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As soon as I get to the door, Tate pulls it open. He grabs me, pulling me into his arms so he can kiss me thoroughly.

“What,” I start, breathless when he pulls back. “Have you just been waiting by the door for me to get here?”

“Maybe,” he says. “Can you blame me?”

Ares and Callan join us in the entryway, both of them taking their turns at kissing me hello.

All three of them look relaxed, and I can tell from the bottle open on the coffee table in the living room that they’ve been decompressing from the festival today with a few drinks.

“What have you guys been up to?” I ask. It’s not like there’s a lot of ways to have fun in this town, especially if you aren’t from here. For people who live in a much bigger city most of the time, it must be downright boring.

“We found Catherine’s stash of board games,” Ares says, meaning the woman who owns this cabin and the others that she rents out. “So we’ve been making our way through those.”

They lead me back into the living room so I can see that they were in the middle of a Scrabble game.

“You should play with us,” Callan says, leaning in the door frame. “Most of these games are meant for four people anyway.”

“We could do Chutes and Ladders,” Tate says, holding up the box.

I smile, amused at the idea forming in my head. “Sure, I’ll play. But after you three were filling my phone up with your dirty talk, I think we need a twist on the rules.”

All at once, I have their undivided attention. “What did you have in mind?” Ares asks.

“Let’s make it interesting. Strip Chutes and Ladders?”

Heat blazes in their eyes immediately, and I know they’re on board.

Ares sets up the game, and Tate starts reading the rules in a very serious game show host voice. None of us are really paying attention, but the goal isn’t to win, after all.

“Ares, you go first,” Tate says, and that starts us playing.

It’s fun, just hanging out with them like this. It feels low pressure in a way that I’ve never really felt in Hope Falls, and it takes my mind off all the other stuff going on.

Callan is the first to lose ground, and we all hoot as he pulls one sock off.

“Come on,” Tate says, laughing. “Socks should count as one item together.”

“We didn’t establish that at the beginning,” Callan shoots back.

Ares gets unlucky next, and he’s already barefoot, so he pulls his shirt off with a wink at me.

I lose my shirt next, sitting there in jeans and a bra, and I don’t know if it’s the distraction or if they’re purposefully tanking the game, but the guys start losing ground—and clothes—quickly after that.

Tate loses his shirt and then both socks. I shimmy out of my pants. Callan’s shirt goes next, and then he ends up losing his pants on his very next roll.

So much of his body is on display, and I’m barely paying attention to the game at all now. I’m too busy tracing the tattoos on his arms and back, and the looping black lines that curl across his chest.

“Oop, get more naked, Brynn!” Ares laughs, and I don’t even mind. I take my bra off, my nipples immediately going peaked in the chilly air.

All three of them look at me, heat flashing in their eyes.

There are only a few more rolls left, and Tate ends up losing. Luckily—or unluckily—it’s before he has to get completely naked, and he’s just down to his boxers as the game wraps up.

We’re all laughing, teasing him about his shit luck, when Ares’ phone rings on the table.

He looks at it and makes a face. “Sorry, it’s Dani,” he says.

I know it’s not a big deal and that his agent has to call him to check in. But at the same time, when he answers the call and steps over to the window to take it, I can’t help the possessive feeling that fills me. He made sure to be certain I knew she was just his agent the last time she called, and something makes me want to remind him of that now.