Jackson McBride was hungover, and he knew exactly who to blame. As he stumbled into the kitchen squinting, he rubbed his aching head and cursed his delinquent brothers. After bar-hopping all night with Denny and Dally, his mouth tasted like a brewery.

Muted light streamed in through the floor-to-ceiling windows. Rain ran down the panes in rivulets. Jackson liked the weather in Vancouver. There was a lot of it, but it sure beat the sticky-hot, humid summers back home in Toronto. These business trips to British Columbia were about the only part of his job he enjoyed.

He turned as Denny ambled into the kitchen with a black carafe in his hands.

"Look who finally got up." Denny ruffled Jackson's hair as he passed. "Boy, we really drank you under the table, didn't we?" He held up the carafe. "Coffee?"

Jackson moaned and rubbed his temples. "Yes, please."

Denny's generous, low-timbred chuckle was unique to the McBride boys. Their mother had always said the brothers could turn a funeral into a nightclub just by laughing amongst themselves.

Jackson rubbed his bleary eyes as Denny took down a mug and poured a cup of steaming coffee from the carafe.

"Here." Denny slid the mug across the marble-topped island. "Drink this. Family meeting in five minutes. Dalton's already setting up the video chat."

Jackson lifted the mug to his mouth and inhaled deeply. He raised a brow as Denny's words sunk in.

"Family meeting?"

Denny nodded and folded his arms. "Dad called. You'd know this if you'd gotten out of bed before noon." He grinned. "Maybe you shouldn't drink so much, Red."

Jackson scowled. He hated it when Denny called him that. His hair was a brilliant shade of copper; it wasn't actually red at all. Not for the first time in his life, he wished he looked more like their mother, the way Denny and Dally did, with their black hair and ability to tan. Instead, he was a McBride through and through, red-haired and prone to burning in the sun.

"What's the meeting about?" he said around his mug.

Denny shrugged. "You know Dad. Probably something fiscal. Come on. Put a shirt on and meet us in the living room. You're blinding me with that lily white chest."

Jackson rolled his eyes and ambled out of the kitchen. "Don't be jealous."

"Why? Because I can spot your pale ass from space?" Denny's laughter followed Jackson down the hall.

In his bedroom, Jackson finger-combed his chin-length copper waves into some semblance of presentability and pulled a black shirt out of the closet. By the time he met his brothers in the living room, he was dressed and almost human, although the thudding between his temples was a reminder of last night's debauchery.

Dalton and Denman McBride were seated on the leather couch, neither of them with a raven hair out of place—despite the fact they'd drunk at least as much as Jackson the evening previous, if not more. They turned as one to greet him.

It would have been impossible to tell them apart if not for Dally's eyes: the iris of his left eye was half blue, half brown, and he wore glasses. The twins were identical aside from this. Tall and broad-shouldered but lean, they sprawled across the entire couch. Jackson was stocky by comparison. Solid as a tank, but not tall.

An open laptop sat on the smoked glass coffee table. Their father was onscreen. Jackson leaned his hip against the back of the couch.

Dad's voice, tinny over the speakers, dripped displeasure. "Nice of you to show up, son."

Jackson tipped his mug to the screen sardonically before taking a drink.

"Listen, boys, it's time I lay down the law," Dad growled. Behind his head, the Maple Airlines logo was emblazoned on the wall; he was calling from the office, as usual. "I assume you've seen the papers?"

Dad held up a copy of the Star. Jackson choked on his coffee, sputtering. He pressed his hand to his mouth and coughed to suppress a laugh. On the front page, in thick, black font, the headline read: THE MCBRIDE BOYS FLY HIGH. Beneath the headline, there was a photo of Jackson and the twins leaning drunkenly on each other in the middle of the street. They were flanked by a trio of pretty women. Jackson squinted at the picture. In it, his eyes were halfway closed, and he was holding a beer stein.

He snickered. "I don't know, I think we look pretty good, Dad."

"You look like you belong in a community college dorm," snapped his father, "not on the board of a national airline. How do you think this looks for us? After all the privileges you've been given. Thirty years old, and you can't hold a drink."

"I think I held it just fine," Jackson muttered. "It's upright."

Denny and Dally laughed in stereo.

Dad merely stared at them, stone-faced, his cheeks flushing. Jackson quieted and took a long sip of coffee. It was best not to anger their father. The idea that all redheads were hot-tempered was a myth, except when it came to Jonah McBride.

"This is not a joke, boys," Dad seethed. "I've had enough of your gallivanting. Denman, Dalton, you're thirty-three years old. Look at the example you're setting for your younger brother."

Denny sputtered. "It's not our fault Jackson can't hold his liquor."

Jackson bit back a laugh.

"Enough." Dad slapped his palm on his desk, making his video feed shake. "I've had it up to here with you three. It's time to settle down. I've made a decision." He regarded them each in turn. "If you're so interested in wine and women—"

"Mostly beer," Jackson interjected under his breath.

His father regarded the camera pointedly. "Whatever it is you like to imbibe in so much." He waved his hand. "I don't care. It ends now. And these womanizing ways have got to stop. What would your mother think?"

Jackson scowled. The ache between his temples intensified. It was a cheap shot, bringing up their mother. Jackson couldn't remember her much outside of a vague feeling and the stories his father and the twins told. Carrie McBride was a memory of a memory. To hear their father tell it, she was also a saint.

Denny and Dally sobered.

"Dad," Denny said. "We're not that bad."

"You're playboys." Their father invested the word with scorn. "Emphasis on the boys. I raised you to be men. I've made my decision. You have three months to clean up your acts, or I'll have you ousted from the board. All of you."

Jackson scoffed. "What are we supposed to do? Join a monastery?"

Dad's smile was mirthless. "Not quite. I want you to find wives. You'll be husbands, not monks. If you don't, you're out of the family business. And you can kiss your inheritance goodbye, too. I won't have the McBride legacy carried on by a trio of womanizing boozehounds. Why, when I was your age, I—"

Jackson tuned him out. The story was always the same: how Jonah McBride built a national airline from the ground up, starting with a single plane in the small, one-hangar town of his boyhood home in the Rocky Mountains—and how Jackson and the twins were burning that legacy to the ground. He couldn't possibly be serious about them getting married.

"—Is that understood?"

Jackson blinked at the screen. His father looked deadly calm. Denny and Dally were hunched over with their forearms resting on their knees looking as though someone had just shot the family dog.

A smile tugged at Jackson's lips.

"Sure, Dad," he piped up.

The twins looked at him.

Jackson smirked. "Find a wife or lose my place on the board. You got it."

"You can't be serious." Denny's glossy, black brows drew together. "You're going along with this farce?"

Jackson shrugged.

Denny exploded. If any of them had a temper, it was Denman McBride. He rose to his feet, waving his arms as he raged against their father's plan.

Jackson simply sat on the back of the couch, sipping his coffee, which had gone cold. He ignored Denny's outburst, his mind racing at the prospect of freedom. Marry or lose his position on the board of directors? It was easy. He just wouldn't get married. In fact, it was the perfect plan.

He crossed his ankles and let out a jovial whistle.

"The fuck are you so happy about?" snapped Denny.

Jackson grinned. "Nothing, man. Nothing at all. Here comes the bride."

Denny threw up his hands. "You're as crazy as Dad is."

Their father cleared his throat, and the boys quieted. Jackson leaned forward over the back of the couch, eager to hear whatever harebrained scheme Dad came up with next. A vein pulsed in Denny's forehead.

Dally finally spoke, his voice thoughtful as he polished his glasses on the hem of his shirt. "I'm not sure of the legalities of this plan."

"I don't give a damn about your legalities," Dad barked. "Get married or get another job. If you don't find suitable wives within the next twelve weeks, you can support yourselves and stop sucking on the Maple Airlines teat. And don't think you can just go out and ask the first woman you meet, either. I've got veto power over your choices." The ringing of a phone distracted him, and he looked away. "I have a twelve o'clock. Sort out your lives." He looked into the camera. "Or else."

The screen went black.

Denny growled. "Find wives in only three months?"

"I really don't think this is legal," Dally insisted.

Jackson's lips twitched. "Legal or not, your right-swipe fingers are about to get a workout."

Denny's head whipped around. "Ours? What about yours? You're in this, too, you know."

"Oh, I'm aware. I just don't care."

Denny clucked his tongue. "Not everything is a joke, Red. You may not care about the business, but Dally and I do. This is serious."

"Seriously insane," Jackson muttered. He heaved a sigh and gestured with his coffee mug. "Look, I have as little desire to get married as I do to sit on the goddamn board, but I know you guys have—" he waved the mug, sloshing coffee as he searched for a word, "—aspirations. I don't know what you're so worried about. We're the heirs to the McBride fortune. You think it's going to be hard to find a wife? Take your pick."

Denny narrowed his eyes.

Beside him, Dally pursed his lips. "That's a low view of women, Jackson. Don't forget, we'd still have to live with these wives."

Jackson shrugged. "Or not."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean you only have to get married. He didn't say anything about staying married. Keep it in your pants, and you can have it annulled. Problem solved."

Dally looked affronted. "Marriage is a contract, Jackson. It's not a game."

Denny rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "He has a point, though." He nodded to Jackson. "And what about you?"

Jackson laughed. "Oh, I have no intention of marrying anyone." He folded his arms, resting the mug on his bicep. "I play along with this little charade for three months and come up empty-handed, and I'm a free bird. No more board, no more meddling—"

Denny interrupted him. "No more money."

He lifted his shoulders. "Money isn't everything."

Denny barked a laugh. "Suit yourself. I'm not about to thumb my nose at an inheritance that numbers into the millions."

"Then start looking for a wife," Jackson shot back.

Dally watched their exchange with a furrow in his brow. He pushed his glasses up on his nose. "Again, I'm not sure this is legal. Besides, where are we to find suitable women in only three months? You heard Dad. He has final say over our choices."

Jackson's grin was slow and lazy. "You're not using your head, bro. Who's the one woman Dad reveres?"

Dally considered this. "Mom?"

"Exactly. So, go to the source."

Beside Dally, Denny squinted at Jackson, frowning, before realization dawned in his eyes. "You're talking about Dogwood."

Jackson smirked. "Bingo."

Dally's heterochromic eyes were full of reservations behind his lenses. "You think a small town in the Rockies is the answer to our dilemma? Jackson, there are fewer women in Dogwood, not more. It's a town of five thousand people."

"Then you'll be fresh meat," said Jackson. "Look, if you really want to find a woman Dad will approve of, you'll start looking in Dogwood. It's where they met. Trust me."

"And you?" Denny put in. "Where will you go?"

"I'll come along for the ride. I need to make it look like I tried."

Denny huffed and shook his head. "I've never understood why, if you hate it so much, you don't just walk away."

Jackson's mouth tightened. He didn't have to explain himself to his brothers. He shrugged and pushed away from the couch.

"You guys do whatever you want," he said. "I'm going."

Denny rubbed his jaw and grumbled, "We haven't been to Dogwood since we were teenagers."

"We used to spend every summer there," Dally put in. "Why'd we ever stop going?"

Denny lifted his shoulders, then let them fall. "It's not exactly an entertainment hotspot. Still, I suppose Jackson may be on to something."

Jackson smiled. "Thank you, Denny."

He took an unencumbered breath. It was a good plan. If it all worked out, he'd be free by September.

Denny eyed him suspiciously. "If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were excited to go."

Jackson looked down at his mug. For a moment, the scent of pine trees filled his nostrils, and he heard the unmistakeable sound of a burbling creek. He caught the faint hint of a whisper in his ear: a young woman's voice, confiding, warm, and full of promise, just as it had sounded when he was a teenager years ago. His heart skipped a beat.

"Just eager to get it over with," he said. "That's all. Come on, boys. We're going home for the summer."