The Texas Valentine Twins

Looking as tense and upset as he felt, she went to the kitchen, stood on tiptoe and pulled out a bottle of Kahlua. Wyatt knew how she felt. He could use a good stiff drink himself. Even if it was barely ten in the morning.

Hands trembling, she made two drinks. Wordlessly, they each took a stool at her kitchen island. “What are we going to do?” she asked in a low, jittery voice, lifting the glass to her lips.

He sipped the concoction of milk, ice and coffee-flavored rum. “The only thing we can. Raise them together.”

She looked down her nose at him. “I’m not staying married for all the wrong reasons.”

He grimaced as the too-sweet mixed drink stayed on his tongue. “I’m not asking you to stay married,” he retorted in exasperation. “I still think we should get a divorce.”

“Good.” Relief softened her slender frame. “I’m glad we agree on that, because the last thing I want Jenny and Jake to suffer through is a marriage like my parents had,” she vowed, her cheeks turning an enticing pink. “With both of them fighting all the time.”

He gazed into her eyes. “I promise you. For the sake of the kids, we won’t fight.” And especially not the way Paul and Penny Smythe had, before Penny had died in that Jet Ski accident when Adelaide was fourteen. He could still remember how unmaternal Adelaide’s mother had been, her dad only a little more interested in their only child. Had it not been for the teachers, camp counselors and horse-riding instructors who had taken an interest in the shy but eager to please little girl, he wasn’t sure what would have happened to Adelaide.

Her face grew pinched. “I promise you, too. We’ll keep things civil in the way we haven’t managed to in the past.”

Regret tightened his gut. It wasn’t the first time he had felt remorse over having given her such a hard time. “Then, we had no reason to buck up,” he admitted shamefully.

She nodded, accepting her own culpability in the ongoing tension between them. “Now, we certainly do.”

The unmistakable ache in her tone caught him unawares. He studied her, realizing for the first time she might wish that things had turned out different for them, too, despite her avowals to the contrary.

Silence. She lifted her eyes to his, then looked at him long and hard. “The question is, how are we going to arrange it?”

He drained his glass. “I don’t want a judge to tell us how the twins are going to divide their time.”

She pushed her unfinished drink away. “I don’t want them to divide their time at all,” she said firmly, sending him a probing look that sent heat spiraling through him. “Not when they are this young.”

It took everything he had not to touch her again. Haul her into his arms. And... “What are you suggesting?” he bit out.

She angled her chin. “That we work together to get you up to speed on all the daddy stuff and make you and the twins comfortable with each other.”

That sounded good in terms of the kids, but there were still wrinkles to work out. “I’m not moving into my mother’s bunkhouse, Adelaide.” He anticipated enough family interference as it was. From his mother, who never seemed to trust him to be able to succeed without her help. And his way too idealistic younger sister, Sage, whose own unsatisfying love life prodded her to look outward for her fix of romance.

“Well, we can’t stay here. The work on the addition to my home is due to start in two days, and the movers are coming to take the bigger items, like the twins’ cribs and changing tables and so on, tomorrow.” She rose and carried her glass to the sink.

Wyatt took his over, too. “I don’t understand why you just didn’t buy a bigger place to begin with when you moved here from Dallas last fall.” Their shoulders touched as they leaned over to put the dirty dishes into the dishwasher.

Adelaide shut the lid and straightened. “I thought about waiting until spring, when more properties were likely to be on the market, and renting something else in the meantime, but I also knew that the modest price and the location of the cottage—just blocks from downtown where I work—couldn’t be beat. So I put an offer on it that was immediately accepted.”

Okay, that made sense, even if his urge to kiss her again did not. “Why didn’t you do the addition before the twins were born?”

She raked her teeth across her lower lip. “Because Molly and Chance were both busy with other jobs, and I wanted one or both of them to handle it for me.”

That he could also understand. His contractor brother and his fiancée had the best building teams around.

Adelaide moved away, giving him a brief, enticing view of her curvy backside in the process.

She swung back to face him, picking a piece of lint from the knee of her trim black wool skirt. “I also didn’t think the twins would need separate bedrooms for a couple of years. But, given the way they keep waking each other up, I figured it would be better if they each had their own space now. A dedicated space for me to work in, when I do work at home, would be nice, too. And since I was able to get a low-interest construction loan from the bank and Molly and Chance were able to fit my project into their schedule... I went for it.”

“Makes sense.” Even if it would cause a lot of temporary upheaval.

Adelaide removed the coated elastic band from her wrist, gathered her wavy dark hair into a knot on the back of her head and secured it there. “Unfortunately, the babies can’t be around construction dust and fumes. It’s not safe.”

The good thing about Adelaide was that she could be easily persuaded to do what made sense logically. The bad thing was that she often came to regret her ready acquiescence if the situation did not continue to align with her wants and needs. Still, she was also known for making the best of whatever situation she found herself in. A propensity he knew would be helpful to both of them in the coming months. Briefly he covered her hand with his own. “You and the babies can stay at Wind River with me. I’ve got plenty of room at the ranch.”

She pinched the bridge of her nose and looked even more stressed than she had in Jackson McCabe’s office. “That will cause a lot of talk.”

Why did people always think gossip was the worst thing in the world? When what really sucked was hiding the truth out of fear of scandal. He shrugged. “There’s going to be a lot of talk anyway.”

Adelaide looked like she wanted to thrust herself against him and hold on to him for comfort. But of course she didn’t.

She ran her finger along the edge of the granite countertop. “How are we going to handle that?” she asked anxiously.

Wyatt worked on keeping his emotions in check, too. This situation was hard enough without adding messy feelings to the mix. He looked Adelaide in the eye. “For starters? By getting my family together.”

* * *

ADELAIDE COULDN’T RECALL ever being this nervous. “Are you sure you want to do this right now?” she asked, as she bundled up the twins and strapped them into their car seats.

Wyatt grinned, as confident as she was on edge. “Sage already knows something’s up. Garrett works at the hospital, so he may have heard we were there with the twins earlier in the week. Then there’s the court-ordered bloodwork, the fact that both our attorneys were at your house with us. Singularly, none of those details may have caused much gossip, but all together...”

Trying not to notice how he towered over her when they stood side by side, she shut the rear passenger door.

“Besides—” he rested his big hands on her shoulders “—the fact I have two children, that the twins have a daddy to love and watch over them, is fantastic news.”

“You’re right.” She stepped back, aware having his kids was, in many ways, her deepest held romantic fantasy come true.

She’d never imagined it would actually be possible, though. Or dreamed he would ever be able to forgive her for changing her mind about marrying him. Because it had been more than his pride that had been destroyed that day. Her actions had eradicated his trust in her. And in them. She still wasn’t sure his faith in her would ever be resurrected, at least not entirely.

And without that, even becoming friends again would be a challenge.

But, given the situation, there was nothing to do but try to forge some peace.

Go on from there.

* * *

THEY TOOK BOTH vehicles out to his mother’s ranch, the Circle H. By the time they arrived, the Lockhart family was already there, save Wyatt’s brother Zane, who was on assignment with Special Forces.

The rest were gathered in the main room of the bunkhouse. Garrett and Hope, and her eleven-month-old son, Max. The newly engaged Molly and Chance, and her three-year-old son, Braden. Wyatt’s sister, Sage, and his mother, Lucille.

Adelaide settled the twins, who were still fast asleep in their carriers, at one end of the long plank table, while Wyatt asked them all to have a seat toward the other end.

“So what’s up?” Sage asked.

Adelaide’s pulse raced as Wyatt moved to stand beside her. She hadn’t expected to ever want to rely on him again, but right now, she did.

Especially with his family looking at them so curiously.