Ten Acres and Twins (5 page)

“Okay,” she said, tugging at the neck of her T-shirt as she sat down again. “Where should we start?”

“I did a lot of thinking last night,” he said as he frowned at his hands, which were folded on the table. “We need to work out a way to keep the twins together.”

Abby felt a rush of relief so profound that she hopped up to kiss him. It was nothing more than a hasty smack on the cheek, but as soon as she did it she realized her mistake.

His beard scraped against her lips, making them feel soft and pouty. And he smelled incredible. Manly, like some bracing man's soap, or like ocean air. She hadn't experienced that sort of smell in a long, long time.

A deep, urgent response walloped her so powerfully that she immediately closed her eyes and collapsed back into her chair. When she opened them again, she realized he was checking out her chest.

Apparently, her kiss had affected him, too. Or perhaps he was always ready for an opportunity to check out a female body. Even Abby's.

She crossed her arms in front of her. “Sorry,” she said. “You caught me by surprise.”

His crinkle-eyed gaze floated leisurely up to her face.

“Hey, don't ever apologize for kissing me,” he said. Then he cleared his throat. “I just don't know how to do it.”

“Um, do what, exactly?”

“Keep them together.”

“Oh, of course,” she said, sweeping her gaze to the precious baby girl she'd managed to forget for an instant.

“I'm not ready to give up my place in Kansas City,” he explained. “It's a phenomenal town home, near the heart of the business district. Many of my clients have offices nearby.”

“Are you planning to leave Wyatt here?” she asked.

Perhaps her hopes were coming true. If he would sell her the land, too, her dreams would be tied up with a tidy bow.

“No,” he said, dashing her hopes abruptly. “I'll stay a year as Brian requested. If you run the orchard, the proceeds can go back into the farm. Next fall, we can talk about a fair price for the land, and a way to keep Wyatt and Rosie in contact. Things might be easier by then.”

“Maybe.”

Jack ran a hand along his whiskery jaw, staring out at the greenhouse. “I could sublet the town home….”

Abby listened as he thought out loud. Since he was moving things in her direction on his own, she decided to let him ramble on before she butted in. Maybe he'd realize he should just leave Wyatt here with her. Forever.

“…and find a place around here. You know of anyplace?”

She thought of the land surrounding the farm. There was a cattle ranch on one side and a wheat farm on the other. She shook her head. “There's nothing to rent out here.”

Wyatt's howl exploded into the room, causing Jack to jump out of his seat. “Hot damn—” he began, then glanced at Rosie. “Hot
dang,
what is that racket?”

Abby clicked off the receiver. “Just the baby monitor.”

He stared at the device. “Why is it so loud?”

Abby was already headed for the stairs. “A bad habit,” she hollered back. “This house is so big I'm afraid I won't hear them, so I turn it up full blast.”

Wyatt quieted almost immediately when Abby picked him up.

She used one of Rosie's diapers to change him, and then carried him back downstairs, thinking all the way.

She loved this baby. She wanted to be near him every single day and night. She'd do anything to achieve that goal.

Anything.

When she got back to the kitchen, she handed Wyatt to Jack, then lifted Rosie out of the bouncer and laid her belly-down on the floor. “This is when a high chair would come in handy,” she said. “Paige was thinking about getting one, but the babies only started eating solid food a few weeks ago.”

A frown creased Jack's forehead. “Is Wyatt hungry?”

“No, but one baby could sit in a high chair with a couple of toys while the other took a turn in the activity center.” Abby took Wyatt and deposited him in the toy's seat. “It's just another source of amusement for the twins.”

Wyatt immediately started bouncing and batting at colorful knobs. “You were just ready to play, weren't you?” she crooned.

Opening a cabinet drawer, she pulled out a couple of toys and tossed them in front of Rosie, who propped herself up on sturdy arms to grab a set of plastic keys.

When she dropped them, they produced a clacking sound that must have pleased her, because she snagged them right back up and began hitting them repeatedly against the terracotta tiles.

“If I can find a big enough apartment, I could run my business from there,” Jack said as Abby returned to the table. “There's bound to be something suitable in town.”

“Or we could both move in here,” Abby suggested, wondering even as she said it if she was completely insane. “This
house has plenty of room for an office, and we could switch off duties so we'd both have time to work.”

“You mean we'd live together as roommates?” Jack asked.

“Of course,” she said, trying with all her might to make the suggestion seem like no big deal. Even though it was. A
big
deal.

“I hadn't thought of that,” he murmured, staring at her with a bemused expression. “I could set up my office here easily enough, but don't you work at a flower shop?”

“My parents own a flower shop in town,” she corrected. “I work at a garden supply warehouse, but I was thinking of quitting, anyway. I could pay my share of the bills with the profits from the cut-flower business.”

“Hmm,” he said, pushing out his bottom lip and toying with the whiskers underneath. “I like this idea more and more. The babies would have both of us around for a year and by the end of that time they'd be easier to manage.”

“Um-hmm,” Abby said, worrying about the idea more and more. Could she and Jack actually live here, together?

He might not know her from a garden of weeds, but she was painfully aware of his vitality. Always.

She also knew he led a pretty active social life. Would he want to bring his women here? She began to imagine a revolving door of various women, coming in and out of the farmhouse and cooing at the babies before they vanished into Jack's room to coo some more.

“Sounds cozy,” he said, breaking into her angst.

“Doesn't it, though?” She feigned composure, but her alarm grew exponentially as her idea hurtled from impetuous to barely conceivable to likely. And remained, all the while, quite impossible.

A
BBY HAD HAULED
seven loads of her belongings past the burned-out front porch light before she finally decided to change it. She had just dragged a kitchen chair outside and perched on top to make the adjustment when her new neighbor, Sharon Hauser, hollered from inside. “Donation box, or new location?”

Sharon's matronly figure filled the doorway. She held a bean-pot lamp on one hip, and Wyatt on the other. Her usual smile was missing as she stared at Abby's precarious pose.

Abby held up the bulb and light cover, and chuckled when her friend's big, gummy smile returned. Though Sharon had at least fifteen years on Abby, she was on the same wavelength. Sometimes words weren't necessary.

Abby finished the job and hopped down. As she carried the chair back in, she said, “I asked you here to help with Rosie and Wyatt. I can finish unpacking.”

Sharon jiggled both baby and lamp, prompting a happy squeal from Wyatt. “Shush,” she told Abby. “Scrap or keep—that's all I need to know.”

Abby knew not to argue. She squinted at the lamp. “Keep,” she answered. “Put it on the table beside the sofa.”

Sharon swept the lamp and the giggling Wyatt off toward the living room, and Abby headed off in the other direction to cart the chair back to the kitchen.

Her helpful new friend was well on her way to becoming a cherished old friend. She had appeared on that very same porch the morning after the accident, and she'd been just as
obstinate then about lending a hand. She'd pushed her way in behind a pierogi casserole, explained that she was the wife of the farmer down the road, and had commandeered the babies and the kitchen duties so Abby could deal with the tragic news.

That morning, Abby had been too stunned to argue. She'd been baby-sitting the twins the night before, and had waited up all night for Paige and Brian's return. She'd thought they must have decided to stay out overnight, and reasoned that they'd been having too much fun to let her know.

She had only learned the grisly truth at dawn, after their overturned car was discovered near a dirt road just two miles from the farmhouse. The white-tailed deer Brian had swerved to avoid was found dead a few yards away, and the furrowed path in the steep embankment told the rest of the story. At first, Abby blamed herself. If only she'd thought to call someone, perhaps they could have been saved. But the coroner had said their death was immediate. He'd called it merciful.

Abby didn't know if a healthy young couple could die a merciful death. She only knew they were gone forever, leaving her behind with a couple of babies who would never be orphans as long as she was around.

That night had created a deep and unhealing chasm in her memory. Everything before had become part of a past that was already lost. Everything since was the future.

Uncertain. Frightening. As important as air.

The delicious sound of baby cackles broke into her thoughts and led her down the hall. She discovered her neighbor and the twins—vital components of her new life—cavorting in one of the rooms she had emptied for Jack.

Sharon now held a baby in each arm, and she was spinning lazy circles in the middle of the room. “Looks funny without Brian's exercise equipment,” she said. “You sure about this living arrangement?”

Abby glanced around at the generous space, unwilling to voice her turmoil. “Sure I'm sure,” she said.

And she was, in a way. At least she was glad to know that Wyatt would be here, in this house, with her and Rosie. Abby might have snagged a rather large stray in the form of Jack Kimball, but since the baby boy she'd tried to lasso was included, it should be well worth it.

“Since I volunteered to baby-sit the twins during the funeral, I've never met Jack,” Sharon said. She stopped turning, and caught Abby's eye. “I assume you know what you're getting into.”

“I think so,” Abby said with a shrug. “Besides, this was the only way to keep Wyatt for the time being.”

“Didn't you say Jack was granted permanent custody?”

“I did.” She pulled Wyatt away from Sharon. “He's a bachelor, though. He has no idea what he's getting into. I'm predicting that he'll want out within three months.”

Sharon frowned. “You know they can learn, right? Most men start off clueless when it comes to their first baby.”

“But Jack isn't like most men,” Abby said with growing confidence. “He's like Tim, my ex-husband.”

“How's that?”

Abby counted off the similarities on her fingers. “He likes women, he spends too much time in bars and he buys expensive, big-boy toys.”

“Sounds like a typical single man, if you ask me,” Sharon said. “My Earl rode a Harley before we got married. He only traded it for the tractor after our third son was born.”

Abby swung Wyatt to her opposite arm and used her other hand to continue her tally. “Well, now I'm just guessing on these,” she said. “But I'll bet that Jack bores easily, avoids commitment and hates self-sacrifice. He's a Tim, not an Earl.”

“What does he look like?”

Abby scowled. “That's irrelevant.”

“Is he tall?” Sharon asked with a chuckle.

Abby nodded. No need to deny that particular quality, since Sharon would find out for herself soon enough.

“Brian had nice eyes. Does Jack?”

She thought about a pair of devilishly handsome eyes and shrugged. “Doesn't matter.”

Sharon's mop of graying blond hair floated triumphantly out of the room. “Sounds to me as if you've got more than the twins to worry about.”

“Jack Kimball is completely resistible,” Abby said as she followed her friend into the living room.

“What if you aren't?”

Abby stopped near Paige's plum curtains and pulled them closed. “Are you kidding?”

Her neighbor turned around and shook her head. “You said he likes women. You are one, Abby.”

She laughed at the thought. “I'm not his type.”

Sharon sat on the sofa with Rosie on her lap and tickled the little girl under her chin. “And that's a problem?” she said. “Opposites attract.”

“Stop it,” Abby said. She jiggled Wyatt. “This is the only irresistible bachelor in my life. And besides, even if Jack doesn't know better, I do.”

“You won't have a problem with being chased around this fine, faux leather sofa?”

“That won't happen,” Abby said with confidence.

Her friend patted the cushion beside her. “Sit down and spill it,” she said. “What are you up to?”

Abby laughed. She walked across the room and flicked on the lamp. “What do you mean?”

“I recognize that look in your eye,” Sharon said. “We're finished moving for tonight. Sit and talk.”

Abby set Wyatt on the carpet amid a cheerful clutter of toys, then took Rosie from her friend's arms to put her down there, too. After that she plopped down on the sofa, shrugged and admitted, “I do have a teensy little plan.”

 

J
ACK KNEW HE'D NEVER
succeed at running his own business if he didn't devote himself to it passionately. He spent most
of his weekday hours developing and marketing software, training clients or troubleshooting problems.

Most days, he had lunch delivered to wherever he was working, and often ate dinners there, too. The only personal things he rammed into his grueling schedule were an hour's exercise at whichever end of the day he could fit it in, and a shower and shave after that.

No one could work harder, and he had achieved a degree of success that allowed JK Business Software Systems to enjoy a nice little profit.

He also knew that play restored him, and he worked hard at that, too. He couldn't do well at one thing without focusing ample attention on the other.

Therefore, most of his off hours were reserved for fun—any kind of fun. Wild or civilized, carefully charted or slapdash. His only requirement was that it, and the woman he chose to share it with, held his attention.

By the time Friday night rolled around, he was usually the first in line for entertainment. This weekend was no exception. Although he'd returned to Kansas City to pack for his temporary stint in the country, there was no reason he couldn't squeeze in a few dates with his lady friends.

A year spent in the sticks taking care of two babies, with Abby's solemn eyes judging his every move, sounded exhausting. And long. Possibly joyless. He wanted to cram as much of his usual rakish lifestyle into this weekend as possible.

It had taken him only a few hours this morning to pack his things and dismantle his computer. He'd boxed everything and stacked it by the front door. The movers would pick up a few big items tomorrow and deliver them to the farmhouse on Sunday. It wouldn't make sense to get out there before his furniture did, which meant most of the weekend was open.

It only proved that he led a charmed life—he had plenty of time, and three beautiful girlfriends who should fill it rather nicely. Maybe if he could smooth things over with each of
them, an occasional weekend visit might be arranged, making the year a little less arid.

Since Diane happened to be a real estate agent, he called her first. Maybe she could help him find a temporary tenant for his condo. Even if that didn't work out, she was well worth his time. His latest paramour had a cap of sexy black hair and mile-long legs. But his favorite feature by far was the seductive laugh she only used in the bedroom.

He dialed her cellphone number, knowing her Friday morning would have been spent showing houses or scouting out opportunities.

“Diane Westmoreland,” she barked.

“Hey, Diane. I'm back in town.”

“Ooh, Jacky!” she said, in a tone fairly dripping with carnality. “How good to hear your voice.”

“You must be alone,” he said, chuckling at the change. She'd gone from frigid to fiery in a second.

“Way, way too alone, big boy.”

Good. He would enjoy seeing her, but more than that, he needed her help. “You busy in an hour?”

“There's not a thing happening here that can't be rearranged for you.”

“How about meeting me for lunch? We can go to your favorite Italian place in the city.”

“Sounds wonderful,” she purred. “I'll be waiting.”

Wonderful it wasn't. It was closer to woeful. Or wintry.

Once Jack told Diane that he was moving to rural Topeka, her temperature went right back down to 98.6 degrees. And when he explained about moving into the farmhouse with Abby, it plummeted well below freezing.

The mood had been so frosty at lunch, he'd worried that they'd both develop hypothermia. Or at least indigestion.

He spent nearly an hour trying to convince her that he was not involved with Abigail Briggs. He told her that Abby was too countrified, often sharp-tongued and genuinely not his type. For some reason, Diane didn't believe him.

She had finished her meal and gathered her purse to leave before he remembered that he was going to ask her to sublet the apartment for him. He opened his mouth to speak, but after looking at her dour expression one more time, he thought better of it. He'd just have to call her later, after she had warmed back up to room temperature.

There was no point in hiring a stranger just because the wiliest Realtor in town was a little miffed.

Besides, there was no need to be alone tonight—Paula was next on his list. He owed her the choice Friday night slot because she'd been the most enduring girlfriend of his adult life.

Ultrasophisticated Paula put up with his other lady friends and always greeted him with a smile. He was hoping she'd be willing to let him crash at her place whenever he had to come into the city on business.

She surprised him. Their understanding about dating other people seemed to fly out the window as soon as he said the word
roommates.

“What do you mean, you're going to live with her?”

Jack held Paula's wineglass out to her. She'd always understood his need to date around. This was only a slight deviation from normal, and it shouldn't truly upset her.

“She'll be living in the same place, but that's all,” he explained. “We're not romantic. Think of her as a housemother, if you wish. Or the girl next door.”

Paula didn't take the glass, and she didn't look amused. “And you're actually going to help take care of two brats?”

Jack frowned as he sat the glass back down. That had sounded ugly. He knew she wasn't the nurturing type, but now she was slandering his own flesh and blood. “They're only five months old,” he said. “Infants can't be classified as brats.”

“Future brats, then,” she sniffed, standing up to leave before they'd even ordered dinner.

“Paula, you surprise me,” he said, as he stood up, too.

“Darling, I'm afraid it's you who has surprised me,” she said over her shoulder.

Jack threw a couple of bills on the table and followed her out, wondering why two out of three of the women who were supposedly crazy about him were giving up so easily.

He wasn't doing anything shady. This was all just geographical. He was moving from a condo in the city to a house in the country, and it was an easy forty-five minute drive between the two. What was the problem?

As they stood near the front of the restaurant, he held out her jacket so she could slip it on. In a desperate attempt to bring their conversation back to its usual witty banter, he said, “If I can ditch the rugrats one weekend and get to the city, may I give you a call?”

“You can try,” she said. “I do have a life, you know. I'll tell you what you can do—you can call me when you're finished playing family man. Perhaps then we can move in together.” She gave him a peck on the cheek before she slid into her car, which the valet had just parked in front. And then she drove away without a single backward glance.

As Jack watched her go, he didn't wonder at his lack of disappointment. He knew his weekend's diversion wasn't lost just yet. He'd simply call in his third option tonight, instead of waiting for morning.