Cathy Thacker - The Texas Valentine Twins

Irritated, she took the stairs quickly, as the cries quickly escalated to a fever pitch. “Well, some things won’t wait.”

He lagged behind at the foot of the stairs. “How long...?”

Adelaide threw the words over her shoulder. “If you want to make it fast, then give me a hand, cowboy.”

Never in a million years did she think he would take her up on the suggestion. By the time she bypassed the tiny master and reached the even tinier room with the twin cribs, the volume had been turned up nearly as loud as their little lungs could go.

Unable to bear to hear her children sobbing, Adelaide quickly picked up little Jake and snuggled him in one arm. His sobs subsiding, she walked over to Jenny’s crib and scooped her up, too. Hence, it was suddenly blissfully quiet, as she carried both to the changing stations set up side by side.

“You’re going to change both their diapers simultaneously?” Wyatt lingered in the doorway, the same cautious, awestruck expression he had on his face whenever he saw a new foal.

Except this wasn’t one of the cutting horses he bred on his ranch.

Adelaide shrugged. “Neither one of them is all that keen on going second.”

“Then how do you...?”

“When I was nursing, I put one on each breast.”

She knew it was too much information. She also figured too much information might incent him to leave.

He seemed to know that was what she wanted, so, as ornery as ever, he strolled languidly into the room.

Jenny and Jake lay on their backs while she worked at unsnapping their onesies, letting their legs go free. Fortunately, both diapers were just wet.

“They look like you,” Wyatt said softly.

No surprise there. She had picked a donor with the same shaped facial features, dark wavy hair and bittersweet chocolate eyes as her own.

The tender regard in his expression made him all the more handsome. “Their eyes are blue, though.”

Pure blue.

His were blue-gray.

The wistfulness he was suddenly evidencing forced her to recall he had always wanted kids, too. “Most fair-skinned babies are born with dark blue or dark gray eyes that can change color several times before their first birthday.”

He stuck his hands in his pockets. “Did not know that.”

Did not know a lot of things. Finding it a relief to be able to distract themselves with information, she explained, “An infant’s eye color changes as he or she gets older and melanin levels increase.”

He watched as Adelaide eased away the wet diapers, quickly wiped down their diaper area and slid on the new.

Wyatt turned to her, his broad shoulder nudging hers in the process. “When will you find out?”

Ignoring the electricity of the brief contact, she fastened one, then the other. “By their first birthday, I’ll know if their eyes are going to be blue or brown or green or gray.”

Not that it mattered.

They would be adorable regardless.

She turned back to the man she had once loved. Suddenly, he wasn’t the only one feeling wistful. Had their elopement worked out, the way they both had hoped, these children could have been theirs. But they weren’t. So...

She sighed, aware Wyatt had gone back to observing her children. He leaned closer, regarding them contentedly. For a person who’d had zero interest in ever laying eyes on the two babies she’d had on her own, he was certainly fascinated.

“I think they have your nose, too. See the way it turns up slightly at the end?”

She certainly recalled Wyatt kissing her nose. And her cheek, and her temple, and...

Best she not go there.

She really should not go there.

“Your eyelashes, too,” he mused.

Aware this situation was getting far too intimate too fast, she challenged him with a droll look. “Is that a good thing or bad?”

He straightened. As their gazes collided, it was hard to tell what he was feeling.

“Fact.”

“Whew!” She pretended to wipe perspiration from her forehead. “For a moment, I thought you were paying me compliments.”

His low laugh filled the room, bringing back a slew of unwanted memories.

Simmering with emotion, Adelaide scooped up Jenny in one arm, Jake in her other. She headed down the hall. He followed, close enough she could feel his steady male presence. “You’re really going to go down the stairs like that?”

He was a man. Of course he wanted to take charge. “Very carefully. And yes, I am.”

He still looked skeptical.

With good reason, had she not already done this dozens of times.

Figuring as long as she had a pair of helping hands nearby she might as well use them, Adelaide turned and handed off little Jake. For a moment, Jake gazed up at Wyatt mutely, studying the handsome rancher’s unfamiliar face.

Blinking in confusion, Jake let out a howl loud enough to wake the entire neighborhood.

“Now what?” Wyatt mouthed, looking every bit as panicked as Adelaide had felt the first moment she was confronted with two in the hospital. When all she had ever signed up for was one baby. Until Mother Nature had intervened. Adelaide held out her free arm.

Wyatt slid Jake back into her hold.

To everyone’s relief, the crying ceased.

Adelaide continued on downstairs, as originally planned. Once in the kitchen, she had no choice but to put both babies down in their infant seats, as she prepared their bottles. Luckily, they were so focused on watching her, each other and their visitor, both forgot to voice their immense impatience, as per usual.

Wyatt stood next to her, his arms braced on the counter on either side of him. Was it her imagination, or did he look completely besotted by her precious offspring?

“When did you stop nursing?”

“Our doctors made me stop when they reached four and a half weeks. I wasn’t able to provide enough milk for both and trying to do so was having an adverse effect on my health.” She sighed her regret. “Since I’m all they’ve got, I had to do what was best for all of us. Even if that meant making concessions I would really have rather not.” She paused to give her babies adoring looks. “I thought it might be hard for them, moving from breast to bottle, but they adjusted really easily. Maybe because they were already getting supplemental formula feedings.”

He nodded. Understanding in a way she didn’t expect.

Telling herself this was no time to start feeling kindly toward him, Adelaide put one bottle in the warmer, waited for it to ding, then added the other. Finished, she tested the liquid of both on the inside of her wrists. Scooping up both babies, she inclined her head at the bottles. “Mind bringing those in for me? You’ll save me a trip.”

“Sure.”

Adelaide walked over to the sofa and settled both infants into the supportive indentions on the extra-large twin nursing pillow already there, then she sat and carefully moved it onto her lap. Wyatt handed over the bottles one at a time, and she tipped the nipples into Jake and Jenny’s mouths. Then all was silent as they drank. For the first time in a while, Adelaide felt herself begin to relax and really breathe. Until she looked up again and saw Wyatt watching her with the kind of respect she had always yearned to see.

Telling herself that his newfound admiration didn’t matter, that this situation would be over as quickly as their one-night stand had been, Adelaide bent her head and did not look up at him again.

* * *

AN HOUR LATER, they were on their way. Thankfully in separate vehicles. Four cheek-swab DNA tests later, they again split up. Wyatt returned to his horses and his ranch. Adelaide took the twins home and thus began the wait for results.

They came in late on the third day.

On the morning of the fourth, she found herself back at the hospital. This time in Dr. Jackson McCabe’s office. To her surprise, Wyatt was there, too.