Page 50 of Triplets for the Pucking Playboys (Forbidden Fantasies #18)
Beau paces, circling the coffee table, not meeting my eye.
“It gets worse. Talia edited the Front footage to make it look like you were high, or out of it, or ignoring the team. There’s a three-minute cut of the trailer collapse, and it’s missing the part where you told Finn to call the medic.
It’s just you, out cold, and the narrative that you were strung out or unfit. ”
I sit. The futon is as hard as it looks, but it holds me. My legs tingle, then go numb. “So you’re telling me,” I say, voice paper-thin, “that every part of my life for the last few months is on a hard drive somewhere, labeled exhibit A?”
Finn nods. “That’s the part we can prove.”
Nobody speaks for a second. The only sound is the click of the baseboard heater, the intermittent wail of a siren from four stories below.
Grey’s voice is level, but the words are loaded. “We took it to the GM, legal, and HR. They all seemed relieved to have a reason to get rid of her.”
I laugh, this time for real. “You mutinied.”
He shrugs. “Somebody had to.”
Finn turns from the window, bracing both hands on the frame. “We got her to admit it. On record. She said you were a liability, that she flagged you for ‘the good of the team.’ Then she threatened us, said we’d lose our contracts if we made it public.”
I stare at the wall, at the Scandinavian print, the only thing in the room that isn’t a memory or a threat. “And?”
Beau spreads his hands, palms up. “And now she’s on leave. Indefinite, with pay, but off the team. The league’s doing an investigation, but everyone who mattered already knows what went down.”
My chest hurts in a way I wasn’t expecting. There’s no relief, just a hollow where the anger used to be.
Finn tries to smile, but it comes out crooked. “You could come back,” he says. “If you want.”
I look at my belly, at the impossible roundness of it, and shake my head. “You know I can’t.”
Grey is ready for this. “We thought you’d say that. Which is why”—he glances at Beau, who nods—“we set up a backup. One of the sponsors is starting a wellness thing for players and ex-players. It’s all online, remote, but they want you to run it. Your name, your protocols, your rules.”
Finn grins, the old reckless light flickering in his eyes. “I’ll be your first client,” he says. “I already quit drinking.”
Beau, still crouched, takes my hand and squeezes it. “We want you, Sage,” he says. “Not just the team. Not just for tape and protein bars and ‘good job’ emails. We want you in our lives.”
The words crack something open. For months, I’ve run every scenario: humiliation, expulsion, shame. I never once imagined anyone would fight for me.
I cover my face with my hands, and for a second, the whole room is nothing but sound: my own ragged breathing, the shudder of a subway underfoot, the faint, hopeful laughter from the street below.
When I look up, the three of them are still there. Waiting.
I clear my throat, try to find a joke, but all that comes out is, “I’m not sure I even know how to do anything but this.”
Finn shrugs. “We’ll teach you.”
Beau says, “We’ll figure it out together.”
Grey, the last to speak, gives a slow, deliberate nod. “You’re not alone, Sage. Not anymore.”
The weight lifts, a millimeter at a time. It isn’t much, but it’s enough.
The first tear falls so slow it’s a cliché.
It hangs in the corner of my eye, refusing to drop, as if there’s still a chance I can swallow it back.
I keep talking, keep spinning sentences about “phosphagen cycles” and “post-trauma wellness,” as if any of that matters, but the next tear comes faster and now my face is hot, salt slicked across my cheeks, my breathing stuttering on the inhale.
I laugh, or try to, but it comes out as a strangled yelp.
It’s not fear. That was before, in the hallways and hospital rooms and the ambulance, when every second was an open wound and every next breath was in doubt. This is the after, the drop off the ledge when you realize you’re not alone, and the only thing left to do is let it all shake loose.
Beau moves first. He doesn’t hesitate, just crosses the space and kneels in front of the futon, his hand on my knee.
He doesn’t say anything; he just looks at me, steady and soft in a way that is so un-Beau, I almost lose it.
I want to crawl inside that calm, to be wrapped up and carried off, but my body won’t move, so I just let him hold my leg until the shaking ebbs.
Finn tries to hold out, leaning on the counter, but I see the way his mouth warps at the edges, the way he can’t stand still, the way his fingers dig into the fake marble like he’s bracing for a hit.
He’s blinking fast, not because he’s sad, but because he’s spent his whole life refusing to be seen and now it’s all leaking out, messy and unfiltered.
When I finally look his way, he laughs and wipes his nose on his sleeve.
“Jesus,” he says, “you always did have to be the tough one.”
Grey just stands there. He’s a statue, arms folded, head tipped slightly to the side, watching like he’s memorizing every tremor in my face for future reference.
He doesn’t offer comfort, but he doesn’t look away either.
If anything, his attention is its own form of care—a silent, unblinking promise that nothing will go unnoticed, nothing will go unprotected.
I’m still crying when I reach out, grabbing Beau’s shoulder, pulling him closer.
He comes willingly, folding me into a hug that’s more tackle than embrace, but gentle too.
His shirt smells like old sweat and hotel shampoo, and I burrow my face there, letting the noise of my sobs disappear into the cotton.
He holds me, one hand on my back, the other cradling the base of my skull.
It’s so much contact I want to flinch, but instead I press in, greedy for every second.
Finn breaks first, crossing the room and perching on the armrest. He wraps a hand around my ankle, thumb stroking the bone there.
I can feel his pulse, rapid-fire, matching my own.
Grey stays where he is, but then—so subtle I almost miss it—he uncrosses his arms and steps forward, standing at the head of the futon.
He places a hand on my shoulder, warm and heavy.
It grounds me, roots me in the moment, makes it real.
I let my head loll back, resting against his hip.
He’s a wall, unyielding, and I have never needed anything more.
I wipe at my face, and now the crying is over, just a residue. My eyes are swollen, my nose is running, but I’m smiling, and the men are all smiling back. For the first time in months, maybe years, I feel more whole than hollow.
“I love you three,” I whisper.
Finn snorts, but his grip tightens. “Took you long enough.”
Beau leans back, brushing the hair from my face, his eyes wet. “If you ever leave again, we’re all coming after you. In shifts, if we have to.”
Grey’s voice is a low rumble. “She’s not leaving.”
The statement is simple, like gravity or hunger, but it holds more truth than anything I’ve said in months.
We stay like that, knotted together, until the pulse of the city outside shifts, until the sun moves far enough to throw stripes across the floor. The world feels warmer now, the room less like a bunker and more like the start of something.
Eventually, Finn pulls out his phone, opening a spreadsheet with a flourish. “We need a business plan,” he says, and I almost laugh at the earnestness in his voice. “We’ve got some time before the season ends, and we have to be ready by then.”
Beau grins. “We’ll get sponsors. Grey’s already got the connections.”
Grey shrugs, but there’s pride in the motion. “One of the old trainers wants to help too. Said she’d run the day-to-day if you want to focus on the clinical side.”
I stare at them, at the trio of faces that once seemed so far apart, now aligned in a mission I never knew I needed.
I run my hands over my stomach, feeling the kick of a foot or maybe an elbow. It’s so real now, so impossible to ignore. I wonder if the three in there can sense this moment, if they’ll remember it as a kind of homecoming.
I look at Beau, at Finn, at Grey. “You know this is going to be a mess,” I say. “None of us knows what we’re doing.”
Finn shrugs. “Neither do parents. People do it every day.”
Beau laughs, and the sound is loud, alive, reckless. “We’ll fake it. Or we’ll figure it out. Doesn’t matter.”
Grey places his hand over my belly, fingers splayed, and the touch is both delicate and certain. “We’re in it,” he says. “All the way.”
We talk logistics until the light fades, until my voice is hoarse and my stomach is rumbling, until the world outside disappears behind the fogged-up glass. We plan, we joke, we argue over the best website domain and the worst possible branding. None of it feels like work.
At some point, Cass comes home, finds the four of us tangled on the futon, her apartment transformed into a think tank or maybe just a den for strays.
She smiles, rolls her eyes, and then brings out a tray of mismatched mugs, pouring coffee for everyone but me.
I get ginger tea, which is exactly what I want, and I let myself feel real, unfiltered joy.