Hutch was the first to move. He strolled over to the bed, raised one brow when he looked her over, then dragged a chair to the bedside and slouched down.
“You look like hell.”
Regina laughed and promptly regretted it as pain wracked her body. God, she’d missed him. She’d never admit it in a million years, but she was glad to see them all. Too glad.
Cam moved closer to the bed, his dark eyes glittering with anger and concern. He put a hand on Birdie’s shoulder then leaned down to kiss her.
“You should go home now, Birdie. Get some rest. We’ll take care of her from here.”
Birdie flashed a guilty look in Regina’s direction then smiled and patted Cam’s cheek. “Someone has to take care of this one. She won’t do it herself.”
Regina growled under her breath.
Sawyer chuckled and elbowed his way by Cam. Regina turned her cheek as he leaned down to kiss her, but he nudged her chin with his fingers and kissed her lingeringly on the lips. His goatee tickled her skin and sent a shiver down her body. He slid his palm down her jaw to the bruises around her neck.
“I’m going to kill him,” he muttered.
Regina shoved at him in irritation then fixed her glare on all three of them. “See, this is why I didn’t want Birdie to call you. I knew you’d come barging in, swimming in testosterone, beating your chests and muttering threats against humanity.”
Sawyer laughed. “You wouldn’t exaggerate, now would you, Reggie?”
She shot him a quelling look, but he only grinned in response.
Cam sat down on the edge of the bed and laid a hand over her leg. “Whether you wanted us here or not, we’re here. We’ve been here all night, and I have to say, you’re a lot easier to get along with when you’re sleeping.”
Damn it, she would not smile.
“Furthermore, you’re coming home with us when you’re released.”
She opened her mouth to protest, but Sawyer touched her arm, Hutch put a hand on her shoulder, and Cam’s grip tightened on her leg, and she forgot all about saying anything. How did they do that?
“I’ve already spoken to the doctor,” Cam continued. “He wants to keep you one more night for observation. He’ll release you in the morning as long as you have a place to stay. Your house alone doesn’t count.” He stared pointedly at her.
She sighed. “I have a job to do. I have a killer to catch. I don’t have time for you guys to fuss over me, and I seriously doubt you have the time either.”
“We’ll make the time,” Hutch said.
She turned to him and frowned. He was the one she could usually count on not to treat her like an invalid. She’d been so grateful when he walked in and said she looked like hell, because it meant he wasn’t going to start posturing like the other two and make a big deal over what had happened.
“I’m a pushover, Reggie, but not when it comes to what’s best for you,” he said as if he’d reached right into her mind and plucked out her thoughts. Damn the man.
“I agree with them, Regina,” Birdie spoke up. “You shouldn’t be alone right now. There’s no way you can go back to your job until you’ve properly healed.”
“Traitor,” she muttered.
“Birdie, you sound tired,” Sawyer said. “If you like, I’ll drive you home. We’re here now. We’ll take good care of Reggie.”
Birdie smiled even as Regina scowled. “I can drive myself. You boys came a long way to see Regina. I’ll leave you to it.” She leaned down to kiss Regina’s cheek. “I’ll be back later. Is there anything I can bring you?”
Regina shook her head. “Thank you, Birdie.”
Birdie squeezed her hand. “No need to thank me. You feel like one of mine. Just like these boys do.”
Regina smiled and watched the guys momentarily forget about her as they gathered around Birdie to give her hugs and kisses. Birdie did love those boys. She’d given them a home and love when no one else wanted them. And they loved her every bit as much as she did them.
There had been times growing up that Regina had envied Cam, Hutch and Sawyer. It sounded silly. She’d had a privileged childhood in that she’d never gone without food or clothing. But the one thing she’d missed was love, the one thing that the guys had never lacked for once they’d come to live with Birdie.
She’d envied them that. They would have laughed at the idea that she, the daughter of one of the wealthiest men in the state, had envied dirt-poor boys who had been in and out of foster homes and juvenile detention. But in a lot of ways, they had had more freedom than she’d ever dreamed of. And they had Birdie.
It wasn’t until junior high that the bond had formed between her and Hutch, Cam, and Sawyer. They had lived with Birdie a few years, Hutch being the last to arrive. It was Hutch who ultimately brought the four together.
He had stumbled across Regina’s “pretend place,” what amounted to a little hollow in the creek bed a mile from Birdie’s house and across the pasture from Regina’s own home.
Regina hadn’t appreciated the interruption any more than Hutch had liked coming across a girl. But with no place else to go and nothing else to do, they’d formed a grudging truce and agreed to share the space.
When Cam and Sawyer had discovered Hutch’s new friend, they’d teased him relentlessly. That is until Regina bloodied both their noses. While Hutch was a little mortified to be defended by a girl, the three developed a healthy respect for the tiny little spitfire.
By the time they reached high school, the friendship between the four of them was solid. Labeled as hellraisers and not given a spitting chance at ever amounting to much (by the townspeople), the three boys hadn’t cared much about fitting in. But no one bad-mouthed them around Regina. Even her father had learned the futility of that.
She sighed. She’d give a lot to go back to those days. Things had been simple. They’d had so much fun. They’d been inseparable.
A warm hand closed over hers, and she jerked her attention back to the present. Birdie had disappeared, and now Regina faced three surly looking men. Hell.
Cam, ever one to take the bull by the horns, didn’t bandy words. She usually liked that about him except when it was her he wanted to be blunt about.
“It’s time we talked, Reggie,” he said firmly.
She glanced to Hutch and Sawyer in a silent plea for mercy. The determined looks on both their faces told her she wasn’t getting any.
“Captive audience, darlin’,” Hutch murmured. “You won’t be running like a scalded cat this time.”
She closed her eyes and clutched the sheet with bloodless fingers. They wouldn’t really bring up that, would they?
“You pretending we didn’t have sex won’t change a damn thing,” Cam said.
Yeah, they would.
Embarrassment heated her cheeks but she worked, at great pain to herself, to keep the humiliation from her expression.
Sawyer leaned down, tucked one finger under her chin and tapped upward until she met his gaze. “It would be one thing if you didn’t enjoy it, Reggie, but we all know that isn’t the truth. It would be different if you didn’t have feelings for us or we didn’t have feelings for you, but we also know that isn’t true.”
She pressed her lips into a mutinous line and glared up at him.
“We have all the time in the world,” Hutch said casually. “You won’t be getting away from us this time. You ran hard, Reggie, and we let you. That’s on us. But it won’t happen again. That’s also on us.”
Helpless rage tightened her chest. She hated how they made her feel. She loved the way they made her feel. She hated how out of control they made her feel.
She swallowed and winced at the pain in her throat. Sawyer stroked his hand over her forehead and gazed tenderly down at her. “We’ll get you something for pain, Reggie. You need rest. We’ll be here when you wake up. We’re not going anywhere. You count on that. You also need to know that we’re going to talk about this. Us.”
He lowered his
head and once again kissed her. Hot tears pricked her eyelids, and she blinked furiously, pissed that she’d allow him to affect her so deeply.
“It was just sex,” she whispered.
His blue eyes flashed and narrowed. “You keep telling yourself that, Reggie, and one day, you might actually believe it.”
“I don’t need you here.” The words caught in her throat, and she immediately regretted them. Weak. She was weak. But her rejection didn’t anger the guys.
Cam just smiled at her, while Hutch stroked her arm above the line of the brace.
“You may not want us here, but you do need us,” Cam said with confidence that grated on her nerves.
“And we need you,” Hutch said simply.
She turned to look at him and felt her stance weaken. What they wanted, no, what they demanded, she couldn’t give them. How could anyone? It wasn’t normal. It wasn’t done. It wasn’t possible. Not in her world. Not in any world.
Sawyer ran his hand through her hair again, and she instinctively moved closer. He tucked the short, curly strands behind her ears and ran his finger down the sensitive skin behind her ear.
They were doing it again. Lulling her, numbing her senses with their touch, their presence. Hutch stroked her arm, rubbing lightly while Sawyer continued to finger the strands of her hair. Cam laid his big hand over her knee, and she could feel the heat of his fingers through the sheet.
She felt safe. More than that, she felt comforted, as if for this one moment, everything was all right.
She jumped when the door opened and the nurse walked in. She scowled at the interruption even as she realized she should be grateful for the reprieve.
Somehow, Sawyer had maneuvered himself onto the bed beside her, all while stroking her neck. Smooth bastard. He sat with one leg hanging over the side, her head nestled in the crook of his arm.
She realized how cozy, how intimate, they all looked, Hutch on her other side, his hand resting possessively on her arm, Cam sitting at her feet, absently rubbing her knee, and her all hugged up to Sawyer.
The nurse raised an eyebrow but didn’t say much as she navigated around the males to get to Regina’s IV. The line had been disconnected but the saline lock was still in place to administer medication. Sawyer gently pulled her arm up and rested it on his lap but made no effort to move for the nurse. She shrugged and reached for Regina’s hand.
“My best oblivion cocktail coming right up,” the nurse said as she uncapped the syringe. She swabbed the port and deftly inserted the needle.
In seconds, Regina felt the slight burn as the medication hit her veins. It swept up her arm, and when it got to her shoulder, she relaxed and sagged further into Sawyer’s embrace.
She drowsily registered his lips nuzzling into her hair and him murmuring softly. As the nurse moved away, he pulled her even closer. She raised her other hand, blindly reaching for Hutch. The action contradicted her every word, but as much as she said she didn’t need them, didn’t want them there, for the last year she’d felt like a huge part of herself was missing.
Hutch caught her hand and lowered it back to the bed, his fingers cautiously laced with hers.
She struggled to open her eyes one more time, and her gaze connected with Cam’s.
“I missed you,” she whispered, too foggy to call back the words before they slipped from her mouth.
Cam’s brown eyes softened. “We missed you too, sweetheart. Now rest and get better.”
“Don’t go,” she murmured as she fought against the lethargy slogging through her body and brain.
“We’re not going anywhere, Reggie,” Sawyer said close to her ear. “I promise.”
She drifted off with the comfort of that promise echoing in her mind.
CHAPTER 3
The sun hadn’t yet peeked over the horizon, and the pale glow of predawn had only just begun to lighten the sky when Sawyer climbed out of the truck and met Cam around the front.
Together they stared at the large two-story house situated on one of the rolling hills of the hundred-acre spread they’d purchased a couple years earlier.
Sawyer’s chest tightened with pride. This was theirs. A piece of land. A home. When he was a child, the idea of home and family had been a fantasy. A dream that was for other kids. Not him. Never him.
When Birdie had taken him in, Cam had been there a week already and was not appreciative of the competition for Birdie’s affection. He’d been resentful of Sawyer’s presence even as he had pushed Birdie away. He hadn’t wanted her and hadn’t trusted her, but he didn’t want Sawyer to have her either.
He hadn’t really understood until Hutch had arrived a few months later. Fear and insecurity, two things Sawyer had been well accustomed to back then, had made a terrible comeback. What if Birdie liked Hutch better? Hutch was quieter. He wasn’t as much trouble. What if she decided three boys were too much? Surely she’d keep whoever caused her the least amount of strife.
“Let’s go,” Cam said, shaking Sawyer from his reverie. “I want to make sure everything’s ready for her to come home.”
They walked to the front porch and Cam inserted the key into the lock. Though they’d visited the house often when it was in the building stages—(Cam had been more than obsessed with making sure every single detail was perfect and exactly according to the plans he’d drawn up)—Sawyer couldn’t help the sense of wonder that slipped over him when he stepped into the foyer.
No expense had been spared in the construction. While it looked and felt masculine, it hadn’t been built or decorated with their tastes solely in mind. No, it had been built for Reggie. It was her dream house.
He meandered to the stone fireplace and ran his fingers lightly over the mahogany mantel. Then he walked over to the French doors leading to the deck and stared out. She’d like it. Several trees shaded the sprawling terrace, including one large oak that they’d built around. It was intended to mimic the banks of the creek where she and Hutch had spent so much time nestled among the tree roots.
The deck overlooked a three-acre pond down a gentle incline from the back of the house. They’d stocked it with bass and catfish, and Sawyer was looking forward to challenging Reggie to see who could land the biggest.
“You think this will work?”
Sawyer turned in surprise to see Cam standing next to him at the doors. More surprising was the worry in his voice. Cam . . . he was the steadfast one. He’d been the one from the start to tell him and Hutch when they had doubts that it would work out. It had to. They loved Reggie.
Now Sawyer realized that Cam needed that reassurance too.
“Yeah, man. It’s going to work. It’s not us she’s running from. It’s herself. She’s afraid. Of what, I’m not sure.”
Cam nodded. “It’s just that sometimes I think we made a mistake. That maybe we pushed too hard.”
Sawyer eyed him before turning his gaze to the outside. “We didn’t push, Cam. It just . . . happened. I wouldn’t have let you or Hutch force her into anything, just like you wouldn’t have let me. We wanted her. But we’ve wanted her a long damn time.”
“I turned on the air and made sure her room was all set. We can head back to the hospital now if you want.”
Sawyer turned, accepting the abrupt change in subject. Yeah, he was anxious to return even though he knew Reggie was going to fight them tooth and nail about coming home with them, especially when she learned that home was here and not in Houston.
Hutch listened to Reggie’s quiet breathing and gently rubbed his fingers up and down her shoulder. She lay sleeping, her head against his chest, her body nestled into his. His arm was numb and had been for the better part of an hour, but he didn’t want to move it and disturb her.
With his other hand, he ran his finger up her slender neck where the vivid bruises marred her skin. The idea that she’d come so close to death scared the hell out of him. He knew her job as a cop put her in danger every day, but this just brought that fact home with a punch to the gut.
/>
He didn’t want her putting herself out there like that. He wanted her at home, in his bed, where he could take care of her. If she had any clue of the direction of his thoughts, she’d kick him in the balls. Of the three guys, she considered him her ally.
If she only knew that he wasn’t nearly as tolerant as Cam or Sawyer. She’d been his for longer than she’d ever been theirs. There were times when he had no desire to follow through with the agreement he’d made with Cam and Sawyer. He knew they loved her. Like he loved her. But he was tired of waiting. One of them didn’t scare her, but the three of them did.
He sighed. She wouldn’t choose between them. They all knew it too, which was why they didn’t have any desire to make her. None of them wanted to lose her, and so they were willing to take the biggest gamble of their lives. Convince her that she belonged with all three of them. And hope to hell jealousy didn’t eat them all