Carla Cassidy - Cowboy's Triplet Trouble

There was a wealth of emotion in her voice, then she finally took a breath and stared at him expectantly. At that moment Jake’s brother appeared in the doorway between the living room and the kitchen.

Grace’s mouth formed a perfect O as she looked from one man to the other. Just then one of the little girls woke up with a cry, as if protesting the fact that her mother had no idea when it came to the question of who was the daddy.

Grace looked from one man to the other, astonished as she realized they were obviously identical twins. No wonder the man seated across from her had insisted he didn’t know her. He didn’t know her.

She dug Abby’s sippy cup out of the diaper bag and handed it to her, an action that immediately stopped Abby’s tears and brought a happy smile to her face. Twins, for crying out loud. How was she supposed to know that the man she’d slept with had a twin?

At that moment a woman appeared behind the man in the doorway. She was a plump, pretty blonde. She placed a hand on his shoulder. “Honey, what’s going on?” she asked. She took one look at the stroller and clapped her hands together. “Oh my goodness, aren’t they precious?”

Grace’s heart sank to the ground. If the man seated on the chair opposite her wasn’t the girls’ father, then the man in the doorway must be. A look at his hand showed her he was wearing a gold wedding ring that matched the one on the woman’s finger.

Married. Oh, God, had he been married on the night they’d slept together? Had he ditched his wedding band for a quick fling while out of town? The very idea horrified her. The last thing Grace would ever do was get involved in any way with a married man.

“I think maybe introductions are in order,” the man in the chair said. “I’m Jake Johnson, and that’s my brother Jeffrey and his wife, Kerri.”

“I’m so sorry. I’ve obviously made some sort of mistake,” Grace said as she rose to her feet. Jeffrey … Justin … maybe she’d gotten his name wrong at the wedding. Certainly coming here had been a terrible mistake.

She didn’t want to screw up a marriage. This had suddenly become an awful nightmare and all she wanted to do was escape from it all. “I’ll just take the girls and we’ll be on our way.”

“Grace—may I call you Grace?” Jake asked. She nodded and he motioned her back to the sofa. “Please sit down. Jeffrey isn’t the father of your daughters either.”

“Heavens, no!” Jeffrey replied. “I’d eventually like to have children, but I definitely want to do that with my wife.” He looped an arm around Kerri’s shoulder and smiled at her lovingly.

“I think you’re looking for our brother,” Jake said.

“There’s more of you?” Grace felt as if she’d entered either a comedy of errors or the Twilight Zone.

Jake gave her a tight smile. “One more. Justin. We’re triplets.”

Grace breathed a sigh of relief, although she was more than a little embarrassed that she’d just given Jake Johnson far more personal information than she’d ever want him to know. “Is Justin here?”

“He isn’t,” Jake replied.

“But he almost always shows up around dinnertime,” Kerri said as she approached the stroller. “May I?” She gestured to Abby, who raised her hands to get out of her confinement.

Grace nodded and checked her wristwatch. It was just after noon. “Could you contact Justin and see if maybe he could come by earlier? Otherwise I’ll just take the girls to the motel room where I’d planned to stay for the night and he can contact me there.”

“Nonsense,” Kerri said briskly. “I’ve got lunch ready and of course you and the girls will stay and eat with us.” She laughed as Abby grabbed her nose with a giggle.

“I don’t want to impose,” Grace protested. The whole thing felt awkward. At that moment the other two girls woke up and suddenly chaos reigned.

“We definitely need introductions to these sweet girls,” Kerri said as her husband pulled Bonnie from the stroller and Grace got Casey.

“You have Abby, Jeffrey has Bonnie and I have Casey,” Grace said. Each of the girls grinned as they heard their names. “And as you can see, they haven’t met anyone they don’t like yet. Although Casey here is definitely the most shy.” She frowned. “Maybe it would be best if I just go to the motel and you can tell Justin to meet me there.”

“You’re here now,” Jake said rather curtly. “You might as well stay for lunch and I’ll see if I can get Justin on his cell phone.” As he left the room Grace felt some of the tension that had coiled in her belly ease. At least Jeffrey hadn’t been in the room when she’d told Jake that she’d been nothing more than a drunken one-night stand with Justin. Gosh, how utterly embarrassing.

“Jeffrey, why don’t you go out to the shed and bring in the old high chairs,” Kerri said, obviously a woman accustomed to being in command. “And while you do that, Grace and I will go into the kitchen and get to know each other a little better.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Jeffrey replied agreeably. He set Bonnie on her bottom at his feet and headed toward the door.

Grace felt as if everything was quickly spinning out of control and she didn’t quite know how to get any control back. At that moment Jake returned to the room. “Justin didn’t answer, but I left him a message to come here as soon as he can,” he said.

“We were just about to take the girls into the kitchen,” Kerri said. “But we seem to be short one pair of hands.”

“The story of my life,” Grace muttered beneath her breath.

Jake bent down and picked up Bonnie. He carried her away from his body, as if he’d never carried a baby before and wasn’t sure he liked it. At that moment Grace decided she wasn’t at all sure she liked him very much.

The kitchen was enormous, filled with sunshine from the floor-to-ceiling windows that created one wall. A heavy wooden table big enough to comfortably seat eight held place settings for three and a steaming casserole dish that smelled of chicken.

“Let’s put the girls here on the floor,” Kerri said. “I’ll get them some plastic containers to occupy them while I finish getting lunch on the table and you and I can have a nice chat.” She smiled at Grace, a friendly gesture that took some of the sharp edge off Grace’s tension.

At least Natalie had been wrong about the person living here being a fifty-year-old pervert. “Where did Jeffrey go?” Jake asked as he gingerly set Bonnie on the red-and-white throw rug on the floor.

“I told him to see about the old high chairs in the shed,” Kerri replied.

“I’ll go see if he needs help.” He escaped out the back door, taking with him much of the energy in the room.

Within minutes the girls were all on the rug with a variety of plastic spoons, bowls and lids to keep them happy. Grace sat at the table while Kerri bustled around the kitchen to finish preparing the meal and laid another place setting.

“How on earth do you tell them apart?” Kerri asked as she placed bread and butter on the table.

“Even though at first glance they look identical, there are subtle differences. Bonnie wrinkles her nose when she laughs and Casey’s hair is just a shade lighter. To make it easier on everyone else, I just dress them in different colors. Abby is pink, Bonnie is blue and Casey is yellow.”

“It’s the same with Jake, Jeffrey and Justin,” Kerri said. “Most people insist they can’t tell them apart, but there are definite differences. Jake is definitely the alpha dog and his eyes are slightly darker than his brothers. My Jeffrey is thinner than the other two and sweeter tempered.” Her voice held a wealth of love. “And you know Justin.”