Chapter 4
DILLON
There is a certain silence that came with focus, the good kind. The kind where the world falls away and it’s just me, the code, and the slow drip of the coffeemaker in the corner.
The rest of the house is quiet, which usually means Boone is out doing something responsible and Chance is probably beating the hell out of a punching bag downstairs in the gym.
Me? I’m my zone. My element. The only place where the world makes complete sense.
Six monitors glow in front of me, lines of code scrolling fast enough to make normal people dizzy, but this is my music. My masterpiece.
For a Fortune 500, this client’s firewall looks like it was built by a first grader watching a YouTube tutorial. I could’ve cracked it with a calculator and a spoon.
After an initial review, we’d decided their security needed to be rebuilt from the ground up, which is exactly what I’m doing. I’m providing them with an industrial-grade, unbreakable security system that is worth every cent we were charging.
Happily, they have more money than they know what to do with, and they’d accepted our fees without blinking.
It still surprises me sometimes how well the company is doing.
We don’t come cheap, but we don’t charge exorbitant prices either, and with our reputation, people are lining up for our services.
As my fingers fly across the keyboard, I make the magic happen. This is where I thrive. Boone handles the clients. Chance handles the systems. I make sure no one can get in unless we want them to.
We work like that in everything, each of us covering the other’s blind spots. Three pieces of a whole that shouldn’t make sense but somehow does. It isn’t just business, either. It’s in life, too.
Over the years, there is nothing we haven’t shared. Homes, fights, bad ideas, and even women. We simply haven’t found ‘the one’ yet.
No matter how good it’s gotten with a girl in the past, it’s just never stuck.
They’d start off curious, open-minded, and maybe even into the idea of the three of us together, but somewhere along the line, things always got twisted. Someone got jealous, or scared, or decided they wanted to claim only one of us.
Usually Chance or me. Rarely Boone. He scared off the clingy ones too fast. After everything that had happened with Tessa, I don’t blame him. He’s on high alert all the damn time, seeing red flags where Chance sees maybes and I see green lights.
I can’t even count the number of times he’s saved our asses with that sixth sense he’s developed, but the point is that as soon as things got twisted, they always fell apart. It’s baffling.
I’d thought it would be easy, but it turned out there weren’t many women who could accept being with three guys.
I lean back in my chair, eyes on the endless stretch of code in front of me and let out a slow breath. Maybe the right one doesn’t exist.
Maybe the world just doesn’t build women for guys like us. Guys who live on loyalty and trust and who don’t fit neatly into boxes marked ‘normal.’
The cursor blinks on the screen like it’s mocking me. “Yeah, yeah. Keep your opinions to yourself.”
I crack my neck, take a sip of lukewarm coffee, and get back to work. If there is one thing I know, it’s that regaining my sanity takes a whole hell of a lot of code.
By the time I get done for the day and wander into the kitchen, Boone just about has dinner on the table. Chance is setting out plates like he’s been born into manners, and the smell of garlic and butter make me forget that I’ve lived off coffee and cookies all day.
When I walk in, Boone glances at me over his shoulder, still carefully stirring something in a pan. “Were you actually working or just pretending again?”
I grin, yanking open the fridge for three beers. “I was working very hard actually. My brain burns more calories than your fancy workouts when I get in the zone like that.”
Chance snorts. “Maybe it’s time you tried burning a few more. You know, balance things out. You didn’t meet me for that run earlier.”
“Yeah, I was too busy working on my stamina in other, more enjoyable ways.” I pop the caps off and hand them over, laughing at the expression on Chance’s face. “Jealousy doesn’t look good on you, Marine. I was napping. You should try it sometime. It’s really fucking great.”
Boone plates up dinner for each of us, steak, roast potatoes, and enough greens to make him feel like he’s being responsible. “Sit down before I change my mind about feeding you.”
“See?” I say, sliding into my chair and winking at Chance. “This guy talks tough, but deep down, he’s the mom of the group.”
The glare Boone sends me could cut steel, but Chance laughs so hard he nearly drops his cutlery. We eat like we always do, fast and quiet for the first few minutes. All three of us have learned at various points in our lives that you don’t waste time talking when good food is in front of you.
Finished eating, Boone leans back, wipes his hands, then gets serious. Even as a teenager, when his dark brows had drawn together those stormy gray eyes had gotten so…well, stormy. He’d made grown men shake in their boots. Not even teachers had wanted to go up against him sometimes.
To this day, Chance and I are the only people who can tell when he’s actually dangerous, and when he’s just annoyed, ticked off, or in this case, simply about to say something important.
“We got a few more requests from town today,” he says as I take a sip of my beer and Chance swallows the last bite of his steak. “The youth center wants help with some repairs before winter and the animal shelter’s short on funds for heating.”
I lean forward, sliding my elbows onto the table. “We’ve already sent the check for the basketball uniforms, right?”
“Yeah,” Boone answers. “That’s why I had to run into town yesterday.
But we’ll need to budget for the repairs.
You know how these things go. Once they actually start working on the building, there’s always more and more that needs to get done.
We can handle it. All I’m saying is that we’ll need to keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn’t get out of hand. ”
Chance nods. “We can do that, but I don’t think we can really say no to any of it. The town depends on us. Not that I mind. It’s nice being the good guys.”
I smirk. “Excuse me, I’m the charming one. The real good guy. You two are just the muscle and the scowl.”
Boone shoots me a look. “You’re one bad line away from being banned from the bakery again.”
“That was one time,” I protest. “How was I supposed to know you weren’t supposed to flirt with the baker and her sister?”
Chance smiles, a wicked glint lighting his hazel eyes. “By using your brain, maybe?”
I shrug. “My brain was occupied with solving a genius-level cybersecurity problem. I can’t multitask.”
Boone shakes his head, but he’s smiling now. “You’re impossible.”
“Oh, no. I’m very much possible these days.” I smirk at both of them. “Either way, you still love me.”
Chance raises his beer. “Some days more than others.”
Boone and I clink our bottles against his, and despite the restlessness of the last couple of months, I still wouldn’t have been anywhere else, with anyone else, doing anything else. We’d built this life from nothing, just three screwed-up boys from Chicago who’d found peace in the mountains.
When we finish eating and the dishes are cleared and the dishwasher running we step out onto the deck. The mountain air outside is crisp, the scent of pine wafting on the breeze, and the faint hiss of the propane heaters lining the wraparound porch.
We’re stretched out in the Adirondacks, our boots up on the rail and beers sweating in our hands while the valley lights blink far below. It looks like a carpet of stars down there. Fucking beautiful.
Boone leans back, his eyes half-closed. “Damn, that was a good meal. Even if I do say so myself.”
Chance grunts in agreement. “You don’t have to say it yourself. I’ll say it for you. You’ve come a long damn way from the days when you were burning spaghetti.”
“I’d hope so. We were in the ninth fucking grade.”
“It’s a memory that stuck,” Chance replies lightly. “Just like the spaghetti.”
Boone flips him off, his eyes finally drifting all the way shut. “You’re cooking tomorrow night, asshole.”
As they fall silent, I take a long pull of my beer, then clear my throat, knowing they aren’t going to like this. But I have to at least bring it up. “I’ve been thinking.”
Boone cracks one eye open and glances at me. “That’s always dangerous.”
“I’m serious,” I say. “I think I’m gonna put us on a dating site.”
Both of them go still.
It takes a full minute before Chance slowly turns his head to face me. “You mean, like, Tinder?”
“Maybe something classier,” I reply. “Or at least with better filters. Just hear me out, okay?”
“Here we go,” Boone mutters. “Fine. Pitch us, but for the record, I’m absolutely not on board with this plan.”
“That’s only because you haven’t heard me out yet but look. It’s not like women are lining up at our door out here. There are only so many people in this town, and half of them are related. The other half are over sixty.”
Boone sits forward with his brow furrowed and his features set in another one of those scowls that would make gladiators scatter. “We’re not dating online. That’s how you get catfished by someone named Brenda who turns out to be a seventy-year-old trucker from Idaho.”
“It could be worse,” I say. “At least Brenda might know how to cook spaghetti.”
Chance chuckles but shakes his head. “You’re not wrong about the lack of options, but dating apps? Come on, do you think what we’ve got going on fits nicely into an online bio?”
I spread my hands out to my sides. “What else are we supposed to do? Sit up here and wait for fate to FedEx us a girlfriend? Because unless UPS starts offering a mountain matchmaking service, this is it.”
Boone shoots me that flat, level stare he uses when he’s halfway between amused and done with me. “We’ll figure something out. We always do.”
“Yeah,” I say, softer now, as I turn to look out over the trees that are lit up in silver by the moonlight. “I’m just getting tired of waiting, is all.”
Neither of them says anything for a while. The heaters hum, and an owl calls somewhere down in the woods, but we just sit there, three guys on a porch too big for the silence, drinking beer, and pretending patience doesn’t feel a lot like loneliness.