Page 37 of Shared By the Mountain Men Triplets

When I cock my head at her, she says, “I live with three men, too.”

“Me too,” Elena says.

At first, I’m sure they’re teasing me, but their expressions tell me they’re not. I stare back and forth between them, not sure whether to ask questions or pretend I don’t have any. The scientist in me opts to gather information. “Are you …romantically involved?”

Both women nod.

“Each of you with three men?”

They nod again, and I’m sure my eyes are as wide as they’ve ever been. Several follow-up questions spring to mind, but since I’ve just met these women, all of the things I’m wondering about seem too personal. Instead, without much forethought, I say, “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Elena and Kira don’t say anything, but their expressions invite me to say more.

“There’s nothing going on between us, but honestly, it feels like I’m sitting on a ticking time bomb in that cabin. Rhett walks into a room, and all the cells in my body seem to rearrange themselves in response to his energy. Cade barely says anything, but I’m somehow aware of him every second. Boone smiles and makes it all seem easy, but nothing about him is easy.”

The confession should embarrass me more, but it’s overridden by the relief I feel from voicing my feelings.

“I keep telling myself it’s proximity. Stress, adrenaline, or the fact that they’re protective and strong and built like a very specific mistake I want to make three times.”

Kira’s lips twitch, and Elena covers her smile with her glass of water.

“I’m serious,” I say, even though I’m fighting a smile, too.

“I know,” Elena says. “Believe it or not, I know exactly how you feel.”

I lower my voice. “I don’t understand how I can want all of them, though. They’re so much the same, yet so different. I feel like something’s wrong with me.”

Elena’s smile disappears. “Oh, Wren, there’s nothing wrong with you.”

The certainty in her voice settles over me like a warm blanket.

Kira looks thoughtful as she strokes her child’s back. “There’s nothing wrong with wanting more than one person. Lying or hurting people is wrong, but wanting more than one person and being honest about it isn’t wrong.”

Elena leans in. “When I first realized I had feelings for Buck, Weston, and Calder, I thought I had to choose one of them, because that’s what I’d always understood relationships to be. But that wasn’t how things were happening with us.”

“What was happening?”

Her eyes get a faraway look. “They were all there for me in different ways. Buck made me feel safe and supported. Weston saw parts of me I tried to hide, and he didn’t make me feel weak for being exhausted. Calder understood my fears, and grounded me.” She pauses, a smile dancing on her lips. “I realized loving one of them didn’t lessen what I felt for the others.”

“The hardest part can be giving yourself permission to follow your heart,” Kira says.

That simple sentence seems to unlock something inside me, but I still have my doubts. “I don’t even know if they want that,” I say.

Kira arches a brow. “Well, Boone’s walked by the window at least four times since we started talking, so there’s that. As for the others, you probably know deep down, because women know these things, but if you’re not sure, you can ask them.”

“What if it changes everything?” I ask, speaking my first thought aloud.

“It will,” Elena says, “but not all change is loss.”

“Men like that don’t jump into things lightly,” Kira says. “Not when they’re brothers, or brothers-in-arms, as my men are. They’re aware of the costsof a misstep.”

Rhett’s face appears in my mind with its controlled, immovable lines. The responsibility he carries on his strong shoulders. “They’re careful,” I say.

“Careful can be good,” Kira says, “but it can also be an excuse.”

I take a sip of my freshly refilled coffee and realize I’m a grown woman with a voice, capable of asking for what I want.What if I don’t have to choose?

Kira suggests we have dessert, and in the spirit of not choosing, we each order a different kind of pie—blackberry for her, apple for Elena, and coconut cream for me—and we share.