Colters' Lady (Colters' Legacy #2)(9)

“The vet,” she said in a husky voice.

“Yes, that’s right. He just started his practice back home.”

“I should go,” she said again, and Michael saw her edge toward the hallway that led to the bedroom.

“Stay and eat breakfast. I made you a cup of hot chocolate. It’s probably cold by now, but I can pop it into the microwave for you.”

She hestitated, her gaze going between the two brothers.

“I need to get dressed,” she said faintly.

“Okay. I’ll be here in the kitchen. I’ll make breakfast so you can eat when you get out.”

She was gone before Seth could say another word. When he turned back to Michael, there was something decidedly desperate in his older brother’s eyes. A desperation that for some reason, Michael felt in equal measure.

“Who is she?” Michael rasped out. Hell, he couldn’t even talk right. He had a knot in his throat the size of a boulder.

Seth cut an impatient glance at his brother. “Lily,” he bit out. “Just Lily.”

“Who is she to you?”

Seth swung around, his eyes blazing. “Why the hell do you want to know that?”

“I want to know,” Michael said. “I need to know, because damn it, I just had the most powerful reaction to a woman I’ve had in my entire life, and I damn well need to know if I’m poaching on my brother’s territory.”

Seth’s mouth gaped open. “You stay the hell away from her.”

“So it’s like that,” Michael said grimly. “You’ve staked a claim.”

“Are you out of your mind? You just met the woman. What are you planning to do, haul her off over your shoulder?”

“Maybe,” Michael said calmly. “Probably.”

“Over my dead body.”

“When did you meet her?” Michael asked. Seth hadn’t mentioned a woman. Not to anyone. He would have known. The dads wouldn’t have kept something like that quiet. They would have been too busy giving him hell.

“Yesterday,” Seth said in a gruff, pissed-off voice.

“Yesterday? Yesterday? And you’re going off on me for having just met her?” Michael laughed. “You f**king hypocrite.”

And then the thought came. Stuck in his head like someone had hit him with a hammer. He’d walked into his brother’s house and met a woman he instantly and absolutely had to have. It wasn’t just sexual. No, his reaction to her hadn’t even been sexual. It was emotional. On a level he couldn’t even explain.

The same woman his brother was having some psychotic caveman episode over.

“Oh no,” he whispered. “Oh hell no.”

“What are you talking about?” Seth demanded.

“Goddamn it, I thought it was bullshit. I thought it was some hokey bullshit that the dads made up to make Mom feel all soft and mushy.”

Seth got into his face, breathing fire he was so pissed off. “What. The. Fuck. Are. You. Talking. About.”

Michael closed his eyes and let out a helpless laugh. “It’s some f**ked-up Colter gene. It has to be. There’s no other explanation.”

Seth threw up his hands. “I swear to God if you don’t start making some f**king sense, I’m going to knock the shit out of you.”

“Think about it, Seth. How many times have we heard the story over the years. The dads met Mom and they knew immediately and with absolute certainty that she was the one. The one. They said it was instant and so powerful they didn’t have a prayer of fighting. They wanted to love and protect her, wrap her in cotton and lock her away for about a hundred years. Now you tell me. Is that what you’re feeling when you look at Lily? Because I sure as hell am, and it’s worse for me, because I don’t even know the goddamn woman.”

Seth looked like someone hit him square between the eyes with a bat. For a moment, Michael thought Seth was going to hit him.

“That’s crazy,” Seth finally said. “She’s a beautiful woman. Of course you’d have a strong reaction to her. You probably haven’t been laid in a year.”

“No need to get insulting,” Michael drawled. “I’ve probably gotten lucky at least twice since the last time you shed the monk robes. And sure, she’s beautiful, but step back a moment, Seth. Really look at her objectively. She’s not the most gorgeous woman you or I have ever seen.”

Seth’s lip turned up into a snarl and Michael held up his hand. “Let me finish. We’ve seen any number of women who were heart-stoppingly gorgeous, but tell me this. Were you tripping over yourself like this with them? You look at her and you see something beyond beauty. I know because I saw the same damn thing.”

Seth shook his head. “I’m not listening to this. This is insane. Our dads may have fallen for the same woman, but you can’t tell me we’ll do the same.”

“You’re forgetting the granddads. Explain that one, Seth. If there isn’t some hinkey shit going on in the gene pool then why are you and I about to go to fist city because we’re both determined to get close to Lily?”

Seth’s eyes looked haunted as it all sank in. “Damn it, Michael, this isn’t what I wanted. It can’t be possible. It has to be some stupid coincidence.”

“Yeah, well, believe me, sharing a woman with my two bonehead brothers doesn’t exactly appeal to me either, but unless one of us suffers a fast change of heart, we’re either going to have to do some serious compromising or one of us is going to go home to Mom in a pine box.”