Chapter 6 Violet
VIOLET
I wake up in the morning feeling a little like I got hit by a truck. There’s a fog in my head that doesn’t lift when I open my eyes, and I groan, pulling my pillow over my face.
I’ve always been the kind of person who finds it literally impossible to function until I’ve had my first cup of coffee in the morning, but it feels especially bad today.
I’m not sure why, since I don’t remember being awake in the middle of the night or having any bad dreams, but it’s a struggle to pull myself out of the quicksand of sleepiness.
My jaw cracks in a yawn, and I rub at my eyes. Luckily, I’ve developed a routine that I can do even half asleep.
I stumble out of bed and open the door, moving down the hall like a zombie to the kitchen to make coffee. Smothering a yawn, I pad into the kitchen and pull the coffee grounds out of the cabinet, filling the machine while I hum under my breath.
I fumble to get the machine going, muttering as I jab at the button. “Come on, you little bastard. Give me the bean juice.”
Finally it lights up, and the sounds and smells of coffee brewing are soothing to my exhausted nerves.
And then a deep voice says my name from the doorway, and I nearly have a heart attack.
I jump, suddenly fully awake as my heart rate skyrockets. I whirl around with wide eyes to see Lennox standing there in the doorway watching me.
In a rush, everything from the night before comes back.
I went to dinner at my parents’ house and somehow came home with three men—my ex’s older brothers—who are now all living in my house for the time being.
And I totally forgot that fact when I woke up, so I wandered into the kitchen wearing just a t-shirt and panties the way I do every morning because coffee always comes before getting dressed.
Lennox is just watching me, and I squeak a little, trying to cover myself up.
I flush deeply, suddenly super self-conscious about being so on display.
My t-shirt isn’t oversized at all, so it’s riding up, showing the curve of my stomach, and with no pants on, Lennox can probably see every dimple in my thighs.
I never care that much when it’s just me here, but with someone who looks like Lennox standing there, all I can feel is awkward and unattractive.
This is probably not what he wants to see first thing in the morning.
“I’m so sorry,” I rush to say as soon as I get my voice back.
“I’m useless this early in the morning before I have coffee, and I totally forgot you guys were here.
” I wish I could sink into the floor, but that technology doesn’t exist yet.
“Could you um… turn around?” I ask, because it’s the next best thing.
Lennox lifts his brows. “You do remember I’ve seen you in less, right?” he says, but he does turn around, putting his back to me.
My stomach swoops at his words, and I’m hit with memories of exactly how much of me he’s seen. My heart beats even faster, and I didn’t think that was possible.
God, I need to calm down.
I slip past him quickly, scampering down the hall to my bedroom as fast as I can. I throw the door closed and get dressed quickly, trying to focus on my breathing as I do.
I feel better once I have some pants on, at least.
I run a brush through my hair as well, smoothing out the bedhead and trying to make myself look more presentable and less mussed.
Once I’m satisfied, I take a deep breath and go back out to the kitchen.
By now, Sawyer and Rhett are awake too, all three of them standing in the kitchen.
Sawyer is at the coffee maker, jabbing at the button with his finger and a frown on his face. He looks up when he sees me and points at the machine. “This thing is janky as hell,” he declares.
I laugh at that. “You’re not wrong. You have to sort of baby it to get it to do the coffee right.”
“Violet, that’s dumb. Who has time to baby a machine to get it to do what it’s supposed to do?”
“Listen, if I had my choice, I’d have a much better one. You know, one of those really expensive ones that can pull espresso and do lattes and stuff. But for right now, the janky one will have to do. I need my coffee any way I can get it.”
It’s still weird to have them here, and I feel off balance from waking up the way I did. Rhett and Lennox are sitting at the table while Sawyer messes with the coffee maker, and I realize that I’m going to have to feed them something for breakfast.
I step around Sawyer and move to the cabinet, trying to see if I have anything other than cereal to give them.
Luckily, there’s always a baked good or five in this house, and there’s a box of pastries that I brought home from the bakery.
“It’s not much,” I say, pulling the box down. “But I wasn’t prepared for house guests, so I hope this works for breakfast.”
“Food is food,” Rhett says, flipping open the lid of the box. “Oh, damn. These look gourmet.”
“Not that gourmet.” I blush a little, getting down plates. “They’re just from the bakery. They’re not even fresh.”
I pass out the plates, and each of them put two pastries on their plates. There’s a variety of things from Danishes to muffins, and I try not to watch anxiously as they take bites.
“Okay,” Lennox says, looking up at me. “These are very good.”
“Seriously,” Rhett adds, mouth full. “You made these?”
I nod. “Yeah. A couple of days ago.”
He looks impressed, and his brothers seem to feel the same way. It’s such a small thing, and I should already know that I’m good at baking, but still. It makes me flush with pride at my work.
I take a Danish for myself and bite into it, smiling at the crust which flakes just right, tasting sweet and buttery. This was one of my better batches.
The men seem content to eat, but there’s something on my mind that won’t leave me alone until I say it. “So, uh, I guess we should probably talk about how this is all going to go, right?”
Sawyer looks at me, licking sugar from his fingers. “What do you mean?”
I have to tear my eyes away from the sight of him, dragging his tongue along the pad of his thumb.
“I mean, we have no idea how we’ll handle the logistics of this thing.
Me dating all of you.” I say it like they need a reminder, although I don’t know how they could have forgotten.
“What do we do in public? How do we act? What are the parameters of this whole thing? We have to be in agreement or the story will never hold up.”
“She has a point,” Lennox says.
“Yeah, we know that,” Rhett fires back. He leans back in his chair, looking at the ceiling for a while, and my stomach churns with nerves.
If the three of them can’t get along long enough for us to discuss this, then it’s going to be over before it even starts.
“We’ve got a story for how we got together,” Sawyer says. “Right? That’s a place to start. And it helps that we’re not strangers.”
I don’t look at Lennox when I answer that. “Right, but that’s not going to be enough. We’re going to have to go to Andrew and Isabelle’s wedding, remember? People are going to expect… stuff.”
“Stuff?” Sawyer replies, grinning. “You mean stuff like the kissing from last night?”
My cheeks definitely go pink with the memory of their lips on mine. “Yeah. Stuff like that. It stands to reason that we might have to kiss in public sometimes.”
“Fine with me,” he says, shrugging like it doesn’t matter either way.
“Me too,” Lennox agrees.
Rhett is the last one to speak up, and his eyes sweep over my face a bit before he nods too. “It’s fine.”
Well, that’s one thing down.
“Okay. Okay, that’s good to know. Um… I guess then we have to think about the future of this thing. Where does it lead? How does it end? I know you don’t want to be stuck here, pretending to be my boyfriends forever.”
And it kind of hurts a little, knowing how true that probably is.
Lennox hums a little, collecting pastry crumbs off the table with the pad of one finger. I notice it’s his good hand, steady and sure.
“We at least have to stay through the wedding,” he says. “We’re your plus three, after all.”
“Right,” Sawyer agrees. “And after that, we can say that you dumped us.”
I can’t help the snort that bursts out of me.
“Yeah, okay. I’m sure that’ll be believable.
” As if anyone could look at the three of them and then look at me and believe that I was the one who dumped them.
Even if that’s the story we go with, people are going to think that they’re the ones who kicked me to the curb, one hundred percent.
“Why wouldn’t it be?” Lennox asks. “It makes perfect sense. We’re long distance, and there are three of us. Anyone will believe that it was just too hard to juggle it all, and you wanted to focus on someone local. Or just dating one person so it doesn’t interfere with your business.”
The others seem to agree with that for once, and I sigh internally. There’s nothing I can really say that won’t make me sound even more pathetic than needing my ex’s brothers to pretend to date me so I’m not alone at a wedding, so I just leave it alone. No point in arguing.
“I thought of something else,” Rhett says. “We should definitely get on the same page with the cover story. The online dating thing is good, but we need a timeline or something. So we’re all telling the same story.”
“What Violet said last night makes sense,” Lennox admits. “We got back in touch online and started talking and it grew into more.” He shrugs. “I don’t think it has to be deeper than that.”
“Who reached out first?” I ask.
“I did.”
“Why you?” Sawyer demands. “It could have been any one of us.”
“Because I spoke up first,” Lennox shoots back. “It doesn’t even matter.”
“Then it doesn’t have to be you,” Rhett puts in.
Sawyer rolls his eyes. “Right, because anyone will believe that you, famous hermit that you are, reached out to someone on social media without being prompted. You can’t even text someone on their birthday.”
Rhett opens his mouth to say something back and then closes it again. “Whatever. It doesn’t fucking matter. I’m just saying we need to have a straight story.”
I bite my lip and then interject. “I reached out first. I hadn’t heard from any of you in a while, so I sent a message to see if you were alive. I messaged Rhett first, didn’t hear back, so I reached out to Lennox and then Sawyer. Eventually you all responded and we started talking.”
That at least cuts off the argument before it can brew any more, and all three of them nod.
“We asked you what’s been going on, you talked about your work and Isabelle and Andrew getting married,” Lennox says.
“It was nice to connect, and I started chatting with each of you at night after work. It was a nice way to unwind,” I add.
“How long ago are we saying this started?” Sawyer asks.
I think about that one. It can’t be too long, or my mother will be all demanding about why I never told anyone. She’ll probably be like that anyway.
“I think it makes sense for it to be kind of new,” I tell them. “Like we’re still feeling things out. That will help cover up any mistakes we make, too.”
He nods and the others seem to be in agreement with that. “A couple months, then?”
“That’s a little early for us to be here to be her dates to this wedding, isn’t it?” Rhett wants to know.
I just shrug. “Not really if you think about it. Andrew’s your brother, so you would have been here anyway. And it’s not like we’re strangers. We already knew each other, so we’re just building on what we already had and making it into something more.”
Sawyer raises an eyebrow. “You’ve put some thought into this.”
“Not really. It just… makes sense, right? It’s how it would be if this was a real relationship, so that’s how we should move forward so people don’t get suspicious.
” The last thing I wanted to deal with was people poking too hard at the story and trying to find holes in it.
This was going to be tricky enough without all that.
“Well, we can say whatever you want and we can kiss and hold hands and all that, but I’m not doing pet names. Pet names are stupid.”
As if on cue, Rhett and Lennox roll their eyes. “Why? Because a pet name means there’s some kind of permanence to the relationship?” Lennox says, keeping his voice light, but there are barbs in the words either way.
“One day you two are going to have to get some new material,” Sawyer snaps back.
“That’s fine, Sawyer,” I say, cutting in before it gets heated.
“You can just call me by my name. You’re already doing enough.
” I glance up at the three of them, feeling a little shy and full of emotions.
“Um… thank you. For doing this. You didn’t have to.
It would have been a lot easier to just stay out of it, and I really appreciate it. ”
As long as we manage to stick to the story and not give anything away, hopefully this will all be worth it.