Page 75 of Filthy Rich Ex's Brothers

“Yeah,” Lillie says, sounding like she’s chewing bubblegum. There’s a dullpop. “I mean, it sounds like a psycho thriller or something.”

“My auntie used to say,When something seems too good to be true, it probably is. ‘ Georgia does an accent I assume must belong to her auntie, then returns to her normal voice. “This seems like one of those situations, Serena.”

Slowly, my stomach rotates, sending a queasy shiver up my throat.

It makes sense that they’re skeptical—I would be, too, if I hadn’t met them. If I didn’t feel Graham’s protectiveness, Ryan’s easy breeziness, and Travis’s organized, effective consideration.

“You should meet them.” The words pop out of my mouth.

“MEET RYAN HUDSON?” Lillie’s high-pitched squealing completely drowns out anything Georgia might have been about to say. “Fuckingyesterday, Ser! When! And where! Get me the address to that creepy sex dungeon in the woods, or wherever they’re taking you. Is Ryan going to cook? Oh, sweet babyJesus,tell me he’s going to make something?—”

There’s a muffledoomphand the sound of a soft thud.

“Ow, what was that for?” Lillie whines, distantly, while Georgia says, “I think it would be a good idea to get a read on the situation. But if it’s creepy at all, we’re getting you the hell out of there, Ser.”

When I emerge into the main cabin of the jet, the guys are all absorbed in their own things. Ryan is tweaking a few seasonal menus, Travis is reviewing information for the quarterly earnings call, and Graham angrily punches at his keyboard, editing a speech he’ll give at the banquet for Congress.

They all stop and look at me when I step out of the bathroom. It’s like being caught in three separate headlights.

“I invited my friends to come over for dinner,” I say, glancing at each of them, landing on Travis. “At your house. This week.”

Each of them looks a bit shell-shocked for a moment, and I feel myself holding my breath.

Then, after a beat, Ryan cracks a smile, “That’s great! Shit, what should I make? I need to think this through…”

Travis presses his lips together and nods, going back to his computer. “It will be nice to meet your friends. We can have the west wing opened up for guests to stay over—it’s a long drive from the city.”

“Looking forward to meeting all of them,” Graham says, rubbing his hands together slowly.

Just like that, with little to no fanfare at all, it’s happening.

I drop into a seat and pull my seatbelt on at Travis’s instruction. They’re all absorbed in their work. I should edit some of my photos and check my freelancing email, but I can’t bring myself to do it.

Instead of doing anything productive with my time, I sit in the seat and let my mind sift through the reality of this situation.

The guys like me.

They want me enough toshareme. To be in a strange, oblong relationship when any one of them could be with any womanthey wanted. It’s like Georgia said—if it’s too good to be true, it probably is.

But the worst part is not their interest in me.

The worst part is how accustomed I’ve grown to Travis’s capable silence. Ryan’s playful, charming banter. Graham’s deadpan sense of humor.

It’s a problem.

Ilikethem. Too much. Enough that I’m teetering on the edge of feeling something for them that I’ve never really felt for anyone. Or, at least, something I haven’t felt since I was a kid, and I learned that wanting another person—falling in love with a home and a set of foster parents—just leads to getting hurt.

If I’m honest with myself, the truth is that I never even felt that way about Alex. That, in our relationship, I always kept a set of walls up around myself. All that therapy, and the work—it applied to the girl outside the walls. Not the one within them.

But these guys easily scaled the barriers. Got to the soft center of me without much effort at all. And that’s fucking terrifying.

Sitting in the posh leather seat, I allow myself to look at each of them in turn. And I think that, for the first time in a very, very long time, I’ve found something that I’m too afraid to lose.

Chapter 40

Serena

The New York Botanical Garden features a large, glass building with curved, domed ceilings and arms branching off in multiple directions. At the entrance, Graham flashes some sort of pass that I can’t quite make out, and the attendant makes a hushed, apologetic noise before quickly allowing us inside. For all I know, what Graham showed them was the deed to the place.