Chapter 7
Maisie
Three men I was not expecting stand at the top of the front porch of a pretty two-story farmhouse thirty minutes outside of town.
Knox, Hunter, and Elias.
They’re all in PJs, which makes sense. It is nighttime. They must have been sleeping when Wyatt went for a drive and wound up pulling me from a burning building and saving my life.
Maybe it should have been obvious to me. It’s not like I haven’t seen them eating lunch together at the diner. I knew they worked together, but I had no idea they lived together.
“You okay?” Wyatt asks.
Startled, I snap my head around to meet his gaze.
Wyatt cut the engine and got out while I wasn’t paying attention. He’s standing outside the truck with my door open, waiting for me to get out.
Idiot.
My fingers fumble with my seatbelt. I stab at the button to release it, but I’m too clumsy or the button is too stiff that my seatbelt keeps me trapped in my seat.
“Can I?” Wyatt offers.
My face is hot when I finally stop fumbling with my seatbelt. All I’m doing is making a fool of myself in front of all of them, so I nod.
He leans in close. Beneath the smoke from the fire, I smell him: bourbon and hot iron. With one firm press, he releases me from my seatbelt.
So much for the stiff button. The problem wasn’t the button. It was you.
“Sorry,” I say, looking down as he steps aside so I can climb out of his truck. “I’m stupid.”
Derek would have called me an idiot if we were in public and slapped me across the face if we were at home. I preferred a slap to being called an idiot. The red mark from a slap went away fast with a bag of peas I held to my burning cheek. The names he called me have stuck in my head for years.
Wyatt waits until I’m standing in front of him. He makes no move to slam the door shut, but when I move to do it, he says, “Sweetheart?”
“Yeah?” I lift my head.
He slides his hand around the nape of my neck and leans in close to give me another of those forehead kisses I’m becoming addicted to. “You are not stupid, and I don’t want to hear you call yourself that again, okay?”
I give him a small smile despite still feeling like an idiot. “Okay.”
“Good.” He slams my door shut and takes my right hand, lacing our fingers together. “Come on. Let’s get you out of the cold.”
I glance up at him as we walk over to the farmhouse. “Why do we need to hold hands?”
I don’t mind it. In fact, I like the feel of his hand around mine.
“In case I trip up the porch steps. I might need you to save me.” Tawny brown eyes sparkle with amusement, so I know he has to be joking.
“I didn’t realize you all lived together,” I say, my eyes on the three men now waiting beside the front door at the top of the wraparound porch.
“I mentioned it on the drive up here.” He glances at me, then casually adds, “That’s my fault.
You were in shock. I should’ve waited until you’d recovered a bit before I started filling your ears with our living arrangements.
Anyway, we’re friends. We work together, travel from job to job, and live together. ”
Taking my mistake—my stupidity—off me and putting it on him instead makes me feel a thousand pounds lighter. No one has done that for me before. For once, I’m not to blame for something.
Grateful enough I could cry, I squeeze his hand. “Thanks.”
He tilts his head, confused. Before he asks why I have tears in my eyes, Hunter is pulling the front door open for me.
“It’s not much,” Hunter warns. “So don’t go expecting a lot.”
“Wyatt called to say you were on your way with just the clothes on your back,” Elias explains as we walk into the farmhouse.
I have no memory of that phone call. Wyatt must have made it in the truck, and I’d zoned out, missing Wyatt telling me he didn’t live alone.
It’s a pretty farmhouse with brown paneling and open doors that lead to the living room, kitchen, and maybe a downstairs half-bath. I get a quick peek into the cozy-looking living room with two squishy green fabric couches and brown leather armchairs as I pass it.
The staircase is a thing of beauty. All glossy with a curved balustrade, and antique-looking gold photo frames with horses and gorgeous Iowa mountain landscapes. I don’t know whether they brought the pictures with them or if they came with the house.
“It’s just whatever we could rustle up for you until we can figure out something better tomorrow,” Knox adds, turning to face me as he leads the way up the stairs.
“There are sweatpants, t-shirts, stuff to wash up with, and we made up the bed in the spare bedroom. The room’s yours for however long you want it. ”
“Have you eaten? I can throw something together for you?” Hunter offers.
I shake my head. “I’m not hungry, and you didn’t have to do all that for me. A made-up bed is more than I was expecting.”
I’m not sure what I was expecting. As I stood in front of my burned-out car, I wasn’t thinking of a whole lot. Mostly, I was panicking and hurting.
“This is your room.” Hunter motions me into a decently sized bedroom with hardwood floors and a fluffy-looking red rug.
The red and white drapes are closed, and the king-size bed with a black metal frame and a thick, dark blue comforter is so inviting that all I want to do is crawl under the sheets and sleep for five years.
It smells clean and fresh. They didn’t just air out a spare bedroom for me; they turned on the lamps on the nightstands to make it cozy and inviting, even though I’m the unwelcome guest who dragged them from their beds in the middle of the night.
Hunter points to each part of the room as he speaks.
“We changed the sheets since we don’t use this room.
Clothes are in the dresser. They’ll all be too big for you, but help yourself to whatever you want to wear; we put them in there for you.
There’s a bathroom that’s just yours, so no need to worry about sharing with any of us.
All the towels are clean. And there’s a spare toothbrush, toothpaste, and stuff to wash up like Knox said. ”
Elias, standing near the doorway, steps to one side and closes the door, pointing to a lock with a vintage white metal key sticking out of it. “And a lock. None of us will come in here, lock or no lock. This is your space, your room, but if you need to lock the door, you can do that.”
I look at the four men watching me so closely that what I think of the room must really matter to them.
They care what I think, and they shouldn’t.
I’m no one to them, yet they dragged themselves out of bed to do all this for me, and it’s making me want to burst into tears.
Maybe I’m being na?ve, but I don’t think I need to use the lock on the door. “Thanks.”
“We’ll let you get some sleep now. Shout if you need anything, okay?” Wyatt asks softly.
“Thanks,” I say. “I really appreciate this.”
They stare at me as if they can’t believe I’m here. I stare back, confused why no one’s moving.
I clear my throat. “Was there anything—”
“Shit.” Elias spins around to leave. He might have made it if Wyatt, Hunter, and Knox hadn’t all tried for the door at the same time.
I bite the inside of my cheek to contain my laugh when they get stuck in the doorway trying to leave at once. Once they’ve stopped glaring at each other and pushed themselves out of my room and into the hallway, Wyatt finds me smiling when he turns to shut the door.
The corners of his eyes crinkle with amusement. “Sorry about that. Promise we all have brains in our heads. Night, darlin’.”
“Night, Wyatt. And thanks.”
“Anytime.”
He shuts the door, and I take in the room again. I’m not sure what I did in my life to deserve all of this, but right now, I feel like the luckiest girl in the world. In a clean, new environment, I smell the smoke on my clothes, and my face feels tight and itchy from crying.
“Shower and get ready for bed,” I whisper. “Then you have permission to cry under the sheets if you need to.”
I’m not sure if the tears will be in gratitude that I survived today, or that I landed on my feet courtesy of the four alphas who have done more for me than anyone ever has. Probably a combination of the two.