Oh, Babies!

“Which way do you think this will pan out?”

“I think you’re going to tell them about the ranch. They will thank you, and then when Chas returns from his honeymoon, he will set the wheels in motion to get the property for the triplets. Once it’s securely in the triplets’ hands, it will be nothing but an investment.”

“But that’s my home,” Kristen protested indignantly.

Mrs. Romani conceded that with a nod. “If you remind them of that, I’m sure the Brewsters will let you live there…until they want to sell it.”

Obviously seeing the panic-stricken look on Kristen’s face, Mrs. Romani laughed. “Honey, these guys are nothing if not smart and quick. They won’t let the ranch fall out of the kids’ hands, and they might even be sentimental enough to let you live there, but when push comes to shove, they’re going to handle this like any other business deal.”

Absorbing the painful truth, Kristen studied the old woman. “What about the kids?”

Mrs. Romani looked at her. “What about the kids?”

“I want them.”

“The Brewsters want them, too.”

“But they belong in Texas.”

“The Brewsters think they belong in Pennsylvania.”

Glancing at her hands, Kristen smiled wryly. “You aren’t painting a very nice picture.”

“And you aren’t taking these kids anywhere,” Mrs. Romani said frankly. “Look, honey, I don’t think you have much more than a snowball’s chance in hell, but just so you get an understanding of how the Brewsters feel about these babies, and also to have a real shot at letting the Brewsters get to know you before they see you as the enemy trying to steal their brother and sisters, I’m going to make a suggestion.”

Kristen peeked at her.

“Take the job as the nanny. We’ll pretend you’re my cousin’s daughter who came here this afternoon looking for me, and I’ll give you the recommendation you need to get hired.”

Kristen shook her head. “I don’t think I could do that. It’s dishonest.”

“Then pack your bags and take yourself back to Texas without these babies. Without getting to know these babies,” she added emphatically. “Without even really seeing these babies. Because there’s no way Grant is going to let you within ten miles of them if he discovers your ultimate goal is to take these kids two thousand miles away.”

When Grant opened the door of the nursery and he saw Mrs. Romani and Kristen with their heads bent low in whispered conversation, he knew he hadn’t misinterpreted, misrepresented or even misjudged how attractive Kristen was. Her feathery blond hair cascaded around her shoulders, and though her lovely green eyes were intense and serious, they sparkled with warmth. Desire hit him like a punch in the stomach.

Again.

As if he had timed it, Evan slapped him on the back, jolting him back to reality. “So, how are things going up here?”

“Great,” Mrs. Romani said, smiling.

“Fine,” Kristen said, nodding her head in agreement.

“No problem with the kids?”

“Sleeping like babies,” Mrs. Romani said, then laughed at her own joke. “By the way,” she added, sliding a quick glance at Kristen. “In all the confusion, we forgot to explain that Kristen is my cousin’s daughter. She came here to visit but when I explained that you guys could use some permanent help with the kids, she volunteered. So, if you want her, you’ve got yourself a nanny.”

Grant watched his brother’s eyes, widen in surprise. “Hey, that’s terrific,” Evan said.

But Grant suppressed a sigh of despair. Wonderful. This was just wonderful. Now he knew why all his alarm bells went off when he started talking with Kristen. She was related to the woman who couldn’t keep a civil tone with him for two sentences even though they lived in the same house and he paid her a damned nice salary. Now he’d have two Romani women in his household. Two women to snip at him and yip at him and yell at him.

“No.”

Everybody looked at him.

“No?” Evan echoed stupefied.

“It’s never a good policy to have relatives working this closely together,” he said, feeling a quick stab of regret when he turned his gaze to Kristen and her beautiful green eyes met his. She was so pretty that he could have happily sighed with pleasure just looking at her. Her pale peaches-and-cream skin invited a touch. He could vividly imagine how wonderful the soft curves of her body would feel pressed against him.

And he knew he didn’t want to refuse to hire her because she was Mrs. Romani’s cousin’s daughter. That was just a convenient excuse. The truth was he didn’t want to hire her because he was attracted to her and if she worked for him he would be up against this wicked temptation all day long…twenty-four, seven.

“Look, Grant,” Mrs. Romani gruffly commanded. “Kristen needs this job. Could you put your feelings aside for a few weeks and let her show you that she can be a good nanny?”

Fighting a grimace, Grant recognized Mrs. Romani didn’t know how close to the truth she was. Could he put his feelings aside for a few weeks?

As a gentleman, and a man who also desperately needed help with his three kids, he had to.

“Then if she doesn’t work out,” Mrs. Romani continued as Grant dragged himself out of his thoughts and back into the real world, “she’ll leave and you can find somebody else.”

“She can stay,” Grant said, trying not to sound magnanimous and sanctimonious, and subduing his own apprehension. He couldn’t do anything about the fact that Kristen was ravishing, but he could conquer the vulnerability and yearnings that sprung up watching Chas get married. And he would, damn it, he would.

Unfortunately even as he said the words that granted his permission, he realized that since Mrs. Romani had the maid’s quarters on the first floor, this woman to whom he found himself unreasonably attracted would now be sleeping two doors down the hall.

Before he strode out of the room, he thanked God they didn’t have to share a bathroom. If he caught her in the bathtub, surrounded by bubbles…

Well, he just didn’t want to go there.

Chapter Two

After the wedding guests had gone, Mrs. Romani showed Kristen to her room, and Kristen took the opportunity to change out of her dress and into jeans and a sweater. When she returned downstairs, she discovered the triplets had been fed a light snack. But before she panicked about not knowing what a nanny should be doing, Grant announced it was time to take the girls upstairs and get them ready for bed.

Kristen climbed the elegant spiral stairway behind Grant, Evan and Claire, the bridesmaid in the autumn-orange dress who Kristen learned was Evan’s wife. She wasn’t exactly sure why it took four people to dress two babies for bed, and she was even more confused about why they weren’t getting Cody ready for bed, but she also wasn’t about to question anything. The less she said, the better. Since caring for babies was supposed to come naturally, she didn’t think the Brewsters would notice her lack of experience with kids as long as she kept her wits about her, but one out-of-place question or comment could give her away.

When she realized how crafty and cautious she would have to be to keep this charade going, she wondered if Mrs. Romani’s plan was the best way to handle integrating herself into the Brewster family. Though her intentions were good, she also knew what she was doing wasn’t honest. Unfortunately now that the wheels were in motion, she was stuck. Until she ingratiated herself to these people, revealing who she was could actually backfire and make it look like she was nothing more than a liar and a sneak. She had to stick this out for as long as it took to show them she was a good person, not someone prone to charades, trickery and lying.

Grant opened the nursery door and Evan and Claire followed him into the rainbow strewn room. Nervous, and out of her element, Kristen hung behind.

“Isn’t this a lovely nursery?” Claire said as she walked over to Kristen and casually slid one of the children into her arms, apparently thinking Kristen wouldn’t be so bold as to do something without permission. “This is Annie. She’s Chas’s child.”

Feeling the softness of the baby’s skin, smelling the sweet scent of baby powder, and looking into green eyes exactly like Angela’s, Kristen felt emotions so strong and so deep she struggled to control them. She cleared her throat, and focused her attention on what Claire had said. “Chas’s child?” she asked quietly.

Evan swung the little boy off the changing table and playfully tossed him to Claire, as he said, “Claire, here, came up with the bright idea that we’d need to do something a little out of the ordinary to make sure each child got special attention. So, we each took responsibility for one child. Cody is ours,” he said, pointing to the little boy Claire held. “Responsibility for Annie belongs to Chas, and Grant cares for Taylor,” he added, nodding toward the dark-haired little girl sitting on Grant’s lap.

When she looked at the beautiful baby, Kristen wondered how her fair-haired, pale-skinned sister could have had a child so dark, then her gaze collided with that of Grant and Kristen didn’t have to think any further. Taylor didn’t merely have Morris blood, she also shared blood with Grant—and right now Grant was their primary guardian. If Kristen wanted these kids, her fight was with him. From the wary look on his face, Kristen could almost believe that was the message he was sending her with his smoky, watchful eyes.

Except he didn’t know she was Taylor’s aunt. Which meant the expression was intended to convey something entirely different. The same thing he’d been inadvertently communicating all afternoon. The same thing she’d sensed ten seconds after he opened his door to her. They were attracted to each other. And because of her choice they were now living together. Obviously the situation didn’t please him.

If they behaved like mature, honorable adults, it wouldn’t be a problem, Kristen thought and glanced away. For her it was a no-brainer, not something she had to ponder or brood about.

Besides, she wasn’t worried about the attraction anymore. All she had to do was remember Bradley, how much she adored him, how hard it was to lose him, how raw the wounds of deprivation could be when you lost someone you cherished, and no man could be attractive to her anymore.

“Do you want me to stay and help show Kristen the ropes?” Claire asked Grant, bringing Kristen back to the matter at hand.

Grant caught Kristen’s gaze again. “No. You guys grab Cody and head on home. It’s been a long day for all of us. I’m sure Kristen and I can handle things alone.”

Kristen quickly, easily got the point of what he was telling her with his black, black eyes. He’d bided his time waiting for wedding guests to leave, waiting for Mrs. Romani to show Kristen to her room, and allowing Kristen a few minutes to change into comfortable clothes, but as soon as Claire and Evan left, he and Kristen would have a heart-to-heart chat. Since he hadn’t been able to get out of hiring her, he probably had every intention of laying down the law.

But it appeared that Evan and his wife were oblivious to the firmness of Grant’s voice because Evan said, “You know, Grant, there’s something I needed to discuss with you. Dad had an investment in the pension fund that doesn’t look right to me. If you’d give me ten minutes to run over the paperwork with you, you could study it and give me your opinion. If you agree with me, I’d like to sell this dog before the end of the month.”

As Evan and his wife walked to the nursery door, Grant cast a skeptical eye toward Kristen. “Can you handle both girls by yourself for a minute?”

Though her heart thumped wildly at the prospect of being alone with the babies, Kristen shrugged casually, “Yeah. Sure. Why not?”

Still cautious, Grant placed Taylor into the play yard and headed toward the door. Claire turned and, with Cody’s hand, waved goodbye to Kristen and the girls, and the Brewsters exited, leaving Kristen behind with her two nieces and the echoing silence.

Glad that Grant had given her time to change into blue jeans and a sweater, Kristen sat Annie on the nursery floor, then reached into the play yard, pulled out Taylor and sat her beside her sister.

Leaning back on her haunches, Kristen stared at them. The girls were dressed in two-piece yellow pajamas with plastic-bottomed feet. Like a little lady, Taylor sat primly and smiled at Kristen. Annie, however, began to howl.

“Shh!” Kristen said quickly, afraid Grant would hear and return before she had a chance to get acquainted with the babies. She scooped Annie off the floor with one arm while reaching for Taylor with the other. “Darn it, Annie, you look so much like your mother, couldn’t you have been born with her sweet, sweet disposition? Did you have to turn out like me?”

As if actually understanding what had been said, Annie stopped wailing and peered at Kristen.

“Yes. That’s right. We share a gene pool. I’m your mother’s sister. There’s a very good possibility you could turn out exactly like me—except looking like your mother.”

This time, Taylor cocked her head and studied Kristen.

“And you,” she said to Taylor. “You look so doggone much like your half brother that it scares me. But at least you act like your mother.”

As if fully comprehending the discussion and happy at the prospect of being like her mother, Taylor smiled, then squealed with glee as she clapped her chubby little hands.

Kristen’s heart lurched. She squeezed her eyes shut to gather her wits before walking to the first available rocker. She felt like fate was reminding her that these kids knew nothing about their mother and would never know about their mother. She doubted the Brewsters could tell the children much since Angela hadn’t been in their family for very long.

Snuggling both girls against her, Kristen leaned back on the rocker. She hadn’t known about these children until she received a letter from Angela’s lawyer announcing that he was withdrawing as counsel in Angela’s claim for the Morris family ranch. Holding the girls close, Kirsten experienced strange, compelling feelings. These babies weren’t merely all she had left, they could easily become the meaning and purpose for her existence. After her husband Bradley’s death, her life was nothing more than day-to-day emptiness, but with the knowledge that she needed to be the mother to her sister’s three children, something wonderful had been born in her. More than a reason to live, a reason to be happy. A reason to rejoice.

But custody of the kids belonged to men she didn’t even know in a state two thousand miles away from her home. They were rich, they were powerful, and she only owned the clothes on her back.

The fight, if it came down to that, would not be a fair one, and she understood why Mrs. Romani had suggested Kristen demonstrate to this family that she was a good, kind, generous person before she not only revealed who she was but also announced that she needed to take these children to Texas.

At the sound of the nursery doorknob turning, signaling Grant’s return, Kristen became fully alert. One swift frown got the attention of the squirming babies on her lap. “Things are strained enough between us already,” she quickly whispered. “If your brother thinks you’re misbehaving for me, he might ask me to leave.”

Though she thought her rationalization explained everything sufficiently that the girls would obey, Taylor then let out with a squeal and immediately thereafter Annie followed suit. “Shh!” she admonished quietly.

“Don’t waste your breath,” Grant said, closing the door behind him. “They’re wound-up from all the attention at the wedding. But more than that, they won’t listen to you because you’re new.”

He added the last as he scooped Taylor from Kristen’s lap. In one smooth motion, he raised her above his head, then swung her down far enough that he could blow on her belly. The action caused Taylor to squeal.

Terrified for the baby’s safety, Kristen gaped at him. “What the heck is that?”

“It’s called playing,” Grant replied, then swung Taylor over his head again.

Kristen bounced from her seat ready to rescue the little girl, but when she realized Taylor was squealing with delight, not fright, she stopped dead in her tracks. “She likes that?”

Grant cast a curious glance at Kristen. “She expects this from me.”

“She expects to be roughhoused?”

“She expects to be played with,” Grant corrected with a laugh, then shifted the little girl into the crook of his arm and reached into the small refrigerator in the corner of the room and pulled out a baby bottle. He tossed it to Kristen.

Only through the grace of God and good reflexes did she catch it.

“Feed Annie.”

She looked at the bottle, then the baby, then back at Grant again. But preoccupied with grabbing another bottle, kicking the refrigerator door closed and carrying Taylor to a rocker, he didn’t seem to see that she didn’t know what to do.

As he sat, Kristen saw that he noticed she hadn’t moved and he sighed heavily. “Slide the nipple into her mouth,” he suggested evenly.

“I was just a little shell-shocked from having a bottle tossed at me,” Kristen said, trying to cover for the fact that she’d never given a baby a bottle before. She’d seen mothers feed babies, dress them, diaper them. She watched all her friends have children and begin to raise them, but she hadn’t actually done any of the baby work with or for them.

“Whatever,” Grant said, sliding the nipple of the bottle into Taylor’s mouth, then relaxing against the back of his rocker. Without another word, he closed his eyes.

Because she’d been primed for a fight or a lecture, Kristen frowned as she gave the bottle to Annie and got comfortable in her rocker. Confused, but guessing that Grant’s brother might have cautioned him against saying anything that might lose their “nanny,” she covertly studied Grant.

Eyes closed, wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, and restfully lounging in the rocker, he was casually gorgeous, but also the epitome of a well-practiced dad. He could have been the babies’ father. In fact, he should have been the triplet’s father. Somewhere in his mid-thirties, Grant was probably closer to Angela’s age than Norm Brewster had been.

Remembering her own shock at being told in Arnie Garrett’s letter that Angela had had triplets with someone from a different generation, Kristen couldn’t even speculate on the Brewster brothers’ reaction. How would the grown children of an elderly man take the news that they had infant siblings? Surely they didn’t rejoice. Second families were always a little hard to take and with the addition of more people into this particular bloodline, the Brewsters would also have to share their inheritance. Nine chances out of ten, they’d been angry with their father—probably furious—when these children were born. And now they were forced to raise the same kids whose very existence had cut their net worths in half.

“Do you resent these kids?” she blurted into the quiet room, too appalled that the Brewsters might mistreat the babies to think clearly, but simultaneously regretting being nosy. Recognizing she had to somehow cover that slip, she added, “Your father must have married a woman a lot younger than he was to have babies. So, you couldn’t have been happy.”

Still not opening his eyes, Grant said, “Mrs. Romani filled your head with the village gossip, I see.”

“She didn’t say anything,” Kristen said, then paused, realizing it was true. The only thing that had really concerned Mrs. Romani was that Kristen understood Grant Brewster wasn’t an easy man to get along with. From his blunt assumption, she was beginning to see why. “I’m just curious.”

“All right,” he said. Sighing heavily, he opened his eyes and faced her, never once jostling or disturbing the baby he was feeding. “You’re going to hear it eventually anyway, so I’ll tell you that I wasn’t pleased when my father remarried two months after my mother died. I threw a fit, left town, dragged my brothers with me and didn’t return until my father died.”

Kristen heard the remorse that resonated through the last part, the part about his father, and she felt guilty for asking. Obviously Norm had married Angela to help the Morris family regain control of their ranch. If he hadn’t explained that to his sons, though, it sounded as if that was because they hadn’t given him a chance.

Unfortunately she also couldn’t explain to Grant Brewster that his father had married her sister because the Morrises were about to lose their family home. When her father and uncle were killed together in an airplane accident, the property reverted to a childless aunt, who didn’t know how to bequeath it. So, in her will she’d stipulated that the first Morris to have a child inherited the ranch, provided he or she agreed to live there with that child. But when Aunt Paige died, Morrises came out of the woodwork, each claiming he was the rightful heir, forcing Angela, Kristen and a handful of California relatives to prove they were the only people with a direct line to the property.

But one of them still had to have a child to claim it. If Norm Brewster married her sister and immediately made her pregnant, Kristen could only assume he’d done it as a kindness.

She couldn’t reveal all this to Grant Brewster because if she went into that kind of detail with him, no matter how speculatively, she would give herself away. But she would explain. Soon. And when she did, Grant Brewster could forgive himself.

“I’m sorry I asked,” Kristen said, intending to change the subject. “It’s really none of my business.”

“No, it’s fine,” Grant insisted coolly. “This is a conversation we needed to get out of the way. It is unusual for grown men to have baby siblings. If you were curious, I can understand why.”

The quiet tone of his voice filled her with compassion. She could tell that beneath his very calm, composed demeanor was a suffering man. Sensitive to his need for comforting in a way she’d never been with anyone before, she nestled Annie closer as she said, “If it’s any consolation, I know a thing or two about loss.”

She hesitated, torn, but decided she owed Grant something since she reopened wounds better left closed. If nothing else she could let him know he wasn’t alone in the world. “My husband died a little over a year ago, my sister a few months later.”

He glanced at her. “I’m sorry. My parents died two years apart, so I had some time to adjust. Your situation must have been terrible.”

“It was,” Kristen said, suddenly realizing how desperate she was to talk with someone who would understand the way she knew this man would understand. But talking about Angela with a Brewster would be courting trouble and discussing losing her husband was still too painful, too personal to discuss.

“But everybody has his or her cross to bear.”

Grant nodded. “Funny how we thought these kids were going to be something like a cross to bear and they ended up being the best thing that ever happened to us.”

Smiling softly as she looked at the big, dark man cuddling the tiny child, Kristen nodded. “I can see that.”

“So that must be why you came looking for Mrs. Romani?” Grant asked, still gazing at his suckling baby.

Kristen’s brow puckered. “Excuse me?”

“Losing your sister and your husband must have been what prompted you to come looking for Mrs. Romani.”

Catching on to what he was saying, Kristen let the sentence swirl around in her head long enough for her to realize half of it was true—or the essence of it was true—and it didn’t complicate things to admit it. “Yes. It was my sister’s death that brought me here,” she said carefully.

“So you’re not close to Mrs. Romani?” Grant asked.

She shook her head. “No, we’re not close at all.”

He caught her gaze. “She didn’t raise you or anything like that?”

This time Kristen giggled. “No, Mr. Worrywart, she did not raise me.”

If anyone else had laughed at him and called him Mr. Worrywart, Grant would have definitely taken offense. Since it was Kristen, and since they were cuddling babies and sharing their very private, painful backgrounds with each other, Grant not only didn’t take offense, but he actually chuckled.