The More Mavericks, The Merrier!

Before she’d finished folding the clothes, she heard, through the baby monitor that she carried with her everywhere she went, sounds of rustling and cooing that were the general precursors to any or all of the triplets waking up. And then she heard Jamie—the low, soothing murmur of his voice as he entered the room and began talking to his children.

She knew it wasn’t easy for him—being both a father and a mother to three babies in addition to performing the majority of day-to-day chores that came with owning and managing a ranch. And yet, when he finally got back to the house at the end of his long days, his first thought was always of his children.

Of course, she knew how much family meant to Jamie, and she understood why it was so important to him to ensure that his children always knew how much they were loved. Because he’d been orphaned at fifteen and separated from his siblings soon after. And as far as she knew, neither Jamie nor Bella had heard a single word from any of the others since.

Losing most of his family in such a short period of time had made him determined to keep his own family together, no matter what. Which was why Jamie had been not just furious but deeply hurt when he ran into his grandfather at Crawford’s a few months after the babies were born and Matthew Baldwin had suggested that the children might be better off if Jamie put them up for adoption, so they could go to homes with two parents to care for them.

Although Fallon believed the old man had offered this advice out of a sincere desire to help guide his grandson through a difficult situation, she didn’t believe it was the right advice. And it renewed her determination to help in any way that she could to ensure that Jamie never needed to worry about losing his children.

When the laundry was folded, she headed upstairs and found him in the babies’ room, changing Katie’s diaper. Henry was standing up, holding on to the bars of his crib and chewing on the top rail. Jared was still sleeping, his arms flung out at his sides. He was the only one of the babies who had hated being swaddled as an infant.

“Need a hand?” she asked.

He lifted Katie off of the changing table. “Sure—you can take her downstairs. I’ll bring Henry and Jared when they’re ready.”

“Okay.” She took the little girl from his arms, and he immediately turned toward Henry’s crib without looking at her.

“Apparently this is going to be awkward,” she said, standing beside the changing table with Katie propped on her hip.

“I’m sorry.” He carried Henry to the table and began unfastening his overalls.

“Sorry this is awkward?”

He finally lifted his gaze to meet hers. “Sorry I walked in on you in the laundry room,” he clarified.

“Forget it,” she said. “It was just unfortunate timing.”

One side of his mouth curved. “Or fortunate—depending on your perspective.”

She felt heat rise into her face again.

“But I wouldn’t have walked into the laundry room if I’d known you were in there. Naked,” he said.

Her gaze shifted to the trio of cribs lined up along the far wall, settling on the closest one, in which Jared was still sleeping. Of course, none of the babies was paying any attention to their conversation. And even if they had been listening, they wouldn’t have understood what the adults were saying. But that knowledge didn’t prevent Fallon’s cheeks from burning. “I wasn’t naked.”

“Close enough,” he said.

“I was topless,” she clarified. “And wearing a bra.”

“White lace,” he said, confirming that he’d noticed.

“A lot of women wear bathing suits that cover less,” she pointed out.

He finished with Henry’s diaper and turned back to face her. “Not in Montana in December.”

“I’m just saying—it’s not a big deal.”

“It is to a man who hasn’t seen an even partially naked female body in almost fifteen months.”

Fifteen months?

He nodded, obviously having read the confusion on her face. “Yeah, the minute Paula found out she was carrying triplets, she shut me out of the bedroom.”

Fallon didn’t know how to respond to that, so she said nothing.

“So if I was staring—” He shook his head as he set Henry back in his crib so that he could perform the diaper routine with Jared, who was just waking up. “There’s no ‘if’ about it—I was staring. And I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” she said, and managed a small smile. “Truthfully, I’m flattered. My breasts are too small to garner much notice.”

“Your breasts aren’t too small, they’re—” He broke off again, swallowed. “Wow, this is a really inappropriate conversation.”

“Forget it,” she said again. “Please.”

“I don’t know if I can,” he admitted. “But I’ll try.”

* * *

The scent of something rich and savory teased Jamie’s nostrils and made his mouth water as he made his way back down the stairs. After setting Henry and Jared in the enclosed play yard with their sister, he headed toward the kitchen, where he could hear Fallon moving around.

“Something smells good,” he noted. And looks even better, he thought, surreptitiously glancing at her. Though she was fully dressed now, it was as if he could see right through her clothes to the creamy skin beneath, the tantalizing feminine curves, the peaked nipples pressing against white lace.

“I figured you would probably be ready for dinner by the time we got back from getting the tree,” Fallon said, “so I put a roast and vegetables in the slow cooker.”

He snapped a leash on his wayward libido and turned his attention to the pot. “We’re not eating until we get back?”

“The plan was to go out before it gets dark,” she reminded him. “And the roast won’t be ready for another hour, anyway. But to be honest, I’m not sure we should get the tree today.”

“Why not?” He had no objection to the reprieve, but he was curious as to why Fallon—who had been so eager to get the house decked out for the holidays—had suddenly changed her mind.

Was it his fault? Had his gawking at her nearly naked breasts made her uncomfortable? He mentally shook his head at the ridiculousness of the question. Of course, his gawking had made her uncomfortable. Unfortunately there was no way for him to unsee what he’d seen, even if he wanted to...and he wasn’t certain that he did.

“Well, the reason I was doing laundry today—” she glanced away, her cheeks flushing prettily “—is that Henry threw up on me earlier.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault,” she assured him.

“But I knew he was feeling off,” Jamie said, relieved that she didn’t blame him for the incident, and especially that she didn’t seem to feel uncomfortable after the laundry room encounter. “He was awake a couple of times in the night, not for any particular reason that I could tell, but he was definitely unsettled.”

“Well, he seems fine now,” she said. “But I’m not sure that being out in the cold for an extended period of time is a good idea.”

“My mom always sent us out to play in the winter so the cold could kill off our germs.”

The words were out of his mouth before he even knew what he was saying. If she realized the significance of his statement, the implication that she was as close to a mother-figure as his babies had, she didn’t show it. In fact, she didn’t react at all, except to ask, “What if it wasn’t some kind of bug?”

“What else could it be?” he asked.

“Maybe...the muffins I made,” she suggested tentatively.