The snow had finally stopped and the clouds cleared, leaving the sky full of stars. Gavin tilted his head back, enjoying the silence. The silence outside of the muddied meadow, anyway, where the guys were still laughing and ribbing one another about the hard hits and missed catches of the game.

“You’re unusually happy, considering we lost.” Jason stopped next to him, stripping out of his mud-caked shirt despite the frigid temperature. “I still think they cheated with that last play.”

Gavin had to laugh. “You got tackled by our own guy who was slipping around on his ass more than staying on his feet. They didn’t cheat.”

He watched as Jason tugged a clean thermal out of the Peaks duffle he’d dropped at the edge of the clearing. The chill of his own shirt was sticking against his skin seeping into his bones, but it was apparent that Jason had something he wanted to talk about, so he waited.

And waited. Finally, unable to stand it anymore, he broke the silence. “What’s on your mind?”

Jason looked at him. “What makes you think something is on my mind?”

“You’re nagging like an old woman.” Gavin grinned. “Even more than usual.”

“Shit,” he muttered, tossing the wet shirt into the bag. “Everything’s just going sideways lately, that’s all.”

Before Gavin could ask what he meant, Mitchell and Connor joined them.

“Problem,” Mitchell said, slipping to a sliding stop next to them. The mud was turning to slush, which made getting traction difficult. And for a guy from Southern California, traction on slush was a completely foreign experience.

“Seems to be going around,” Gavin muttered. “What’s going on?”

“Erin’s wasted.”

Gavin blinked once and could feel the grin spread across his lips. “Is that so?”

“You may not find it so funny when I tell you they’re all drunk,” Mitch replied sourly. “Every single one of them is falling down, giggling madly, completely trashed.”

The other men couldn’t hold back their laughter any longer. “It’s not unusual for the women while we play,” Connor told him. “The spiked hot chocolate is as much of a staple to this game as anything else.”

“Why is it a problem?” Gavin asked.

Mitchell shook his head. “There’s been a reporter that’s been snooping around Erin’s grandfather’s place. He followed us to the rehearsal hall too.”

“And?” Jason asked.

“And I’ve been part of her personal security team for three years. I’ve never seen her as intoxicated as she is right now.”

Gavin shook his head. “Why is it a problem?”

Mitch blew out a breath, a large cloud of condensation formed in front of him. “She hasn’t been herself lately. Typically, she remains in complete control of every aspect of her life. The letters have set her off kilter and she’s on a path I haven’t seen before.”

Gavin nodded. The letters had begun when? “You’re worried about her.”

“She’s my friend.”

“Are you sure that’s all there is to it?” Jason’s question had a bite that had Gavin’s head jerking up. What the hell?

There was a tension in the air that hadn’t been there before. A quick look at Connor told him he wasn’t the only one feeling it. Mitchell and Jason had squared off, facing one another. While Mitch’s stance was relaxed, Jason stood rigidly, fists clenched at his sides.

“What’s going on?” Gavin asked again, not really caring which of them answered. He was missing something and he didn’t like it.

This time Mitchell’s lips twitched, but he didn’t take his eyes off Jason. “It seems that someone isn’t all that happy that I’ve been spending time with Gwen and is trying to infer that there’s also something going on between me and Erin.”

“Wait, this is about my sister? I thought you were hooking up with Chloe.” Connor had started laughing at Gavin’s outburst, so he wasn’t prepared when Gavin shoved him, causing him to land on his ass.

Jason didn’t laugh with the rest, instead turning to look at Gavin. “I’ll talk to you later. It’s time we took a more serious look at what’s been happening around town and see if we need to beef up the services for our clients. I’ll start a proposal and bring it to you.”

Gavin nodded and watched as his partner stalked off. “Holy shit.”

“You had no idea he was into Gwen?” Connor asked, still sitting on the ground.

“Gwen doesn’t like him,” Mitch told him. “That’s why she’s been hanging out with us so much. She told Erin that he gave her the creeps, so Erin asked for my help.”

“Why wouldn’t she tell me?”

Connor was climbing to his feet and started laughing again. “You’ve been a little preoccupied with Regan since she got back. Maybe she didn’t want to distract you.”

“She’s my sister,” Gavin objected as he hauled Connor to his feet and the three of them began to walk back to where the women were waiting. “She should know that she could come to me with anything.”

Again, Mitchell shook his head. “She didn’t want to put you in the middle. You work with Jason. He’s your partner and your friend. She knew that if she went to you and let you know he made her uncomfortable, you’d take her side. She didn’t want to cause any trouble for you.”

“You should have told me,” Gavin told him.

“I just did.”

Connor interrupted. “You need to think about this from her perspective. If there’s one thing I’ve learned being with Bethany for so long it’s that women overthink everything. Even the small things they weigh as though it was a matter of national security.”

He glanced at his brother.

“With everything you went through with Kathy, then getting Peaks started, it’s no wonder she didn’t want to cause any friction between you and your partner.”

Gavin admitted that they had a point. He didn’t like it, but he understood it. Turning back to Mitchell’s original worry, he asked, “What does it matter that Erin’s had too much to drink? There’s no press out here.”

“She’s been acting off, like I said.” There was a shrug in his tone, but the underlying worry was obvious. “There’s something bothering her, something beyond the typical worry about the tour or whatever monkey show her publicist wants her to put on.”

“Are you sure it isn’t just the normal woman stuff?” Connor asked again. “Bethany’s been acting strange lately, and she doesn’t have any of the types of stressors that you described Erin putting up with on a daily basis.”

“Yeah, because running a business and having a nearly teenaged boy is a walk in the park,” Gavin responded, bending to scoop a pile of snow into his hand before tossing it at his brother. For a smart guy, Connor was a dipshit about his wife.

Connor frowned and scooped his own pile of snow and mud to create his own snowball. “I’m being serious. Andy’s getting older, so things are easier in that regard, but something’s up. She doesn’t seem happy.”

Gavin stopped. “You think Bethany’s unhappy? Like how unhappy? You guys have been together since forever.”

“I don’t know if she’s thinking about leaving, but there’s something going on. Something that’s not right. Maybe it’s just worry about Andy and everything going on around town,” he said, not sounding all that convinced.

“Okay, so Erin’s freaking out about something, Bethany’s freaking out about something, Gwen’s freaking out about Jason. Is that everything?”

“You forgot Regan,” Mitch reminded him.

They’d come to a stop in front of Connor’s truck and could see the women inside. They were all laughing as though they were sitting front row of a comedy show rather than parked in a vehicle drinking schnapps like they were still in high school.

“Nah,” Gavin said, going around so he could open the passenger side door. “I know what Regan’s freaking out about. Me.”

Regan was still pleasantly buzzed as Gavin maneuvered his truck back toward town. Her head was filled with the various problems and secrets her friends had told her about. Bethany pregnant again, after all these years. It had been the scandal in high school. People had blamed her for Connor giving up his football scholarship, choosing instead to go into the Army so he’d have a paycheck to support his new family.

It had been a short-lived scandal when it became obvious that Connor didn’t feel like he was sacrificing anything and truly loved his little family. So those same people who had been the loudest detractors had become their biggest supporters when Bethany had gone into business for herself and had started her bookkeeping firm.

Times hadn’t been easy, but things had paid off, with Connor becoming the youngest chief of police in town history and Bethany now having a successful business. Not to mention their adorable, well-rounded son, who was the picture of his father with his mother’s wit. To imagine they would now be starting over, at the same time Regan herself would be considering starting a family was…

Wait. She sat up and shook her head. Where had that thought come from? She wasn’t starting a family. Not even close. She glanced at Gavin, but he was oblivious, focused on the road in front of them.

“You okay over there? You’re awfully quiet.”

She jumped when his voice cut through the silence. Letting out a breath, she shook her head again. She’d told him she didn’t want anything serious, but here she was, imagining starting a family with him. Should she tell him what she was thinking? Was he still thinking this was just a fling? Her pulse started a rapid throb in her throat at the thought he’d walk away if she told him her feelings were deepening. “I’m fine,” she said, ignoring what he was really asking.

“Did you have fun tonight?” she asked, trying to distract him. Her train of thought was not a conversation she wanted to have. Not when that schnapps had made her comfortably numb.

Gavin’s smile spread across his face and she couldn’t help but smile in return. “The Snow Bowl‘s always fun. The guys are different now, and there are more people involved, but it’s still fun. Did you have a good time?”

“I did,” she admitted. “It was fun to catch up with my friends like that.”

“You’ve been able to catch up since you’ve been back, haven’t you?”

She shrugged and shifted in her seat. “A bit, like that night at the Bitterroot. But they’re all busy, and my parents and sisters are trying hard to bring me back into the fold.”

“And do you want to be in the fold again?”

She cut him a glance, only to find him looking at her with an intensity that made her think he knew the answer. “Watch the road,” she instructed, trying to ignore the feeling that maybe, just maybe, he knew her better than she wanted to admit.

“Well?” he prompted.

“Well, what?” she retorted, irritated that he was making her say it. Of course she wanted to be back in the fold with her family. She loved them. They were family.

Instead of responding to her surly tone, he reached over and took her hand in one of his. “It’s okay to not be super comfortable with it all yet.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she told him. But she did. And the fact that he could see right through her was another thing on the growing list of things she didn’t want to think about.

How could he possibly understand that her parents’ need to be involved in every part of her life made her feel like she was suffocating? She could remember all too well the desire for privacy when she was a teenager. Regan thought it wouldn’t be an issue when she returned home. Her parents were aware she was an adult and would respect that. So far, she’d managed to hold them at bay with a few family dinners, but she didn’t know what to think about the fact that they’d invited Todd and given him the key to her house. Since then, she’d been avoiding them completely.

Letting out a sigh, she relented. Maybe it would be easier to say it aloud to someone who wasn’t wading through the murkiness of the family dynamics. Her sisters understood, but there was nothing they could do about it. They were dealing with the same thing. “It’s not that I don’t want to be back in the middle of things,” she told him, trying to figure out how to say the rest without sounding ungrateful. Her parents had sacrificed a lot for their girls, staying in Montana rather than moving to a more exotic locale to continue their archeological studies in ancient civilizations, something they talked about often. The fact Becca was nearing graduation made the possibility they could finally do so something they were excited about. “The whole thing is just overwhelming sometimes.”

“How so?”

The lights from town came into view, twinkling along the valley like a blanket of stars that had settled in for the night. Regan leaned back against the headrest. She didn’t really want to think about this with the few minutes they had left before he dropped her off, but now that she’d broached the subject, she couldn’t stop. “They’re overwhelming. They shoehorn themselves into every part of my life and stretch into other areas that I thought were sacred.”

“Like inviting your ex-husband to town and handing over the key to your place.”

“Like that,” she admitted.

When she fell silent again, he squeezed her hand. “What else did you think was sacred, Regan?” He lifted her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to the back of her fingers. “What is it that you are fighting to protect from everyone else?”

Tears filled her eyes at his tender words, but she blinked them back. She didn’t want to show weakness. Not when it came to her family. Not in front of him. “There’s nothing in my life that’s sacred,” she told him instead of admitting that she feared what she’d lose if she tried to go there again. “That’s the problem.”