something tells me these three would spend the night putting me back together if that happened.
When we return to the mountain, my emotions are fried, and I don’t even argue when Wyatt slides out of the truck and makes his way into the barn with me. I glance at his brothers, worried we’ll give ourselves away, but Wyatt just dutifully follows me upstairs.
I let him inside, and he moves straight for my dishwasher. “What are you doing?”
His voice is tired when he replies, “I’m going to empty your dishwasher.”
“Why?”
He hits me with a devastating look. “For the same reason I got you a new bed, and bring you breakfast, and hired you a cleaning lady. I like to do things for you, Lucky. And tonight, I want to just do what I want for you.”
