“Congratulations, Ms. Marshall—you have just hit the jackpot. You are the lucky winner of twins.”

Nikki stared at Seth, certain she couldn’t be hearing correctly. “What do you mean I won them?” she croaked finally.

Seth shrugged. “I could have said you lost the lottery, but I thought it would make you feel better if I put a positive spin on it. What it comes down to is, you get to keep the twins a while longer.”

Nikki’s head was spinning. “Oh, no.”

“You’re the one who volunteered for this responsibility,” Seth pointed out.

“I said I’d take care of the babies for three days. Count them—Friday, Saturday, Sunday!”

“Or until Laura gets home.”

And Laura didn’t expect to be hit by a virus, any more than I would expect to get struck by lightning…But what was she going to do about it?

Couldn’t Seth help…?

Leigh Michaels has always been a writer, composing dreadful poetry when she was just four years old and dictating it to her long-suffering older sister. She started writing romance in her teens and burned six full manuscripts before submitting her work to a publisher. Now, with more than 75 novels to her credit, she also teaches romance writing seminars at universities, writers’ conferences and on the Internet.

Leigh loves to hear from readers. You may contact her at:

PO Box 935, Ottumwa, Iowa 52501, U.S.A. or visit her Web site at www.leighmichaels.com

Books by Leigh Michaels

HARLEQUIN ROMANCE®

3783—PART-TIME FIANCÉ

3800—THE TAKEOVER BID

Assignment: Twins
Leigh Michaels

www.millsandboon.co.uk

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ONE

NIKKI plunged her hands into the hot, soapy water for the last time and pulled the plug out of the drain. “There, that’s the last of the dishes.” She picked up a baby bottle which had tipped over and set it upside down to drain on one of the towels which lined the small counter.

From the dining nook just outside the galley kitchen, Laura called, “Washing three days’ worth of my dirty dishes wins you the friendship service medal, you know.”

Nikki dried her hands, rolled down the sleeves of her silky blouse, and buttoned her cuffs. “Is that all I did?” She kept her voice light. “From the size of the pile, I expected it had taken a week to build up.”

“For the average family of four, perhaps. But when you have two kids this size, dirty stuff collects in a hurry.”

Nikki paused in the doorway. Laura was sitting with her back to the kitchen, facing a pair of high chairs. In each chair was a dark-haired child, not quite a year old, each armed with a small, soft-tipped spoon and a plastic bowl. The thick, gooey, grayish, slimy-looking substance which had once been in the bowls was now spread liberally over the high-chair trays as well as the two cherubic faces, and a few lumps had landed on the plastic mat which covered the floor.

All things considered, Nikki thought, I got the best end of the deal by doing the dishes.

Laura’s babies were adorable, no question about it. But fond as Nikki was of Zack and Anna, she didn’t regret that her life had taken a different channel from Laura’s. At least, not very often.

“What is that stuff they’re eating, really?” Nikki asked.

“Rice cereal mixed with mashed pears.”

Nikki wrinkled her nose. “It looks like library paste that’s been left out to mildew.”

“Shh. They’re very sensitive to other people’s reactions to food. I mashed up some squash for them to try the other night. Stephen took one look at it and made gagging noises—and the twins spit out every bite after that.”

“You’re certain it was because of their dad? I mean, honestly, Laura—squash? They’re only eleven months old. Not liking squash seems to be part of the deal.”

“It’s an excellent source of Vitamin A,” Laura said firmly.

“I’m sure it is.” Nikki nodded toward the twins. Zack had cereal in his left eyebrow. Anna’s chin was covered with half-dried paste. “Are they actually getting any of that stuff inside where it counts?”

“Well, Anna’s better at it than Zack is,” Laura admitted. “But Zack’s more determined to do it himself, so I have to sneak in an extra bite when he’s not paying attention.” She dipped a spoon into one of the bowls and inserted it into the boy twin’s mouth while he was inspecting a lump of cereal that had stuck to his smallest finger. He swallowed absent-mindedly and opened his mouth again.

“Want me to help?”

Laura smiled. “You don’t really mean that. If you got cereal all over that suit right before you go meet an important client, I’d feel awful. You’ve already done enough for one day, anyway, clearing up my dishes. Having a broken dishwasher and two babies does make life a little difficult.”

Nikki pulled up a chair. “I know finances have been a bit tight lately for you and Stephen,” she said gently. “But it will have to be fixed before you can list the house for sale.”

Laura nodded. “Seth’s going to tear it apart when he has time and see if he can get the parts so he and Stephen can get it running again.”

“When he has time? I see.” Nikki was proud of herself; her voice sounded absolutely neutral. “How’s The Lone Repairer doing these days?”

Laura shot her a suspicious look. “Since when do you want to chat about Seth?”

“I was just making conversation. But if you don’t want to talk about your husband’s brother—”

“I thought you might have run into him recently. He’s working on a house up in the Rockhurst neighborhood, one of those huge mansions near the art museum. It’s a big job.”

“And that—plus all the blond fashion-model lookalikes who require his attention—is why your dishwasher is still broken.”

“Well, I do wish he’d date someone whose IQ is larger than her dress size,” Laura said. “But to be perfectly fair, my dishwasher isn’t Seth’s responsibility. He has his own place to keep up.”

“I suppose when it’s your full-time job to fix things, it’s not much fun to do it on your day off, too.”

“It would be sort of like asking you to go on a tour of homes for fun, after you’ve shown houses all week long.”

“I happen to love home tours, but I see what you mean. It’s too bad Stephen wasn’t the brother who inherited the handyman genes.”

Laura sighed. “The poor guy tries. He put up a towel rack in the bathroom last week.”

“Without Seth supervising? I’m amazed.”

“Of course, it fell off three days later and tore a chunk out of the tile wall.”

Nikki winced.

“At the rate we’re going, we’ll never get this house in shape to sell. Of course, if we can put it off till the kids go to college, we won’t need to buy a bigger house at all. The next eighteen years will be something of a challenge, in a two-bedroom house with no playroom and a kitchen the size of a postage stamp, but—”

“This is a darling house, Laura.”

“That’s the real-estate person inside you talking.”

“It’s a cute little cottage with an efficient floor plan. Perfect starter home for a young couple.”

“Until they unexpectedly have twins.” Laura spooned cereal into Anna’s mouth. “Stephen wanted me to ask you something. A favor.”

Surprise tingled through Nikki’s veins. It wasn’t that she and Stephen never talked, but it was generally Laura who issued invitations and arranged plans for the couple, while her husband was the quiet, always-agreeable one. For Stephen to specifically ask Nikki for a favor…

Laura went on hastily, “I already told him it wouldn’t work, but you know how guys can be—once they get an idea, there’s no blasting it out of their heads. I had to promise him I’d ask, so I’m asking. But honestly, Nikki, I’ve already told him you can’t, so there’s no problem.”

“Well, that seems to settle it,” Nikki said cheerfully. “But maybe you should tell me what the favor actually is, honey? I mean, in case Stephen should bring it up, it would help if I have a general idea.”

“Oh.” Laura grinned. “I guess you’re right. There’s this thing he has to attend next weekend. His boss was scheduled to go, but at the last minute he’s had a conflict, and so they’re sending Stephen instead. And he wants me to go with him.”

“So you need a baby-sitter? What’s the big deal? Of course I’ll—”

“It’s not just an evening, Nikki. It’s a conference. Sort of a continuing education seminar that goes on all weekend.”

“Well, that does make a difference,” Nikki admitted. “He actually wants you to hang around waiting for him while he’s taking classes? I hope you can at least go shopping.”

“It’s on a cruise ship in the Caribbean.” Laura sounded wistful. “But I’ve already told him I can’t go.”

Nikki stared at her. “Of course you can. Are you nuts, Laura? How many times do you get a free second honeymoon?”

“Well, it wouldn’t exactly be free. We’d have to buy my plane ticket. And I called a couple of babysitting agencies—Do you know what they charge for round-the-clock care for two babies for a weekend?” She shivered.

“I can imagine. So Stephen wanted you to ask me to look after the twins so you can go.”

Laura nodded. She looked unhappy. “I know how busy you are—”

“You said it’s next weekend?”

“A long weekend, actually. Friday morning to late Sunday night.”

“I don’t have any open houses scheduled over the weekend, so—”

“What about dates? Are you still seeing Richard?”

“Once in a while. It’s no big deal.” She saw Laura start to open her mouth, and hurried on before the questions could start. “All I’d have to do is clear my calendar for Friday.”

“Nikki, please don’t feel obligated to do this. Even Stephen admitted that it would be a lot to take on for anyone who isn’t used to twins. He’ll understand that you can’t do it. He’s just disappointed right now.”

“What about you?” Nikki asked gently. “Are you disappointed?”

Laura didn’t look at her. “Of course I am. We could never afford a cruise on our own. But I’d probably be seasick anyway, so—”

“Not on a ship that size. You’re going, so start packing.” Nikki picked up her suit jacket from the back of a chair. As she was putting it on, she looked past Laura to the twins and hesitated. Both of Zack’s eyebrows were now daubed with cereal, and Anna had a bit on her nose.

Three days. Alone. With twins…

“Wave bye-bye to Aunt Nikki,” Laura prompted the twins.

Zack was too absorbed in turning his bowl upside down and watching it drip to pay attention. Anna gurgled, grinned, and waved her spoon in the air. A blob of cereal flew off and splatted against the lapel of Nikki’s jacket.

Laura sighed and held out a damp washcloth. “Sorry about that. I won’t hold you to the offer, Nikki.”

Nikki scraped the blob off with her thumbnail and rubbed the dark blue fabric with the corner of the washcloth. “I’ll just move my name tag up to cover the spot,” she said. “Come on, Laura. You do this all the time. Surely I can handle it for three days.”

Nikki had taken care of the twins before, of course—for an evening now and then to let Stephen and Laura go out for a sandwich and some adult talk, and once in a while for an afternoon so Laura could get her hair cut or see a doctor. This would be no different, she told herself. Only longer.

Much longer, she realized on Saturday afternoon as she took the twins out of their stroller after a walk. She was exhausted because Zack had awakened at two in the morning with a nightmare and it had taken an hour to get him settled again. She’d already run through every activity she could think of and built so many block towers to be knocked down that she was qualified for a job putting up a skyscraper. And she hadn’t even looked at the briefcase full of paperwork that she’d brought with her.

And they were not quite halfway through the weekend. She had just as many hours stretching in front of her as had already passed.

What she’d failed to take into account was that the twins at eleven months were far more active and inquisitive than when they had been infants. They were no longer charmed by the slow revolution of a mobile above a crib. Peekaboo and pat-a-cake were no longer exciting. Not only had they had been actively annoyed at being strapped into the double stroller, but they’d made it clear they were highly insulted when Nikki refused to let them kiss all the neighborhood dogs.

By the time she untangled Anna’s safety harness and extracted her from the stroller, Zack had already crawled into the narrow space between the couch and the recliner in pursuit of his ball, and got himself stuck.

Zack started howling at his predicament, and Anna began howling in sympathy. Nikki was just drawing a breath and thinking about joining them when she heard the back door open and a deep voice call, “Anybody home?”

She gritted her teeth. Seth Baxter. The Lone Repairman had finally found time to look at Laura’s broken-down dishwasher.

Why right now? she wanted to shout. Why not last week, when Laura had been at home? Or if he absolutely had to come this weekend, why couldn’t he have showed up that morning, during the fifteen-minute span when Zack and Anna had been contentedly playing with two empty boxes and a stack of plastic yogurt cups? Or last night after they’d been bathed and tucked into their cribs?

Of course, by the twins’ bedtime she’d been practically a zombie herself, with pureed peaches and baby shampoo down the front of her sweatshirt…

Not that Seth Baxter would have cared what she looked like, anyway.

In the last two years, every time she’d ever come face to face with the man, he had acted as if he found her mildly interesting—worth one long appraising survey, but nothing more. She’d come to expect that no matter what she was doing or how she was dressed, Seth would scan her with that same slightly ironic gleam in his eyes, looking her over just long enough to make her want to scream—and then, as if the sight of her bored him to tears, he would turn his attention to something else. Nikki would rather have him ignore her completely, but she supposed the chances of that happening were nil.

Of course, all things considered, she didn’t exactly blame him for inspecting her as if she were a curious breed straight out of the zoo, because that was pretty much the way she’d acted the first time they’d spent any significant time together—though his own actions hadn’t exactly won any etiquette prizes.

She sighed and reminded herself to be grateful that she didn’t run into him more often. Once every few months was bad enough.

“In the living room, Seth.” She stooped to extract Zack from his predicament.

Seth came around the corner from the kitchen. “Nikki? What are you doing here?”

She snagged the back straps of Zack’s overalls and tugged him out from under the edge of the couch. “Didn’t anybody tell you about the cruise?”

“Yeah, Steve said something. I forgot it was this weekend.” He leaned against the stubby wall which separated the living room from the dining nook, arms folded across his chest. “I wondered what they were going to do with the house apes. Zack, buddy, you’ve got to remember how to get yourself into reverse.”

Nikki finished wiping Zack’s tears and took a good look at Seth. It had been several months since she’d seen him—across a baptismal font, where he’d been holding Zack while she cradled Anna—but he matched the picture in her mind almost exactly. His dark-brown hair was sun-streaked and longer than it had been at the babies’ christening, and he was wearing jeans and a polo shirt instead of a suit. But he was every bit as tall and lean as she remembered, his eyes were just as stunningly green, and his shoulders pushed the limits of the knit shirt. And the look…yes, there it was. Half-bemused, half-fascinated, and totally wary—the same expression that always made her want to scream.

Anna stopped crying, dropped to her hands and knees, and scrambled across the carpet toward Seth. He picked her up almost absently, still looking at Nikki. “How’s it going?”

She was darned if she’d admit that a few minutes ago she’d been ready to howl along with the twins. “Great. We’re doing fine.”

“Uh-huh. How many times has Laura called?”

“From the ship? Just once, when they first got on board.”

“That’s amazing.”

“She said she’d call back, but I heard Stephen in the background reminding her this was supposed to be a vacation. Anyway, she doesn’t need to check in—she left a full list of instructions on the refrigerator door, right next to her appointment calendar.”

“Her list actually fit on the refrigerator? I’d have expected a whole volume—alphabetized and cross-indexed.”

Nikki smiled. “Maybe she just didn’t have time to write it all down. But it doesn’t take an instruction manual to know that these two need a nap right now. I was just ready to put them to bed, so don’t let me keep you from working on the dishwasher.” She stepped closer to him, close enough to feel his warmth, and held out her free arm to take Anna.

The baby had nestled into Seth’s shoulder, and she didn’t seem inclined to move. Nikki stroked the baby’s back. As her fingertips neared Seth’s forearm, braced under Anna’s bottom, Nikki felt tingles run along every nerve.

Don’t be ridiculous, she told herself. You’ve touched him before.

At least…Well, she must have touched him somewhere along the way, she told herself, even if right at the moment she couldn’t remember a specific occasion. They must have shaken hands when they were introduced, for one thing—though when she stopped to think about it, she couldn’t remember actually meeting Seth. He must have just been part of the crowd, at some party back in the dark ages when Laura was dating Stephen and Nikki herself had been engaged to Thorpe. Perhaps it had been about the same time the four of them had started to make plans for a double wedding…

The dark ages, indeed.

Seth held the baby out so she could get a grip on Anna’s waist. Nikki’s hand brushed his arm, and she jerked back a little before she got hold of herself and very deliberately let her arm rest against his while he transferred the baby’s weight.

He didn’t say anything and neither did she. And it was utterly ridiculous for her to feel breathless over such a little thing. But—maybe she hadn’t ever touched him before, because she’d have remembered that kind of smoldering heat.

Nonsense, she told herself briskly.

As if they were afraid of missing something exciting, the babies did their best to fight off sleep. Ultimately they succumbed, however, and Nikki tucked them into their side-by-side cribs and tiptoed out of the room.

The house was quiet except for the catchy rhythm of a jazz tune coming from the radio in the kitchen. The front panels of the dishwasher were propped against a cabinet door, and Seth was lying on his back on the floor, peering into the dark cavity underneath the machine.

Nikki stopped in the doorway. “Have you found the problem?”

“Not yet. The drain’s not clogged, and the floats are working.”

“Is that good news?”

“Nope. I’ve eliminated the simple stuff.”

Which means he’ll be around for a while longer. Just leave him to his work and go get your briefcase, Nikki. But she didn’t move. “I’m going to make myself a cup of coffee. Want one?”

“Sure.” He slid further under the dishwasher. “How are you, Nikki? It’s been a while.”

“Since we ran into each other, you mean?” She shrugged. “Three or four months, I guess.”

“Three. It was at the christening, and you were scandalized that Laura had asked a heathen like me to be the babies’ godfather.”

Nikki didn’t bother to argue the point. Instead she stepped across him and started putting water into the coffeepot. “How’s Inga? Or was it Elsa you brought that day? I get your girlfriends all mixed up.”

Seth smiled, but he didn’t answer. Nikki wondered if that meant he’d forgotten the woman’s name, too. Quite likely, she thought. All of Seth’s girlfriends looked, sounded, and acted alike.

“How about you?” he asked. “Are you still seeing the stockbroker you brought to the christening?”

“He was a commodities trader,” Nikki corrected. “The stockbroker was before that. And no—not for a while now. There’s a banker I’m seeing at the moment.”

“What happened to the commodities trader? He was practically glued to your side that day.”

Nikki had to think about it for a moment before she remembered. “I realized that if I wanted to get a play-byplay of the day’s markets, I could watch the financial channel—and turn it off when I got tired of listening.”

He prodded at something deep under the machine. “What the…I hate working on antiques. I swear the motor’s rusted into this thing. Being second-best never did appeal to you, did it, Nikki?”

She stopped spooning coffee into the filter and turned to stare at him. “Oh, now The Lone Repairer has expanded into psychology?”

He reached into the cavity with a pair of pliers, and she heard a metallic snap. “Still touchy about the wedding, I see.”

Touchy. That was one way to put it, she supposed. “It’s been two years, Seth. I’ve put it behind me and gone on with my life. So can you just forget it?”

He shook his head. “Of course not. That was one of the great dramatic scenes of the age. I’ll never forget watching you tell Thorpe where to get off.”

She plugged the coffeepot in and pushed the button to turn it on. “Next time I break an engagement,” she said dryly, “I’ll be sure to invite you.”

“Don’t bother. Nothing could ever top that one. Thorpe’s already at the church, wearing his tux, boutonniere pinned in place, fussing with his hair and trying to cover up the signs of a really bad hangover, and you come storming into the ushers’ room wearing half a wedding dress and shrieking at him like a banshee. The costuming alone would have been worth the price of a ticket.”

“I was not shrieking. I was making a point.”

“Not that you didn’t have reason to shriek,” Seth added. “Though I still think you went a little over the top when you started yelling at me. Just because I happened to be there to hear it all—”

“You could have let me know you were there, instead of hiding behind a pillar and listening to every word I said.”

“And interrupted your train of thought while you were on a roll?” He shook his head. “You were just lucky all the rest of the ushers had stepped out for a breath of fresh air so I was the only witness.” He sat up and reached inside the machine, grunting as he tried to lift out the motor unit. “I admire you for doing that, you know.”

Nikki was startled. “For what? Calling off my wedding because the groom spent the night before the ceremony carousing with a bunch of call girls?”

“I think they’d probably prefer to be called exotic dancers.”

Nikki shrugged. “Same thing, as it turned out.”

“Anyway, that’s not the reason. I admire you for going out in front of the crowd and facing the whispers because it was Laura’s wedding day too, and you didn’t want to spoil it for her.”

Why there should be a lump in her throat was beyond Nikki’s understanding. She bit her lip. “Thanks.”

“Anytime.” The motor twisted, and Nikki heard a crack from somewhere deep inside the dishwasher. “I didn’t like the sound of that,” Seth muttered. “In fact, I think I may have found the problem. Or maybe I just created a new one. That’s not my cell phone ringing, so it must be yours.”

Nikki hadn’t even heard the buzz. That in itself was an indication of how badly the man got to her, she told herself as she retrieved the phone from her briefcase. “This is Nikki Marshall.”

“Thank heaven. I thought you’d never answer.” The voice was soft, feminine, and dripping panic.

Nikki recognized it—Jen was the youngest and least experienced member of the sales staff at the realty office. Why she was apparently on duty alone was beyond Nikki’s comprehension. “What’s wrong, Jen?”

“The MacIntyres are here to make a counteroffer on the house they want to buy, and I don’t know what to do. Can you come in right away?”

With two babies asleep in the next room? It had been difficult enough to take them for a simple walk through the neighborhood. Hauling them out of bed and across town to meet with a pair of clients would be torture. Unless Seth would agree to keep an eye on them…

She looked over her shoulder and saw him putting the panels in place on the front of the dishwasher. So much for that great idea.

“Out of the question, Jen.” She ignored the woman’s protest. “Their file is in my bottom desk drawer. The client number is on the tab of the folder. Pull it up on the computer, find the offer they made last week, put in the new price, print out the form, and have them both sign it.” She glanced at her watch. “Then call the delivery service—have a courier bring the papers here, and I’ll check them over. Got it?”

Jen repeated the instructions and the address. “Okay,” she said doubtfully. “If you’re sure you can’t come in.”

“I’m sure,” Nikki said, and snapped the phone shut. When she came back into the kitchen, Seth was putting the last screw into place. “Is it all fixed?”

“Far from it. I have about fifteen pieces to replace—if the home-supply store has them.”

“Then why put it all back together now? You’ll just have to take it apart later. I don’t mind if it’s in pieces—it’s not like I’m getting ready for a dinner party tonight.”

“Because I don’t want the twins to rearrange all the pretty wires.”

“Oh. Good point. You’ll be back later, then?”

“Tomorrow sometime. I have an engagement tonight.”

“With Elsa?” She kept her voice light. “Or Inga?”

“Neither. Why?”

That figured. By now, Nikki thought, there could have been half a dozen more tall, slim blondes in and out of his life. “Seth, you don’t know the meaning of the word engagement.”

“People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones, darling…. How many guys have you dated since Thorpe, anyway?”

“A few,” she said coolly. “Why?”

“Anybody who’s lasted more than a month?”

“I don’t think so.” She kept her voice deliberately light. “But then by your standards, a month is an eternity, so you don’t need to worry about me being fickle. I’ll see you tomorrow, if you don’t want that coffee after all.”

He shook his head. “I’ll take a rain check. You know, you look as if you could use a nap yourself, instead of caffeine.”

“I’ve got some work to do. I have a closing on Monday, and a new client coming into town—so I need to refresh my memory of the listings before I decide what to show him.”

“Him? I thought it was normally the woman who chooses the family home.”

“Usually it’s the wife who does most of the looking,” Nikki agreed. “But this guy’s single. Actually, I think he’s divorced. He’s an upper-level executive with the auto-assembly plant.”

“Now that sounds promising,” Seth said. “If you’re really lucky, maybe he’ll be like the commodities broker—and you can find out every step it takes to build a car.”

Nikki didn’t know whether she was getting used to the routine, or the twins were accepting her, or they were all just too tired to make a fuss, but everything went a little more smoothly on Sunday.

The babies had already had their nap and were in their high chairs toying with their dinner when Seth arrived. He let himself in with a cheerful hello, set a large paper bag of parts on the kitchen counter, and gave the coffeepot a speculative shake.

“If you’re hoping to have that cup of coffee you missed yesterday, you’re too late,” Nikki said. “I kept it hot for you till just a couple of hours ago, though.”

He made a face and started to take the bottom panel off the dishwasher again. “The truth is, you forgot to turn the pot off.”

Nikki put another spoonful of peas and carrots in front of Zack. With his index fingertip, he rolled a pea across the tray. Then he tried to roll a carrot chunk, and settled for smashing it into mush instead.

“How’s it going today?” Seth asked.

“We’re doing great, aren’t we, kids?”

Anna gurgled. Zack noticed remnants of carrot on his fingertip and tried to shake them off.

Seth slid under the dishwasher. “How long till Laura and Steve get home?”

“Six hours,” Nikki answered automatically. Too late, she tried to bite back the words.

Seth was grinning. “I’m surprised you don’t have it figured out down to the minute. So you want to tell me how you’re really doing?”

Nikki sighed. “I missed the courier yesterday because I was in the middle of a diaper change when he rang the doorbell. I yelled, but he couldn’t hear me and I couldn’t get there in time, so I have a counteroffer hanging in limbo because the papers are locked up in a delivery van till Monday.”

“That’s rotten luck.”

“And this morning Zack was standing up in his crib when I went in—and the way his face crumpled when he realized that it was me again and not his mother almost broke my heart.”

“Better you than a baby-sitter he doesn’t know at all.”

Nikki twisted around to look at him. “Don’t you have any sympathy for the poor kid?”

“Of course I do. I’m just realistic about it instead of sentimental. It’s good for them to get used to different people.”

“Well, good luck convincing them.” She added a few chunks of chicken to Anna’s tray and handed the baby her cup of milk. “And while you’re at it, try persuading Laura. Though she still hasn’t called back.” Nikki frowned. “Now that I think about it, it’s a little strange that I haven’t heard from her.”

“There hasn’t been a word?”

Nikki shook her head. “Aren’t phone calls from a cruise ship pretty pricy? Maybe Stephen put his foot down.”

“He could try, but I don’t think that would stop her any more than it would keep a mother bear from charging to defend her cubs. Are you in the mood for a bet?”

“Tell me what it is first.”

“Whether Laura calls the minute they land at the airport, or she rushes straight home to her darlings.”

“She’ll call,” Nikki said promptly.

“I don’t think so. If she calls, she’ll be five minutes later getting here.”

“It won’t hold her up a bit, because she’ll send Stephen after the car while she’s on the phone. That’s not a bet, Seth, it’s a certainty—so the only question left is how much money you want to give me. Anna, smashed peas are not a good conditioner for your hair. Come on, sweetheart, let’s go wash it out.” She lifted Anna from her high chair. “Do you mind if I leave Zack here for a minute, Seth? It’s much easier to wash them one at a time.”

Seth waved a hand instead of answering.

When she came back, he’d turned the radio on and taken the baby out of his high chair. Zack had pulled himself up beside a dining room chair and was hanging on tight, swaying his bottom in an approximate rhythm with the music. Seth was on the floor, both hands out of sight underneath the dishwasher.

“Hold that bag down here for a minute so I can sort through it, would you, Nikki?”

She knelt, holding the bag out of the babies’ reach. “How are you doing?”

“So far I’ve managed to break another valve and increase Zack’s vocabulary by at least two words that Laura doesn’t want him to know.”

The music stopped and a newscast began, but Zack danced on, too fascinated by his own movement to notice. Anna watched him as if she was studying each step. Seth sorted through pieces. And Nikki, half-listening to the newscast over the rattle of metal parts and the babbling of two babies, caught a few words that sent chills up her spine.

“Cruise ship…Caribbean…virus…quarantine…”

She scrambled to her feet and made a dash for the living room.

“Hey,” Seth called, “where are you going with my bag of parts?”

Nikki didn’t bother to answer. She dropped the bag in the nearest chair and dived for the television remote control.

The story was on the second news channel she checked. A mysterious virus had struck a cruise ship in the Caribbean, and public health officials were taking no chances. The ship and the two thousand people on board would be quarantined off the Florida coast until the bug was identified and the passengers were confirmed not to be contagious.

Nikki didn’t have to hear the name of the ship; the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach told her it was the one Laura and Stephen were on. “Oh, no,” she whispered. “All those poor people, shut up on a ship together with stomach cramps and headaches and fevers—”

Seth stood in the doorway, listening intently. “At least it doesn’t seem as though the symptoms are life-threatening. Just miserable.”

“Somehow I don’t think it would be a lot of comfort to know you’re not going to die,” Nikki mused, “if you feel bad enough to want to. What a way to spend a vacation!”

“I wonder if Steve’s boss will charge this up against his sick leave.” Seth’s voice was flippant, but there was a shadow in his eyes and a furrow between his brows.

“No wonder she hasn’t called. There must be two thousand people waiting in line to use a phone, if they can even get out of bed long enough to dial.”

“So we both lost the bet,” Seth added, “because she won’t be calling from the airport, and she won’t be coming straight home, either. At least not tonight.” He looked down at Nikki and raised one eyebrow. “Congratulations, Ms. Marshall—you have just hit the jackpot. You are the lucky winner of twins.”

CHAPTER TWO

NIKKI stared at him, certain she couldn’t be hearing correctly. “What do you mean I won them?” she croaked finally.

Seth shrugged. “I could have said you lost the lottery, but I thought it would make you feel better if I put a positive spin on it. What it comes down to is, you get to keep the twins a while longer.”

Nikki’s head was spinning. “Oh, no.”

“You’re the one who volunteered for this responsibility,” Seth pointed out.

“I said I’d take care of the babies for three days. Count ’em—Friday, Saturday, Sunday. I’m—”

“Or until till Laura gets home.”

And Laura didn’t expect to be hit by a virus, any more than I would expect to get struck by lightning… But what was she going to do about it? “I wasn’t counting on this.” Her voice felt feeble. “They could be delayed for a couple of days.”

“At least.” Seth was looking at the television set.

Nikki followed his gaze. Someone from public health was showing off a chart of infection rates. The angle of the line tracing the increasing number of infected people aboard the ship looked like a rocket’s path to the heavens. If her sales figures were to climb at that rate, Nikki thought, she’d be thrilled.

She said, trying to sound cheerful, “The good news is that at this rate the virus will have gotten to everybody on the ship by about tomorrow. Once that happens, things can only get better, right?”

“That’s what you call the good news?”

Nikki had to admit it didn’t sound very encouraging. “Look, I’m not trying to make light of the situation. I’m as worried about Laura and Stephen as you are. But it looks as if they’ve got the entire public health organization working on it…” Her words sounded hollow. That sort of no-holds-barred action wasn’t directed at every garden-variety virus. This stuff was different.

Poor Laura had been afraid that she might get seasick on the cruise. Now there’s irony for you, Nikki thought. Compared to the bug that was running wild on the ship, it sounded as if seasickness would be positively pleasant.

“No point in worrying. There’s nothing we can do about Laura and Steve right now.” Seth picked up the bag of parts and went back to the kitchen.

Nikki trailed him hopefully.

Zack had flopped down on the kitchen floor and was chewing on the handle of a screwdriver. Seth took it away from him and put it back in the toolbox atop the counter. The baby howled, and absently Nikki picked him up, handed him a plastic measuring cup from the cabinet and watched in disbelief as Seth snapped the toolbox closed.

“You’re not leaving.” It was half-question, half-plea. “Seth, I can’t stay here till that ship’s out of quarantine. I was supposed to go home tonight. I have a life, and I’ve already put it on hold for three days to do this.”

“What are you planning to do with the twins, then?”

Nikki opened her mouth to answer, and shut it again. What on earth was she going to do with the twins? Much as she hated to face the fact, Seth was right—she had assumed the responsibility, and now it was up to her to make sure the babies were safe and taken care of, until their mother could take over once more. If she couldn’t actually look after them herself, then she’d need to find someone who could. She looked speculatively at Seth.

“The way I see it,” Seth said, “you can look in the want ads under baby-sitters—”

“Hire a stranger? Laura wouldn’t like that.”

He didn’t seem to have heard her. “Or you can call child protective services and report that the babies are being neglected, and have them put in foster care. Or you can drop them off on a stranger’s doorstep, ring the bell, and run.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

Seth shrugged. “That’s about all the options I can think of.”

“There’s one more. I can hand them over to you. You’re their godfather.”

“Being a godparent has nothing to do with baby-sitting. It’s purely a spiritual duty.”

“Don’t go getting sanctimonious on me now, Seth.”

“I wouldn’t dream of trying. You’re the one who said it. As I recall, you told Laura on the twins’ christening day that I was a bad choice for the position because I wouldn’t recognize a spiritual experience if it bit me in the—”

“Seth Baxter, do you ever do anything when you’re in church besides eavesdrop?”

“So you admit telling her that.”

“I may have,” Nikki admitted. “I don’t actually recall. But that’s beside the point.”

“In any case, you’re their godmother, so the same argument applies to you.”

“All right then, we’ll leave godparenting out of it altogether. You’re their uncle. With their parents out of the country—”

“Don’t forget indisposed,” Seth added.

“That makes you their closest kin at the moment. I’m only a friend of the family, with no legal standing at all. So the bottom line is that you’re the one who has to make the decisions.”

Seth’s eyebrows raised slightly. “If it’s my choice, then I choose to let you keep them. You’ve been doing a fine job so far.”

Nikki couldn’t decide whether to scream or kick the nearest piece of furniture. “I have a house sale closing tomorrow, and I can’t even change the time because too many people are involved. I can’t find a sitter by tomorrow morning because I haven’t the faintest idea where to start looking. Seth, I’m begging. You have to help me out here.”

“Why me? You signed up for this duty. I didn’t.”

“Because I can’t take a set of year-old twins to a mortgage closing, that’s why!”

“Well, I can’t just hang them from my tool belt while I rebuild Mrs. Cooper’s closets, either.”

Nikki bit her lip. “I don’t suppose you can. But surely you can put Mrs. Cooper’s closets on hold for a day or two. At least till we find out what’s going on on that ship.”

“Obviously you’ve never met Mrs. Cooper, or you wouldn’t say that.” He lowered himself to the floor and began to put the panels on the dishwasher once more.

As soon as he finishes, he’ll leave. You have to do something, Nikki—and fast.

She put Zack down on the floor. “How about that cup of coffee you were wanting earlier?”

“I expected better from you in the bribery department than that, Nikki.”

“All right,” she conceded. “I won’t waste your time by making coffee.”

“The truth is, there are so many dishes in the sink you couldn’t get to the faucet for water anyway.”

Nikki ignored him. “Let’s talk about this like adults. I can’t miss that closing. If you’ll just keep the twins tomorrow morning—”

Seth was shaking his head.

“You won’t even do that much? Just till noon.” Nikki knew she sounded desperate. She didn’t care.

“I can’t. I’ve got a supplier delivering a load of materials at eight o’clock in the morning.”

Nikki chewed her lip. “Eight? My closing isn’t till half past nine. Maybe we can work this out after all. Surely that gives you enough time.”

“Depends on how fast the crew unloads. It’s a big order.”

“Well, the closing is downtown. If I get the babies up in the morning while you go sign the receipt for your supplies, then I can swoop by and drop them off with you in Rockhurst—it’s almost on my way—and go straight to the closing. You can bring them back here and—”

His eyebrows raised. “How do you know I’m working in Rockhurst?”

“Laura, of course.” Nikki surrendered the last of her pride. “Seth, if you’ll just bail me out for a couple of hours in the morning, I swear I’ll come straight back after the closing.”

“What about your new client? The fancy executive at the auto plant?”

She’d forgotten. For a moment there, she’d actually forgotten a client, something which had never happened before. So it’s not just an old wives’ tale. Spending countless hours with babies really can turn your brain to mush.

“I wonder whether he likes kids,” Seth mused.

Nikki gritted her teeth.

“If he’s divorced, maybe he has children of his own. He might even enjoy having the twins around. It’s such a cozy little domestic image—you, him, the babies, looking at houses…”

Nikki had no trouble at all creating that picture in her mind. She sighed. “I guess someone else will have to show him around tomorrow.”

“Hey, kids,” Seth announced. “She’s giving up the tycoon for you. Bet you’re tickled to hear that.”

Anna clapped her hands as if in delight. More likely, Nikki thought, the baby was pleased that she’d managed to pile all her plastic blocks into an unsteady tower. Now she was eyeing her brother’s supply.

“Nobody else in the office could possibly be less prepared than I am,” Nikki said almost to herself. “I haven’t even glanced at the multiple listings all weekend. All right, that covers tomorrow.” She rushed on before he could argue the point. “Now about tonight—”

“What about it?” Seth sounded wary.

“I don’t have any real clothes here, just jeans and stuff. I’m going to have to go home and get something to wear to the closing.”

“Do it in the morning.”

“It’s impossible to get all the way out to my place and back downtown before half past nine. Not if I’ve got the twins, because they move like molasses in the mornings.”

“Then go shopping on your way.”

“You can’t be serious. Try on clothes with two babies in tow? Besides, the malls don’t open that early. And in any case, you can’t just go and buy a copy of that blue jacket we have to wear—the real-estate company has them specially tailored.”

“Okay, okay, you made your point. Let’s go.”

For a moment she was too thrilled at the hint of cooperation to take in what he’d said. Then it hit her. “What do you mean, let’s go? It will take me an hour. Ninety minutes, tops. All you have to do while I’m gone is dunk the kids in the tub, put their pajamas on, and tuck them in.”

“That’s all.” It was obviously not a question.

“Hey, I’ve been doing it all weekend. I’ve gotten pretty good at it, too.” Nikki couldn’t resist taking a jab. “You’ll probably still be wrestling with diapers when I get back.”

“I have a better idea. We’ll all have an outing.”

“You would actually drag two kids halfway across the city at this hour just so you don’t have to give them a bath? Maybe it’s just as well if you keep dating lame-brained blondes, Seth. If you actually ever break down and marry one, maybe she’ll be dim enough not to notice that you’re ducking all the work.”

“I’m not ducking anything. When we get back, we can both pitch in for bath and pajamas, and we’ll get it done in half the time.”

Nikki doubted it, but at least he sounded willing to try. That made her even more suspicious of what he was really up to. She stared at him, eyes narrowed, and finally all the pieces clicked together in her mind. “You don’t trust me to come back at all, do you?”

“Would you trust me, if you were in my shoes? If I put on my jacket right now and said I’d see you later—”

“Probably not,” Nikki admitted.

“Then we understand each other quite well—and we’re square to start with.”

She said carefully, “You mean you’ll actually help? All that protest earlier about not wanting to be involved—”

“Earlier, you weren’t asking for help. You were trying to dump the whole mess on me.”

He was probably right, she admitted. Relief surged through her.

“I’ll pitch in, Nikki,” he warned, “but don’t get the idea that you’re off the hook. Come on, let’s go get you some clothes.”

She went to get the twins’ jackets from the stroller, which was still sitting just inside the front door. As she wrestled Zack’s arms into the sleeves, the television bulletin caught her eye once more. This time the jumpy, grainy picture on the screen showed a helicopter hovering over the deck of a ship, lowering bundles of supplies. Everybody within range of the camera was wearing a surgical mask. A few were fully garbed in protective gowns and gear.

For a disease that wasn’t supposed to be severe, Nikki thought, it certainly looked scary.

Seth came into the living room, with Anna already bundled in his arms. “Are the kids’ safety seats in your car?”

Nikki shook her head. “I wasn’t planning to go anywhere, so I didn’t bother to put them in. Seth—what if they’re not all right? Laura and Stephen, I mean. What if it’s worse than the health department’s saying? They don’t take this sort of precaution for just any little bug.”

“Don’t even think about it. Worrying won’t help Laura and Steve, but it will sure upset the babies. In the meantime…” He shrugged. “You’re the religious one. Pray that somebody figures out how to stop that virus in its tracks.”

Nikki had underestimated how long the trip would take. It was closer to two hours before Seth’s SUV was back in the driveway. Anna was asleep in her seat, Zack was yawning, and Nikki felt like falling into bed herself.

Seth carried Nikki’s suitcase and Zack, while Nikki wrestled a limp Anna out of her seat.

“I don’t care how grubby they are,” Nikki said. “I don’t even care how many of Laura’s rules I’ve violated tonight. Let’s just put them to bed in their clothes, and I’ll give them a bath tomorrow.”

As soon as the twins were tucked in, she unpacked her suitcase, hoping that in her haste she’d managed to grab at least a few pieces of clothing that coordinated. Trying to suppress a yawn, she went back to the living room. Tired or not, she still had to look over the paperwork for tomorrow morning’s closing.

Though she wasn’t surprised to be doing her review at the last minute, she hadn’t anticipated these circumstances. By now, Laura and Steve should be driving from the airport into the city. Any minute, they should be pulling up beside the house, unloading bags and souvenirs, chattering happily about the flight and the cruise, exclaiming how much the kids seemed to have grown in just a few days…

Don’t let yourself start, Nikki.

The house was quiet. She looked around in surprise. Had Seth gone, without even a word? He’d followed her out of the babies’ room, but where had he gone then?

He probably slipped out before I could think of any other favors to ask, she told herself dryly. Or perhaps someone was waiting for him. He hadn’t mentioned another date, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have one.

She opened her briefcase and swore when the blinking blue light on her cell phone caught her eye. The light meant she had voice mail waiting for her—probably from the courier service trying once more to deliver the paperwork on the MacIntyres’ counteroffer. That was yet another thing she’d have to deal with—or hand off to someone else—tomorrow morning.

She was truly off balance, she told herself, to have gone away and left her phone behind—and not even noticed that it wasn’t in her pocket. It figures, she thought. The damned thing had rung only once all weekend, until she’d walked off without it—but now she probably had messages stacked to the ceiling.

She punched in the code to retrieve her voice mail. There was only one message after all. That was a small blessing.

Behind her, Seth said, “Give me your keys so I can move the safety seats into your car.”

That was sweet of him, thinking ahead to make the morning easier for her. Nikki dug in the side pocket of the briefcase for her key chain, and froze as the message started to play. “It’s Laura,” she said and held the phone at an angle so Seth could listen too.

The connection wasn’t the best, and there was so much background noise that it sounded as if Laura was calling from a New Years’ Eve party. “Nikki, where are you? You always answer your phone—oh, no, I hope that doesn’t mean something’s wrong with one of the babies. I only have a minute—there are people waiting, so I can’t talk long. We’re fine, we don’t have this—stuff, this virus, whatever it is. But they’re holding us prisoner even though we’re perfectly healthy—oh, all right, Stephen, I know my minute’s up. Nikki, I’ll try again when I can get back to a phone, but I don’t know when that will be—you wouldn’t believe the lines. I’m so sorry to do this to you. Kiss the babies for me and tell them Mommy wants to come home.”

The message clicked off and there was silence.

Nikki tried to blink back tears. “Oh, damn, I wish I’d been here. I could have told her I’ll take care of the babies—”

“She knows.” Seth’s voice was little more than a whisper.

Only when she felt the warmth of his breath against her cheek did Nikki realize how close his face was to hers. It had seemed so natural to share the phone, to tip it so he could listen, too. So he could share right away in any news, rather than her having to relay it. To be close enough to lean on him, in case the news was bad.

But now that they were practically cheek to cheek…She was almost breathless.

Don’t be ridiculous, she told herself. It isn’t like there’s anything romantic going on here.

Oh, there were plenty of sparks between her and Seth Baxter, all right—there had been ever since that day at the church two years ago when she’d told Thorpe precisely why she wasn’t going to marry him, and then she’d turned around to see Seth half hidden behind a pillar and drinking in every word as if it were hundred-year-old scotch.

But the sparks weren’t the starry-eyed kind. Far from it, in fact. What the two of them created was the kind of grinding, gnashing spark which flared when metal scraped against rock—and heaven help anything that got between.

No, the reason she was feeling off-balance right now had nothing to do with Seth practically having an arm around her. She was just suffering from a sudden attack of sentimentality. Even if she’d expected that message to be from Laura, Nikki would never have anticipated how strongly affected she would be by simply hearing her friend’s voice. It was no wonder if her first thought was to look for a supportive shoulder—it had absolutely nothing to do with who the closest shoulder happened to belong to.

She snapped the phone closed and took a step away from him. “Well, at least we know that Laura and Stephen are all right.” She kept her voice cheerful. “That’s good news. If they haven’t gotten sick yet, they probably won’t, and maybe they can leave the ship tomorrow.” She dropped the phone back into her bag. “Oh, you wanted to shift the car seats.”

Seth took her keys without a word.

Nikki pushed the high chairs aside and sat down at the dining room table with her papers. Though she didn’t try to memorize the details of every transaction, she’d learned a long time ago that being able to explain each number, what it meant, and how it was calculated was almost certain to make the closing proceed more smoothly. When clients were signing documents that obligated them to thirty years of mortgage payments, it was no time for the real-estate person to appear uncertain or uninformed.

She flipped through the document and tried to page back to make a comparison, only to find the first sheet stuck to the table. How on earth, she wondered, had Zack and Anna managed to spread their lunchtime applesauce so far and so liberally without her noticing?

Seth came back inside as she was prying the page loose. “Thanks for moving the seats,” Nikki said. “I’m always afraid I won’t get them in right.”

“I didn’t move them. I’ll take your car tonight, and we’ll swap back in the morning in Rockhurst. Got a scrap of paper?”

“What? You’re taking my car?”

Seth shrugged. “I looked at the back seat and decided it’s easier to move my tools than the safety seats. See you at Mrs. Cooper’s in the morning.” He scrawled an address across her copy of the offer-to-buy, dropped his key on the table, and was gone before she could say anything more.

“Nice guy,” Nikki muttered. “He just drives off in my car without even asking whether I mind.”

But the longer she thought about it, the more relieved she was. Seth might be tempted to leave her stranded with two babies, but she was absolutely certain that he would never abandon her while she had possession of his SUV.

Seth caught himself checking his watch again. If Nikki was going to make it downtown on time, she’d better get her cute little tush—and his SUV—into gear. What was holding her up, anyway? Heavy traffic, perhaps. The Monday morning rush hour had been worse than usual. He just hoped she hadn’t stalled out on the freeway, or gotten into a fender-bender. Maybe he should have turned himself into a contortionist to get those seats into the back of her car after all, instead of expecting her to drive his. She wasn’t used to a big vehicle—he knew that for a fact, because he’d had to fold himself up to fit behind the wheel of her little car.

He heard wood slam against concrete and wheeled around to see one of the workers looking sheepishly down at a scattered pile of lumber lying on the driveway. The delivery crew foreman came around the back corner of the truck and started to yell. “That’s high-grade oak, you idiot! Take it a few pieces at a time so you don’t bang it up.” He called to Seth, “We’ll get it all around back and then we can inspect for damages, sir.”

Seth nodded. He looked down the driveway again and saw his SUV pulling cautiously off the street. About time she showed up. Relieved, he walked down to meet her.

Nikki rolled the window down and leaned out. She was already wearing her standard-issue dark-blue jacket, with her engraved name badge clipped to the lapel. Her hair was caught up at the back of her head in a knot that was held together with what looked to Seth like chopsticks. The sunlight made it look more red than its usual medium brown, and the breeze caught a strand and whipped it around her face. She tucked it impatiently behind her ear.

“You’re running late,” Seth said. “I thought you might have had trouble finding the place.”

She looked indignant. “Not likely. For your information, I know every address in Rockhurst. I’ve sold a good number of these houses. In fact, see the one across the street? I’ve sold that one twice.”

Seth couldn’t resist. “Why? Weren’t the first buyers happy with it after all?” He enjoyed watching her sputter for a few moments. “You can park over there, out of the way of the delivery truck.” He pointed at a narrow strip of concrete between the garage and a row of ornamental evergreens.

She didn’t put the SUV into gear. Instead, she opened the door and slid out. “If you want it out of the way, you park it. It was all I could do to drive this bulldozer. Putting it into a confined space is something I don’t even want to think about. Where’s my car?”

“On the street, just around the corner and out of the path of the truck.”

One of the babies wailed, and Nikki looked over her shoulder, biting her lip.

“The other one will start up pretty quick,” Seth said. “They probably think since they can’t see you at the moment that you’ve disappeared forever. I’ll get them out in a minute and they’ll be fine.”

“They’re a little cranky.” She sounded a bit crochety herself, he thought, but the expression in her big hazel eyes was almost pleading. “I finally had to wake them up or I’d never have made it. But there wasn’t time to give them a bath, and they didn’t want breakfast, so they’ll no doubt be hungry in an hour or two.”

“Oh, that’s just great.”

“Hey, I’m not the one who kept them up late last night,” Nikki pointed out. “But I’ve already had to face the music. It’s your turn.” She leaned into the SUV.

The tailored khaki trousers she was wearing molded themselves to a trim but nicely rounded bottom. Seth watched with appreciation until she turned around again.

She was holding not a baby, as he’d expected, but only her briefcase. “See you in a couple of hours,” she said. “Have a good time.”

Both babies had started to cry in earnest. Seth smothered a sigh and opened the back door of the SUV. “Don’t worry,” he called after Nikki. “I’ll make sure they have a nap so when you get back they’ll be wide-awake and ready to entertain you!”

Nikki made a rude gesture over her shoulder and kept walking.

He grinned and unlatched Zack’s safety harness.

“Sir.” The foreman was standing right behind him, clipboard in hand. “If you can come around to the site now, we’re ready for you to inspect the materials and sign the invoice.”

Seth sighed and reached across Zack to lift Anna out. With a tearstained baby in each arm he followed the foreman around the corner of the house and past a trailer full of tools to the construction site.

At the back of the Mediterranean-style house a new wing, half as big as the original main floor, was taking shape. The poured concrete walls were ready for an eventual coat of stucco to match the rest of the house, half of the windows were in place, and the crates full of red tiles which had been part of this morning’s load of supplies were now stacked neatly nearby, ready to go up on the roof.

Half a dozen men were already at work, but the instant Seth came around the corner of the house with a baby in each arm, everything stopped while the men gawked at him.

His crew chief grinned. “What’s that, boss, a couple of new trainees? Couldn’t get any with experience?”

Seth ignored him and made the rounds of the site, checking the counts and looking over the oak which the delivery men had piled inside the new rooms, safely away from rain. A couple of boards had splintered when they’d hit the driveway, and the foreman noted the damage. “Do you need the replacements right away, or can we just put them on next week’s load?” he asked.

“Next week will be fine.”

“I’ll make sure they get on the truck then. All right, if you’ll sign here….” The foreman looked uncertainly at him and the babies. “I mean…”

The twins probably didn’t top twenty pounds each, but their combined weight, plus the fact that with both arms full he couldn’t shift the burden to let one arm take a break, had left Seth’s muscles aching. Moving stacks of two by fours—even tossing concrete blocks—was dead easy compared to walking around with a twenty-pound weight attached to each arm.

He thought about handing one of them to the foreman, but as if she’d read his mind, Anna grumbled and nestled closer. Well, the babies would just have to lump it for a minute, Seth decided. As long as he kept a close eye on them, they’d be as safe on the ground as anywhere.

He squatted down and set them on the lawn. Zack instantly grabbed a handful of the trampled grass and put it in his mouth. Anna yelped, clutched at Seth’s jeans, and tried to pull herself to a standing position. He hoped his belt buckle wouldn’t suddenly give way.

Seth signed the ticket, folded his copy, and stuck it in his shirt pocket, then bent to pick up Zack, who had green saliva trickling down his chin. “Come on, champ, spit it out,” he ordered.

“And then we need you to move the SUV out of the driveway so we can get the truck out,” the foreman added.

You can park over there, out of the way of the delivery truck, he’d told Nikki. But she had refused to move the SUV, and he’d forgotten to. He smothered a groan, picked up the babies, and hauled them back around to the front of the house.

The hell with it, he thought. It was only ten in the morning, but he might as well call it a day. He wasn’t going to accomplish anything with a twin grafted to each arm, anyway. And since he’d have to buckle them back in again so he could move the SUV fifty feet, he might as well take them home where they could play in the grass without risking splinters and stray roofing nails.

Only after he got them both settled in the back seat and slid behind the wheel did he realize that his key wasn’t in the ignition switch. In fact, it wasn’t anywhere to be found.

Nikki’s luck held. The traffic had lightened up in the few minutes while she was stopped in Rockhurst. And instead of having to drive five blocks past the bank and then get dizzy swooping around a parking ramp to find a spot to leave her car, she managed to filch the last parking place on the street directly in front of the building. It was a one-hour spot, however, and that helped to make her more brisk than usual at the closing, hurrying things along as much as she dared.

As soon as the last papers were signed, she stood up and started to briskly shake hands all around. “What’s your hurry, Nikki?” the banker asked. “I thought you and I would have lunch at that new little bistro on Country Club Plaza.”

“It’s much too early for lunch.”

“Of course it is,” he said gently. “I’ll pick you up at the office later.”

“Oh—I’m sorry, Richard, but I can’t. I have a long list for today.” The excuse sounded—and felt—a bit feeble, but she didn’t feel like explaining the twins, the cruise ship, and the virus in front of clients and bank staff. “I’ll call you later in the week,” she added, and gathered up her briefcase.

Richard Houston didn’t look pleased, but he didn’t argue.

The new homeowners had stopped on the sidewalk to wait for her, to thank her and invite her for dinner as soon as they got moved in. Nikki smiled vaguely and said she’d be in touch, and she practically ran to her car.

It had been locked while she was in the bank, of course, and the sunshine pouring through the glass had heated the leather of her seat till it was buttery soft and soothingly warm against her back, helping to relax the tension in her muscles.

The heat also seemed to have activated the scent of the leather—and something else, she noticed. Something clean-scented and musky and vaguely familiar. Seth’s aftershave, she concluded. She wondered how long that aroma would linger.

At the office, she gave the finished paperwork on the closing to Jen to be filed, picked up her messages, and looked wearily at the courier package which had finally come full circle back to the office. She’d probably better deliver it in person rather than take a chance on another delay.

“Also, Bryan wants to see you,” Jen added. “He’s in his office.”

No doubt her fellow salesperson was going to rib her about the MacIntyres’ counteroffer, Nikki thought. Well, there was nothing she could do about it now except smile. Telling Bryan what had really happened to sidetrack the courier package would only amuse him more.

Bryan was on the phone, so she started to walk on past his cubicle. But he beckoned her in and waved her to a chair while he ended his call. “It’s an important day for you, Nikki. I thought perhaps you’d like a hand to figure out your strategy for Neil Harrison.”

The auto-plant tycoon. At least it wasn’t about the MacIntyres. Not that Nikki was any happier to be talking to Bryan about Neil Harrison, especially since she was going to have to admit that she couldn’t stick around the office long enough today even to meet the man, much less show him houses.

“It’s nice of you to offer to help,” she said. “As a matter of fact—”

“Oh, I’m happy to give you my advice,” Bryan went on. “It’s all in finding the right strategy, Nikki. You know, of course, that men look at houses differently than women do. Women will look at anything and everything which vaguely resembles their needs. They’ll make a full-time job of house-hunting, while men want to look at just one place and be done with it.”

Ordinarily Nikki would have objected to the generalization, but today she didn’t have any room to maneuver. Bryan might be a sexist jerk at times, but he was a good salesman—and he was in a position to bail her out of a jam. If she asked him for help directly, however, he’d never let her hear the end of it.

It’s all in finding the right strategy, Nikki, she told herself. “You know, it’s funny,” she mused, “but I was just thinking about that very thing. The original call came to me because of the ordinary rotation, but I was wondering if Mr. Harrison wouldn’t rather have a man show him around.”

Bryan didn’t react at all for a moment. Then he said, sounding wary, “That isn’t like you, Nikki. Not grabbing a challenge—and the chance at a big commission.”

Nikki tried to look innocent. “I just want to do what’s best for the firm. You’re right that this is a very important client, and I’d much rather have you make the sale—and get the commission—than for me to fall short and get nothing.”

Bryan propped his elbows on the arms of his chair and clasped his hands together. “What’s wrong with him, Nikki?” Suspicion dripped from his voice.

“Wrong? Nothing, as far as I know. I’ve never met the man. I just thought you could probably read his reactions better than I could. You know, man to man.”

Bryan hesitated, then smiled slowly. “Well, that’s certainly true. All right, I don’t have anything better to do this afternoon. Which property were you going to show him first?”

“I hadn’t decided yet,” Nikki said truthfully. She wasn’t about to volunteer that she hadn’t even started to make a list, much less prioritize it. “And I wouldn’t want to cloud your judgment, anyway. Let me know how it goes, all right?”

She dug into her briefcase for her car key, and pulled out two. Her own, and Seth’s.

He was going to kill her. Worse, she didn’t blame him.

It was just past noon when Nikki got back to the house. The SUV was in the driveway, and she breathed a sigh of relief—though she still almost tiptoed into the kitchen, wary of fallout.

Seth was washing dishes while the twins played on the floor at his feet, creating a mad symphony with pan lids for cymbals and wooden spoons for drumsticks. He looked up when she came in, but he didn’t comment.

Relieved, she set her briefcase on the counter and picked up a towel. “I guess the fact that you’re here means you must have a spare key.”

“Now I do,” Seth said dryly.

Nikki bit her lip. “I’m really sorry. It’s force of habit to never leave a key in the ignition. Living in the city, driving in all kinds of neighborhoods…”

“Oh, think nothing of it. You could have automatically locked the doors with the twins still inside.” He rinsed the last plastic bowl.

Nikki looked at the pile. Laura had been right—it didn’t take long to create a mountain of china, glass and plastic. “Something tells me this is bad news for the dishwasher.”

Seth nodded. “It’s completely shot. I hoped I could substitute a new style of motor, but it’s just too ancient to find one that will fit.”

“Laura’s not going to like that.”

“It can’t be helped. I’m going back to work, Nikki. The babies are all yours.”

All yours. That sounded ominous. Was he planning to come back at all? He hadn’t promised anything beyond this morning… “Look, Seth, I said I’m sorry about the key.”

“I heard you. They’ve had lunch, by the way.”

“I see that. I’m just surprised they’ll eat spinach, if they won’t touch squash.”

Seth paused in mid-step. “Spinach?” He sounded as if he’d never heard of it before.

“Yeah.” She gestured. “The green stains down the front of Zack’s shirt. I’m not complaining, mind you, but you might try a bib next time.” She wanted to ask, Is there going to be a next time?

“Sure. I’ll keep that in mind.”

She followed him to the door. “Is there anything you’d like for dinner?”

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