“Lily,” I practically growl, chasing after her through the corridors of the large law firm.

She doesn’t turn around, just keeps heading forward, her high heels clicking on the marble tiles. This time, I can keep myself from becoming distracted by that body of hers that so desperately needs to be worshipped, but only just barely. The fact that I’ve been staring at her for the past hour and a half, trying to put the pieces together in my head of how we ended up here, probably helps.

She slips through a glass door and as I head past who I assume is her secretary, I’ve already made up my mind. I’m not going to let her get away from me that easily this time.

I step into what I assume is her office. It’s a small, modest, no corner office with a spectacular view. Not like mine, is what I guess I’m saying.

Turning around to face me, she’s still clutching her folder like it’s a lifeline, sort of like she was holding onto that damn coffee at the library. Like she’s constantly looking for an anchor and she just can’t find it in herself.

“Would you stop and talk to me for god’s sake, Lily?” I say, flustered.

I’m pretty sure my twin stepbrothers aren’t far behind.

Her hazel eyes twitch from me to someone outside – the assistant – and then back to me. She drops the folder, squares her shoulders and then puts on a smile that I would buy as genuine if I hadn’t seen the real thing before. If I didn’t know what she looks like when she’s actually having fun, I might believe this charade.

“What can I do for you, Mister…”

She trails off, biting her lower lip slightly.

It takes everything I have to not walk over to her and kiss the breath from her lungs, if for no other reason than to clear both our heads.

“Stephenson,” I grind out. “You know very well who I am, Lily. Can you calm down and talk to me about this? If you think I walked in here expecting to find you, you’re wrong.”

Her lips purse for a moment and I can see a shadow crossing her expression. She’s even sexier when she’s angry, which is frankly unfair to me and the rest of the male gender.

“Well, life works in weird ways, I guess,” she says vaguely, shrugging her shoulders as I take a step closer to her.

Her perfume has hints of vanilla and lemon. It’s perfect on her.

“I’m sure we’ll have no trouble working together in this professional setting without incident. I mean, we have only met once and you’re not my client, so it’s not like we have any conflicting interests here,” Lily reasons.

I suppress the urge to roll my eyes. That’s not what I came here to talk about and she knows it.

“I think we can both agree on that,” I start, but I’m interrupted by the door swinging open and the already cramped office becoming even smaller due to the addition of the Stephenson twins.

“Lily,” Callum says pleasantly.

As I look at him over my shoulder, I recognize the fire burning in his eyes immediately. It’s the same flame I’m damn sure is alit in mine when I look at her.

She has mine written all over her, but I think that’s what all three of us think. How the hell did we get here?

“How do you know each other?” I ask, prompting a little groan out of Lily’s mouth.

It hushes the room completely, the three of us focusing on her. I want to make her moan way fucking harder than that.

“We met at the Padres game,” Troy fills in, crossing his arms over his chest. “How do you two know each other?”

“We met at the library,” I add.

The three of us share a look and we grin pretty much at the same time. This is exactly our luck.

It’s not the first time this has happened. During high school, and even a short stint in college when we were in schools close enough to compete, we kept ending up finding the same women attractive. It usually just… happened.

What would follow would be a brutal challenge between the three of us to try and win her over to our side, with the twins usually teaming up. Despite that, we have a pretty solid 50/50 standing and it hasn’t happened in years. Not after I met Selina…

“Is that all?” Lily asks, her voice a little shaky.

Her office is absolutely dwarfed by the three of us and she can’t see outside anymore because we basically block the glass surfaces with our collective bulk. She’s stuck here with us, no means of escape.

“Yes, I’ve met all three of you. Troy and Callum last Friday, at the baseball game, and Austin at the library the next day. And I thoroughly didn’t expect to see any of you again. However, I guess we’re not that blessed, are we?” she asks.

She’s managed to jab at all three of us at the same time. I don’t think any of the Stephenson brothers is very well-versed with rejection. I certainly am not, and with Selina in my very recent past, I’ve had far more practice than Callum or Troy.

Callum presses his lips together, giving his twin an expectant look.

“Did you get the flowers?” he asks.

“The flowers?” I butt in, quirking a brow. “Since when the fuck do you two send flowers to anyone who isn’t dead?”

And so it begins.

Troy hushes me with a raised hand. We both know it won’t end there.

“I did, thank you,” Lily says, tucking a strand of her auburn hair behind her ear. “They were very pretty.”

“So where are they, then?” Callum continues, turning around and looking around himself as if he’s looking for the bouquet. “I don’t see ‘em anywhere.”

“They’re in the kitchen,” Lily says, that blush of hers creeping up again to her cheeks.

“That’s no way to thank us for our consideration,” Troy says with a mock pout.

“Wait, so you two knew she was going to be here?” I ask.

If they knew where to send the flowers, they had to know she worked here. Which of course means nothing because they didn’t know that I’d met her…

“Jealous we’re one step ahead of you?” Callum asks, like he’s reading my mind.

“No one’s a step ahead of anyone,” Lily gasps, pupils dilating. “We need to play nice with each other for the sake of your little sister, that’s it. We’ll get through this trip with our collective dignities intact and then we can forget that… this,” she motions at the three of us as if we’re some indefinable entity that she’s afraid of stepping too close to, lest we swallow her up.

We just might, to be honest.

“We can forget that this ever happened, okay?”

“Tell me, Lily, what do you think this is?” Troy asks, a predatory grin stretching across his lips.

He takes a step closer to her. And then another. The urge to rush between the two of them and grab her for myself is only held back by the fact that her assistant and probably half the rest of her office is watching at us right now – Troy and Callum can make a crowd gather anywhere – and that our stepmother and sister are in the building.

I vow that the next time I’m alone with Lily, it won’t be the same, though.

She opens her mouth and closes it again just as quickly, at a loss for words. I know what she’d like to say, what she thinks this is… And she’s completely right.

This is three men who any woman would die to have just one of, all wanting her. Needing her. And to make matters worse, we’re stepbrothers.

Her well-bred, well-behaved little brain can’t take it, and she certainly can’t put it into words.

Which is exactly why she needs us.

“I’ll tell you what this is,” I say, my voice dark and low.

Callum and Troy both glance at me, but I only have eyes for Lily as I move closer to her.

She’s standing in front of her desk so in a couple of steps, I have her pinned between myself and the hard wood, with my cock throbbing in my slacks. I’m so close to her that I can inhale her scent freely and if I were to only put my arms around her, she’d be plush against me. I stand close enough that she can feel my cock against her hip.

“This is you being given a choice. I don’t know how you did it, baby, but you’ve got us all on the hook now and none of us will give up until we have you. And you get to live with that, think about it every second of every day… And then you’re going to be stuck with us with nowhere to run.”

I pause for a moment, cocking my head to the side slightly and letting my eyes track the line of her chin, the curve of her neck. I don’t touch her, but I can see her visibly shaking as if I was running my fingertips over her right now.

“And then you won’t have anywhere to run but right into our arms.”

The last part is more of a growl than anything else. It’s a promise. A promise that we’ll have her, one way or another. She doesn’t need to know yet that it’s going to be a competition between the three of us, but it is without doubt that we all want her and we won’t stop before we have her.

Completely.

At that very moment, the door swings open and her assistant peeks in.

“Hey, Christine,” Troy greets her jovially, though he doesn’t quite turn to face her.

I’m pretty sure Troy and Callum have the same problem I’m currently having. With that table right there and Lily pressed up against it, the mental image of bending her over it and fucking her senseless is far too fucking delicious to ignore. And that comes with certain physical… difficulties when in the company of others.

“Um, hi,” she says, looking a little shell-shocked.

She hones in on why she came in the first place, though, in her defense.

“Lily, they need you in… um, at… the meeting! You have a meeting!” she quips, visibly relieved that she figured out what to say instead of gawking at the situation.

I lick across my lips, grinning as I look at Lily. I’m not sure if she’s taken a breath since I started talking, but her heart has been pounding through her chest, making me want to put my palm over that silky blouse of hers and feel it thudding.

“Right, the meeting,” Lily says, wiggling past me.

I don’t make it easier for her.

“Gentlemen, we’ll…I… I’ll see you in Hawaii,” Lily says finally, rushing out of the room.

She does that a lot. The whole running thing.

Christine disappears after her and as I watch the two of them leave, immediately starting to talk to one another in hushed voices as they walk down the hall like they’re running from a tsunami, I notice the rest of our onlookers. At least ten clerks and lawyers are staring at us, though mostly at Callum and Troy, truth be told.

I give the onlookers one harsh look and they scatter like mice. The door falls shut behind Lily and Christine and I turn to face my brothers.

“So,” I say. “I think we have some things to discuss.”

Do we ever…