JULIET Strong arms catch me before I meet the fate of the football field, and I hear snickers all around me. "Isn't she like the best?" I hear someone's attempt at a whisper. "That was a rookie mistake." "You okay?" Scott asks me, concern written all over his face. I wipe away the hair from my face that somehow escaped the prison of my ponytail. "Yeah, good catch." He grins playfully. "Told ya." My heart is pounding in my ears as I turn my back on Scott again and spot the guys now standing off to the side with their eyes on us. It's undoubtedly Alonso Moretti. Tall, dark hair that is wet and plastered to his forehead. He's dressed in shorts and a T-shirt that stretches over his muscled chest and arms, leaving no doubt that he's seriously hot. And the whispering idiots are giggling now, most likely ogling him and the rest of the guys who are undoubtedly on the football team. Scott counts with a tap on my waist, and this time, I make sure I do the stunt per
ALONSO POV I glance down at my brother's choice of clothing and shake my head. "You do know it's still summer, right?" I only receive his customary bored expression in return, and I chuckle in response. "Remind me why we are going out for breakfast when we have a fucking chef waiting to tend to our every need?" Arc raises a dark eyebrow at me as he buckles himself in my truck. I shrug. "Because I feel like going out." "Didn't you have a brutal practice just this morning?" He runs his hand through his slightly longer hair. You know what the problem is with being part of triplets? The fuckers can see straight through your bullshit. My brothers know my schedule as if it's their own. I also pride myself on extreme discipline and routine, so whenever I do something out of the ordinary, they know immediately. I usually don't hide anything from my brothers, but I can't tell them of my new little interest. Because usually things don't turn out all too well when I have
JULIET POV My heart is literally galloping out of my chest at being in close proximity to not just one but two Morettis! I'm trying really hard to keep my outward appearance as cool as a cucumber, but inside, I'm keeling over with both excitement and fear. What if they find out who I am? My mother changed her identity before she met my father, but if people like the Morettis decide to dig into your past, I'm sure they'll find out the truth. They certainly have the means to do so. Alonso Moretti had an aura even when he was standing far away from me. And right now, he has his hand in mine with a predatory look in his eyes. Danger emanates out of his every pore, and if I knew what was good for me, I would stay far away from him. I smile politely and extract my hand from his. "Nice to meet you." I can't quite get a read on Alonso because he's wearing sunglasses, but Arcangelo's head is slightly angled to the side, and he's unapologetically looking me up and down.
ARCANGELO POV I knock on my brother's study's door. One thing he hates is people barging into his personal space unannounced, and sometimes being triplets can be overwhelming. You're always up in each other's business and space and fucking head. Sometimes, my brothers know what I want before I've even figured it out. It's both a blessing and a curse. And also the exact reason why I'm knocking on Alessi's door right now, when his head is probably stuck in a medical journal. "Come in!" He barks, and true enough, his big body is slumped over his desk with a book open in front of him. For some reason, all three of us always want to be the best in what we do. My father always said we should do what we wanted, but then my mother would always interject and tell us there's no need to be mediocre while doing it. Or maybe it's just in our nature to be highly competitive and strive for success. The school year hasn't even started yet, but my brother is already getting a head sta
ALESSI POV I'm sitting in my car outside the football stadium, looking at a damn girl in a cheerleading photo on my phone. Juliet Monroe. Who the hell names their daughter Juliet anyway? There's a lot of cheerleading things I found about her online, like there are pages dedicated to her, but none that she runs herself. What eighteen year old girl doesn't have social media? That was literally the weirdest thing to me. I did do some digging, though. Her mother died when she was a kid by apparently drinking too many sleeping pills and then drowning in the bath. The police report claims it was an accident, but it sounds like suicide to me. Her father is a construction manager, and he never remarried. Miss Monroe isn't just some blonde bimbo cheerleader like I initially thought. Oh no, Miss Monroe was valedictorian of her high school class and enrolled in my department. A smart blonde bimbo. So now I'm in my car, waiting to see a glimpse of her like I
JULIET POV Everyone around me is restless in anticipation of who made the A-squad. Well, everyone except me. Not to blow my own horn, but I've been killing it at tryouts this past week, so if I don't make the cut, it would be surprising. The rest of my new teammates are even starting to act nicer towards me. I'm not here to make friends, but it would also be nice not to be in an antagonizing environment for the next four years at least. Scott has been really cute, offering to drive me into town to get everything I need for my dorm room. I also see the way he looks at me, and usually, I would have squashed it before he got any wrong ideas, but I needed him. I even feel slightly bad about it. You can tell he's nice and sincere, and he will make any girl really lucky if he was their boyfriend. If I were a normal girl, I would've flirted with him for sure. "Are you nervous?" He asks me where he's leisurely stretched out on the turf with his hands tucked under his head.
ALESSI POV There's an energy in the house that is palpable. Alonso has asked me twice if I think his outfit is okay. Alonso never asks me for fashion advice. He says my style is too uptight, and Arc looks too emo. Arc has been playing soulful melodies for almost two hours on the baby grand piano in the living room. He only stops to jot down notes. That means she's coming to the party. And I don't know how I feel about that. Our start of term parties have become legendary on campus. Only the who's who of campus get invited. That means the whole football team and the hot chicks who follow them, some of Arc's music friends, and a few people who I tolerate from my pre-med class. I don't really mingle with the students from my class. If I have my brothers, I don't need anyone else. The front doorbell rings, and I assume it's some dudes from the football team. Those guys love to party, and I let them indulge at our place for at least one party a term. "Ge
JULIET POV I take small sips of the rum and coke I poured myself. it's more coke than rum, though. I have no intention of getting drunk in the devil's lair. The party is nothing like I imagined a college party would be like. And the house is no frat house either. It's off campus and secluded, so there will be no cops being called because of noise. The house itself is something I imagine a well-off family would have. People with kids and careers, not three college boys. It's the type of house I deserved growing up in, filled with love and laughter. I'm instantly reminded of why I'm here. My eyes dart around the backyard with tables of food and drinks set up, music playing, and people laughing and dancing. Like a magnet, I'm drawn to two of the Moretti boys. One is most definitely Arcangelo with his black clothes and tattoos. If it wasn't for their personal style, I would have struggled to figure out who is who. The one with the girl has to be Alessi. The brother I
ALESSI POV In my life, I have never seen something more perfect than my twin daughters. Love like I've never experienced before took a hold of me when these two tiny little girls were born. I've always been my brothers' keeper, the one with the solid head on his shoulders. I think those titles were just preparing me for this role. A father. "Are they supposed to be that small?" Alonso peers through the glass of the incubator. "Are they sick? Why are they in the baby growing thing?" Arc joins Alonso to peer through the glass to the perfection that is my daughters. "It's just procedure." I enlighten them. "They were born on thirty-seven weeks, but they're healthy and perfect." Utterly perfect. They look like their mom, but babies' faces change every single day. "Dude, you have to tell me how do I get Summer to marry me."I tell Alonso. He managed to bag Amelia, even with all the shit that was going on at the time. "You just ask her." He tells me without
AMELIA POV What was supposed to be the happiest time in my life has become one of the worst. Alonso is lying with his head in my lap, my fingers running through his hair as we're waiting for news from the doctors who are operating on Arcangelo. Bailey striked again. This time, she got caught, and her fucking parents can't get her out of this one this time. The shooting is on every social media site, it's trending on the internet. Videos are circulating around from fans. I feel so sorry for Lola. She's still wearing the dress she performed in, clutching Cassie to her chest as if she might lose her, too. They gave her something to wipe the blood from her arms, but there's a faint streak of it left on her cheek. The world would be a worse place if Arcangelo died. I kiss Alonso's cheek, and his eyes flutter open, sorrow in the swirl of green and brown. Alonso would not be the same person if he had to lose one of his brothers. They're all an extension of each other, and I pra
ALONSO POV I'm in seventh heaven. I know the bomb will explode very soon, but right now, I'm blissfully holding my wife in my arms as she's coming down from another orgasm. My wife. I fucking love the sound of that. It's not the way I wanted to do it. She deserves a big wedding with a designer dress and a big, fat diamond ring, and I promised her that I would give her all of that, but she said our wedding was the best. I thread my fingers through hers and kiss the diamond wedding band on her finger. I've already arranged appointments with jewelry designers for her engagement ring, and then I will do it the right way. "I fly out tomorrow afternoon with the team." I reluctantly tell her. "I want you there, but I also don't want you in the open where Bailey can easily get to you." She sighs and nuzzles her face in my neck. "I know. Maybe I'll arrange to see my parents while you're not here." "No!" I say definitely. "We face them together, I'm not sending you into the lion
ARCANGELO POV I must have died and gone to heaven. I have the girl I've been pining over up against a wall with her full, succulent lips eagerly moving under mine. She was a vision tonight in the elegant black dress with her dark curls spilling everywhere. Her lips were painted a fiery red that enticed me the entire time, and I just couldn't stop myself anymore. I tried being respectful because she has a child. My plan was to make her fall so irrevocably in love with me that by the time I did kiss her, she wouldn't be able to resist me. I wanted her to trust me implicitly, to make her feel that I would never let her down, that I'm solid. I hope I did enough because just this one taste of her is making me addicted, and I don't think I would be able to stop touching her now. She groans underneath my mouth, opening those lips like a flower, and I take that opportunity to plunge my tongue inside. She tastes like mint and desire, and a groan rumbles from my chest. I think I might
LOLA POV I don't exactly know what is going on with my life right now. It's like I'm in a twilight zone, part of a family in an instant. Arcangelo refuses to let me and Cassie go back to the label's apartment, and at first, I felt slightly awkward being at his parents' house, but everyone else handled it like it was completely normal. I understand that Alessi's ex-girlfriend apparently almost killed Alonso's girlfriend a few years back, so everyone who might be in danger right now has to stay here. But I'm not even his girlfriend. I'm just one of the artists he signed. Right? Wrong. I've never experienced anything that I feel for Arcangelo. The sexual tension is brewing underneath the surface whenever we touch. It's in the songs that we write together, in the way we gaze into each other's eyes when we think nobody is watching. Every night, after a big dinner, and I've given Cassie her bath and taken a shower, we climb into his bed. About an hour after when Cassie is f
ALONSO POV I can't believe one girl has the power to have all of us on our toes. I, for sure, never thought the sweet girl that we grew up with would turn out to be some obsessed psychopath. Apparently, Evan and Sammy Micheals have Bailey's son. They took her son from her when she was starting to talk about us again over the phone. My parents are pissed because they weren't even warned. Let's just say that the friendship between the Morettis and the Micheals would never be salvaged again. "What's with the security?" One of my teammates asks as we finish up at the stadium. "You good man?" Fuck, I love this team. We're new, and certainly the underdogs, but we're becoming a family. They've been concerned about me ever since the allegations of sexual assault. It's dfficult being in the public eye, and they all know how it feels to be under such scrutiny. "I'm good, but there's someone who's a bit too obsessed, just being cautious." "Be careful out there." He claps me on the s
AMELIA POV "Bailey Micheals has been sighted by Alessi Moretti yesterday." I hear the words coming out of my father's mouth, but it's like it doesn't register at first. I blink rapidly, trying to make sense of what he just said. "You said she would never set foot in this country again!" My mother jumps from her chair in front of my father's desk. "You promised!" "She didn't come in with her real passport. We're scouring security footage to try and see which airport she came through." My heart starts beating rapidly after it missed a few beats. Fear rushes through me in an instant. Bailey is going to kill me. "You don't have to worry about anything." Dad looks at me. "There's no way she'll be able to get to you here." Just another reason to keep me locked up in my gilded cage. I can't do this anymore. It feels like I'm going fucking insane. Even when I'm strolling in the garden, I can feel eyes on me like a hawk. I know I said that this is what I have to
ARCANGELO POV I'm in bed, and Bach is playing softly through the surround sound, but I can't fall asleep, my mind on the dark-haired petite beauty that is in my building. Lola is on my mind twenty-four-seven. She's the first thing I think about when I wake up in the morning and the last person in my thoughts before I close my eyes. Working with her has been nothing but astonishing. We've been writing music about love, loss, happiness, hurt, and so entwined in our own little bubble that the assistants have to remind us to eat. I have never met someone who understands how I make music like she does. It's like she was always tethered to my soul, and I just had to find her in the cosmos. Even Cassie crept under my skin. She calls me her prince charming, and I'm not mad about it. I wonder what they're doing right now. Cassie is probably asleep already, maybe Lola, too. What would it feel like if they were here? Would Lola listen to classical music with me while I run my finge
ALESSI POV I feel slightly guilty for being this happy, but fuck, I can't help it. My internship is coming to an end. I still have the two-day assessment coming up before I'm officially a resident, but I've been working for this all my life. I'm prepared and ready. Then I have this gorgeous woman roaming my apartment with my babies in her belly. Granted, she's currently shooting lasers at me while I'm calmly sipping my coffee before I have to leave for my shift. "You don't get to decide if I work or not, Alessi!" Summer shouts at me, pink blotches appearing on her cheeks. "You're completely taking over my life! First my apartment, and now this!" I might have told her supervising nurse that she will probably have to hire another nurse soon, seeing that Summer might quit her job. "I was just thinking about the future." I shrug. "You're mine, and I have to take care of you. Carrying twins is not going to be easy on your body, you think you can work the shifts you do being se