18. Colton
Chapter 18
Colton
I leaned on the counter, still a little out of breath from my post-practice workout, sweat clinging to my skin as if it belonged there. Annie’s contact details stared up at me from my phone screen, one click away from calling her.
“Just do it,” Xavi said, his tone still laced with annoyance as he shoved the jug of milk beneath the steam wand on the espresso machine. The sound of tearing paper filled the space for a moment before it was just hissing, the milk swirling in the jug, and then he was shutting it off, somehow knowing exactly how to work that ridiculous contraption. Black instant coffee was fine enough.
“What if she says no to coming over?” I mulled over the scenario in my head, trying to work out a plan, but I was too tired to really think. I was desperate for a cold shower, needed it to stop my thoughts from being so muddied.
“Then we tell her the truth and say we all need to talk to her,” Cole said from the couch, his voice a little gruff as he stared down at his phone, watching back a clip Coach had taken from practice today. “Xav, that poke check you tried at the blue line? Way too early. You opened up the lane for that pass. You’ve got to read the play better, wait for the puck carrier to commit. You’re a wall when you play smart, but you can’t get too eager.”
“No, no, I know,” Xav bleated. “I’ve been thinking about it?—”
I groaned, cutting Xavi off. “Oh my god, can you two shut up for a minute so I can call her?”
Neither of them responded.
“Thank you,” I sighed exasperatedly.
I tapped on her name, bringing the phone up to my ear, my muscles still buzzing beneath my skin from the workout.
“Hello?”
“Hey, sweetheart,” I grinned, the familiar warmth in her voice when she answered going straight to both of my heads. “Quick question. No pressure, but like, maybe a smidgen. What are you doing tonight?”
The sound of her laughter carried down the phone. “Colton, I just saw you yesterday.”
“Heaven forbid I get to see you twice in forty-eight hours.”
“That’s not—shit, I?—”
“I’m just teasing, Annie,” I chuckled. “Seriously, though. I want to see you. Are you free?”
“Well, I was supposed to be working at Smokey’s tonight, but Gab swapped the shifts around last minute so… yeah, I’m free,” she said, the words a little hesitant, like she was nervous.
Gab swapped the shifts around. I glanced at Xavi, watching him like a hawk. He must’ve called his dad earlier. “How wildly convenient that your shift got moved,” I said, making sure to repeat what she’d said so he knew exactly what I was talking about.
Xavi shrugged.
“Come over,” I added. “We can hang out, have a drink. I can send you the address.”
There was a slight pause before she spoke again. “Just you, or?—”
“Do you like pizza?” I asked, cutting her off before she could finish that question. I didn’t want to tell her it was all of us — that wasn’t the plan. I didn’t want her to worry about being around all three of us at the same time right now, didn’t want that to hold her back from showing up. “I’m fucking starving and I’ve been craving it.”
“Aren’t hockey players supposed to, I don’t know, eat well?”
“Some do,” I chuckled. “I’ve never really had a problem eating whatever the hell I want. Don’t tell me you’re a cheese-only kind of girl to go along with your plain ol’ rum and coke.”
“I’m more of an everything-but-anchovies kind of person.” I could hear the grin in her voice. “And how dare you say that about rum and coke. It’s a staple.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say.” I tapped my fingers on the countertop, trying to keep myself from smiling like an idiot. “Come over. Seriously. I promise not to try to give you alcohol poisoning this time.”
She hummed thoughtfully, dragging it out, toying with me. “Hmm… all right. Fine. I’ll head over in, like, thirty.”
I pushed off the counter, fisting the air silently in victory. “Sounds good, sweetheart. The gate code is four-six-two-five-three-nine.”
“I’m absolutely going to forget that.”
“I’ll text it with the address, then. See you soon.”
We hung up and I set the phone down, letting out a steady stream of air through a small hole between my lips.
“Success?” Cole asked hesitantly.
I smirked. “Obviously.”
————
The doorbell chimed and I was up and over the back of the couch before it could finish ringing out. Xavi tensed at the kitchen island, almost like he was preparing to get it himself, but we’d made a decision — I’d get the door. I’d invited her, I’d intentionally left out that the boys would be here and they at least wouldn’t be visible from the front door, not with the entrance hall blocking the space. I could charm her into staying if she freaked out a little.
I could see her outline through the frosted glass of the matte black door, and already, my heart was in my damn throat. Taking a deep breath to calm myself, I pulled it open, Annie’s cheerful grin greeting me before it immediately turned into a startled blink as the sound of broken glass rang out from somewhere behind me.
God dammit.
The plan was already breaking down. They were supposed to be quiet until I could get her inside.
“Hi,” I said, trying my absolute hardest to ignore whatever chaos was erupting behind me.
But Xavi’s quiet muttering still weaved through the entrance hall, his voice carrying even though he was out of sight. “Shit, can you grab the broom?”
I wanted to bash my head against the door.
“Hi,” Annie said hesitantly, her gaze glancing behind me before locking back on mine.
She’d dressed casual — at least, she definitely thought she had. Tight high-waisted jeans hugged the soft curve of her hips like they’d been tailored specifically to make any man ache, and the black, loose crop top dipped down just low enough to tease, the long sleeves of it rolled up to her elbows. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, her standard lazy wave like she’d just shaken it out and walked into the night air. And god help me, the way her eyes had lit up when I’d opened the door, when she’d seen me , had made my heart do a stupid flip. But her expression now was more one of puzzlement, clearly trying to add two plus two more, confused at why she’d been invited over for a presumed solo hang out with me when Xavi and Cole were obviously in the house.
“You okay?” I asked, giving her my warmest, but fakest, grin.
“Uh… yeah.” She took an uncertain step over the threshold. “I just, um, I thought it was just going to be us.”
“It is us,” I said, taking a step back to let her in and nudging the door open a little more. “Just with two extras who don’t know how to keep their noses out of anything and everything. You didn’t notice the cars in the drive?”
She swallowed as I shut the door behind her, her eyes drinking in the small entryway with two halls leading off on either side. “Uh, I did , but I also know you guys aren’t exactly poor and can afford more than one car,” she chuckled, her teeth raking over her bottom lip.
My Fire hoodie felt a little too tight at the sight of her like this, a little nervous, a little confused, but still pushing through to make herself comfortable enough to be here at all. “Yeah, yeah, I guess.” I cupped the small of her back, pushing her gently to the right hall. “And to be clear, I didn’t mean to ambush you. Promise.”
She rolled her eyes playfully. “Mhm, sure.”
The guys stood in the kitchen as we stepped through, Cole’s white shirt damp from something, and Xavi holding a dustpan full of glass. “What even…?”
“Xav bumped into me, dropped his glass, it’s fine,” Cole explained, peeling the damp fabric away from his chest. “Hey, Annie.”
“Hey.” She raised a single hand, her cheeks already a little red, and fuck, my mind went right back to how red in the face she’d gone when I’d licked up?—
“Got you an everything-but-anchovies pizza,” Xavi said, his voice a little tight, a little reserved. He set the dustpan to the side and scrubbed his face. “There’s ranch and hot sauce on the counter. Want a drink?”
Annie tilted her head, her smile crooked from nerves but still sharp. “Only if the glass doesn’t come pre-shattered.”
I snorted as Xavi’s cheeks heated, and even Cole’s lips twitched into a grin as he pulled his shirt up over his head. My eyes narrowed into a glare aimed in his direction.
“Just gonna go change,” Cole huffed, slipping around the counter and heading off down the hallway. “Make yourself at home, Annie.”
She didn’t respond right away, just looked down the hall, her eyes tracking Cole’s bare upper body like a hawk. I pushed on her lower back lightly, urging her toward the island where the pizza boxes sat open and Xavi was loading up a plate. “Come on, sweetheart. If you keep staring, you’ll start drooling.”
She had no idea what was coming this evening, no idea the insanity we were going to thrust on her, and if anything, that made me nervous as I watched her. To distract myself, I grabbed her a plate, put a couple of slices of everything-but-anchovies pizza on it for her, and pushed it across the island.
“Rum and coke again, or maybe a Stella?” I offered, yanking open the fridge.
“Stella’s great. But no offense, Colton, I no longer trust you to give me drinks.” She smirked at me before picking up a slice from her plate, dipping it in ranch and taking a bite.
Xavi reached across me in an instant, plucking a Stella from the shelf and popping off the top before passing the bottle to her silently.
“Thank you!”
I grabbed one for myself and two for the guys, passing them to Xav for opening, silence falling over us like a thick curtain save for the sounds of glass bottles clinking and Cole’s heavy footsteps as he walked back into the room, a crisp black t-shirt taking the place of his abandoned white one. Annie ate quietly, almost picking at her food, tearing off little chunks of the crust and dipping it in ranch while her eyes tracked each one of us.
We tried, genuinely, to keep it casual. We shot the shit about the game a few nights ago, Cole bitching about a bad ref call, me making fun of Xavi’s failed deke that nearly got him flattened. Xavi flipped me off with what was almost a grin, but his heart wasn’t in it right now and that was clear — not when the conversation was hanging over us. Annie chuckled to herself about it, but it was tight, not quite comfortable, and I hated that she wasn’t easing into this.
It was absolutely our fault. We should have had the conversation before food, but I’d wanted to make sure she’d at least eaten considering how little she’d had when I went over yesterday.
When the silence hit again, none of us knew quite where to go from there. One of us needed to pluck up the courage to bring up the topic, but I knew damn well it wouldn’t be Xavi, not with how twitchy he was being over the whole thing. Cole could have, but I could see how nervous he was about it, could tell by the way he was rubbing his shoulders and wrists like they were about to give out, by the way he was eyeing Annie as if he was afraid she’d bolt out the door at any second.
Which left me to do it. It was my idea anyway, it was only fair.
I cleared my throat and turned to her, opening my mouth, but she was already pushing her plate away and lowering her beer from her lips. “So, is this some kind of intervention or something?” she asked.
I barked out a laugh, and Cole cracked a grin beside me, the tension bleeding just a little from the air. Even Xavi’s mouth twitched, his jaw unclenching slightly for the first time all night.
“Nah. Unless the intervention is about how criminally good you look in those damn jeans,” I teased, tipping my bottle toward her with a wink before knocking back a sip. “But no, sweetheart, not an intervention. No one’s here to tell you what to do.”
Her cheeks warmed a little as she snorted, but the smile she wore didn’t quite reach her eyes. I saw it, the flicker of wariness behind the blue, like she was trying to laugh with us but was already braced for impact. She pulled one foot up onto the barstool, her knee against her chest, and wrapped her arm around it like she could shield herself from whatever this was with it.
I exhaled slowly through my nose, feeling the weight of Cole and Xavi’s stare on me, and leaned forward onto my elbows on the cool marble counter between us. “But we do need to talk to you,” I said, my voice a little lower, a little more solemn. “About a couple of things.”
She looked at me, really looked, and something in her shifted. Not away from me, but like she was guarding herself outside and in. Like she was waiting for another shoe to drop or a punch that might knock her unsteady. “Has anyone told you that it’s extremely disconcerting when you’re serious?”
I huffed out a breath, trying to keep it light. “Yeah, actually. A few times.”
“Would you rather I do it?” Cole offered to her, pushing off from the counter behind him so he could stand at full attention.
Her gaze flicked from me, to Cole, to Xavi — then back to Cole. “Honestly? Yeah.”
Fair. Fine. That made sense.
“All right,” Cole sighed, stretching his neck back and forth as he took a deep breath in. He set his beer down on the counter and met her gaze, looking at her in that way that only Cole had mastered — gentle, but fucking serious. “Two things. The first one is the Elliot situation.”
Her mouth formed a hard line. “So it is an intervention.”
Cole didn’t rise to the bait. “Call it what you want, Annie, but we just want you safe.”
Annie looked away from him, glanced at me, at Xavi, and then off into the middle distance. “I’m fine. Honestly.”
“You’re not,” Xavi cut in, his voice a little strained.
“Xav’s right, you’re not.” Cole’s tone was firm, low, skimming that line between gentle and immovable that he lingered on so well. “You shouldn’t be having to block a new number every damn day. You shouldn’t have to worry about whether or not he’s lingering outside your apartment. That’s not fine.”
Her throat worked. “I’m not worried that he’ll show up?—”
“You asked me not to park outside,” I interjected. “It was obvious, sweetheart.”
She didn’t answer. Instead, her jaw shifted like she was chewing on the inside of her cheek, and she knocked back another sip of beer, her eyes lingering on the bottle as she placed it back down gently.
“We know Colton offered for you to come to the next away game,” Cole continued, not phased in the slightest by the difficulty of this. “We all think it’s a good idea. We’ll get you out of Atlanta for a few days, and you can be with us, around people who care and want you to be okay. Treat it like a mini-vacation.”
Annie’s head snapped toward him. “But that’s?—”
“It’s in LA. Start of the Pacific Division. We’re leaving Friday morning, the game’s Saturday night. You can be back home on Sunday if you want. We’ll cover your flights, but you’ll have to fly alone since we fly with the team,” Cole explained, his hands gesticulating as if this was the easiest conversation in the world. “You can stay with us. We always room together, so it’s not like there won’t be space.”
Her brows rose slowly as the words sunk in. “With all three of you.”
“Yeah,” Xavi said.
She leaned back a little on the stool, her eyes finding that middle distance again, her fingernail picking at the label on her beer. “That’s not going to be weird at all,” she muttered.
“It doesn’t have to be,” I said softly, and her gaze flicked to me in an instant.
“Except it kind of already is. I’m—Colton, we—” Annie cut herself off, her cheeks flushing, and shook her head a little. “Look, I still don’t know what the hell I’m doing. I haven’t… decided , and this feels messy. I guess it’s not a damn secret that I like you guys, all of you, when you obviously talk to each other about this kind of stuff.”
She swallowed, her throat working and turning pink like her face. I wanted to reach out and cup her cheeks, wanted to tell her that it’s fine and she doesn’t need to be worried about this, but we needed to let her process this before we moved on, even if it was hard.
“I feel like this is… I don’t know,” she muttered. “Crossing a line? I mean, what am I supposed to do, sleep with Colton in his bed since we already…? That feels wrong when I can’t stop thinking about… Christ, this is embarrassing.”
Cole’s gaze didn’t waver as he watched her. “That leads us to the second thing we need to talk about.”
She looked like she was about to crumble in on herself. “Please don’t make me decide,” she murmured, covering her face with her hands. “I’m not… I don’t?—”
“We’re not,” I cut in, something inside of me breaking to see her like this. I pushed up from the counter and stepped around the island, coming up behind her chair and wrapping my arms around her shoulders. I let my chin fall on top of her head, just holding her, and met Cole’s gaze. “Just tell her or she’s gonna fuckin’ spiral, man.”
Xavi opened his mouth to speak beside him but closed it half a second later, his hands flexing at his sides.
Cole exhaled slowly, his gaze flicking from me to her, clearly trying to find the words when I was the one who was meant to be handling this. He rubbed a hand along the back of his neck and leaned one hip on the counter. “We know Colton brought it up to you yesterday,” he said, quiet but certain, measured in the way he always was when something mattered. “He brought it up to us, too.”
She stilled in my arms, but her breathing was strong, fast. She looked right at him. “Brought what up?”
There wasn’t a chance in hell she didn’t know what he was talking about. The way she’d flushed when I said it, the way she’d kissed me when I told her I’d been thinking about it — it had been in her head. And now it was in all of ours.
Cole shot me a warning glare, one that clearly said — If you’ve lied about this, I will fucking kill you myself.
“Sharing,” he said, the word slipping from him with an ease that made my skin go cold. He was absolutely compartmentalizing this. “We’re willing to try that. The three of us.”
She jerked a little in my arms, her breathing even faster. “You— what ?”
Xavi looked away, his hold on his beer hard enough that I was worried we’d need to clean up even more glass. Cole just held her gaze, unwavering, unshaken. And I… I felt like a rock was sinking into my stomach and pulling my entire body down with it. Maybe I’d misjudged, maybe I’d misread the way she’d reacted yesterday.
“Is that something you would be open to?” Cole asked her, crossing his arms over his chest. “Or something you would want at all?”
She squirmed in my arms, and I released her, praying to whatever god was listening that she didn’t hop off the stool and run out of the house. But she didn’t. She spun slightly, enough to see all three of us, and looked between us like we’d all grown a second head. “You can’t be serious.”
“Dead serious, sweetheart,” I rasped, taking a step back to give her space.
“I’ll be entirely honest and say I didn’t like the idea at first,” Cole said. He pushed a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair, his chest expanding and filling the space of his shirt. “Neither did Xavi.”
“Yeah, no shit,” she breathed.
“But none of us want to make you choose,” I cut in. “Because if one of us ‘wins’, the others lose. And none of us want that. And I’m pretty sure you don’t want that either.”
She looked directly at me, her mouth parted, her eyes wide as hell. “What if someone gets hurt?”
I tried to control the twitch of my lips — she wasn’t saying no, and I wanted to smile about that, but I needed to stay serious. “The possibility of someone getting hurt is a better option, in our opinion, than two of us definitely being hurt.”
She took a deep breath, her head tipping back a little as she thought it over.
“We can try it, if you’re open to it,” Cole said softly.
Her lips rolled between her teeth as she slowly lowered her head, shifting uncomfortably in her seat. “I won’t… I won’t lie . Of course I’ve thought about it. But I just…” She sighed, glancing around at all of us. “How the hell would this even work?”
Cole shrugged. “Depends on what you want, An. The basics would be pretty easy. We’d all need to be open with each other, and communicate if we’re having a problem with it. We’d need to go over what you’d be okay with, what lines you’d not want crossed, but… we can figure it out. What are you worried about in particular?”
“I don’t even know. This is insane. You guys are insane.” She shook her head, her auburn waves shifting around her shoulders. “But I mean, yeah, I’d be… open. You’re all okay with this?”
I’d be… open.
I moved immediately.
I didn’t care that Cole and Xavi were right there, didn’t care that the tension was high. She was open to it. She was open to it.
My legs ate up the single step I’d left between us, and I crowded her, one hand grasping her by the back of her neck, my mouth descending and crashing against hers.
She jolted in my grasp, but she didn’t pull away. Her hands were hesitant, but within a second they were on the front of my hoodie, curling tight like she needed something to anchor herself with. She kissed me back, timid at first and then full, hungry, like she’d tossed restraint out the window despite both of them being within feet of us. Her breath caught in that little stuttering gasp I’d already memorized from the night before, and I let myself sink into her, into this , for a second, maybe two, maybe more. Time felt so strange with her.
When I finally pulled back, I kept my hand on her neck, my forehead resting against hers. “I already told you I’m open to it,” I grinned. “I meant it. I’m all in if you are.”
Her lashes fluttered, her forehead shifting against mine as she nodded. I pulled back a little more, drinking in the way she looked — her eyelids half lowered, her lips parted, cheeks flushed. I couldn’t notice anything else, not until I felt a hand on my shoulder gently tugging backward, and I went with it, letting go of her entirely as Cole stepped into the space he’d created.
He leaned down to her, studying her, his fingers brushing across her jaw like he was afraid she might run. But she didn’t. And neither did I.
“I’ll ask you this time instead of assuming,” he said softly, cupping her chin and lifting it, making her look up at him with that overwhelmed expression, like she was in some sort of fever dream she wasn’t trying to get out of, like she was high off this. Off us. “Can I kiss you, Annie?”
She nodded. I braced myself.
He leaned in slower than I had, gentle, as if she were made of glass — and kissed her. And for whatever reason had driven me to suggest any of this in the first place, I wasn’t hit with an ounce of jealousy. She melted into him almost as easily as she had with me, her hand sliding up his chest and wrapping around his neck, and his shoulders sank with the kind of relief that had weight .
He pulled back, letting her go, his Adam’s apple moving on a swallow. “I’m okay with it,” he murmured. “With you, with us.”
She let out a shaky, breathy laugh that died out quickly, her teeth raking over her lower lip, her eyes glued to him as he stepped back, making space.
Three sets of eyes turned to the one person who had barely spoken.
Xavi still leaned against the counter on the other side of the island, his beer abandoned beside him, his gaze trained on her. He was hard to read — brows knitted, hands in his pockets, his jaw flexing, his mouth pressed into a thin line. He looked like he was either about to vault the counter to get to her or nope out of all of this in a second.
His eyes warred with hers.
She looked at him, really looked at him, the silliness she’d tried for earlier gone. My heart pounded in my goddamn chest as she slipped off the barstool and rounded the counter toward Xavi, her movements slow, steady, like she was worried she’d scare him off. If he freaked out, if he panicked and ran and called it off, I had no idea what the fuck we were going to do.
But he’d agreed to try. I had to keep faith that he’d uphold that.
“Are you okay?” she asked, her voice quiet, almost a whisper. She stopped a few feet from him, testing the waters, making sure he wasn’t going anywhere. His chest rose and fell a little sharp, a little quick, his nostrils flaring. “‘Cause I… I don’t feel comfortable doing this if you’re not.”
Xavi didn’t say a word.
I took a hesitant step forward, but Cole’s hand entered my space, stopping me. “Give him a minute,” he murmured, his voice barely audible.
“Xavi,” Annie breathed. “Please don’t make me guess how you feel?—”
He moved.
Not slow, hot hesitant — he lunged , like her words had struck a chord in him and the only thing he could think to do was move. One second he was standing stiff and silent with his hands clenched in his pockets like he was holding himself back, and the next, those same hands were grabbing Annie by the waist and hauling her in hard enough that her feet actually stumbled.
She gasped, caught off guard, and I couldn’t blame her. I wasn’t expecting it either.
Her hands flew up to his chest to catch herself, but he was already there, keeping her upright, his mouth crashing down onto hers with force. I could see it — the anger in him, the softness too, the things he’d been shoving down since that first night with her.
It was feral. Raw. Not sweet, not careful, just need , and I wondered if I’d looked like that the first time I kissed her, too. It was desperate, so intense that she moaned into his mouth, that she faltered for all of half a second before she gripped him back just as fiercely. Her fingers cupped him around the back of his head, knotting in his hair like she was trying to anchor herself, her surprise melting in seconds. She chased his mouth, head tilting, mouth opening, taking anything he gave her.
It wasn’t the first time I’d seen Xav kiss a girl, but it was the first time I’d seen him like this . And still, there wasn’t a hint of jealousy flaring in me.
He growled low in his throat, grabbed her tighter around her hips, and lifted her up instinctually, taking one quick step before setting her ass down on the countertop like it was nothing. And it was nothing, for us at least. He slotted himself in between her legs, leaning over her, one hand braced on the higher ledge of the island behind her.
I stared, stunned. Cole was too — his eyebrows were up, his lips parted, that single hand still frozen in front of me.
My grin snuck up on me. I loosed a breath as I watched them, something akin to pride swelling in my chest. Good for him. It took him long enough to do something.
“Jesus,” I muttered under my breath, the sound half a breathy little chuckle, and Cole snorted.
Xavi broke the kiss immediately, his gaze shooting to us, his hand cupping the back of Annie’s head. He was breathing like he’d run a goddamn marathon, but the stress he’d been holding onto all evening had lessened just a little — his shoulders were more relaxed, the little lines between his brows smoothed out. He looked back down at her, dropped his forehead to hers, and stayed there for a moment, all of us lingering in the silence.
But then he spoke.
“I’m in, baby,” he said, his voice hoarse and low, like it cost him something but gave him far more. “I’m fucking in.”