“Have you always been this much of a skeptic? Or do babies make you that nervous?”

“Come on,” Eric said. “You waltz into my life with some crazy story about a sister I never knew I had? Wouldn’t you have some doubts, too? A desperate woman looking to find a decent home for her baby can come up with a very convincing lie.”

She leveled him a look that would have made most men back off in a hurry. “I personally guarantee that if you don’t want to raise the girls for any reason at all, they will always have a good home—with me.”

The intensity of her words brought him up short. This woman was not fooling around. “You want to adopt the twins?”

“With all my heart.” A fine sheen of tears appeared in her eyes, but she didn’t let them spill over.

“Then why did you bother to track me down? I never would have known otherwise.”

“Because I promised I would.”

Montana Twins

Charlotte Maclay

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Charlotte Maclay can’t resist a happy ending. That’s why she’s had such fun writing more than twenty titles for Harlequin American Romance, Duets and Love & Laughter, plus several Silhouette Romance books. Charlotte is particularly well-known for her volunteer efforts in her hometown of Torrance, California; her philosophy is that you should make a difference in your community. She and her husband have two married daughters and four grandchildren, whom they are occasionally allowed to baby-sit. She loves to hear from readers and can be reached at P.O. Box 505, Torrance, CA 90508.

Books by Charlotte Maclay

HARLEQUIN AMERICAN ROMANCE

474—THE VILLAIN’S LADY

488—A GHOSTLY AFFAIR

503—ELUSIVE TREASURE

532—MICHAEL’S MAGIC

537—THE KIDNAPPED BRIDE

566—HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE

585—THE COWBOY & THE BELLY DANCER

620—THE BEWITCHING BACHELOR

643—WANTED: A DAD TO BRAG ABOUT

657—THE LITTLEST ANGEL

684—STEALING SAMANTHA

709—CATCHING A DADDY

728—A LITTLE BIT PREGNANT

743—THE HOG-TIED GROOM

766—DADDY’S LITTLE COWGIRL

788—DEPUTY DADDY

806—A DADDY FOR BECKY

821—THE RIGHT COWBOY’S BED*

825—IN A COWBOY’S EMBRACE*

886—BOLD AND BRAVE-HEARTED**

890—WITH VALOR AND DEVOTION**

894—BETWEEN HONOR AND DUTY**

915—WITH COURAGE AND COMMITMENT**

929—AT THE RANCHER’S BIDDING

943—COURTSHIP, MONTANA STYLE

980—MONTANA DADDY

984—MONTANA TWINS

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter One

“I’m going to be a father.”

Still stunned by the news, Sheriff Eric Oakes sat down heavily in the swivel chair behind his desk, trying to figure out how it had happened. Or if it could possibly be true.

His brother Rory, who had just come into the office, looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. “You’re kidding.”

“Twins. Girls.”

“Hey, I didn’t even know you were seeing anyone. How come you’re keeping secrets from—”

“No, it’s not like that. It’s like—” He was stammering almost as much as the woman who’d called him with the news a few minutes ago. “They’re my sister’s kids.” Three months old, the woman had said.

Rory frowned, and a hank of his dark hair slid across his forehead. In a futile gesture, he shoved it back into place. “Have you been nipping at that bottle you keep in your bottom desk drawer? You don’t have a sister. Two brothers, me and Walker. Unless ol’ Sharpy has had a sex change I don’t know about—”

“No, that’s not it.” Eric pushed back from his desk, stood and paced across the room to look out the window onto the town of Grass Valley, Montana, located not far from the Canadian border.

Small was the only way to describe the town.

Rory’s veterinary clinic was down a side road a block away, across from Doc Justine’s medical clinic where Rory’s bride, Kristi, worked as a nurse practitioner, helping her grandmother, the long-time town doctor.

On the main street there was a garage with rusty old heaps parked around it, a drugstore that sold more ice cream than prescriptions, and a general store. The saloon with a tattered banner that announced “Good Eats” was the only place that ever drew a crowd, except for the nearby church.

Crime wasn’t a big issue in the community. A few Saturday-night drunks to fill his two jail cells now and then. Traffic accidents on the highway that called for him to respond. Occasional reports of cattle rustling or adolescent vandalism. A safe place to live.

And to raise kids, he thought as a lump formed in his throat. He’d always wanted children. A family of his own.

He turned back to his brother. “Some woman called a couple of minutes ago, a Laura somebody from Helena. She says my mother had another baby after she abandoned me.” It was no big deal to tell Rory he’d been dumped by his mom. Rory’s mother had done the same thing to him. That’s how they’d both ended up at the Double O Ranch as foster kids to Oliver Oakes, who’d eventually adopted them and another kid, their brother, Walker—nicknamed Sharpy because he’d once shot himself in the leg. Walker was running the ranch nowadays.

“According to this woman, my sister’s name was Amy Thorne, and she had twins a couple of months ago. Then she died.” Still incredulous about the phone call, he shook his head. “She wanted me to have the babies. Be their dad. Apparently I’m their only living relative.”

“Somebody’s putting you on.”

“I don’t know. This Laura person sounded pretty legit.” Except she’d been nervous, stuttering and stammering as she tried to tell her story.

“No, it’s got to be some kind of scam. Did she ask for money? Child support?” Rory hooked his hip over the corner of Eric’s desk and crossed his arms. His Native American heritage sometimes gave him a brooding look, but since discovering that he had a son and his recent marriage to the boy’s mother, Kristi Kerrigan, Rory had been all smiles. Until now.

“The whole phone call kind of caught me off guard,” Eric said. He was still shaken, half disbelieving the news yet wanting it to be true. “But no, she didn’t say anything about money.” Not that he could remember, at any rate. “She’s going to bring the twins up here tomorrow.”

“And just hand them off to you?”

“I don’t know. She said something about interviewing me.” Which didn’t make a whole lot of sense. Either he was the twins’ uncle or he wasn’t. And if he wasn’t, that woman wouldn’t have bothered to call and make him identify himself by his birth name, Eric Johnson. A name he hadn’t used since he was fifteen and Oliver Oakes adopted him. Eric had celebrated his thirty-second birthday last fall out at the ranch. Walker’s wife, Lizzie, had baked the most lopsided cake he’d ever seen—not that he or anyone else had cared. Devil’s food with chocolate frosting was hard to beat whatever the shape.

He shoved his fingers through his hair, shorter than Rory’s, more brown than black and several shades lighter. Now that he was trying to explain this baby situation to his brother, it sounded pretty damn crazy. Maybe it was a hoax. One of those adolescent games when a kid calls someone and asks if their refrigerator is running. When the victim says yes, the kids giggle and say you’d better catch it before it runs out the door. A silly, harmless prank.

But his caller hadn’t sounded like a kid. More like a woman with a sultry voice who hadn’t wanted to call him at all.

And the story of his mother, who had run through boyfriends like water through a sieve, sounded legit, too. She could have gotten pregnant again.

God, could it be that all these years he’d had a sister who he didn’t even know existed and now she was dead? He’d never have a chance to meet her. Or talk to her. Why hadn’t she come looking for him sooner?

Or could that call have been nothing more than a cruel trick? The woman the same kind of person who would abandon her own kid?

Tears stung at the backs of his eyes as memories assailed him. He’d been ten years old and standing in the parking lot of a fast-food hamburger joint. Looking for his mother and her current boyfriend. Looking for their car. He knew where it had been parked. It wasn’t there anymore. He’d had to go to the john. They’d left without him. God, he’d felt so alone. So hurt.

How could any mother do that to a kid?

He hadn’t had a sister then. He’d been an only child, crowded into the back seat of the car along with everything they owned, and making it a point to stay out of reach of his mom’s boyfriend. The guy had big meaty fists, Eric remembered that. And he knew how to use them.

A sob rose in his throat.

The office door opened to admit a current of fresh spring air along with Rory’s wife, Kristi, and their son, Adam.

Swiping the back of his hand across his face, Eric struggled to pull his emotions back under control.

“Hi, Uncle Eric.” The dark-haired five-year-old made a beeline for the nearest jail cell and began to swing on the door, peering out through the bars.

“Where did I put that key?” he asked, playing the game he and the boy had started recently. “I’ve caught me a monkey and I need to lock him up.”

The youngster giggled and made scratching gestures under his arm pits. “Hoot-hoot-hoot.”

Kristi stood on tiptoe to brush a kiss to her husband’s cheek. “Ted Pomperan is at the clinic with a dog that cut its foot.”

“Okay, I’ll be right there. Eric’s been telling me he’s going to be a daddy. Twins, he says.”

“Girls,” Eric added. If the tale was true.

“You’re kidding!” Kristi whirled toward him, her eyes widening. “I certainly hope you plan to marry the woman.”

“Well, no. I mean, I don’t even know the woman. She just called a couple of minutes—”

“I’d say you know her plenty well enough if she’s going to have your babies,” Kristi insisted.

Adam piped up. “Does that mean I’m gonna get some more cousins?”

“She’s not going to have my babies. They’re already three months old. And they might not even be—”

“So she hadn’t told you she was—”

“Rory!” Eric came around the desk, caught Rory and Kristi by their respective elbows, ushering them toward the door. “Go take care of your canine patient, and in the meantime will you please explain the situation to your wife so she doesn’t think I’ve committed some mortal sin.”

“I’m not sure I get the picture myself,” Rory complained.

“Neither do I. With luck, when the woman shows up tomorrow with the twins, I’ll be able to figure out what’s going on.” Assuming she comes at all.

Rory opened the door for his wife.

“You be nice to the woman, Eric Oakes,” Kristi admonished him. “If she’s had your babies, she’ll be feeling very vulnerable and unsure of herself. I know that’s how I felt when I came back to Grass Valley and had to face Rory and tell him about Adam.”

Exasperated, Eric said, “Talk to her, bro.” He eased them out the door, closing it behind them and drew a deep breath.

Incredible. Was he really about to become a father of two baby girls?

Which reminded him that he didn’t know squat about babies and diapers and bottles or any of that stuff. How the hell was he going to manage if it came to that?

Turning around, his gaze landed on Adam, who was still behind bars.

“Your folks just left.”

The boy lifted his shoulders in an easy shrug. “The door locked itself. I can’t get out.”

“Right.” He headed for the ring of keys hanging on a peg behind his desk.

Not only did he know little about caring for babies, he wasn’t all that sure he’d be able to handle a couple of girls Adam’s age when the time came. And God help him, when they became adolescents, his goose would be cooked.

If they were his nieces and he was about to become their daddy.

“I DON’T KNOW how you can give away those sweet little babies.” Barbara Cavendish shaded her eyes against the morning sun as Laura loaded the twins inside her SUV for the trip to Grass Valley.

“It’s what their mother wanted. Amy made that abundantly clear.” A knot formed in Laura’s throat at the mere thought of handing the twins over to a perfect stranger, even if he was their only living relative. And she fully understood that in her mother’s heart, she’d already claimed the twins as her grandchildren.

Laura tried for a brave smile as she adjusted Amanda’s car seat, then reached across her to the second car seat and caressed the blond fuzz on Rebecca’s head. She’d never seen two more beautiful babies, small for their age but absolutely perfect in every way. She desperately hoped that once their uncle Eric met the twins he wouldn’t feel the same way about them as she did. There was no law that said he had to raise them. He could easily reject the idea once he realized what it entailed.

“You know I loved Amy as if she were my own child,” her mother continued. Barbara Cavendish had taken Amy into her home and heart as an abused foster child when the girl had been only ten years old. Laura had become her big sister—a role she’d loved and continued as best she could after Amy had moved out on her own. “I’m just not sure she was thinking clearly, wanting to give her babies away to a complete stranger when she knew you—”

“Her half brother, Mom.”

“Who she didn’t even know existed until she rummaged through that shoe box of things her mother left her. I wish you hadn’t hired that private detective to find the man.”

In more ways than Laura could count, she wished that too. “I promised Amy I’d follow her wishes if I could.”

During Amy’s last trimester of pregnancy, it had become clear she wouldn’t be able to continue working as a waitress, and the complications of Amy’s diabetes made the pregnancy high risk. She was told she could die.

Not wanting to burden Laura’s mother, who tended to be overly protective, Amy had moved in with Laura. Soon after that she’d discovered she had a half brother—the twins’ only living blood relative.

Then the worst had happened. Amy slipped into a coma before she gave birth to the twins. Only the doctor’s quick action, taking the babies by cesarean section, had saved them. Amy had given her life for the children she never had a chance to hold.

Preparing for that contingency, she’d left written instructions for Laura to follow, signed and notarized, as binding as any will. Find Amy’s half brother, if she could. See if he’d be a suitable daddy. If not, Amy wanted Laura to raise her babies. In the end, the decision would be Laura’s.

It had taken the private detective three months and several thousand dollars to locate the man. Five hours from now, give or take a little, Laura would actually meet him.

“In spite of the rocky road she’d traveled, Amy believed families ought to stick together,” Laura told her mother. “I suspect you were the one who taught her that.”

“I don’t know, dear—”

“Mom, I have to do this. I gave my word of honor.” Straightening, she rested her hand lightly on her mother’s shoulder, trying to reassure herself as much as her mother. “Chances are a sheriff in a town like Grass Valley has a beer belly, chews tobacco and has only a passing interest in the offspring of a woman he never knew. I’ll have an easy decision to make—he obviously won’t be a fit father for the twins—and my conscience will be clear.”

Failing that, her last, best hope would be that Eric Oakes wasn’t married—at least the detective hadn’t uncovered any evidence of a woman in the picture. Amy had been adamant that she didn’t want her babies raised by a single father. She didn’t trust any man that much.

Laura hugged that thought tightly to her as she kissed her mother goodbye and climbed in behind the steering wheel of the SUV. Amanda and Rebecca were already her life, the children of her heart.

Because she couldn’t bear children of her own, they were her one best chance to be the mother she longed to be. They could ease the ache that had been with her since that terrible accident when she’d been sixteen years old—an accident that had been her fault. Oh, she hadn’t been driving the pickup truck filled with a half dozen cheering high school friends when a speeding car crashed into them.

But climbing into the back of that truck after their team had beaten the town rivals had been her idea. She’d carry that guilt with her forever.

Her hand trembled as she twisted the key in the ignition. Anxiety about what would happen in Grass Valley dried her mouth like a summer drought turns a prairie to dust.

The early-morning sky was a pale blue, the air crystalline clear. The temperature would probably reach seventy-five degrees, typical for July.

Normally she loved driving across Montana during her time off from teaching high school history and government. She’d even been known to go hiking on her own or camping with friends. But this trip—and what might follow—she dreaded at a deeply personal level.

She could lose the babies she had come to love with the intensity that only a mother could possess.

AS SHE’D EXPECTED, six hours later and three stops for diaper changes and bottles, she discovered Grass Valley was little more than a wide spot in a very narrow road.

Laura slowed as she entered the town. Eric Oakes had told her to meet him at his house, so she cruised past the few buildings that lined the main street, noting a couple of women visiting in front of the general store. An older man coming out of the saloon waved at Laura—probably mistaking her vehicle for someone else’s. She caught sight of the sheriff’s office, a short, stout building that wouldn’t even intimidate a jaywalker.

Then she saw the quixotic roadside mailbox, a prisoner in a bronze striped uniform escaping through the roof of the jail. Eric had said she’d have no trouble finding his place.

Drawing a deep breath, she turned into the long driveway leading to a two-story house. Modest by most standards, the best feature was a porch that stretched the full width of the house and was positioned to catch the morning sun. Two wicker chairs promised comfort while watching the sun rise.

A big cottonwood tree shaded portions of the front yard, and beyond the house stood a small barn and corral. A pair of sorrel horses raised their heads to check on her arrival.

Laura didn’t want to think about how much Amanda and Rebecca might someday want their own horses or have a swing hanging from a sturdy tree branch. Her townhouse didn’t have room for a corral, and the trees were mostly poplars, impossible to climb much less swing from.

When she pulled to a stop, a man came out of the house, the screen door bumping closed behind him as he walked down the steps toward her with an easy stride. Tall and lean in his khaki uniform, he wore a badge pinned to his broad chest and a pager on his belt that was no larger than a trim size thirty-two.

She’d really been counting on a beer belly.

Checking first to see that the twins were still sleeping, she got out of the car.

“Afternoon,” he said in the same clear baritone she’d heard on the phone, a tone that held a note of caution.

She nodded. “Sheriff Oakes.” His hair—the color of a sand dune after a rainstorm—was cut short, probably to tame the natural waves rather than from any desire to appear military. Crinkles fanned out at the corners of his eyes, as though he’d spent a lot of time squinting into the Montana sky—or laughing. His face was tanned, his jaw square, his lips set in a firm, skeptical line.

“Most folks just call me Eric. We’re pretty informal around here.” He glanced toward the truck. “You’ve got the twins with you, Ms…uh…I didn’t get your whole name.”

“Laura Cavendish. They’re in their car seats.”

“I wasn’t a hundred percent sure you’d show up.”

“I said I would.”

“Well, let’s take a look at ’em.” He gestured toward the back seat.

She bristled. “This isn’t like picking out a good horse, you know.”

His pale-blue eyes narrowed and darkened with suspicion. “I didn’t think it was, Ms. Cavendish. But they are my nieces, aren’t they?”

“Apparently.” More than anything in the world, Laura wished they weren’t—wished the detective had made a mistake and traced the wrong man. But he’d assured her that wasn’t the case.

“How did you find me, anyway? Johnson is a pretty ordinary name.”

“I had your date and place of birth from your sister, which I gave to the detective I hired. Since I knew you and she hadn’t been raised together, we guessed you had landed in the foster care system somewhere.” The tricky part had been getting ahold of the adoption records. Laura hadn’t asked the detective how he’d managed that.

He cocked his brow, then edged closer to her vehicle, peering through the tinted side window. “So you’re pretty sure I’m the right guy.”

“Yes.” She swallowed hard. If she simply got back in the truck and returned to Helena, no one would question that she’d done as Amy had requested and decided their uncle wasn’t suitable. The twins would be hers. “But if you’re not interested in raising them—”

He grasped the handle and opened the door. Laura held her breath as he leaned inside.

“Oh, my God.” He spoke as though his words were a whispered prayer and filled with awe. “They’re so little.”

Through the crack, Laura saw him tenderly slip his finger into Rebecca’s hand. The baby closed her tiny fingers into a fist around him and opened her eyes, looking up at Eric with her bright blue eyes. A bubble escaped her lips.

“Hey, Tinkerbell,” he said softly. “This lady says I’m your uncle Eric. Whadaya think, huh?”

The magical exchange between the big, rugged sheriff and his tiny niece was so powerful, Laura’s throat closed down tight, and she almost couldn’t speak. “That one is Rebecca. The other one is Amanda.”

“How do you tell ’em apart?”

“Rebecca’s left eyebrow arches a little more than Amanda’s does and her ears stick out a tiny bit more. She’s also more wakeful than her sister.” Somehow, from almost the first moment following their birth she’d been able to tell the twins apart without checking their ID bracelets. The hospital nurses had been amazed. “Other than that, they’re identical.”

“I’ll say.”

A light breeze ruffled Laura’s hair, shifting it along the back of her neck, and she felt a chill run down her arms. “I think we ought to take the girls inside. They’re still a little fragile.”

He backed away from the truck. “Oh, yeah, sure. Come on in.”

“You get Rebecca, and I’ll go around to the other side to get Amanda.”

“You want me to—” He blanched as white as if she’d asked him to pick up a deadly snake. “I’ve never held a baby that tiny before. I’m not sure I know how.”

He’d better learn how in a hurry if he expected Laura to even consider leaving the twins in his care for as little as two minutes—forget the rest of their lives.

“Here, let me.” She edged past him, acutely aware of what a big man he was. His aura expanded around her, stealing inside her personal space, leaving her feeling slightly breathless. Unsnapping the car seat harness, she lifted Rebecca and gave her a quick kiss. “Come on, Becky. Meet your uncle Eric.” She held out the baby to him.

He hesitated.

“She won’t break as long as you don’t drop her.”

“I won’t,” he promised.

She laid the baby in his arms. “Keep her head propped up. Don’t let it fall back.”

He looked as awkward as a boy at his first dance, standing as stiff as a robot, not knowing quite what to do with his hands, his expression frozen with fear. Even so, Laura saw he was gentle. His big hand cradled the back of Rebecca’s head, his arm held her firmly against his chest.

Not that that meant he’d be a good daddy for the long haul.

“Now, hold her carefully,” she warned him again. She hurried to the other side of the SUV, quickly extricating Amanda from her car seat. The infant stretched and yawned, then let out a tiny cry of complaint. “Sorry I had to wake you, Mandy. You’re fine, really you are.” She grabbed the oversize diaper bag and rejoined Eric, who hadn’t budged. “We were going inside?”

“Right.” He eyed Laura, then looked down at Rebecca. “I was wrong before. She’s not Tinkerbell, she’s Stinkerbell. And I think she’s leaking.”

“Oh, dear.” She stifled a smile at his horrified look. “Well, let’s get her inside, and I’ll change her diaper. That probably means Mandy is about to let loose, too.”

Eric didn’t look at all pleased with the prospect. His easy walk that she’d noted earlier turned to a tiptoe race up the porch steps. Despite that, he took the time to hold the door open for her.

An officer of the law and a gentleman—shades of the old west.

For a bachelor’s place, the living room looked neat, and the heavy leather couch and recliner gave the room a masculine flavor. In lieu of any feminine touches, there was an overflowing bookcase stuffed with mystery, adventure and science fiction titles, a big-screen TV and a stereo sound system that would rival an outdoor amphitheater. It looked like a case of a boy with plenty of expensive toys.

Noting the row of huge silver rodeo trophies on the mantel above the natural rock fireplace, Laura suspected Eric’s music of choice would be country-western. She wondered how he was at two-stepping. Not that she was an expert. Just the opposite. But the dance had always looked like fun.

Holding Amanda in one arm, she pulled a receiving blanket from the diaper bag with her free hand and spread it on the center cushion of the man-size couch. She put Amanda down and reached for Rebecca.

Eric passed her the baby, thinking how odd the situation felt. A woman in his house and two tiny babies so small he could probably cradle one in each hand like a football if he wasn’t so darn scared he’d drop one.

No question, he was going to need a crash course in infant care if they had any chance of surviving under his roof after he was on his own with them.

A father ought to know something about taking care of his kids.

If indeed he was a relation at all. He had the feeling he should be waiting for another shoe to drop, one that resembled a complicated con job intended to raid his bank account.

How could anyone know how much he’d always wanted a family of his own?

He watched Laura’s swift, confident movements as she changed the babies’ diapers. Her head was bent over them, allowing her hair to slide forward, hiding her face behind a ginger-blond screen. Her hairdo was practical, only long enough to reach the angle of her jaw, one of those styles that brushed into place with a few strokes or little more than a shake of her head. But it seemed to shine in the reflected light of the room as though someone had turned a golden spotlight on her.

Her clothes were practical, too. A businesslike navy jacket over a light yellow blouse and navy slacks. Sensible shoes. A long way from a femme fatale or what he’d imagine a scam artist would wear.

She dressed as primly as every social worker he’d ever known as a kid, but something was different about her. When she held one of the twins, murmuring sweet, loving sounds, her smile glowed from the inside out. She had some kind of a special connection to these babies. Eric wasn’t sure what.

Granted, he wasn’t a big-city cop. But he’d had a fair amount of police training and pretty good instincts. Despite her very attractive packaging, this woman was hiding something.

“Except for knowing my birth name, what other proof do you have that these babies are any relation to me at all?”

Chapter Two

Laura’s head snapped up, her eyebrows arched in surprise at his question. “Trust me, Sheriff Oakes, there is no reason in the world why I would lie to you about that.”

“But that doesn’t mean what you’re saying is true. How well did you know the woman who said she was my sister?”

“Half sister. You and she had the same mother. I’ve known Amy since she was ten years old.”

“That long?” The more a witness talked, the more likely they were to get their story confused, if they were lying. Eric wanted this woman talking. He wanted the truth.

Rebecca started to fuss, and Laura picked her up, holding her against her shoulder, patting her back. “My mother took Amy in as a foster child when I was about twenty and going to college. I was still living at home, so I was around a lot.”

Something dark and painful rose in Eric’s chest. “Where was her mother?” His mother, if what she was saying was true.

“Amy was being both abused and neglected. Child Welfare removed her from her home and placed her with my mother for her own safety. It was the best thing that could have ever happened to Amy.”

God, remembering what had happened to him as a kid, Eric could believe that. “Where is her mother now?”

Laura softened her voice slightly. “She died about five years ago. I’m sorry.”

A muscle flexed in his jaw. “I see. You realize I can check your story, don’t you?”

She made an impatient sound and plucked a baby bottle from the diaper bag. “Be my guest. The detective’s business card is in the truck. And my mother would be happy to give you the name of Amy’s former case worker.”

Either she was telling the truth, as she knew it, or she was a damn good actress. But the whole story could still be a scam.

Eric sat down on the arm of the couch and watched while Laura slipped the bottle into Rebecca’s hungry mouth. She did it with such ease, he guessed she’d done it a thousand times before. Probably. He also noted she wasn’t wearing a ring, which likely meant she wasn’t currently married.

“What about the twins’ father? You know where he is?”

“She never gave me his name. I’m not sure if I knew who he was that I’d go looking for him. She’d gone off with him about a year ago. From what she did tell me, he was abusing her. After she got pregnant, she ran away.”

“Smart woman. But if he knew about her pregnancy, he could still show up and claim his parental rights.” Eric couldn’t think of anything worse than losing his own children. But he couldn’t imagine abusing a woman, either.

“I think it’s unlikely he’ll show up, whoever he is.”

“If Amy knew I existed, I wished she’d tried to find me sooner. I might have been able to help.” With a restraining order…or something a little more personal and persuasive.

“She didn’t know about you, not until shortly before her…death.” Her voice caught on the word and her chin trembled slightly as though experiencing a painful memory. “She was going through some old papers of her mother’s. That’s how she…we learned about you.”

Amanda began twisting and turning on the couch like an eel. Almost immediately she registered her displeasure about something. Eric didn’t have a clue what.

“There’s another bottle in the bag,” Laura said. “Mandy’s has a blue top. Can you feed her?”

Panic spiked him in the chest. “Uh, sure, I guess.”

He found the bottle, gave it a little shake as he had seen Laura do, then stuck it in Amanda’s mouth. She started sucking eagerly.

“It would be better if you picked Mandy up and held her while you were feeding her. Cuddling is important to an infant’s emotional and intellectual development.”

“Right.” His brow tightened into a frown. It looked so easy when Laura held and fed Rebecca. In contrast, he didn’t know quite where or what to grab on to, and it irritated him that Laura sounded like a baby-care expert.

“You do this for a living?” he asked. “Taking care of babies.”

“Bigger babies.” She smiled slightly. “They can cry louder. I’m a high school history and government teacher.”

“Oh.” Adjusting his position, Eric picked up the baby, bottle and all, cradling her in his arm. She looked up at him with big blue eyes, trusting him as though he could walk on water.

God, did he dare believe these two babies were really related to him? That they were family? That he had a legitimate claim to be their father and raise them?

“What makes you so sure these records you’re talking about weren’t forged or something.”

“Have you always been this much of a skeptic? Or is it that babies make you that nervous?”

“Come on, you waltz into my life with some crazy story about a sister I never knew I had? Wouldn’t you have some doubts, too?” Less than a year ago a woman had shown up at his brother Walker’s house with a baby in tow and claiming to be his new housekeeper. A totally phony story, which had worked out well in the end, he admitted. “A desperate woman looking to find a decent home for her baby can come up with a very convincing lie.”

She leveled him a look that would make most men back off in a hurry. “I personally guarantee if you don’t want to raise Rebecca and Amanda for any reason at all, they will always have a good home—with me.”

The intensity of her words brought him up short. This woman was not fooling around. “You want to adopt the twins?”

“With all my heart.” A fine sheen of tears appeared in her eyes, but she didn’t let them spill over.

“Then why did you bother to track me down? I never would have known otherwise.”

“Because I promised Amy I would.”

That simple truth, stated with such conviction, had more power than anything else she could have said. She wanted to be the twins’ mother. She loved them. Eric was standing in her way. And still she had kept her word to a dead woman—her foster sister.

Removing the bottle from Rebecca’s mouth, she lifted the baby to her shoulder again, rubbing her cheek against the infant’s blond, fuzzy little head and patting her back.

Assuming the twins were related to Eric, did he have any right to take them away from a woman who so obviously loved them even if it had been their mother’s wish that he raise the pair? What the hell had made her—or him—think he was qualified for the job?

Rebecca gave a very unladylike burp, and milk drooled down her chin.

“I brought along the box of records and snapshots Amy discovered. It’s in the back of my truck.” She laid the baby back down on the couch and wiped the dribble from her lips with the edge of the blanket. “If you’ll watch the twins, I’ll go get it. Some of the pictures are of you and your mother.”

That news drove the air from his lungs. He had nothing of his mother except memories. Some good, some bad. All of which he had tried to repress because the very last memory was of her abandoning him.

LAURA MANAGED to get outside before her chin began to wobble again. She didn’t want Eric to see how strongly his interrogation had upset her. It had taken all of her courage to come here to fulfill Amy’s wishes. She didn’t appreciate being treated like a common criminal. Given a choice, she’d be happy if he decided he wasn’t related to the twins, didn’t want them around.

But her damn conscience demanded she give him all the information she had before he made up his mind about what he wanted to do.

Sometimes being honest really stank!

Grabbing her slender briefcase from the front seat, she went around to the back of the truck and lifted the hatchback. Her suitcase, baby paraphernalia and a crib filled the back of the SUV. Tucked to one side was a shoe box from a discount store that had long since gone out of business. She took that and a small quilt, carrying them inside.

She found him gazing at the babies but couldn’t quite read his expression. It was softer than when he looked at her, more relaxed with at least a trace of awe.

Please don’t take my babies away from me.

He looked up at her.

“This is the box with the snapshots and Amy’s birth certificate. You’ll note the similarity of your mother’s name and hers.”

Eric held the box in his lap unopened for longer than necessary while Laura busied herself by spreading the quilt on the floor and laying the twins down one at a time. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know what was in the box. For the most part, he’d put his childhood behind him. He’d grown up. Whatever faults his mother had had, he didn’t dwell on them now.

He didn’t want to reopen wounds he’d spent most of his life trying to heal.

One of the babies made a singsong sound, and he realized he had to see whatever Pandora had in mind for him.

The snapshots didn’t appear to be in any particular order. A young blond girl in a ponytail standing in front of a pickup truck. The twins’ mother, his half sister? A younger version of her on a tricycle. He felt no recognition, no connection.

He picked up the birth certificate and examined it. Amy Maria Thorne, mother listed as Millicent Karen Thorne.

Eric swallowed the tightness in his throat. His mother must have finally found some guy to marry her. She’d been listed Millicent Karen Johnson on his birth certificate. Unmarried.

And then she’d abused and neglected her daughter—just as she had neglected and allowed a hamfisted man to abuse him.

He caught his breath at the next snapshot, he and his mother standing in front of a roller-coaster ride. He’d been maybe seven or eight at the time.

“I remember this.” His voice sounded rusty, his throat was dry. “We’d gone to a county fair. It was the first time I’d ever ridden a roller coaster and some guy with a camera…”

His throat shut down entirely. He couldn’t speak, and it felt like someone had tightened a band around his chest, screwing it down hard.

He stood. He had to get away from Laura. Couldn’t let her see how upset he was.

With a vague wave of his hand, he fled the room.

Why had his mother abandoned him? What had he done that was so wrong?

Sitting back on her haunches, Laura watched him leave. His obvious pain had brought an ache to her own chest. From what she’d just seen and what Amy had told her, Eric’s wounds were fully as deep as his sister’s had been.

Smiling down at the twins, who were now chewing on each other’s fingers, she silently vowed she wouldn’t leave them with Eric until she made sure whatever damage his mother had done to him emotionally hadn’t left him so severely scarred that he was incapable of giving the twins the love they deserved.

If she decided to leave them here at all.

When he returned, his strong, masculine features were tightly under control, and he held himself erect.

“You’ve convinced me,” he said. “Amanda and Rebecca are my nieces. We’re blood kin, and I’ll give them the best home I know how.”

Fear and adrenaline drove Laura to her feet. “It’s not that easy. I’m not going to simply hand the girls over to you.”

“Why not? That’s why you tracked me down, isn’t it? It’s what my sister wanted, right?”

“Not exactly. First, I have to—”

The doorbell chimed, but before either of them had a chance to react, the door opened.

“Hey, Eric, are you home?” a female voice asked.

Laura’s heart sank. If Eric had a woman in his life who could be a good mother to the twins—

A young woman with reddish hair swept into the room followed by an equally attractive blonde.

“Oh, look at those sweet little babies,” the first one crooned, kneeling beside the quilt on the floor. “Look at their tiny pug noses. They’re adorable.”

Laura bristled, her protective instincts rising.

Frowning, Eric muttered, “What are you two doing here? And since when do you use the front door?”

“Since we knew you had company and we came to see the babies, of course,” the blonde responded. “And to meet the woman you’ve been seeing on the sly.” With a welcoming smile, she extended her hand to Laura. “Hi, I’m Lizzie Oakes, Eric’s sister-in-law. And that’s Kristi fawning all over your babies, Eric’s other sister-in-law. We’re both upset he’s been keeping you a secret from the family.”

Laura gaped at the woman before finally taking Lizzie’s hand. “I think there’s been some misunderstanding. Eric and I haven’t been—”

“You don’t have to pretend with us,” Kristi said, playing peek-a-boo with Amanda. “We’re certainly not ones to cast stones.”

“Neither of us,” Lizzie agreed. “We just want to make sure Eric is prepared to do the right thing. A woman shouldn’t have to—”

“Ladies!” Eric barked, causing both babies to twist their heads around searching for the source of that unpleasant sound. “This is Laura Cavendish, who I just met today. And those two babies, who you think are so cute, are my nieces, which is no doubt why you think they’re cute. Family resemblance.”

Jaws agape, both young women stared at Eric.

“What sister?” they said in unison.

“Half sister,” he admitted. “Laura, who knew her when she was growing up, brought the twins here so I could meet them. I’m very grateful for that.” He acknowledged her with a nod. “And it is my intention, based on my sister’s wishes, to adopt the twins and be the best darn father I know how to be.”

“Oh, my…” Kristi murmured.

“Well, then,” Lizzie said. “Congratulations. You’ll be a terrific dad.”

“Excuse me, but it’s not that simple,” Laura told them. She’d been aware via the adoption records the detective had uncovered that Eric had two brothers. She hadn’t expected to be assailed right off by two sisters-in-law, however.

“You’re right,” Kristi agreed, placing a kiss on Rebecca’s forehead before she stood. “Among other things, I don’t think Eric has a lot of experience with babies. I know he’ll be grateful if you could stay here with him for a few days to help him get the hang of things. Unless you have a husband to get home to.”

“No, I don’t—”

“That’s a terrific idea.” Lizzie shot a conspiratorial look in Kristi’s direction.

Eric stepped forward. “Now wait a minute—”

“You’ve got that extra bedroom where Laura can stay,” Lizzie said. “And the room on the south side will make a wonderful nursery. Sunny and warm in the winter. The babies will love it.”

“Trust me, you’ll need a lot of extra help at first,” Kristi added. “Why, I remember when…”

Laura’s head spun as the two women pointed out the importance of having someone on hand who knew how to handle infants. They, the women insisted, didn’t have time to help him out. They had their own families. Laura suspected the whole deal was a match-making scheme. On the other hand, she wasn’t about to leave the twins in Eric’s care just yet. Maybe never. In order to give him a fair chance at proving himself, she needed to give him some time with the babies. Maybe he’d hate all the inconvenience enough to forget being a father.

Driving through town, she’d noted Grass Valley didn’t offer a whole lot of options for temporary housing. She hadn’t considered that problem before she left home, and now she had nowhere else to stay except with him and the twins, because she sure as hell wasn’t going to leave them.

“I think staying here is a fine idea,” she announced.

They all turned toward her. Eric shook his head. Lizzie said, “I think it’s perfect, too. Would you like us to help bring in your luggage?”

“No, I’m sure Eric will be more than happy to do that for me.” She gave him her stern schoolmarm look that had been known to wither a whole gang of adolescent boys. Managing one man shouldn’t be all that difficult.

Lizzie and Kristi appeared pleased they’d accomplished whatever it was they’d set out to do.

“We’ve got to be running along,” Kristi said.

“Just wanted to welcome you to Grass Valley,” Lizzie added. “Eric’s a great guy, by the way.”

Laura smiled weakly. The man had certainly developed a fan club among his sisters-in-law. She wondered what their spouses thought of that. And knew their views wouldn’t sway her about leaving the twins with Eric if she wasn’t one hundred percent convinced it was the right thing to do.

Given how much she loved the babies, it was hard to imagine she’d ever be willing to do that, despite Amy’s wishes.

She swallowed hard, telling herself she didn’t know enough yet about Eric to seriously consider handing over the twins’ custody. His worthiness to be their father could take days to determine. Maybe even weeks.

She nearly groaned aloud. Surely it wouldn’t take that long to discover some fatal crack in his paragon-of-virtue image.

He managed to escort his sisters-in-law out the door, then returned to the living room.

“I’m sorry about the misunderstanding. Those two are really great people but they do sometimes jump to conclusions.”

“It’s all right.” She knelt and draped a light blanket over the two sleeping babies. “The fact is, you’ve jumped to a conclusion, too.”

“What’s that?”

Pulling some papers from her briefcase, she handed a copy of Amy’s notarized instructions to Eric.

“Amy was abused most of her life, not just by the man who fathered the twins. The one thing she asked me to do before I relinquished the babies to you is to make sure you had a wife who could love them like a mother should.”

He stared at her in disbelief, then quickly read through the papers.

“This makes you the final arbiter of whether or not I get custody.”

“That’s true.” The attorney she and Amy had hired had carefully crafted Amy’s last wishes so that the custody decision about the twins would be Laura’s and hers alone.

“And she wanted me to have a wife.”

“It was her very strong preference. She had good reasons to—”

“That’s crazy!”

“Those were her wishes.” She gestured toward the legal papers in his hand. “This is what she wanted. I intend to fulfill her request as best I can.”

“Then I guess that makes it you and me against each other.”

“If that’s how you see it. I see it as doing what’s best for the twins.”

Chapter Three

“I’m going to need some sort of a changing table.”

Sunshine streamed through the window of the designated nursery, but the room itself looked bare, the only furniture the crib Eric had hauled upstairs. There ought to be a border of teddy bear ballerinas dancing along the top of the walls to match the bumper pads and crib sheets Laura had chosen for the twins. An overflowing toy box would fit under the window, a pair of desks in the corner for when they got older, a two-sided easel for painting.

“Seems to me we’re short one crib, too,” Eric commented, checking that the crib was solidly held together. “They should each have their own.”

“For now, they’re all right in one. In fact, I think they like it better that way. They seem to want to cuddle as if they were in the womb. When I take them back home—”

“The way I see it, they are home. Right here.”

“Yes, well…” For a man who’d only lately learned about the twins, he had certainly developed a possessive streak. Or maybe he was challenging her because he was innately competitive. Given the number of rodeo trophies on the mantel downstairs, he wasn’t one to give up easily. “That’s yet to be determined, isn’t it?”

“A court might decide my claim has more merit than yours, given my relationship with the twins.”

“You’re welcome to consult with an attorney.” She and Amy had already done that. In general, the mother’s wishes would prevail.

“I think I’ll do that tomorrow. Assuming you don’t mind staying with the babies while I drive into Great Falls and back.”

“If you’re planning to raise the twins, you’d better get used to having to take them with you wherever you go.”

His brows slammed down into a straight line, narrowing his eyes. “Now you’re telling me I’ll be disqualified as a father if I use a baby-sitter?”

Laura was sure Eric knew how to smile, but she had yet to see him accomplish the maneuver. But then, her comment had been unreasonable. “Point taken. I’ll stay with the twins while you check with your attorney.”

Before her accident, Laura had had adolescent dreams of someday finding a man as protective of her as Eric appeared to be of the twins. But as she’d grown older and finally fallen in love, she’d learned the truth. She was damaged goods, a woman no man would want to marry. She couldn’t bear his children.

She swallowed back the bitter memory. A man as macho as Sheriff Oakes would demand nothing less than perfection.

“Come to think of it,” Eric said, “who watches the twins when you’re at work?”

She cut him a sharp look. Fair was fair, she supposed, and he had a right to know what arrangements she’d made for the twins. “My mother will baby-sit the twins during the school year. She lives only a mile from me and adores Mandy and Becky. She loved Amy like her own, and she’s always wanted grandchildren but knew, since my accident—”

“Does that mean in order to get custody I have to come up with a loving grandmother, too, as well as a wife?”

“Well, no, I’d never require that of you.” Although Laura’s mother would be heartbroken to lose the only grandchildren she was likely to have.

He nodded, but his expression didn’t soften much. “Now, you were saying you needed something?”

She forced her thoughts back to practicalities. “A changing table. If you’ve got a card table or something like that I can use, it will do temporarily.”

“I haven’t done much decorating of the place, it didn’t seem important.” Until now, he realized. What did a bachelor need with eight rooms filled with furniture? He only used three or four of the rooms himself. But if this was going to be the twins’ home, they needed the right equipment. “Come on, we’re going shopping.”

“For what?”

“I saw some oak chests of drawers at the general store. Handmade by an old guy east of town. There ought to be one that’s the right size. You can help me pick it out. We can put their clothes and stuff inside.” He headed for the hallway. He could get another crib, too. At least order one from the catalogs Hetty Moore kept around. And he remembered Susie-Q, Lizzie’s little girl, had a jumping swing thing. He’d need two of—

“Eric, the babies are about to wake up. They’ll be hungry and need their bottles.”

“Oh. Well, okay.” So he needed to learn their schedules. No big deal. “We’ll feed them and then we’ll go.”

“What time does the store close?”

He checked his watch. “Six o’clock. It’s four now.”

“That should give us barely enough time—if the store doesn’t have a big selection and you don’t linger over your decision.”

His jaw went slack. It took that long to get the twins ready to roll? Lord, when he got up in the morning, he shaved, showered, ate breakfast and was on the road in under thirty minutes. How much longer could it take to get two itty-bitty babies organized for a trip of less than a half mile?

IT WAS LIKE PREPARING for an African safari.

There was a diaper bag, extra bottles, a plastic baggie of pacifiers in case the twins began to fuss. Then Laura had insisted that the infant car seats, which only an hour ago he’d taken into the house, had to be transferred to his vehicle. She was right, of course, that the babies’ safety was all-important but the seat belts had tangled. Sorting out the mess had taken Eric a full twenty minutes. She’d suggested, with mock sweetness, that they could take her SUV, which had the seat belts already adjusted to the proper length.

Not a chance! They were his kids now.

Still, he had to give her credit. While he had battled frustration, she had remained calm. Cuddling the twins and cooing at them. Checking on his workmanship to be sure the babies would be as safe as possible.

A child could do worse than have her as a mother.

Which didn’t mean Eric was going to concede the twins’ custody to her, not by a long shot. Blood counted.

By the time they all piled into the police cruiser, a black-and-white SUV with a light bar on top—which he’d been forced to drive because his personal vehicle was a pickup truck that didn’t have a place for the twins—Eric was exhausted. He suspected Laura was, too. But she was so tight-lipped, he was afraid to comment.

Hell, they would have been better off to carry the babies down the street to the general store. But then, how would they have gotten a chest of drawers back home if he hadn’t driven the SUV?

Not that there was much time left before the store closed to do their shopping by the time they got there.

LAURA ADJUSTED AMANDA in a cuddly sling across her chest. She had yet to find a sling to handle both babies at once, so Eric carried Rebecca into the general store.

A cheery chime greeted their arrival as he pushed open the door and held it for Laura.

An amazing array of products, from wilted produce to bathroom faucets, cluttered the narrow aisles. Aging Christmas items were still on display on the higher shelves, two-foot-tall aluminum trees, dusty Styrofoam snowmen in jaunty hats and a plastic crèche missing its wise men.

Idly Laura wondered how many years the decorations had been waiting for a frantic last-minute shopper to succumb to desperation.

From the back of the store, a woman appeared. She wore a blue butcher’s apron over a print dress and had one of those faces that was best described as having character. Laura guessed a line had been etched for each of the seventy-something years she had lived in Montana.

“Afternoon, Eric. Bet you’ve run out of frozen dinners again and don’t want to eat at—” Her eye caught the baby in his arms, and she halted abruptly. “My sakes, look at what you’ve got. Isn’t she the cutest little thing.”

Laura winced as the woman chucked Rebecca under the chin. She’d been told by the doctor that the twins’ immune system might not be as strong as those of a higher birth-weight baby, and she hated to take the twins around strangers.

“Excuse me,” Laura said. “The babies are—”

“Hetty, I’d like you to meet Laura Cavendish. Hetty Moore and her husband, Joe, own the store.”

Laura smiled politely, but before she could prevent it, Hetty had zeroed in on Mandy’s rosy cheek, giving the baby a grandmotherly pinch.

“Twins…” she crooned. “You’ve been keeping secrets from us, Eric. Shame on you. These little bundles are too precious to hide. And their mamma, too. Such a pretty girl.”

“I didn’t know about them till yesterday, Hetty.”

“He’s their uncle,” Laura tried to explain.

Hetty’s eyes widened and she gasped. “You mean Walker has been—surely not Rory. Why, they’re only just married, the both of them. I can’t think what gets into a man’s head these days. My Joe and me—”

“Hetty! It’s not what you think. This has nothing to do with my brothers.”

She huffed. “I should hope not.”

Eric rolled his eyes, and Laura stifled a smile. The good folks of Grass Valley had a tendency to jump to conclusions. Explaining the situation would likely take hours, and there wasn’t that much time before the store closed.

“Eric was hoping to buy a small chest of drawers to put the twins’ things in,” Laura said.

“With two new babies to manage, you’ll be needing a lot more than one chest of drawers.” On a mission now, Hetty bustled down the aisle toward the back of the store.

“They may not be staying that long,” Laura called, hurrying after her.

“Now, honey, you don’t have to play coy with me, giving me some wild story about young Eric being the twins’ uncle. If he’s their daddy, you have to give him a chance to make up for whatever he did that upset you. I’m sure you two can work out your differences.”

“We might as well give it up for now,” Eric muttered only loud enough for Laura to hear. “Once Hetty gets something in her head, it sticks there like Super Glue, even if it’s wrong.”

“I don’t want people to think you and I—”

“They won’t. Not for long.”

Just what did that mean? Was he going to take out an ad in the local paper, assuming there was one, to explain the situation? Or was it simply too obvious the handsome town sheriff wouldn’t be caught dead with someone like her? Not that she was a dog. But she certainly wasn’t model thin. Nor had she ever been considered sexy. Men had never fallen all over themselves to ask her out. And the few who had soon lost interest, either because she knew more about history and government than they did, or because she couldn’t give birth to the offspring their egos demanded a woman produce.

“Now here’s a nice one.” Hetty scooped a display of American flags and red, white and blue bunting off the top of a five-foot high honey-oak chest of drawers. “Conrad Gelb’s a true craftsman. I’m sure he’d make up another one just like this if—”

“It’s too tall,” Laura said. “I’m going to use it for a changing table while I’m here.”

“He could make you one of those, too, if you want.”

“We aren’t a hundred percent sure the babies will be staying—”

“I’m sure.” Juggling Rebecca in one arm, Eric lifted the edge of a dust cover from a similar oak piece that was about waist high and had three drawers. “How about this one?”

Laura nodded. “That would work fine.”

“Won’t hold but a teaspoon’s worth of baby clothes,” Hetty warned.

“We’ll take it.” Eric glanced around the store. “How ’bout those swing things babies like?”

To Laura’s dismay, and frequently over her objections, Eric went on a shopping spree that would have made most women envious. It made Laura uneasy. She didn’t like the thought of anyone wasting money. And she didn’t like the idea that Eric was so determined to provide everything possible the twins could want or need. In the long run, that attitude wouldn’t be healthy for the twins.

Short term, it would make it all the harder to put the babies back in her car and take them away from Eric.

Finally running out of steam, Eric handed Rebecca off to Hetty, who cuddled, cooed and happily pinched the baby’s cheeks.

Joe Moore, Hetty’s big, burly husband, who looked nothing like a storekeeper, was called from the back room to help carry the purchases out to the car.

Laura had the distinct feeling she and the babies had been dropped into the middle of a fast-moving stream at flood stage and were being carried along by the current. A helpless feeling and inherently dangerous.

ERIC PLACED the oversize teddy bear near the crib, fluffed its polka-dot bow and stepped back to admire his work. He’d brought everything up from the car. The low chest of drawers was in place across from the windows. The wind-up, jumping-rocking swing was at the closet end of the room right next to an oak rocking chair. Hetty had told him all moms needed a rocking chair.

A dad would, too, he reasoned, smiling. Yep, he’d done all right for his first day as a father.

The cry of a baby preceded Laura’s arrival in the nursery, one of the twins in her arms. He couldn’t tell them apart yet but he would soon enough.

She handed him the baby. “Mandy needs a change.”

“You want me to do it?”

“It comes with the territory, Sheriff. Spending money does not a father make.”

“I know that,” he mumbled. “It’s just that I haven’t ever—”

“Changed a diaper. I suspected as much. It’s time for your first lesson.”

“Maybe I ought to watch first.”

“Hands-on is the best way to learn, and Becky dozed off after her bottle, so this is a good time. Unless you’d like to wait until they’re both fussing.”

“You have a vindictive streak, don’t you?” He carried Mandy to the dresser and laid her on the thick pad he’d bought for this very purpose. He should have known Laura would make him initiate the darn thing.

Laura’s smile was all too smug. “Possibly.”

Almost immediately, Mandy began to fuss and kick her little legs.

“Hold still, Twinkle-Toes.” He managed to un-snap the legs on the pink-and-white sleeper but had trouble getting the toes unhooked. “Hey, Sweet Cheeks, how ’bout a little cooperation for your old man?”

Mandy’s crying increased in volume.

Eric began to sweat. “Feel free to help out anytime you feel like it.”

“You’re doing fine.”

Like hell! A little more struggling and he got one foot out. The second came easier. He gave Laura a grim smile of accomplishment. “Now what?”

“Take the old diaper off, use a wipe and put on some lotion so she doesn’t get a rash.”

It all sounded so easy the way she rattled off the instructions.

By bending Mandy’s legs over the top of her head, he got the old diaper off. He needed a third hand to reach the new diaper, and by the time he got that more or less in place, he realized he hadn’t done the wipe and lotion part. So he started again.

By now Mandy was pretty frantic, little sobs lifting her chest.

He opened the diaper, did a swipe, spread the lotion, reconnected the sides to the front with the sticky tabs and lifted Mandy, smooching her on the forehead, quieting her immediately.

He exhaled in relief, giving Laura a triumphant smile. And the diaper slipped down around Mandy’s ankles.

Laura’s stern, disapproving expression cracked. He’d thought of her eyes as an ordinary shade of pale blue, and they suddenly sparkled with amusement—at his expense—and he decided they held an amazing depth. Her smile was like a sunrise after a stormy night when the dark clouds had finally lifted. Her laughter reminded him of a lyrical songbird, light and airy. The uncanny transformation flustered and bewildered him. Beneath her tough-as-nails, I’m-the-teacher exterior lurked an entirely different woman.

A woman a man might have trouble resisting—if she were interested.

“I’m sorry.” She covered her mouth to silence her laughter, and he was sorry she’d hidden her beautiful smile. “It’s just that you looked so—”

“Ridiculous. I know.”

“No.” Her gaze softened. “Endearing. You were trying so hard, and then—”

“Yeah. I sort of made a mess of things.” Except now Mandy had her head buried against his neck, sucking on his collar, and seemed as contented as a baby could be. That part felt good.

“Perhaps we should start again and begin with me showing you the basics.”

He met her gaze, nodding. “Starting again sounds like a great idea.” He didn’t limit his thoughts to simply starting over with basic baby-care lessons.

SHE SHOULD HAVE PAID closer attention to Hetty’s comment about Eric eating frozen dinners.

Laura gazed into the refrigerator at the meager contents. A gallon of milk, a six-pack of beer, some eggs, two apples—one of which was already half rotten—and an assortment of condiments.

“I’m not much of a cook,” he admitted. “Most of the time I grab a burger and fries over at the saloon. Or stick something in the microwave.”

She opened the freezer and found the selection pretty much limited to pot pies and lasagna. “You might want to consider adding fresh vegetables to your diet.”

One side of his lips kicked up into a half grin. “Guess I’ll have to be a good example to the twins, huh?”

Now that he’d stopped glaring at her all the time, he looked less formidable. Which didn’t make him any less dangerous. More so, since he was so set on being a good father.

“I’ll treat you to chicken pot pies tonight,” he said. “Tomorrow I’ll pick up some fresh stuff when I’m in Great Falls. Hetty doesn’t have a real good selection.”

“I noticed.”

While Eric started dinner, Laura surveyed the spacious kitchen. The twins were in their car seats in the middle of a long oak picnic-style table with benches, probably crafted by the same man who had made the chest of drawers upstairs. The cabinets were a darker wood and needed a face-lift as did the tile counters. But there was a big window over the sink that faced west. It was dark now but Laura suspected it would provide a view of some spectacular sunsets.

“How long have you been sheriff?” she asked Eric while she tickled Rebecca’s tummy with one finger. Her reward was a wide, gummy smile.

“About five years. Before that I was on the rodeo circuit.”

“I noticed the trophies.” How could she not when they were on such prominent display?

“I had some Best-All-Around years until I took one too many headers off a bronc named Lucifer. I broke my leg in three places. Now I’ve got a couple of pins that set off security alarms in airports.” Still in his uniform, he stood with his back to the counter, one booted ankle crossed over the other, looking very much at ease. “I had to stay off my feet for six months, so I moved back to the Double O Ranch. About the time I was mobile again the former sheriff announced his retirement. I decided settling down was a good idea.”

“But not on the ranch?”

“Walker enjoys punching cows a lot more than I ever did, and he’s a good manager. Rory and I still have an interest in the place, though, and help out during roundups, that sort of thing.”

“I gather no woman wanted to settle down with you?”

His eyes immediately narrowed, and Laura regretted she’d asked such a personal question. It wasn’t that she was prying, exactly. Knowing something of Eric’s past, including his recent history, would help her decide if he was suitable to be the twins’ father.

“I’ve never met a woman I wanted to ask.” He held her gaze, the microwave humming its monotonous note behind him. “How about you? Have you ever been married?”

She swallowed hard and turned back to the twins. Mandy had spit out her pacifier; Laura plugged it back in. “I came close once. It didn’t work out.”

“What went wrong?” His voice was a little softer than it had been. Intimate.

Her past was none of his business, except maybe he’d understand better why she was so reluctant to turn over the twins to a stranger. Why she wanted to be their mother.

“He wanted to have a son to carry on the family name.” Lifting her head, she looked at him levelly despite the painful knot in her stomach. “I can’t have children. I was in an accident and they had to remove my uterus.”

His mouth went a little slack. “I’m sorry.”

“No more than I am.” She forced a shrug she hoped looked casual. “The worst is, they left the rest of my female parts, so I get the joy of PMS without any of the benefits.”

The buzzer on the microwave saved him from responding to her revelation. Just as well. Laura didn’t want his sympathy.

She wanted a reason, even a small one, to salve her conscience so she could reject him as a suitable father for the twins and raise them herself. After meeting Eric, that had to be the most selfish thing she’d ever wanted in her life.

DINNER didn’t go well.

Laura explained to Eric the uncanny knack the twins had for turning fussy the moment anyone sat down to eat a quiet meal. Eric found himself cradling Becky in the crook of his left arm while trying to fork a bite or two of pot pie into his mouth without dribbling the hot gravy on the baby. Not an easy task.

She couldn’t have babies of her own. No wonder she was so damn anxious to keep the twins for herself. As much as he might sympathize, that didn’t mean he had to hand them over to her. His sister had wanted him to raise her babies. It made sense that they’d live with a blood relative.

As a kid in foster care, Eric had spent hours fantasizing about an uncle or aunt or grandparent who’d show up and give him the home he’d dreamed of having. His own family. But nobody came.

He wasn’t going to let that happen to Mandy and Becky. It didn’t matter how much Laura loved or wanted to raise them. Or that she’d been Amy’s foster sister.

She wasn’t real family.

By the time they’d finished eating, the babies were ready for another bottle. That was followed by a change of diapers and clean sleepers. Tomorrow, Laura warned, she’d give him a lesson in bathing the babies. It was too late now.

“Do you want to do the next feeding on your own?” she asked as she placed Mandy in the crib next to Rebecca. Magically, the pair gravitated toward each other.

“What time does that happen?”

“Usually between one and two. Then they wake again around five.”

“How are we supposed to get any sleep?”

She gave him a wry smile that said sleep wasn’t a part of the deal.

“I’ll handle both feedings,” he said generously. “You’ve been up since early morning.” Of course, he hadn’t been out to feed his horses yet this evening, and there were still dinner dishes to do. But there weren’t many and they could wait until morning. He’d put them in the sink to soak. No big deal.

She arched her brows. “If you’re sure.”

“I’ll have to manage sooner or later. I might as well start now. I’ll call you if I run into trouble.”

With a shake of her head, Laura told him good-night and headed toward the guest room. He was the most determined man she’d ever met. She suspected, however, it was a case of a fool rushing in when an experienced person would be more wary. Granted, he’d pretty well gotten the hang of changing diapers and could fix a bottle, but in the middle of the night his new skills might not come all that automatically.

The spare bedroom looked as though it had once belonged to a teenage girl, the white antique furniture and twin bed with a pink flounce likely left behind by the prior owners. It smelled musty, and she opened the window to let in some fresh air. The scent of sage and lush summer grass wafted in the window.

The faint glow of starlight shadowed the rolling landscape and outlined the nearby barn and corral. Unlike her home in Helena, where there was always the sound of neighbors coming or going and the hum of traffic on the boulevard, here silence enveloped the night. It pressed in on her ear drums, sending a message of loneliness that was more easily ignored when drowned out by the presence of others.

The sound of the back door opening broke the quiet, and she caught sight of Eric striding toward the barn. The horses in the corral whickered a soft greeting, moving in the same direction. No matter how tired he might be, caring for his animals came before his own comfort.

She pressed her lips together. Given a chance, he’d do the same for the twins.

Turning away from the window, she opened her suitcase and pulled out her cotton nightgown. She’d been busy all day and was too weary to unpack now. When she’d left home, she had hoped she wouldn’t be staying long in Grass Valley, wouldn’t need to settle in.

In the face of Eric’s determination to be a father, that goal seemed less attainable now.

The next day or two—or maybe one sleepless night up with crying infants—would tell the tale of his resolve.

She’d hope for the best—or perhaps it was the worst she was looking for in the twins’ sleeping habits.

ERIC WENT TO SLEEP making plans to hang an old tire as a swing from the cottonwood tree out front when the twins were old enough.

He woke to the wailing sound of the smoke alarm.

He was on his feet, pulling on his pants, before he realized it was the twins crying. How could two tiny sets of lungs make that much noise?

Shaking the fuzziness from his head, he stumbled out of the bedroom into the hallway. He met Laura at the door to the nursery.

“I’ve got ’em,” he mumbled, his voice thick with sleep.

“Becky’s been crying for five minutes. She woke up Mandy.”

“Sorry. I didn’t hear ’em.” How could Laura tell which one was crying, for Pete’s sake? It just sounded like a racket to him.

They both bent over the crib, each one picking up a baby, which quieted the infants only briefly. Eric followed Laura downstairs, where she retrieved two bottles from the refrigerator, where she’d had him place them earlier, and popped them into the microwave. Jiggling the baby in his arms, he stared stupidly at the glow of the oven until it buzzed.

They each took a bottle and sat down next to each other on the bench at the kitchen table. A moment later the screams were replaced by the sound of eager little sucking noises, not unlike a newborn calf discovering his source of sustenance for the first time.

Eric sighed in relief.

“After a while you get tuned in to their cries and wake up at the first peep. It’s better not to let them get too upset.”

He grunted noncommittally. That kind of adjustment might take more than a day or two.

Gazing at nothing in particular, his eyes finally focused on Laura’s feet. Her bare feet. Long, slender toes tipped by polish in a rainbow of bright colors, each toenail a different hue.

He grinned, awake now. “Nice toenail polish.”

“Huh? Oh.” She folded one foot over the other like a shy little girl. “My neighbors have a nine-year-old daughter who wanted to try out her new fingernail polishing kit.”

“And you volunteered?”

“Something like that.”

He let his gaze wander higher, surveying the modest nightgown she wore buttoned securely at her throat. He had the oddest urge to slowly undo the gown one button at a time to discover what other surprises were hidden behind her prim exterior.

He’d never had a woman stay overnight in his house. It had never seemed to be the right time. The right woman.

Having Laura here was definitely going to challenge his view of what was “right”…and what was wrong for both him and her.

Chapter Four

Frustration had Eric clenching his teeth by the time he finished his meeting with the attorney the next day. He called his brothers and asked them to meet him at the ranch. Maybe they could help him figure out how to get over or around the custody plan for the twins.

The heart of the Double O had always been the office Oliver Oakes had used. That was the place where he’d designed successful breeding programs, determined how many head of beef cattle had to be culled in the fall so the herd would survive until spring with the available feed…and where his adopted sons were called onto the carpet for their misdeeds.

Walker sat behind the heavy oak desk now, reading Amy Thorne’s instructions regarding the future of her children. Rory lounged in the leather chair in the corner, contemplating the problem while Eric paced.

Walker set the papers aside. “That’s crazy.”

“My thought exactly,” Eric said. “Unfortunately, the attorney says it will probably stand up in court. I could appeal, but the twins would be going to their first prom before any higher court heard the case. Meanwhile, Laura would be raising them.” He didn’t have to explain why the twins were important to him. He and his brothers had all dreamed of having their own families. For Walker and Rory that dream was coming true.

Not so for Eric.

Leaning forward and linking his hands between his knees, Rory said, “I don’t suppose it would be a good idea to put a price on Laura’s head and let my Indian brothers know about it.”

Walker shot Rory a quelling look. “Not funny, Bird Brain,” he said, using the nickname he and Eric had chosen for Rory following his Blackfeet naming ceremony when he’d become Swift Eagle. They had decided it was far too classy sounding for their troublesome brother. “Among other things, Lizzie tells me Laura is a nice lady. Very attractive.”

“She is,” Eric agreed.

“I don’t get why she’s so damned anxious to raise somebody else’s kids, though,” Rory commented.

“She has her reasons.” Eric didn’t feel any need to reveal Laura’s personal problems. That was her own private business.

“I’ve got a gaggle of kids Lizzie and I are raising who weren’t born to us,” Walker pointed out. “Children have a way of getting under your skin when you’re not watching.”

At this point, Walker and his wife of a year were raising six children, four of them teenage boys plus one preschooler and a toddler. Eric expected someday soon they’d get around to having a baby of their own and expand their family again.

He sat on the edge of Walker’s desk. “The point is, I want to be a father to Amanda and Rebecca. Raise them. But I don’t see how I’m going to do that unless I can magically pull a wife out of a hat somewhere.”

His brothers were quiet for a moment, then Rory said, “You aren’t bad-looking for a white-eyes. There’ve got to be a lot of women who’d be willing to marry you.”

“Thanks for your vote of confidence,” he muttered.

“How much time is Laura Cavendish giving you to come up with a wife?” Walker asked.

Eric shrugged, feeling defeated. “We haven’t talked about a deadline.”

“Well, that’s the answer, then.” Rory shoved back from his desk and stood. “While you’re learning to be a daddy, Rory and I will help you find a wife.”

“We will?” Rory asked.

“Sure. It shouldn’t be too hard. Like you say, he’s not bad-looking and there are a lot of girls out there wanting to tie the knot. Most of ’em even like babies.”