The Texas Valentine Twins

by Cathy Gillen Thacker

  “That’s good,” she said in relief. Because she was pretty sure if her dad was back, Wyatt would not understand. Or forgive.

  Chapter Six

  Adelaide hoped to find peace upon her return to the ranch. And, thankfully, the converted barn was quiet, except for the whisper of the double-stroller wheels gliding across the wide plank floor.

  It was Wyatt who looked on the verge of parental exhaustion, a feeling she knew all too well.

  Guilt mingled with regret. Wondering just how long he had been pushing the stroller around, she set down her belongings and quickly shrugged out of her coat. “Sorry that took so long,” she said, moving toward him.

  He stayed where he was, gently moving the stroller back and forth. Nodded, as if to say, “I’ll bet.”

  She hated withholding stuff from him, had sworn she wouldn’t do so again, and yet here she was, forced, for all their sakes, to hide what was really going on with her.

  Aware Wyatt always noticed much more than she wished, she closed the distance between them. “I got caught up. I had a problem with my laptop, which—” she sighed in real frustration “—I was eventually able to resolve. And then Kyle McCabe dropped by.” She choked out the fib, knowing that if her “husband” heard about it, it should be from her. “He wants me to do his tax return.”

  “You couldn’t have called?” Wyatt asked brusquely.

  Of course she could have, but she had needed the time to gear up for the half-truths she was going to have to tell if she were to keep him—and the twins—out of the mess her life was quickly becoming. “You’re right. I should have.”

  He gave her a telling look but made no reply.

  She knelt to look at her little darlings. “What’s been going on?”

  Seeing her, both babies spit out their pacifiers and burst into tears. With a shhh sound, Adelaide steered the stroller to the rocker-glider. She put on the brake, sat, then gathered first Jenny, then Jake into her arms, cuddling them against her breasts.

  “They’ve been awake the entire time,” he reported grimly, his emotional exhaustion mirroring hers in similar situations. “The only thing that soothed them was that.” Looking tough and sexy in his usual indomitable way, he pointed to the stroller.

  As Adelaide rocked the twins, slowly, but surely, their cries subsided. “So you’ve been wheeling them around the entire time?” For three hours?

  “When I wasn’t changing them and feeding them another bottle, which by the way, neither seemed to really want.”

  She hated that he’d had such a hard time. She allowed herself to admire the width of his shoulders and the flex of his muscles beneath his shirt. “Why didn’t you call me? Or your mother?”

  Wyatt’s brow furrowed. “I didn’t call my mother because she already lacks faith in my ability to do this on the fly.”

  Adelaide knew Lucille could hover. Particularly where her Wyatt was concerned, but she had never realized it bothered him. “Did Lucille do or say something...?”

  He was silent a long moment, his expression inscrutable. “She emailed me a slew of articles on being a good dad and husband.”

  Adelaide swallowed around the sudden ache in her throat. “Husband?”

  “Yep.”

  The tension within her intensified. Only it was a different kind of heat and tension. The kind that usually preceded their lovemaking. “Lucille knows we’re not planning to stay married.”

  His gaze caressed her face. “Yeah, well, she says the key to being a good father is being a good husband. So, according to her, if I really want to do it right, I’ve got to figure out a way to make us work, too.”

  “I’m sure she means well,” Adelaide soothed.

  He cocked his head. “I take it this means you didn’t get any articles?”

  “Ah. Not yet.” Hopefully never. “But,” Adelaide said, trying to stay positive, “even if she did send them, I would not take offense because your mom has become a second mother to me.”

  In fact, Adelaide wasn’t sure what she would have done the last year without Lucille. “I’m sure it’s just her way of helping,” she continued.

  He rested his hands on his waist and gave her a dubious glance. “Well, here’s hoping Mom offers a lot less assistance in the future.”

  Adelaide watched him walk into the kitchen and pour himself a glass of chilled water from the outside spigot on the fridge. Big body tense with frustration, he drained two-thirds of it in one gulp.

  “Okay, I get why you didn’t call Lucille when you could have used some help with the twins,” Adelaide persisted, curious, “but why didn’t you call me?”

  He drained the rest, then looked at her over the rim of his glass. “Because I thought you’d be home any moment.”

  Home. Adelaide liked the sound of that, despite her inner caution not to let herself get as wound up in her relationship with Wyatt as the Lockhart matriarch wanted.

  He let out a rough exhalation of breath, oblivious to her simmering guilt and tension. “And I didn’t want to worry you if you were driving.” He edged closer, peering at the snoozing babes. “Especially since things were sort of under control,” he admitted softly.

  Adelaide stopped rocking long enough to meet his smoky blue gaze. “You did a good job with them.”

  He sent her a skeptical glance.

  “Seriously. With anyone else they didn’t really know, if they’d been awake that long, they would have been howling at the tops of their lungs when I walked in. The fact they stayed calm must mean—” she drew a deep breath, determined to get this out whether he wanted her to or not “—they realize on some instinctive level that you’re their daddy.”

  He paused. “I doubt—”

  “Can’t you feel the connection? With me...in the hospital...it was innate.”

  He hunkered down beside her, his expression one of almost unbearable tenderness. Reaching out, he gently stroked the side of each baby’s cheek. “Yeah.” He surprised her by admitting softly, reverently, “I felt it the first time I saw them at your home, even before we had any idea they were ours. That’s why I couldn’t stop looking at them. And noticing everything about them. I feel it even more now. I just didn’t know they did.”

  “Well, they do,” Adelaide said fiercely. Powerful emotion welled within her for this man, the children they shared.

  “And if you’ll help me now, I think we can put them down in their cribs. At least for a little while.”

  * * *

  “HOW DO YOU feel about brisket tacos?” Wyatt asked, when they came back downstairs.

  Glad the tension had eased between them once again, Adelaide smiled. She took a seat at the island while he moved around the counter. “Love ’em.”

  He pulled an armload of items out of the fridge. “Good, because I’m starving, and that’s all we’ve got for dinner that can be ready in about ten minutes. What’s that look for?”

  Adelaide shook her head in a mixture of apology and regret. “I’m usually so linear about planning, but all I thought about this morning was making sure I had enough supplies to feed and diaper the twins.”

  “That’s why you have me,” he joked.

  She wished it were true. That he was there to see to her needs and wants, as well as just the twins. But that wasn’t the deal they had made.

  “I guess you have to be prepared out here in the country.” She rested her chin on her upraised fist, and watched him chop up a pound of smoked brisket, then slide it into a skillet. A smattering of southwestern spices and splash of beef broth followed.

  Apparently Sage wasn’t the only chef in the family, she thought as the tantalizing aroma of Tex-Mex soon filled the air. “You can’t exactly call for takeout.”

  He flashed her an impish grin. “Not unless you want to drive an hour round-trip
to pick it up.”

  As the mood began to lighten, she found herself relaxing, too. Maybe this arrangement of theirs would work out after all. “Next time I’m in town, I’ll check with you before I leave.”

  He set another skillet on the stove and began warming flour tortillas. While he worked, he poured grated Monterey Jack cheese and slaw into serving bowls. Then got out some chips and tomatillo salsa. “When do you need to go back in to Laramie?”

  She dipped a crispy corn chip into the fragrant salsa. “The twins have their two-month checkup next week.”

  “Can I go?” He helped himself, too.

  Adelaide savored the spice on her tongue. “You are their dad.”

  He grinned, obviously liking the sound of that.

  “But yes, to answer your question more directly, I really would like your help,” she admitted, the heat in her mouth nothing compared to the heat rippling through her, whenever he neared.

  He looked at her, listening intently.

  “They’re going to have immunizations,” Adelaide continued. “And I’m a little nervous about it. The Hep B injections they had at one month didn’t go so well.”

  Wyatt put the softened tortillas in the warmer, turned off the heat under both skillets and covered the meat mixture with a lid. Then came around to sit beside her. “What do you mean?”

  Their blue-jeans-clad legs nudged as they faced each other. “Well,” Adelaide confessed, a little embarrassed, as he took her hand in his, “they’d never had a shot before. And they cried. And then I cried.” Adelaide welled up just thinking about it. “I was supposed to be calm and reassuring, and instead I was almost as much as a mess as they were. At least for a couple of moments. Luckily, your mom had offered to go with me to help out, and she was much more composed.”

  Wyatt tightened his hand on hers. Stood, and guided her off the stool and into his arms. “That was nice of her,” he murmured, stroking a hand through her hair.

  Adelaide rested her head against his shoulder. “That’s when I got the idea to ask her to be their godmother. Even though what I really wished—” Wyatt’s understanding glance helped her admit “—was that Lucille was their grandmother.”

  He pressed a kiss onto the top of her head. “Looks like you got your wish,” he commented in a low gravelly tone. He pulled her tighter against him, his gaze warm, possessive. Sliding his hands down her hips, he planted his hands on either side of her, trapping her between the counter and his tall hard frame. “And for the record, I’m glad we gifted my mother with two more grandchildren, too.”

  His head slanted downward, and he gazed deep into her eyes. Then his lips shifted over hers, as he delivered the kiss they’d been avoiding all day. Adelaide knew they should slow things down. Get to know each other again first before attempting intimacy. But she couldn’t do that this time any more than she had been able to the last time he took her in his arms.

  She’d been frightened today.

  And she still felt unnerved.

  Holding and kissing him felt safe.

  Wreathing her arms about his shoulders, she opened her mouth to his and kissed him back with all the pent-up emotion of the day.

  Not just once. But again and again.

  Sensation swept through her. And suddenly everything she had held back, everything she wanted and needed, came pouring out of her. And what she wanted most was a do-over with Wyatt.

  Maybe they couldn’t go back to the innocent place where they had left off. But they could replace the heartbreak they’d felt when they split with happier memories. They could use the erotic connection they had to deepen the bond between them.

  So she kissed him feverishly, until their hearts pounded in unison. Until her mind was rife with all the possibilities she had been forcing herself not to consider. The God’s honest truth was, she wanted to be more than just co-parents with him. Or casual partners. How crazy was that?

  As if sensing the direction her thoughts were going, he unbuttoned her blouse, undid the clasp on her bra. Then stepped closer again and kissed her until her breasts pearled and her knees weakened.

  His eyes dark with desire, he cupped her breasts and ran his thumbs across the jutting crests. She caught her breath as he ran his hands over her ribs, unzipped her jeans, eased them—and her panties—off, too. The next thing she knew, he had shifted a knee between her thighs. Still kissing her, he showed her a new way of giving and receiving pleasure.

  That quickly, she trembled on the precipice. All because of his lips and hands and rock-hard thigh. She moaned again. Pushed him away. “I want us to come together.”

  He grinned. Grasping both her wrists, he pinned them on either side of her, kissed his way down to her breasts, languidly exploring her nipples. “We can do that, too...”

  Impatient to feel him all the way against her, she wrested free, undid his jeans, stroked him silkily. He extracted a condom from his wallet, then tensed as she helped him roll it on. The next thing she knew, he’d lifted her onto the counter. Hands circling her hips, he tugged her toward the edge.

  Their eyes locked. Desire and something else...something a lot more powerful...reigned. Her muscles tautened, trembling as he found his way home in one slow, purposeful slide.

  Allowing her the time to adjust to the weight and size of him, he went deeper still. Kissing her, rocking into her, slowly, patiently, until she writhed in ecstasy with each stroke. Surrendering to him completely, until there was nothing but the intense driving need, the giving and the taking. Nothing but pleasure and a sweet, swirling oblivion that led to the most magnificent peace Adelaide had ever known.

  Gradually, their breathing eased.

  Their bodies stopped shuddering.

  Adelaide had never felt more like a woman—his woman. Shaken by how emotional she felt, she knew she had to change the mood to a much more practical level before she ended up doing something really reckless, like fall in love with him all over again. She opened her eyes and lifted her head.

  He looked just as besotted as she felt. “Wyatt?”

  “Hmm?” His gruff, sexy voice made her quiver all over again.

  She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders resolutely. “That food smells really good. And I’m starving.”

  * * *

  WYATT WASN’T SURPRISED Adelaide wanted to put their lovemaking into the Just Sex category. The part of him that had crashed and burned in his prior relationship with her wanted that, too. It would be so much easier. Especially now that they had kids to consider. So, with an easy smile, he conceded to her wishes. Concentrated simply on enjoying their dinner.

  By the time they finished, the twins were awake again. Two sets of hands for the diaper changes, and the bottle warmers she’d brought back with her, made quick work of heating up the formula and settling down to feed the babies.

  The only problem was, Wyatt noted in disappointment, that neither Jenny nor Jake really wanted him to be the parent caring for them. Both much preferred to be in Adelaide’s arms, in their sole rocker-glider. He couldn’t really say he blamed them. She was a far sight more adept at all of this than he was. Hopefully, though, with her help, that would soon change.

  In the meantime, they had important matters to discuss. “I forgot to tell you earlier. Gannon Montgomery called while you were gone.”

  Adelaide gestured for him to head up the stairs, toward the “nursery” now set up in the center of the open loft. “And...?”

  Aware Jenny was increasingly drowsy, she put their daughter on the changing table and swaddled her.

  Watching, learning, Wyatt paced back and forth, Jake curled up against his chest, peering over his shoulder.

  Not sure if it was too soon to discuss this or not, Wyatt told her, “Gannon wanted to know if we are considering any kind of name change for the twins.”

&nbs
p; Adelaide took Jake and put him on his changing pad, then handed off Jenny to Wyatt to cuddle. Her brow pleated in wary confusion. “You mean call the twins something other than Jake and Jenny?”

  “No.” Wyatt breathed in the baby-fresh scent of the infant in his arms, not sure when he had ever felt as happy as he did in this instant, with a family of his very own. No wonder all the women he knew, his age, were so baby crazy. He looked Adelaide in the eye, glad she had given him this gift, even if she hadn’t actually meant to do so. “Their first names suit them perfectly,” he said sincerely.

  “Good. For a moment, I thought...” Adelaide broke off with a shake of her head, then slid a folded blanket beneath their son and swaddled him, too.

  Wyatt knew Adelaide feared he would barge into their lives, like a bull in a china shop, and try to control everything. Which was why he was trying so hard to give her as much space as she needed, so she wouldn’t instinctively withdraw and put up a wall around her heart again.

  A move that would make things difficult for them on every level.

  “But I would like them to carry the surname of Lockhart,” he continued, forthright.

  Adelaide picked up the yawning Jake and walked over to gaze out the windows overlooking the south end of the ranch. “How would you feel about a hyphenated last name?”

  Wyatt joined her and turned the not quite as drowsy Jenny, so she too could enjoy the sweeping views of the training rings and moonlit pastures that held his cutting horses during the day.

  “Smythe-Lockhart?” He tried it on for size.

  Adelaide paced toward the area where his office had been set up, and now contained her queen-size bed. It had been placed beneath the arched windows that overlooked the drive leading up to the ranch.

  Noting she looked as weary as he felt, he admitted, “I’d prefer Smythe as a middle name, for both, and Lockhart for the last. It’s more traditional, especially in rural areas like this. But if you object...”

  “I don’t.” Adelaide carried the now snoozing Jake to the crib. She laid him gently on his back and turned on the musical mobile. The upstairs was suddenly filled with the soothing Brahms lullaby. She took Jenny from Wyatt’s arms, settling her in her crib, on the other side of the twin changing tables, beneath her mobile, too.