Braydon(15)

Jessie laughed. “Right. Insatiable. That’s such a horrible characteristic for your men to have.”

“Insatiable, huh?” Gage’s deep voice echoed in the small kitchen, and Jessie nearly leapt out of her chair. He’d come in the back way rather than through the swinging door, where she would’ve expected him. He was too damn stealthy for his own good.

Kylie blushed. She actually blushed. The woman who was married to two men actually had the decency to turn a pretty shade of crimson when her husband teased her.

“Among other things,” Kylie finally said after sipping her coffee a little longer than necessary.

After pouring a cup for himself, Gage moved around the table, coming right up behind Kylie and leaning down for a kiss. Jessie watched, a twinge of envy echoing in her chest.

She’d had that. Once.

Kind of.

Not really though.

But at one point she did have something that bordered on a relationship with Brendon and Braydon. It had actually been the perfect setup, allowing her the freedom to not get tied down, even if it had been a total surprise to her when she’d found out that the Walker twins were into sharing their women. Neither brother copped to having girlfriends, but they were quite open about the fact that if a woman was going to be with one of them, she was going to be with both of them.

Jessie had realized just how true that statement was early on. And she had enjoyed it immensely.

For whatever reason, Brendon had taken a somewhat avaricious stance when it came to her. From the get-go, they had established some sort of strange arrangement and Braydon had ended up the third. It hadn’t taken her long to realize that Brendon was the take-charge twin and Braydon just seemed to go with the flow. Jessie was inclined to believe that had something to do with Braydon’s warped sense of loyalty toward his brother. Then again, she kind of understood because when it came to Kylie, Jessie would do whatever she possibly could to make her sister happy. These days, Kylie didn’t need much help. Proven by the lip-lock going on across the table.

Jessie cleared her throat about the same time Travis walked into the room.

Lord have mercy.

It was like a powerful cloud of testosterone exuded from the man. When he entered a room, his presence wasn’t just seen. It was felt.

“Hey.” Travis greeted Gage with a loving hand on his shoulder as he passed him by. Obviously on his way to the coffeepot. The rumor that Travis couldn’t function without caffeine wasn’t really a rumor; it was fact. Jessie had seen him a time or two without it. She tried to avoid visiting her sister when Travis didn’t have his daily dose readily available. “Mornin’, Jess.”

Jessie tracked him across the room, muttering a good morning.

“How’d you sleep?” Gage asked Travis, and Jessie clearly wasn’t in on the joke because Kylie laughed at the same time Travis did.

“Okay, then. I think I’ll let myself out,” Jessie said abruptly, pushing her chair back with a loud squeak on the hardwood floor.

“Sit,” Travis ordered, and she’d be damned if her legs didn’t give out and she didn’t find herself planted back in her chair.

“Be nice,” Kylie scolded Travis.

“I’m always nice. I’m the one who threatened to kick Brendon’s ass many months ago, am I not?”

“You should’ve done it, too,” Gage added, his whiskey-colored eyes focused on Travis.

“Not necessary,” Jessie told them, once again trying to get up from her chair.

“Sit,” Travis commanded again.

“What the hell?” she asked her brother-in-law. “Last I checked, you weren’t my keeper.”

“No, but I’ve got some news you’re gonna want to hear.”

Jessie’s heart leapt into her throat as she slid back down onto the chair. There was only one piece of news that she actually cared about these days. And it had to do with Braydon.

She looked up into Travis’s blue-gray eyes with a sense of hope that nearly leveled her.

“Braydon’s not coming back to Coyote Ridge,” Travis stated directly.

The room began to spin, much as her spoon had earlier, and the next thing Jessie knew, Gage was next to her, catching her as she began a rapid descent to the floor—face-first.

“Take her to the living room,” Kylie ordered Gage.

Jessie was surprised by how easily Gage lifted her, carrying her out of the room. They were moving through the doorway when she heard her sister say, “Why the hell would you tell her that?”

“What was I supposed to say?” Travis countered.

Jessie couldn’t hear any more of the conversation as Gage deposited her on the sofa in the living room.

“Are you okay?” he asked, sounding genuinely concerned.

“Yes. Sorry. I just . . .” She just what? Almost passed out from the thought of Braydon not coming home? Why wouldn’t he come back? Those were questions she wanted to ask, but she knew no one had the answers. No one other than Braydon.

“I’ll be right back,” Gage informed her.

Jessie looked around the open, airy room until clarity returned and she no longer felt faint. When her head stopped the tilt-a-whirl imitation, she felt so much better that she sprang from the couch and grabbed her purse from the table in the entryway before she ran out the front door and directly to her little piece-of-shit car, which was truly on its last legs.