A little peek inside…

CHAPTER 1

The carnage from my youngest brother’s Welcome Home party is everywhere. Empty beer bottles litter the floor. Wine bottles sprawl haphazardly over the countertops. Whiskey bottles—yes, that’s plural—are stacked three high on the coffee table, and there’s a tequila graveyard where countless crushed limes mourn their fallen gods.

The pain in my head, however, is not due to a hangover.

The swelling in my left eye throbs. My knuckles are a bloody mess. I work my jaw side to side, opening and closing it against a dull ache.

“Brody! Cage!” I yell out for my brothers. I should call them Shit-head and Ass-wipe. “Where the hell are you?” My eyes pinch with pain.

People talk about the twin connection being a thing. I don’t know anything about that, but as the eldest of identical triplets, I can testify to the crazy connection between us. That mystical link is how I know Brody is passed out on the porch before I head outside, and how I know Cage is currently working nameless chick number three to her fourth orgasm in the barn.

It’s a problem because I need to go out to the barn and I’m not looking forward to walking in on my fucking brother—fucking.

I kick the porch door. It slams against the exterior stone of the house. Brody startles and pops up from the couch he appropriated for the night. His forest green gaze snaps to mine.

“What the fuck, Ace?” He runs his fingers through a mop of midnight black hair. It falls in front of his eyes and he gives a practiced flip, the same one I use to get the hair out of my eyes.

Like I thought, he spent the night curled up outside. Evidence of the party extends out here. More bottles, most of which are empty, tell a tale of heavy drinking and there’s more. I scrunch my nose at the used condoms next to the couch.

“Dude, you’d better be picking up that shit.” I make a point to kick over a small trash can. “Start with that.” My eye catches a third sticking out from under the couch. “Holy crap, three?”

“It was a good night.” Brody gives me a cheeky grin.

I shake out my hand and look at the bruising on the back of my knuckles. My nemesis, Felix-fucking-Franklin, got in a couple good swings. I’ve got the black eye and sore jaw to prove it, but I brought him to his knees. Fucker was no match for me in high school and he’s no better now.

Fucking putz.

“You look like crap.” Brody yawns and stretches his arms over his head. “Nice shiner. What happened? You run into someone’s fist by accident?”

My anger is no less now than a few hours earlier. “Felix-fucking-Franklin’s right hook gave me the damn shiner. His left hook did a number on my jaw, but that’s all he had time for before I split his lip, bruised his eye, cracked a couple ribs, and kicked him hard enough in the nuts he won’t be walking for a week.”

“Damn. Way to go. When the fuck did he get back in town?”

“Don’t know. Don’t fucking care. He looks like shit. If I never see his smug-assed face again, I’ll die a happy man.”

“Dude’s got some balls. La Rouge property is a no-go zone for that asshole, especially after what he tried.” Brody leans back on the couch and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“The fucker fucked my girl, under my own goddamn roof, while I was inside doing shots of tequila. I think it’s pretty clear what he was thinking.”

“He slept with Erin?”

“Fucking putz.” Erin’s my girlfriend…or was. Shit, I had a ring waiting for the right moment.

“How’d you find out?”

“Knight.” I rub the back of my neck and jerk a thumb over my shoulder toward the barn.

“Huh?” Brody glances out toward the barn. The barn door is wide open, almost always is. I think I’ve closed it maybe once or twice in a year.

“Knight went all batshit crazy last night. When I went to check on him, I found Felix balls deep inside Erin, fucking her brains out right next to Knight’s stall. You know how he can be.” Knight is a high-strung stallion with attitude, who basically hates every human but me. “Felix gave me a cheeky assed grin, so I punched him.”

“Well that’s fucked up.”

“No shit.”

“Told you Erin was shit.” Brody gives a satisfied snort. I hear it in his tone, but he doesn’t say ‘I told you so’ out loud. Brody and Cage never liked Erin; said she was trouble, but they tolerated her for my sake.

I’m the fucking asshole with blinders on, thinking she loved me when she was only using me to get to La Rouge money. Too ready to settle down, I missed all the signs.

“Glad you found out now, instead of later.” He gives me a long look. “You good?”

“I kicked her out right after I shoved Felix’s balls so far up his ass that he might as well have swallowed them.”

Brody tips his head back and laughs. “Now that’s a visual.”

“Well, Felix won’t be showing his face around here anytime soon.”

“I’m surprised he showed at all, considering…”

“I agree. Fucking-Felix can rot in hell with his bruised testicles. As for Erin, she can cry her eyes out. I’m done with relationships.”

“About damn time you came to your senses.” Brody spreads his arms out wide. “We’re young, wild, and free. No need to go tying ourselves down.”

Except we’re not as young as we used to be. In two years, we’ll be thirty. Eventually, one of us is going to crack and give our mother the daughter-in-law she always wanted and those grand-babies she’s been waiting on forever. Hell, when she was our age, we were little hellions in second grade.

I palm my face and drag it over the stubble of my jaw. It’s too damn early and I’m getting tired of these all-nighters and the nameless women who flock to a La Rouge brothers’ party. Our events are memorable. Always have been, but I’m tired of this shit.

The backbreaking work to keep this place going, and the constant pressure not to lose it all, is getting to me.

I’m grouchy.

It’s an hour before the ass-crack of dawn.

And I have work to do.

It begins in the barn where there’s shit to shovel out of the horse stalls, where memories of Erin’s betrayal linger, and where the youngest La Rouge triplet is currently getting it on.

Unlike Brody, I don’t have the day off. There’s shit to do, and from the look on his face, I’m not getting any brotherly help.

Brody shifts on the couch and swings his legs around. He reaches down and swipes up the used condoms to toss them at the trash can. Only one of the three actually makes it inside.

“Your aim sucks.” I shake my head, then glance out at the barn. Brody follows the direction of my gaze and his mouth twists into a grin.

“He’s out there, isn’t he?”

“Yeah.” Brody huffs a laugh. “Took two with him.”

“I’m surprised it wasn’t three. Shit, you guys come down for a long weekend, chase tail, and fuck anything with two legs, while I…”

“Whoa! Slow down there. We don’t fuck anything with two legs. There needs to be pussy attached and the longer the legs the better. Which is exactly what you need.”

“What’s that?”

“A little pussy action, idiot. You need to get laid; the sooner, the better. A little pussy will make you forget all about that bitch. Erin is trash, and speaking of trash, you know Felix is just going to go stirring shit up.”

“Yeah.” Felix always had it in for us. I’ll be looking over my shoulder waiting for whatever revenge he has in mind.

As for forgetting Erin? I’m not sure keeping my dick wet is the best idea.

First off, my reputation around town is legendary. Brody and Cage fly in and fly out. They sleep with women all over the globe and only occasionally come home. I’ve been sticking my dick in the same local waters for the past decade and, except for Erin, scared off any potential interest years ago. I’m known as the fuck-them-and-forget-them-man.

“Tell me, aren’t you tired of a new girl in your bed every night?”

“No.” His brow quirks up. “I like having options. No strings. No commitments. Just fun.” As an investment banker, Brody’s killing it in the city, but he’s never been in a relationship that lasted through the night.

I cringe thinking about all the places he’s dipped his dick. Despite his aversion to relationships, he’s never without some model-gorgeous catch of the day hanging from his arm. He has those rugged good looks girls go crazy for and a panty-melting grin which never fails to seal the deal.

I should know, I have the same looks. That same smile. Those same arresting forest-green eyes which never fail to get me laid.

When people look at us, they only see the similarities. I see the differences.

Brody spends his life behind a desk. He’s got the same wide shoulders and powerful legs, but he’s leaner than me. When not at the office, he bikes hundred-mile days, or is on one of his insane ultra-marathon training sessions. I’m bulky, packed with muscles honed by rough, rugged work. Cage is a mix between us. A nature photographer, he travels the world and lives an active outdoor lifestyle.

We all take advantage of our looks.

Brody is simply looking for the next great lay.

And Cage?

Littlest brother is a beast.

I turn to Brody. “Wanna saddle up and make the rounds?” I try enticing him with a little bit of fun. La Rouge Vineyard is situated outside Napa Valley, nestled against state forest land.

“Naw, it’s too fucking early.” He squints at the pre-dawn twilight. “What time is it anyway?”

“Mom’s expecting us to make an appearance.” I try to entice him. “We can be there in time for pancakes.”

Our mother moved out of the sprawling family estate to a small cottage when I took over operations eight years ago. With our father’s passing, she said the house held too many memories. The small, single bedroom home we built for her snuggles up against state forest land and is perfect for her.

“Seriously, the thought of riding makes my head swim.” He glances at the sky. It’s covered in pale, pastel pinks, yellows, and greens, a pre-dawn show put on by the sun every day. Brody gives a wistful sigh. “Don’t see much of that in the city.”

“You miss it?”

“Sometimes.”

“Enough to move back and help me out?”

“Ha-ha. You’d just spend your time bossing me around, and as fun as that might sound, it’s not going to work.”

He’s the CFO of our little slice of heaven. Cage is our marketing genius. As the eldest, I’m CEO of La Rouge Vineyards, which makes me their boss.

I came into this world first, making sure it was safe for them, while they hung out inside mom for a little bit longer and fought to be second. Brody won that exchange with Cage entering the world last. He was born seconds after Brody, but last is last, and we never let him forget it.

“Well, if you’re not going to come…” My frustration shows as I bark orders at him. “Clean this place up.”

“Why? You’re just going to hire a cleaning crew.” He cups his head in his hands and rubs his temples.

“A cleaning crew I depend on. They won’t be cleaning up your discarded condoms.”

Brody plops back down on the couch and covers his eyes. “You really think mom will make pancakes?”

“For her favorite son, she will.”

He grabs one of the throw pillows and aims it at my face. “Give me five minutes. I need to piss and brush my teeth.”

“I’ll meet you in the barn.”