Foundation for Three by Vella Day

personal?”
    A brief flash of indecision skated across his face. Way to go. She’d shared her fears with him—had been more open with him than with her own family—and foolishly thought he might want to share back. Zoey loved analyzing people and reverted to shrink mode too often.
    He leaned back in his seat. “I’m an open book.” He upended the bottle and drank his beer.
    That was what most people said, but they really weren’t. She could ask him something else, but she couldn’t help herself. She was obsessive about compartmentalizing people into personality types, but she didn’t want to jump to the wrong conclusion. “Are you and Thad a couple?”
    He nearly spit out his beer. “Couple? Fuck no. We like to share our women.”
    Her heart stopped.

Chapter Six

    “Y ou told her we shared?” Thad shook his head at Pete. “What the fuck were you thinking? The woman almost died yesterday. Hell, she witnessed two men get shot. One of them being me.” Thad tapped his chest.
    That was the problem. Pete had just reacted. This might be Rock Hard, Montana where sharing was the norm rather than the exception, but he knew damn well that a woman like Dr. Zoey Donovan wouldn’t be into something like that. Christ . She was from freaking uptight Connecticut and even went to a prestigious boarding school.
    Pete needed to explain. “She asked if you and I were a couple. Can you fucking imagine? I couldn’t let her think that was true.” There . He’d said it. It had taken a while to get over the embarrassment. He didn’t have anything against gays. Hell, two of his best workers were together. Pete just didn’t want a beautiful woman to think he swung that way.
    “She thought we were gay?” Thad laughed so hard he had to grab his arm. “Shit, that hurts. Don’t make me laugh again.” He swiped his eye. “What made her think that?”
    Pete understood why she’d drawn the conclusion. “She asked how you and I met and how we ended up being roommates. I told her about the convenience store defacement and about how the landlord kicked you out of your apartment. It makes sense she might think that.”
    Thad dropped his head back on the hospital pillow. “So you mentioned sharing because you wanted to fucking prove to her you were straight.” It came out as a statement rather than a question.
    If Pete was that transparent then why couldn’t Zoey see that? “Maybe. Yes. But I was upset and a bit disoriented. It’s not every day I have to comfort a woman who’s been through something so upsetting.” It wasn’t totally his fault. “She’s intriguing, you know, and quite distracting.”
    “You know you fucked things up for us?”
    His roommate had seemed quite taken with her during the sting. Now, Pete had probably ruined any chance of her ever going out with either of them. “Zoey seems like the type to forgive.”
    “How do you fucking figure?”
    “When I told her about me and Alex, she didn’t judge my dad—much.” He shook his head. “Shit. I’m grasping at straws, aren’t I?”
    “Hell, yeah, you are.” Thad inhaled deeply, and then blew out a long breath. “Don’t worry about it. She’s smart and nice. If she thinks about it, she might forgive you.”
    “Me? What about you?”
    “I don’t need forgiveness. I’ll just tell her you lied about sharing. Then I’ll ask her out for myself.”
    Pete’s jaw hardened, and he gripped the seat of the chair. If Thad ever followed through, Pete would throw his sorry ass out on the street.
    No he wouldn’t. But he’d think about it.
    Thad laughed again. “Gotcha!”
    “You’re a real shit, you know that?”
    His roommate waved a hand. “Trying to lighten the mood, that’s all.”
    Pete leaned back. “When she was crying, my heart broke for her. She was scared, man. It messed with my mind.”
    Thad looked to the side, suddenly sobering. “I know. I watched every range of emotion cross her face during the exchange. That’s why I had to