3. Casey Brooks

Ishook my head as Mal disappeared into the garage and was probably hightailing it to the office. Jett stretched and didn't bother to put on anything else before he walked through the living area and straight to the kitchen.

"What do you think he's going to say?" he asked, not bothering to look at me. I sighed.

"I don't know." Mal was a fucking wild card. It all depended on what state of mind and fucking bad mood we found him in.

He hadn't always been that way.

Once upon a time, he had been happy. But after his college sweetheart broke up with him when we graduated from our undergrad work, he'd changed. Where he had been fun loving and easy going, he'd turned into the serious one of the group. As shitty as it was, if I was honest, it worked for our dynamic.

I reached the kitchen and helped Jett get the coffee machine going while he cooked us breakfast. Out of the three of us, Jett knew what the hell he was doing in here. If it weren"t for him, I knew we would need to have a personal chef on staff twenty-four seven or ordering out daily.

Mal and Jett were opposites. Both in personality and looks.

Mal was all about deadlines and budgets. The man hardly smiled or spoke a soft word to anyone, and that included us, his best friends. He loved wearing designer suits that cost a whack and had to be tailormade for his muscular body. He liked to work out and build more muscle than anyone needed. Probably due to how he had grown up. Jett and I hated that Mal had been his dad's own punching bag all through high school. Our sophomore year, he had shot up, and when he did, funny enough, his dad never came close to him from the moment Mal was bigger than him ever again. Mal's skin was bare of tattoos. Unlike Jett, whose body was covered in ink. Jett was also hard to shake. Mal was prickly almost every waking moment, but you could hardly get a rise from Jett.

Mal was the serious one, I was the charming one, and Jett was the easy one. We were all different, but it was why we worked and had become a success in real estate.

We sat down and dug in.

"You woke up late," I noted as I dug into my egg white omelet.

"I stayed up and cleaned," he muttered, taking a bite.

"You did?" My eyes widened. Again, Jett simply shrugged. He never thought anything was a big deal.

It's how I knew he believed in our plan.

"You should have seen the way those kids left the bathroom." He winced, and my lips curled in disgust.

"Bad?"

"Nothing like spring break in Cabo our junior year in college, but close."

"Fuck," I cursed and shook my head. "To be that young, dumb, and full of cum."

"Hey! I'm still the latter." We both chuckled. "He will come around," Jett murmured before looking out toward the floor-to-ceiling glass walls that led to the pool. "We all…" His lips pressed together. "We all have feelings."

"Feelings?" I scoffed. "Really? That's all you're going to admit to?" I asked, not giving a shit if it made me seem whipped. "Maybe you and Mal have a lot more in common if you can"t admit?—"

"Shut the fuck up." He shook his head. "It's not that I don't love her. I just… I worry."

"About?"

"Us being too much for her." Jett frowned.

"We'd be gentle." I groaned, and the asshole's expressionless face crumbled into loud laughs.

"That's not what I meant, but I'm glad you think we could be gentle with her."

"We would be anything she needed us to be," I cut in. "I know how I feel, and I'm done wasting time."

"I know." The tone in his voice changed. "I am, too. I just mean… she's not like us, you know? She has a sister and a niece and a nephew. Family"

"Oh." I got what he meant. None of us had any family left, each for different reasons, but all the family we had was each another. "I worry her sister won't get it. What would she tell Betsy and Mike? How would she introduce us?"

"As their new uncles?" I guessed and shrugged. "That's a long way aways," I muttered quietly. "And a hurdle I'm more than happy to figure out when the time is right. The three of us just have to get on the same page."

"You think Mal's going to be pissed." It wasn't a question but an observation.

"As much as he likes to crab and get pissy, he doesn't like to feel left out," I reminded him.

"That's why we're including him." Jett rolled his eyes.

"I know. I just hope he doesn't feel ganged up on." I sighed before taking a healthy drink of my coffee.

"He got jealous of you talking to Rosie," he reminded me. "He got pissed at me for coming out of my room the way I always do. She doesn't blink at me being shirtless anymore."

He shrugged, and I set my fork down while observing Jett. He almost seemed sad about Rosie not blushing and stammering when he came out wearing nothing but his sleep pants. Not that he would know she stared at him when she thought no one was watching.

"She still checks you out." I tossed the poor sap a bone. That made his ears perk up, and when our eyes connected across the table, I shrugged first for once. "When she thinks you're not looking, so wipe that look off your face."

"What look?" His brows burrowed together, and I chuckled.

"Like someone stole your puppy. Look, she likes us. She's attracted to us."

"Even Mal?" I had to bite away a laugh.

"Even Mal." I grinned and took another healthy chug of my coffee. "This is going to work because we all feel the same way about one another."

"If she doesn't feel that same way towards him, too, I don't know if this will work."

"It's going to work," I reassured him.

"He shouldn't have talked to her that way. And he shouldn't have left without apologizing." The tips of his fingers tapped the top of the table impatiently.

"I know. He will, though."

"You sure?"

"You're not?" I challenged, and I knew he did when he exhaled slowly and got back to finishing his breakfast. After picking up and clearing the table, I got dressed for work.

I hated wearing a suit, but it was the price to pay for what we got paid. Soon, though, our business would be changing. We'd still be in real estate, but each of us would be taking on different positions. I couldn't wait. I wanted something easier, less stressful, and had talked them into buying a couple of investment properties for me to renovate. I'd always loved working with my hands, and I had been so busy stuck in offices and meetings, I couldn't remember the last time I'd created anything.

I was running late, but even so, I went around the house looking for her. I couldn't leave without saying goodbye and checking on her. I found her in the pool house folding towels. I knocked on the open door, and when she turned to look at me, her eyes were glassy and slightly red.

"Rosie?" I stepped closer, unable to keep the distance I had promised Jett. Before I knew it, I was standing in front of her holding her face, staring down at the beauty before me. "What's the matter?"

"Nothing." She shook her head. Her eyes drifted down to the floor. Something came over me. I tipped her chin up, not letting her look away from me. "Is this about Malcom?"

"Oh!" Her eyes widened. "No." She sniffled and shook her head. "I think it's just allergies," she sniffled some more, and I noticed how flushed she seemed.

"Allergies?" I questioned, but I was so fucking captivated by her I was too slow to realize she stepped back and away from my touch. My hands dropped to my side, and I stuffed them into my slacks in tight fists. I swear I could still feel the smoothness of her skin against my palms.

"Did you need me for something?" She crossed her arms in front of herself.

"I just wanted to tell you I was heading out to work."

"Okay." She smiled tightly. "Is there anything you need done while you're gone?"

"Yeah, for you to sit and rest." Her eyes widened, and then she giggled. My eyes dropped to the beauty mark just above her lip and watched it dance as her body shook with laughter. The sound made me relax a little. If she could still laugh around me, it wasn't as hopeless as I worried Mal could have made things.

"I can't do that." Her eyes almost sparkled with amusement.

"Why not? I can't believe you finished the pool area so quickly."

"It wasn't so bad. Just bottles of beer and some cans."

"It wasn't a mess for you to clean," I clipped. "I'm sorry that happened. Trust me, that little shit will be paying for it."

"He was celebrating his graduation."

"Cooper is a spoiled brat." He had also been stuck with Mal as a guardian after his parents passed. But Mal wasn't the warm, fuzzy type and had done what countless generations of Jennings had done before him and sent the kid to boarding school.

Out of sight, out of mind.

The kid was spoiled because there was hardly a thing Malcom denied him, but he was emotionally stunted because no one had been particularly sweet to the kid. Not that he was a kid anymore. He just graduated college, not high school.

"Still." She smiled softly before leaning in and bumping my shoulder with hers. "Don't you remember what it was like to be his age? Has it really been that long ago?" she teased. I willed my dick not to choose that moment to get fucking hard, but that was like asking the sun not to rise every fucking morning.

"You calling me old?"

"No, I would never." She grinned, and I swear her eyes sparkled. "I just mean, sometimes we have to let loose."

"Do you?"

"What?" Her smile faltered.

"Do you let loose? Party and —"

"No." She shook her head, and I swear she fucking blushed.

"Ever?" I pressed. A vision of Rosie popped up in my head. One of her spread out without a stitch of clothing, her limbs tied to each corner of the bed, and the three of us having the time of our life exploring her and mapping out her body with our mouths and hands.

"Not in a long time." She ran her fingers through her hair. "I should finish this up and then get to work on the inside of the house." She pointed behind me, and I nodded.

"I'll see you tonight," I muttered. She opened her mouth like she wanted to say something but then shook her head and left.

I'd find out soon enough. I breathed in and exhaled slowly.

Soon enough, Rosie would be ours. We just had to get Mal on the same page.