“I don’t care.” Hunter’s voice was too loud and bounced off the walls of the tiny trailer. “That letter made me as mad as hell.”
“You have to see things from McLaughlin’s point of view, my friend. He was with her long before we were, and it was through no fault of his own that he had to leave her to us.”
“I still don’t care. I want Morgan to be ours.”
“So do I, but getting angry and shouting about it won’t help. Neither will getting drunk.”
Hunter ran his hands through his hair. He was tempted to take another pull from the bottle, but then he shoved it aside and out of his sight. He realized he was being immature. It took Drake’s wisdom to bring his mind back into focus.
But the more he thought about their problem, the more he came to realize there just was no solution for it now that Nathan McLaughlin was back home with his woman. An angry sneer came over Hunter’s face when he thought about it. Morgan wasn’t McLaughlin’s anymore. She belonged to them.
“I feel like we ought to go out there and fight for her.” His eyes burned with intensity as he looked at Drake.
“That wouldn’t do any good.”
“Don’t you still love her?” Hunter couldn’t understand how calm his friend was right then.
“Of course I still love Morgan. I love that woman with all of my heart.”
Hunter pushed back from his chair and wanted to have some action. “Well then let’s go out there and get her back from McLaughlin.”
Drake restrained him, and Hunter was forced to sit back down in his chair.
“I would agree with you if things were different,” Drake explained to him in his always calm voice. “If McLaughlin was a bad man, and if Morgan didn’t truly want to be with him, nothing on earth could stop me from going out there at this very moment and fighting to reclaim her.”
“That’s what I’m saying.” Hunter spoke from frustration and did not understand Drake. “Why don’t we go on out there?”
“Because that isn’t the situation. Morgan has chosen to be with him. We know how much she said she loved him, and by all accounts he loves her just as much. We also know McLaughlin is a good man. The two of them are happy with each other.”
Hunter did not want to hear the logic behind his friend’s words. “I still want to go out there and fight for the woman I love.”
“No you don’t.” Again Drake rested a restraining hand on his shoulder. “If we did that, we would only end up hurting Morgan. Is that what you want to do?”
Hunter tilted back in his chair, all the life and the fight gone out of him. “I would never do anything to hurt Morgan. You know that.”
“Neither would I.” Drake let out a long sigh. Hunter realized Drake was feeling the pain of lose just as much as he was but had his own way of dealing with it. “Maybe we should just consider that the best man has won and get on with our lives.”
Hunter gave him a suspicious sideways glance. “Could you go out with another woman after Morgan?”
“No.” Drake expelled another long sigh of frustration. “I’d never known what real love for a woman was before I met her. I’d been searching for Morgan all my life.”
“I don’t want anyone else, either,” Hunter said glumly.
A car door slammed outside the trailer, and both men looked up. Hunter went over to the window and looked out.
“You won’t believe this, but McLaughlin has just driven up outside.” Hunter clenched his fists. He thought perhaps they were going to get to have a showdown with their rival yet.
* * * *
“May I come in?” Nathan asked. He stood at the door to the trailer. Hunter didn’t look as if he wanted to let him in. Nathan knew at once he wasn’t going to be welcomed here.
“All right. Let’s see what you have to say.” Hunter was skeptical, but held the door open for him anyway.
Nathan nodded his thanks and stepped inside. He saw the second man, Drake, seated at a table. It was good he had them both in the same place to talk with.
“Have a seat,” Drake said, shoving out a chair for him.
“Thanks.” Nathan took the seat. There was tense silence among the three men. The other two watched him with suspicious eyes.
“Morgan’s told me a lot about you two.” Nathan tried to size them both up.
“She talked about you a lot, too.” Hunter seemed in no mood to listen. Nathan couldn’t really blame either of them. If the tables had been turned and he thought he was going to lose Morgan, he wasn’t sure he would have handled it any better.
“She’s a special woman.” Nathan felt uncomfortable. He realized they already knew exactly how special Morgan was. They had lived with her for nearly a year.
Drake brought a bottle of scotch off the table and set a shot glass down in front of him. “We’ve already had one, but now that you’re here, I think one more might be in order. Will you join us?”
“Sounds good. Thanks.”
Hunter pushed aside his shot glass and seemed to have no interest in it. He was still regarding Nathan as if trying to make up his mind about him.
“Is Morgan happy?” Hunter asked.
Nathan took a swallow of the scotch and squinted from the strong taste. “No. She isn’t, and it’s my fault.”
“What did you do?” Drake asked. Nathan was starting to get an idea about these men. They were both concerned for Morgan’s well-being, and that made them good men in his book. He realized they would both be willing to sacrifice for her happiness. In fact, for the last year that was exactly what they’d been doing.
“I tried to dismiss the two of you from our lives. That was a mistake.”
Hunter shoved the letter he had written them across the table. “We know. That came in the mail yesterday.”
Drake sat forward in his chair and looked at Nathan as if trying to figure him out. Nathan realized he must have seemed quite foreign to these two shifters.
“I don’t understand you,” Drake said. “You’re a shifter just like we are. But you don’t act like one.”
“Shifters aren’t jealous of one another,” Hunter pointed out. “We’re more amenable to sharing our women than folks in the outside world.”
“You’re right,” Nathan admitted. He rubbed his hand over his eyes. He was tired because he felt like he had done wrong. He had done wrong by these two who were most likely very decent men. Most importantly, he had done wrong by Morgan. Now he was going to try and set things right.
“Before I returned to Wolf Creek two years ago, I had been living in Chicago for over ten years. I went to college there and worked there. I lived with regular people and took their customs as my own. I didn’t shift once until I came back here to live. I forgot what it was like to be a shifter. Dr. Hughes thinks my lack of shifting all of those years may have even contributed to the disease I just overcame.”
“Some around here might call you a stuck-up city boy,” Hunter challenged him.
Nathan gave a half laugh. “They’d have been right to call me that.” Then he gave them both a serious glance. “However, I spent the last year in wolf form. That changed me. It let me know what’s important in life, and as you can probably imagine, Morgan’s at the top of that list.”
“I’m happy to know you’re looking out for her well-being.” Drake seemed genuinely relieved that Morgan had someone to love her.
“If Morgan hadn’t met you all, I wouldn’t have shared her with other men around here. That’s because Morgan isn’t a shifter and would not have let me do it.” He fixed them both with a firm stare. “Morgan loves me. However, she also loves the two of you.”
“So we have a problem,” Hunter said.
“It doesn’t have to be a problem.”
“How do you propose to solve it?” Drake asked.
Nathan got up and looked around the trailer. It was small, and he felt claustrophobic inside. The furniture was old and not well cared for. It looked like a bachelor pad. He remembered having a small apartment in the city similar to this before he met Morgan and took on responsibility.
“This doesn’t look like a good place for a shifter to live.”
“This is my place,” Hunter informed him. “Drake’s is down the road. But it’s just in back of our business, so it’s convenient.”
“How would you like to buy some land from me?”
“I don’t follow you,” Drake said. Though Nathan knew the other man was too clever to not know what he was proposing. He was just afraid to jump to any conclusions where his future happiness was concerned.
“I was thinking since you all do pretty well in your business, you might want to buy some of my land and put up a house of your own next to mine.”
“Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?” Hunter was on the edge of his seat, anticipation in his voice.
“Morgan wants you back, and I want to make Morgan happy. Since we’re all shifters, sharing a female shouldn’t be a problem for us.” Nathan took a deep breath and said what he’d come to tell them, the one thing that he knew would make Morgan happy. “I’m offering to share Morgan with you.”
Morgan was doing her spring cleaning. It was a beautiful if slightly chilly day outside. She opened the windows and let in the fresh mountain air. The scent of pine from the forest drifted through the house, and she could almost taste it in the air.
Nathan told her he had a surprise for her that night. He wouldn’t tell her what it was. She suspected he was trying to make her feel better. She was still prone to bouts of melancholy, and Nathan was trying to help her.
He had told her to dress sexy that night. It wasn’t their anniversary or any other special occasion that she could remember. Apparently he just felt like exploring the physical relationship between the two of them. Morgan would not object. Sex with Nathan had been better than ever since he returned.
As she was cleaning the house, she forced herself to the south wing. This was the side where Hunter and Drake had their rooms while they were staying with her. Morgan had not been back inside these rooms since they’d left.
Myriad emotions ran through her as she opened the door to Hunter’s old room. The men had left in a hurry, and some of their things were still here. Today she would clean out the closets and pack whatever they’d left behind in boxes. It was safer to have it shipped to them, best not to stir any temptations by taking the boxes down to town in person.
The two stuffed wolves the men had won for her on the night of the county fair were seated on a chair in the corner. A window was in front of them, and it looked like the wolves were gazing out at the mountains in the distance.
A smiled played over her face as she remembered the county fair. This was a sweet memory. It had been a warm summer night. She had been feeling lost without Nathan, yet those two men had been at her side and made her feel strong. It could have been such a horrible time, but because of the men it had been a wonderful night.
The bedside table had a photo on top. Morgan bent to pick this up. It was of all three of them together the night of the art fair. The men had big smiles on their handsome faces. Surprise shot through Morgan when she glimpsed how happy she had been in that snapshot.
Good fortune had favored her for the time she had known them. Ironically, their presence in her life at that time had probably saved her relationship with Nathan. They had been the first to learn he was sick and that he hadn’t just left her. Then later they had stuck by her until the end. If not for those things, she probably would have packed up and gone back to Chicago, and Nathan would have returned to an empty, rundown house.
As it stood now, she and Nathan had a future, and their relationship had been repaired, and in many ways was stronger than it had been before he left.
Morgan felt like the luckiest woman on earth that fate had sent those two rough-and-tumble shape-shifters into her life when it had.
Guilt also plagued her. Those men had fallen in love with her. She had allowed it and encouraged it. Now they were alone because she had been forced to make a choice.
She attempted to reason with herself. They were incredible men, handsome and wealthy and over-the-top sexy. They could have any woman they set their sights on. It wasn’t as if they would be alone for the rest of their lives.
Just the thought of Hunter and Drake being with another woman sent a stab of pain through her. She still felt territorial where they were concerned. This was completely unreasonable on her part because she had given up all claims on them and had a fulfilling life of her own with Nathan. Mentally, she kicked herself for even feeling like this.
Everyone had to get on with their lives. It was better if they could just put the pain behind them, and she sincerely hoped that was what Hunter and Drake were doing now.
The afternoon was getting on. Nathan would be finished in his office soon. Morgan hurried back to their bedroom and the adjoining bath and hopped in the shower to freshen up for an interesting evening to follow with her man.
When she got out of the shower and dried herself off, she decided to put on a matched set of lace bra and thong. Over the thong she stepped into a short, flowery skirt that reminded her of the approaching spring. For her top she selected a white silk button-down blouse.
Well, after all, Nathan had told her to dress sexy that night, and she aimed to please her man. She figured before the night was over she’d also be the one getting pleased.