Three Little Callahans!

You could knock Rafe Callahan over with a feather. He and the very prim, very proper judge Julie Jenkins are having triplets! Rafe doesn’t expect their precious news to end the bad blood between the Callahans and Jenkinses. And as for saving his family’s New Mexico ranch, with three brothers married off, Rafe’s in fourth place. But that doesn’t stop the die-hard bachelor from proposing—feud or no feud.

Julie always had a soft spot for the long, lean cowboy. But Rafe’s still a Callahan, and if she says “I do,” she’ll be dealing with an army of bad-tempered in-laws and out-laws. Rafe’s promised her it wouldn’t be forever—just until their baby girls are born. That doesn’t stop the mother-to-be from dreaming of a future at Rancho Diablo—with Rafe as the happy father!

Rafe took a deep breath. “Julie, marry me.”

That got her attention. “Are you crazy?”

“Yes. It doesn’t have to be a forever thing. It doesn’t have to be a romantic thing. But let’s get married so that the babies will have the best start we can give them.”

She raised her brows. “Marrying you is a best start?”

“Yes. I know you don’t have a whole lot of reasons to trust me right now, but we need to do this for the children.”

“Not really. And don’t start with the father’s-last-name machismo. Jenkins is a fine name, a better name in this town than Callahan.”

Dear Reader,

Valentine’s Day is such a romantic day—a bright spot in cold February! For Rafe Callahan, romance was always a no-go with the beautiful Judge Julie Jenkins, his next-door neighbor and the bane of his existence. He found himself in quite a fix, falling for the one woman he knew he could never have—Julie simply didn’t think much of footloose, handsome Rafe. In Julie’s opinion, the man totally deserved the fifty red hearts she drew on his face while he was asleep—a practical joke his brothers heartily endorsed! But it seems that waking up covered in red ink was just the beginning, and somehow, sweet Valentine triplets were the next big surprise Julie had for the sexy cowboy!

I hope you enjoy this fourth book in the Callahan Cowboys series. It’s my great wish that His Valentine Triplets will add happiness and romance to your reading during this special season!

All my best,

Tina Leonard

www.tinaleonard.com

www.facebook.com/tinaleonardbooks

www.twitter.com/tina_leonard

His Valentine Triplets

Tina Leonard

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tina Leonard is a bestselling author of more than forty projects, including a popular thirteen-book miniseries for Harlequin American Romance. Her books have made the Waldenbooks, Ingram and Nielsen BookScan bestseller lists. Tina feels she has been blessed with a fertile imagination and quick typing skills, excellent editors and a family who loves her career. Born on a military base, she lived in many states before eventually marrying the boy who did her crayon printing for her in the first grade. Tina believes happy endings are a wonderful part of a good life. You can visit her at www.tinaleonard.com.

There are so many people I can never thank enough for the success in my writing career, but at the top of the list are my patient editor, Kathleen Scheibling; the magical cast of dozens at Harlequin who unstintingly shape the final product; my family, who are simply my rock; and the readers who have my sincere thanks for supporting my work with such amazing generosity and enthusiasm. Thank you.

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 Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Epilogue

Chapter One

“Rafe is too smart for his own good.”

—Molly Callahan, recognizing the seeds of mayhem in her too-bright toddler

As Augusts in New Mexico went, it was a hot one. Rafe Callahan stared at Judge Julie Jenkins in her black robe in the Diablo courtroom and felt a bit of an itch. Was it the heat, or was he just thinking about what they’d done in July when his steer had gotten tangled in her fence?

“Counsel,” Julie snapped to his brother, Sam. “Why should I recuse myself from hearing State v. Callahan? Have you any substantive reason to assume that I could not hear proceedings in this matter fairly?”

“Judge Jenkins,” Sam said deferentially, “as you know, your father, Bode Jenkins, has brought suit against our ranch, invoking the law of eminent domain.”

“Not my father,” Julie said, her tone stiff. “The State handles matters of eminent domain.”

Yeah, Rafe thought, and everyone but Julie seems to understand that her father is in it up to his neck with every government official and thief in the local and state governments. Good ol’ Dad can never do anything wrong in his little girl’s eyes, and vice versa.

Julie’s gaze flashed to him, then away. Guilt. It was written all over her beautiful face. He knew what was under that prim black robe, and it was the stuff of dreams, a body made for the gods. He’d been lucky enough to find the chink in her sturdy armor—a testament to the fact that she couldn’t resist him, Rafe thought smugly.

He’d made her guilty. Julie knew very well that their night together meant she should step down from this case.

“Mr. Callahan,” Julie said to Sam, after sending another defensive glare Rafe’s way, “it seems to me that you have no good reason why I shouldn’t hear State v. Rancho Diablo.”

Sam, the crack-the-whip attorney assigned to saving the Callahan family fortunes, looked down at his notes, marshaling his thoughts. It was important that Julie not be the judge hearing this case, Rafe knew—as did all six Callahan brothers—because she was completely partial to her father. What good daughter would not be? But Julie seemed to have it in her mind that the case was purely New Mexico versus the Callahans, not Jenkins versus Callahans, Hatfield and McCoy style.

Ah, but he knew how to bring little Miss Straitlaced to heel. He hated to do it. She’d been a sweet love that one night, and a virgin, which wasn’t so much a shock as it had been a pleasure he’d remember forever. He got warm all over, and stiff where he shouldn’t be at the moment. There was something about those brown eyes and midnight hair that just undid him, never mind that she had enough sass in her to send up fireworks.

But this was war, unfortunately, and the Callahans needed all the help they could get to draw level with Bode Jenkins and his bag of crafty tricks. Rafe stood, and with Julie’s gaze clapped on him warily, leaned over to whisper to Sam. He could feel her eyes on him, as well as those of his brothers, his aunt Fiona and uncle Burke’s, and half the town, who’d come to hear today’s proceedings. Julie wouldn’t want to be embarrassed in front of the people who’d helped raise her after her mother died. But it had to be done.

So he whispered some nonsense in Sam’s ear about the price of pork bellies, all the while knowing that Julie thought he was telling Sam about their passion-filled sexcapade.

“Now act surprised,” he said to Sam, and his brother pasted a dramatic and appropriately shocked expression on his face.

Julie said quickly, “Would counsel step up, please?”

Sam went to Julie, as did the lawyer for the State, a slick Bode yes-man if Rafe had ever seen one.

“I’ll consider recusing myself,” Rafe heard Julie say, her tone soft yet tinged with anger. His ear stretched out a foot trying to hear every word. “But I’m not happy that you’ve indicated I don’t hear cases completely fairly. I’ve never been asked to recuse myself before, and I feel this is another case of Callahan manipulation, for which they are famous.”

Her accusing stare landed on Rafe, and he couldn’t help himself. He grinned. She stiffened, so cute in her judge getup, but completely naked to his eyes. It was as if she knew it.

After a long glare his way, during which time he noted her pink cheeks, and her full lips pressed flat with annoyance, she said, “Court will adjourn while I consider the motion. We will resume in one hour. And Mr. Callahan,” she said, her voice tight as she addressed Rafe, “I’d like to speak with you in my chambers, please. Counsel will not be required.”

“You’ve done it now,” Sam said in a low voice. “She’s going to eat you alive, scales and all. It’s your fault, too, for sitting there smirking at her.”

“I can’t help it,” Rafe said. “She just looks so stiff and formal in that robe. I remember tacking her hair to her desk in biology class, and chasing her on the playground. It’s hard for me to take her seriously.”

“She’s going to teach you the meaning of respect, dude. Good luck. I’m off to get a hot dog.” Sam sauntered away, his conscience clear, unconcerned about his brother’s impending misfortune.

Rafe sighed and approached the chamber of doom. “Judge?”

“Come in, please, Mr. Callahan, and close the door.”

She sounded like a vinegary old schoolteacher. Rafe sat down, and tried to arrange his face into the most respectful expression he possessed.

“Mr. Callahan,” Julie began, and he automatically said, “You can call me Rafe. I’m not a formal guy.”

She nodded. “As you wish. And you can call me Judge Jenkins.”

He nodded, reminding himself not to grin at her prissy tone. The fact was, Julie was in command of their futures at Rancho Diablo. If they could get her to recuse herself, they could probably get a more impartial judge to hear their case. This thought alone kept Rafe from smiling. He even tried his damnedest not to stare at Julie’s legs, shapely stems skimmed by the black robe, and elongated by high-heeled black pumps. Very severe, and very sexy. She wore her ebony hair in a no-nonsense upsweep, which made her look like a dark-eyed, exotic princess. She wore a lipstick that was a shade off red, and he wanted to kiss her lips until there was no lipstick left on her.

But he couldn’t. So he waited for her ire to recede.

“Mr. Callahan,” she began again, “you may be under the misapprehension that because we have had an engagement of a personal nature—”

“Sex,” he said.

Her full lips pursed for a moment. “You may be under a misapprehension that I will tolerate disrespect in my court.”

“No, Judge. I have the utmost respect for you.”

Her big brown eyes blinked. “Then quit smiling at me in the courtroom, please. You look like a wolf, which you may not be aware of, and it comes across as if you take this proceeding lightly.”

“I do not.” Rafe shook his head. “Trust me when I tell you that this proceeding is life-and-death to me.”

She nodded. “See that you try to maintain a more serious composure in the courtroom.”

“I will.” He nodded in turn, his expression as earnest as he could make it. “And you’re wrong, Julie. Just because I let you seduce me in a field doesn’t mean I don’t respect you.”

She gasped. “I did not seduce you!”

He shrugged. “You’re a powerful woman, Julie. Not only are you beautiful and smart, you’re sexy as hell. I couldn’t resist you.” He shook his head regretfully. “Ever since then, I’ve wondered if holding you in my arms was a dream.”

She glared at him. “You can be certain that I didn’t seduce you. You—you…” She seemed at a loss for words for once. “You seduced me!” she said in a whispered hiss. “This is what I’m talking about, Rafe. You Callahans always manage to twist things around!”

“Oh, Judge, it’s every man’s dream to be seduced by a gorgeous woman. Don’t burst my bubble.” Rafe smiled his most charming smile. “I wish I could seduce you, but I’m pretty sure you’re impervious to men.”

She blinked. “That didn’t sound very nice.”

“Maybe you’re just impervious to me.” He sat on her desk and swung a leg, considering his words. “That’s probably it.”

“I don’t even know how that happened that night. But,” Julie said, her voice low, “I’d appreciate you not bringing it up again, and particularly not in the courthouse.”

“But was it good for you?” Rafe asked. “That’s a worry that’s kept me up at night.”

Julie drew back. He gave her a forlorn look. “Good for me?” she repeated.

He nodded. “Did I make you feel good?”

She hesitated. “I guess so. I mean, considering it was you, I guess it felt as good as it could have.”

He tried not to laugh. She was lying like a rug, and in her own judge chambers, just down the hall from where she made people take oaths to tell the truth. “Ah, Julie,” he said, “there are nights when I wake up in a sweat thinking about how sweet you are.”

She appeared confused. Probably no one had ever said that to her before. But he knew she was sweet. He took her hand and tugged her close to him. “Seduce me again, Julie.”

“No,” she said. “You’re bad news, Rafe Callahan. My dad always says that, and it’s true. You’re really, really bad, and I should never have—”

He touched his lips to hers, stopping her words. “So why did you?”

“I don’t know,” she said, not pulling away from him. “I have no idea why I even let you talk to me, Rafe. I shouldn’t have done it, though, and I can tell you it will never happen again.”

“I know.” Rafe framed her face with his hands. “And it makes me so damn sad I just don’t know what to do.” He kissed her gently, then with more thoroughness as he felt some of the stiffness go out of her. “We geeks never get the beautiful girls.”

She blinked, pulling back. “Geeks?”

“Yeah. You know, those of us who think too much, when we should be men of action.” He moved his hands down her shoulders, down her arms, and began kissing along her neck. God, she smelled good. He had a stiff one of epic proportions sitting in his jeans, and the call of the wild firing his blood. “I’m guilty of thinking too much, when I should be going after what I want.”

He circled her waist, holding her to him, and kissed the hollow of her throat.

“Rafe—”

“Mmm?”

“Is this about the court case?”

He pulled back a moment. “Is what about the court case?”

“This.”

He looked into her dark eyes, completely confused. His mind was totally fogged by Julie, her sweet perfume, her sexy mouth—and then he realized what she was asking. “God, no, love. I compartmentalize much better than that.” He couldn’t help the grin that split his face. “I may be a thinker, but I’m not that good, sweetie. This is all about trying to get under the robe of the most beautiful girl in Diablo.”

Julie seemed to consider his words. Rafe was pretty certain he should strike while the iron was hot. Clearly, she was of two minds about letting him kiss her, and the fact was, he wasn’t about to let Julie out of his grasp. He remembered far too well how wonderful it had felt to be inside her. So he did what any normal, red-blooded man would do when faced with an uncertain female: he staked his flag on Venus. Pushing up Julie’s robe and dress and everything else that was in his way, he slid off the desk and kissed her soft tummy. She gasped, and he ran his hands under her buttocks.

“What are these?” he asked, staring at the darling little pink straps holding up her stockings. Julie looked like a Victorian saloon girl, and he was pretty certain he was so hard right now diamonds couldn’t chip him.

“Garters,” Julie said. “And a thong.”

“Pretty,” Rafe said, and moved the thong so that he could kiss her the way he wanted to. Gently, he licked and kissed and tasted her, and when her knees were about to buckle, he pushed her into her desk chair where he could kiss her to his heart’s content. He’d waited a long time for this moment, and when he could tell she was about to rip his hair out by the roots, he licked inside her, taking great pleasure in her gasping cries as she climaxed.

He wanted to just sit and look at her for a second, all disheveled in her black robe, but she shocked him by grabbing his belt. “Wait,” he said, “just a minute, Julie. I don’t want you to do anything you don’t—”

She cut off his words with urgent kisses. Okay, he wanted her to do everything. She was pulling at him, trading places with him, and the next thing Rafe knew, he was sitting in the tall-backed black leather chair and Julie was sliding down him, clutching his shoulders as if she was afraid he was going to disappear.

What could he do but give her exactly what she wanted? “Hang on,” he said, crushing her bare buttocks in his hands so that he could hold her tightly to him. He thought he was going to black out from the pleasure. Julie gasped against his neck, then tore off the judge’s robe and threw it on the floor.

“Let me help you.” Rafe undid the frilly white blouse she had on, tossing it away. That left a sweet ivory bra, but he was a pro with bras, and he had that hanging over a law book before Julie could realize that she now was seated on him wearing nothing but a soft peach skirt, pink garters and black heels. I’m living a dream, Rafe thought, taking in Julie’s breasts, which were beautiful, shapely, peach-nippled. He wanted to grab them, but his hands were full of her soft buttocks and he had her right where he wanted her, so when she rose on a thrust and wrapped her arms around his neck, and her breasts engulfed his face, he was profoundly grateful. He sucked in a nipple before it could get away, and Julie stiffened on him, giving him a very pleasurable jolt where it counted.

“Oh, Rafe,” she murmured. “Oh, God, don’t stop.”

He didn’t. He suckled, and thrust, and touched, and invaded. And when Julie tightened up on him, giving a tiny muffled shriek of pleasure as she came, Rafe held on for just a moment longer, making sure he’d never forget this moment, before letting himself surrender to the magic of Julie.

He was pretty certain he’d rested his case, and that the jury had found him more than irresistible.

TEN MINUTES LATER, RAFE tried to help Julie dress.

“I’ve got it, thanks.” She swept his hands away, fixing her robe and her skirt. He could tell she didn’t want to meet his gaze, so he pushed his white shirt into his dress jeans and straightened his tie.

Tidied up, Julie regained her professional demeanor. “This is awkward.”

“Not really.” Rafe stole another kiss, which he noticed she didn’t return. Well, of course, she needed time to process how much she wanted him. He grinned. “See you in court.”

Julie didn’t smile. “Remember, please. Respect, Mr. Callahan.”

“Oh, I do, Judge.” Taking her hand, he raised it to his lips. “I respect the hell out of you.”

She jerked away. Rafe saluted her and went to the door. Then he turned, catching her eyeing his butt just before she realized he’d found her staring. “Next time, this is going to happen in a bed.”

Her cheeks pinked. “There won’t be a next time.”

He smiled at her. “The thing is, as good as it is between us in all these hot locations you pick out, Julie, I could make you feel so much better in a private place where I can spend hours giving you pleasure you’d never forget.”

She gasped. “Go!”

He nodded, drinking in her straight posture with appreciation. She was a darling little thing, so prim and bad by turns. My God, he loved a woman with sass, one who said no but begged so prettily, too. He didn’t tell her that her hair was slightly mussed—actually, she looked like a Barbie doll that had gotten caught in a windstorm—and he didn’t tell her that her lipstick was shot. Nor did he tell her that somehow she’d forgotten to put her bra back on. It was still draped over a law book in the corner of her office.

“Thank you, Julie,” he said softly, meaning every word, and then he left her chambers and returned to sit beside Sam.

“Where the hell have you been?” his brother demanded. “I brought you a hot dog.”

“Thanks. I’m starved.”

“So, did she read you the riot act?”

“Pretty much.” Rafe bit into the cold hot dog, moaning with satisfaction.

“Did you apologize for pissing her off?”

“I did. I apologized the only way I know how. Is this soda for me?”

Sam nodded. “And did she accept your apology?”

“She did. She accepted everything.” Rafe chewed his hot dog happily, feeling like a new man, thanks to his encounter with Julie. “She’s a very generous woman.”

“I’ll say she’s generous if she accepted your dopey apology.” Sam sighed. “I hope you didn’t do anything to change her mind about recusing herself.”

Rafe froze. “Uh…”

Julie swept into the courtroom. Everyone rose as the bailiff instructed, then seated themselves again. Rafe swept his food out of sight.

“She doesn’t look happy,” Sam said.

No, but she does look satisfied. His little judge was going to flip when she realized she’d forgotten to put on lipstick. Her hair was pretty much blown out of its ’do. She looked gorgeous to him, but flustered, and Rafe grinned, thinking that next time he wasn’t kissing Julie Jenkins until she begged him to.

He snapped himself out of his sexual reverie, realizing that her gaze was on him, and she did, in fact, look annoyed again. It was the smile, he remembered, and he put on his most serious expression.

She didn’t seem impressed.

But she had been a few moments ago, and that had to speak well for the future. He hoped so, anyway. Next time, I’m going to figure out how those little garter things work, and spend about an hour kissing the judge where I know she likes being kissed the most.

“THOUGH THERE IS NO fundamental reason for me to recuse myself,” Julie said, “I will do as the defendants have requested. Let the record reflect that I do so with a good deal of misgiving for the request that was made of this court.” She pinned Rafe and Sam with a mutinous glare. “Court adjourned.”

“She’s really ticked,” Sam observed. “This will not be good for our neighborly relations.”

Rafe watched Julie sweep from the courtroom on a cloud of displeasure and irritation—with maybe a little embarrassment thrown in. He watched her go, fascinated by the woman he loved wrapped in a real good snit. What Julie didn’t know was that he loved her all the more for her spiciness and warmth, and now that she was good and mad at him, he was dedicated to getting her out of that black robe again. He had a one-track mind when he wanted something, and he wanted Judge Julie Jenkins badly.

They said the best sex was makeup sex—and if that was true, then he was all for making up as soon as humanly possible.

“THAT WAS UGLY,” SAM SAID as he and Rafe walked out into the sunlight. People left the courthouse and were milling around, chatting over what had happened in Julie’s court.

“Not ugly,” Rafe said, thinking about how beautiful she was. “The Callahans are free to fight another day.”

His brother shoved his briefcase into the front seat of his truck. “I’d like to know what Judge Julie was thinking that made her do a turnaround like that. She is not an easy judge to sway. Frankly, I was expecting a lot more fight. And what the hell was all that ‘act surprised about pork bellies’ crap? We don’t do pork at Rancho Diablo.”

Rafe shook his head. “It doesn’t matter now.” He got in the passenger seat and pondered how he might ever put his plan of The Seduction of Julie into place. As Sam had said, she was not an easy woman to sway—and she seemed to hold him in as much esteem as a rattlesnake.

If he didn’t know better, he would think she hadn’t enjoyed his lovemaking.

But he did know better. Judge Julie didn’t have a faking bone in her body, and the woman put on no grand act. He’d be forever thankful for his steer getting tangled in her fence in the first place. Okay, maybe making love in a field on a blanket he’d grabbed from his truck wasn’t a woman’s idea of My First Time, but by golly, he’d waited for years to hold Julie Jenkins, and he’d made the most of it. He’d had her sighing and moaning like crazy, a yearning cat under his fingertips. Today, he’d tried to make her second time something she’d remember with a heaping helping of must-have-more. “I’d just put it up to the fact that she’d heard of your reputation, bro, and went down before the fight.”

Sam shook his head. “There’s something funny about Judge Julie calling uncle that easily. Bode’s hired one of the best teams of lawyers around.”

Rafe clapped his brother on the back. “No one’s as good as a Callahan.”

And it’s true, Rafe thought. I’ve had it from Judge Julie’s own lips. Maybe not in those exact words. Maybe not in any words at all. But I know Julie Jenkins digs her some Callahan cowboy.

FOR A WEEK, ALL WAS SILENT. Rafe saw his brothers at mealtimes and at work, and everybody seemed preoccupied. He wrote it off to the heat. Jonas was moody, but what the heck. When one was a retired surgeon turned rancher, perhaps one got moody. Jonas had always been a brooding cuss, anyway, and as far as Rafe could tell, his oldest brother had been eyeing Sabrina McKinley for the past couple of years, and nothing had changed. If there was one thing guaranteed to put a man off-kilter, it was the unrequited desire for the love of a good woman. It could kill a guy. “Or at least the lust for a good woman,” Rafe amended out loud, earning a glance from Sam, who was studying a mass of papers almost as thick as the Bible. Rafe went back to considering the sales figures for Rancho Diablo, but his mind wasn’t on it. Sam works too hard. He’s been trying to save this ranch for nearly three years now, and I don’t think he’s even looked at a woman in all that time. Callahans should have it easier getting sex than we do.

“The problem,” Rafe said out loud, “is that we all work too hard. And we’re picky.”

“What, ass?” Sam said. “Do you mind taking your braying elsewhere? These briefs are eating me, and I can’t think with you chattering like a teenage girl.”

His brother definitely needed a woman. “You know, Sam,” Rafe said, “since I’m the thinker of the family, I’ve been thinking. And I think it’s time we got you out of the house.”

Sam glared at him. “Thank you, Sophocles, for that bit of news I can’t use.”

“Dude, this lawsuit has sucked you dry.”

“You have a solution?” Sam shrugged. “I’m not giving up on Rancho Diablo, no matter what barrel Bode Jenkins thinks he’s got us over.”

“Yeah.” Rafe considered his brother. “Nothing seems to be working, does it? Aunt Fiona’s Plan has gone off the rails. We’ve had weddings and babies out the wazoo around here, and our brothers have populated a small town all by themselves, and still we can’t convince the courts that we should have our own zip code free of Jenkins.”

“Do you mind, Hippocrates? Can I get back to this?” Sam waved some documents.

Rafe grunted. “I’m just saying maybe you ought to get some fresh air. Or get lucky, alternatively, if that’s in the range of your possibilities.”

Sam laughed, and it wasn’t a pretty sound. “And when, pray tell, was the last time a woman opened her door for you, Einstein?”

Rafe couldn’t brag. It would make Sam feel bad. He probably felt that they were brothers in bachelorhood. Of the six Callahan boys, only Sam, Rafe and Jonas were unmarried. No woman was going to throw her cap at Jonas, because he was about as much fun as a wart. Sam had an easygoing style, when he let himself hang loose, which wasn’t often.

Of the three of them would-be champions to Fiona’s Plan to get all the Callahans married—and then award Rancho Diablo to the brother with the largest family—Rafe figured he had the best chance. I have the highest IQ, I have the best hair, I fly the family plane and girls love geeky guys like me. “If you knew anything at all about Hippocrates, brother, you would know that he believed the body must be treated as a whole and not just a series of parts. Therefore, with your mind in overload over Rancho Diablo’s attempt to free itself from Bode Jenkins, you’re under too much stress. We’ve got to find you a woman.”

“Excuse me,” Sam said, “but I didn’t hear you tell me when you last saw a woman naked and welcoming you.”

Rafe didn’t reply. He didn’t want Sam to feel bad, and he would never let the cat out of the bag about the judge. Especially since Sam was pitting his wits against Julie’s father.

“That’s what I thought, genius.” Sam went back to glaring at the mountain of paper in front of him.

“Never say I didn’t try to help,” Rafe stated, and leaned back to continue studying ranch paperwork.

The bunkhouse door blew open with the speed of a rocket, crashing against the wall. Rafe’s jaw sagged as Bode Jenkins barreled into the room.

The old rancher was holding a rifle in his hands, pointing it at him.

“Jesus, Bode,” Sam said. “Put that popgun down before someone gets hurt.”

“I’m going to kill him,” Bode said, glaring at Rafe. “You dirty, thieving dog!”

“Are you talking to me?” Rafe stood, pushing Sam behind him. “What the hell, Bode?”

Fiona burst in behind their neighbor and faced him, before kicking him a smart one on the shin. “Bode, give me that gun, and cool your head. Whatever’s gotten up your nose now, it isn’t worth doing time in jail.”

Burke appeared and snatched the gun from Bode, who seemed to give it up without much fight. All the other Callahans filed in, glaring at the rancher, then glancing around the room to make certain everyone was in one piece.

“Do you mind telling us what’s going on?” Jonas demanded.

“I’ll tell you,” Bode said, his voice quavering. The man’s face was red, pinched with fury as he glared at Rafe.

“No, you won’t.” Julie winked and shoved a few Callahans out of the way so she could reach her father. “Dad, you’re going to give yourself a heart attack. Calm down.”

Rafe blinked at Julie, who was stunning in a summery sundress and sandals, with her inky hair swept up in a ponytail. There was just something about her that hit him like a fist to the solar plexus every time he saw her. He liked her in her judge’s robe, he liked her in a dress, and he loved her naked in the moonlight.

But something had her wound up tight. More than the court case. “What’s up?” he asked her. “What’s got Bode steamed this time?”

That got Julie’s laserlike attention. She practically stabbed him with her eyes as she sent him a particularly poisonous glare. “Now is not a good time for you to be speaking disrespectfully to my father. I just saved you from being shot, Mr. Callahan, so if you don’t mind, zip your lips.”

Well, wasn’t that a big dose of judgelike attitude? He grinned at Julie. She liked him, he could tell. No woman was that starchy around a man unless he rattled her love cage. He couldn’t wipe the smile off his face.

“Bode, the next time you come running onto our property like a madman—and may I remind you this is not the first time you’ve acted crazy…” Fiona began.

Bode pinwheeled his arms with frustration. “You Callahans make me crazy. Why can’t you just git? This is my land, my property, but you’re like fleas. You multiply like fleas—”

His face turned redder, as if he’d just thought of something horrific. He glared at all of them, reserving his most potent fury for Rafe. “You—”

“Dad,” Julie said, “we’re leaving right now. Come on. There’s nothing here we want.”

Rafe watched her go, tugging her protesting father along with her. Of course there was plenty here Bode wanted. He wanted the ranch, he wanted their home, he wanted the Diablos and the rumored silver mine—

Bode whirled, punching his finger toward Rafe as he escaped his daughter’s clutches. “You’re not winning,” he told him. “You haven’t won.”

Julie dragged her dad from the bunkhouse.

“Damn,” Rafe said, “I believe Bode’s finally gone over the edge.” He sank onto the leather sofa. His brothers and Fiona and Burke gathered around. “I thought he had a caretaker over there to keep an eye on him.”

“Seton’s busy, I think,” Fiona said. “She’s been over here helping Sabrina with some things for me.” Their aunt shrugged. “Seton does have time off, and she chooses to be here with her sister. That has nothing to do with Bode’s visit, because he seemed mostly upset with you.” Fiona looked at Rafe. “Didn’t he say he was going to kill you?”

Rafe shrugged in turn. “I took that ‘you’ in the global sense, as in all of us. I don’t think he meant me personally. If he wants to kill anyone, it would probably be Sam, who is beating him all to hell in court.”

“Oh.” Fiona nodded.

“I swear,” Rafe said. “I didn’t do anything to the old man. We all agreed we’d abide by the law, and the decision of the courts, and I’m cool with that.” He held up two fingers in a V. “Peace, brothers. It’s all chill in the house of Callahan.”

Jonas snorted. “Yo, thinker, don’t do anything stupid. The man is tense, and next time we might not be around to save you.”

“Save me?” Rafe shook his head. “He’s crazy. Everyone knows it.”

“Everyone may know it, but that won’t save you if Bode decides to get crazy on you.”

Burke looked at Fiona. “Actually, that’s the most upset I’ve ever seen our neighbor. Thankfully, his firearm wasn’t loaded, although they say there’s really no such thing as an unloaded gun.”

“He is crazy,” Fiona agreed, “but he’d been quiet for a while. Which made me nervous in a different way. But now I’m really nervous.” She looked around the room at all the brothers. “Now is as good a time as any to tell them,” she said to Burke, and Rafe thought, oh, that didn’t sound good.

“It’s up to you,” Burke said, moving his hands to her shoulders.

Fiona looked down, allowing Burke to massage her shoulders, which was strange, for this independent woman rarely accepted anyone’s comfort. Rafe could tell his little aunt was struggling to put her thoughts in order. Bode’s untimely visit had put speed to something that had been on her mind. Rafe waited, feeling tense himself now.

“Burke and I believe that Bode’s ill feelings in this suit have largely been directed at me. I’ve been a thorn in his side for quite some time,” she said.

The room was so silent Rafe thought he could hear Sam’s heart beating beside him, which was really annoying. It should be my heart I hear beating. Sam’s always been one for attention. It’s why he’s a lawyer.

“Remember the Plan I put forth to all of you? How I put Rancho Diablo in trust for whichever of you married and had the largest family?”

They all nodded. A couple of his brothers looked pretty proud, because they figured they were in the lead. Rafe snorted. It didn’t matter. They’d decided among themselves that, whoever won it, they were going to divide ranch ownership between them equally, in spite of Fiona’s Plan. And once he got started making a family—when he finally decided to settle down—Rafe would make all his brothers look like beginners, anyway. There was such a thing as proper planning, which all men of deep thought knew. Strategy. Chess players understood the importance of strategy, for example.

“Well, after a great deal of thought, worry, prayer and yes, even strategic plotting, Burke and I have decided,” Aunt Fiona said, taking a deep breath, “to move back to Ireland.”

Chapter Two

“Now see what you’ve done, brain man,” Sam said beside him, and Rafe turned.

“What?” he demanded. “What did I do?”

“You’ve upset Fiona.” Sam shook his head. “None of this would have happened if you hadn’t ticked off Bode and his precious pumpkin, Julie. By the way, did you get my play on words? Brain man? Like the movie Rain Man?”

“Yeah, a laugh riot.” Rafe turned to face his aunt. “Okay, before everything gets really out of hand, I suggest we discuss topics of concern that affect the ranch and its future.” He went to Fiona and patted her on the back. “Let’s meet in the library in thirty minutes, which will give everyone time to finish what he was doing just as our neighbor had another of his dramatic fits.”

The brothers went off in separate directions, muttering and murmuring. Rafe looked down at Fiona. “It’s going to be all right. You can’t let Bode upset you every time he decides to be a clown. Because he does it so often.”

She stared up at him, her eyes bright. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes, I know, in my raising of you boys and the management of this ranch. But I cannot let something bad happen to any of you.” Fat tears plopped down Fiona’s wrinkled cheeks.

He hugged her. “We’re grown men, Aunt. You don’t have to worry about us anymore.”

“That’s not what that rifle said.” She sniffled.

“Yeah, but we all know Bode’s a terrible shot.”

“Eventually even a bad shot finds a mark.”

That might be true. Rafe pondered the wisdom in his aunt’s words as he held her to him. He looked at Burke over Fiona’s head. The only father figure most of the brothers remembered shrugged helplessly.

“All right, no more tears. We’ll get this figured out.” Rafe patted Fiona on the back and let Burke lead her away.

She was shaken, of course. They all were. Except him, for some reason. Staring down the barrel of that gun didn’t upset me like it should have.

Bode was just superhot under the collar because the Callahans made his precious lamb recuse herself from the lawsuit. He’d expected Judge Julie to be his ace in the hole.

Ha.

“Crazy old man,” Rafe muttered under his breath.

But an annoyed Jenkins was not to be treated lightly. Rafe remembered the time Julie had been teed off with him, and his brothers had let her into the bunkhouse where he’d been sleeping off a bender, and she’d drawn about fifty tiny red hearts all over his face with indelible marker. It had taken a week for those suckers to wear off. He’d been the laughingstock of Diablo.

He still had a bone to pick with her about that.

She hadn’t looked too happy with her father’s attempt to put a piece of lead in him today, but it wasn’t because she cared what happened to Rafe. All Julie cared about was her old man.

“Which means,” Rafe muttered as he left the bunkhouse to head to the family council, “that the next time we make love, I’m going to have to make certain that the folks all the way over in Texas hear my darling little judge banging her gavel as I completely disorder her sweet little court.”

“YOU REALIZE HE’S AN ASS,” Julie Jenkins snapped to Seton McKinley thirty minutes later, after she’d remanded an exhausted Bode back into Seton’s care.

The blonde and beautiful care provider blinked at her. “Your father?”

“No,” Bode interrupted, impatient for the story delay. “Rafe Callahan. He’s an ass. An eight-point horned ass.”

Julie sighed. “Dad, calm down. Put all this behind you. Most importantly, it’s against the law to go waving rifles at people and threatening them. I know you don’t realize this, but you jeopardize my career when you lose control.”

“I would never do that.”

Bode looked at her with big eyes. Julie sighed again, realizing only too well how much the Callahans got under her father’s skin. “Dad, you did. I could be in trouble for not calling the sheriff out on you.”

“This is what I’m talking about.” Bode waved a hand at her and Seton. “The Callahans are always at the root of every problem.”

“Usually I agree with you wholeheartedly.” Most especially, she would agree with him that Rafe was something of a rascal. No sooner had his longhorn gotten caught on her land then Rafe had shone all his legendary Callahan charm on her. And she, like a weak, silly princess in a fairy tale, had let him wake her up from her self-imposed sleep, and then made certain she’d not had a night since when her dreams weren’t interrupted by his devilishly handsome, always grinning face. She didn’t even want to think about what he’d done to her last week in her own chambers—and yet she hadn’t had five minutes where she didn’t remember his mouth all over her body, tasting her hungrily as if he’d never had a meal so good. It sent shivers shooting all over her just thinking about it.

“This time, I can’t agree with you. You’re at the root of this problem.” Julie settled a red-and-black plaid blanket over her father and left him to Seton, who seemed to have decent luck soothing Bode. Once again the situation was equally split, with blame for both sides. Her father was angry that the Callahans had asked her to recuse herself, and the Callahans were doing what they had to do to keep their ranch. It was all pointless. In the end, Bode would get Rancho Diablo. Her father always got what he wanted.

She should have taken herself off the case long ago. But she’d wanted to stay in control as long as possible to make certain the Callahans didn’t pull any of their numerous tricks on her father.

Callahans were famous for practical jokes on people they considered friends, and dirty tricks on those they didn’t.

She had to protect her dad.

“I gave him a shot of brandy, and he went right to sleep.” Seton walked into the kitchen and handed a glass to Julie.

“Oh, no, thank you.” She waved away the crystal glass and reached for water.

“I’m not sure what set him off,” Seton said. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here when he got emotional.”

Julie shook her head and began unloading the dishwasher. “Trust me, there wasn’t anything you could have done. When Dad gets his mind made up, off he goes. Wild horses couldn’t hold him back.”

“Do you know what was bothering him?”

Julie didn’t turn around. “The Callahans. They always bother him,” she said simply, but she knew the truth wasn’t simple at all. “Don’t worry about it, Seton. Dad gets worked up about once a month. It always blows over.”

“All right. Let me know if you need anything.”

She nodded, and heard Seton leave the kitchen after a moment. Julie kept straightening, her mind not really on the task. After she finished the dishes, she closed the dishwasher and went out to the den to look at the black-and-white photos on the mantel. Almost every picture was of her and Bode. Riding horses. Swinging on the porch swing. Hunting deer. Skiing in Albuquerque. She’d framed them all in black frames so they matched, a chronology of their years together. Just the two of them—except one photo.

That picture was of her, Bode and her mother. The three of them, a family, before Janet Jenkins had passed away from cancer. Bode had been a different person before her mother died. He was pretty focused now on wheeling and dealing, the thrill of the hunt.

Julie didn’t think her father had ever mentioned the Callahans except in passing before he’d become a widower. His hatred of that family knew no bounds now.

Of course, the Callahans stirred the pot like mad. Fiona was no wimp at plotting herself, and seemed to take particular delight in keeping Bode wound up.

Julie had gotten revenge once, but even when drawing hearts all over Rafe’s face, she’d known she was totally attracted to him. Like his twin, Creed, he was lean and tall, with dark hair and a chiseled face. Creed’s nose looked a bit broken, but Rafe’s certainly wasn’t, despite the fact he’d rodeoed and been in numerous fights. He was totally, hauntingly masculine. Julie couldn’t touch his skin and not know he was totally delicious.

But she’d never dreamed she’d slip under his spell and willingly shed her dress and her inhibitions for him—cross line, father and court to experience the wonder of making love with Rafe Callahan.

“He’s still a jackass,” she muttered. Rafe did not like her. She was pretty certain their day in court had been a game, a Callahan hookup, for which the cowboys were famous. She looked at the picture of herself as a small child held by her mother, and knew there were some things she couldn’t even tell her father. He was just too mentally fragile these days—and some things were too terrible to confess.

Especially when they had to do with Callahans.

Unfortunately, she was pretty certain she was under the spell of a certain black-haired, crazy cowboy.

“THERE IS NO REASON for us to pay any more attention to Bode than we have before,” Rafe said. He looked at Fiona, who was seated next to Burke in the upstairs library. Each brother had joined in the family council to discuss the next move, and Fiona’s startling pronouncement.

Rafe took a sip of brandy from a crystal glass. “The strain of the suit is no doubt taking a toll on everyone, but there’s no reason for you to feel that you’re the problem, Aunt Fiona.” He shrugged. “Bode’s just getting himself caught in his own game, and it’s making him a little nutty.”

“That’s right,” Jonas said. “There’s no reason for you to go back to Ireland, when we need you here.”

“I second that,” Pete said. “Who would watch my three bundles of joy? Jackie needs help now more than ever.”

“I third that,” Creed said. “I’ve got my hands full with kinder now that Aberdeen’s expecting again. Her sister Diane living on the ranch with Sidney means three more toddlers on top of that. Who has the energy to keep up with all these children besides you, Aunt Fiona?”

She gave them all a leery glance. “Do not try to entice me with babies.”

“But that was The Plan all along, wasn’t it?” Judah grinned. “The Plan was to get us married and in the family way as quickly as possible. You wanted babies, and we complied.”

“And have been having a lot of fun doing it,” Pete said, and everyone booed him.

“It’s true, though.” Creed glanced around at his unwed brothers with a big grin. “The fifty percent of you who haven’t joined in Fiona’s Grand Plan don’t know what you’re missing out on.”

Rafe rolled his eyes. “Dirty diapers? Sleepless nights? Pint-size potties?”

Creed raised his glass. “Nightly lovemaking that you don’t have to go hunting for.”

“Afternoon quickies on call,” Pete said with a smile.

“Booty that has your name on it,” Judah said with a big grin, “and furthermore, has her name on yours, as much as you can stand it.”

Rafe blinked. “Jeez. Is it all about sex with you knuckleheads?”

“Yes,” his three married brothers said in unison, and Rafe sighed.

He knew exactly how they felt. If he could go home to Julie every night, he’d beg her to cook naked for him. He’d make certain she had see-through baby doll nighties that he could tear off her every night, a different one for every day of the month. He’d—

Damn. They’re getting to me. My own brothers.

He looked at everyone staring at him, and swallowed hard. Creeps.

“Anyway, what I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted,” Rafe said with a glare for the married side of the room, “is that if you leave, Aunt Fiona, you cede the field to Jenkins.”

“Which is a bad idea,” Judah said, “because you’ve been running Rancho Diablo for over twenty years. There’s no reason for you to let him run you off.”

“And besides,” Pete chimed in, “someone’s got to marry off the rest of our brothers. We don’t need half of us causing trouble in our bachelor phases.”

“Jonas, Sam and Rafe.” Creed shook his head. “My twin, Rafe, and Jonas, the eldest of the bunch, and Sam, the youngest of the bunch. I’d say we still need you, Aunt Fiona.”

“Don’t coddle me,” she said. “Don’t try to lure me with babies and matchmaking and spitting in Bode’s eye. I know what’s best, and what’s best is that Burke and I leave you men to unite against a common foe.”

They all stared at their tiny, determined matriarch.

“Damn,” Rafe said, “that’s pretty strategic thinking, Aunt.”

She nodded. “One of my better plots, I must say.”

He glanced around the large library. His brothers lounged in various positions, some looking lazy (but always ready for action), some rumpled (hard workers), and Jonas, who looked cranky, as always.

Rafe loved his brothers. They were a tight-knit band.

“But what if we don’t unite?” he asked. “What if we turn on each other?”

“Would you?” Fiona asked, looking at him.

“Hell, I don’t know. There’s a ranch at stake.” He shrugged. “Without your hand on the reins, we might go running wild through the New Mexico desert.”

“I doubt it.” Fiona’s voice was crisp. “Anyway, today’s flare-up has convinced Burke and me of what we’d been discussing since Bode launched his grab for your land. We think you are better off without me here to rile him. I’ve divided the ranch up into six equal parts. For the three of you who are married, I’ve put your portion in your name. For those of you who are not married, your portion is in trust, which you will receive upon my death or your marriage, whichever comes first. Without me here, I’d say it won’t be marriage.”

She nodded and took Burke’s hand. “It has been an honor to raise you. We love you like our own sons. We always did. There are a lot of questions you may one day want to ask, and when you’re ready, we’ll answer them for you. And remember that everything you think you know isn’t always what is. Take good care of each other, and most importantly, be brothers.”

Fiona and Burke made their way from the library. Rafe tried not to gawk at the departing figures of their aunt and uncle. “I think she’s serious.”

Sam nodded. “She really believes she’s the source of Bode’s anger. I say we just kill him.”

They all snorted at him.

“She can’t go back to Ireland,” Jonas said. “We need her here. She belongs here. Burke belongs here. They haven’t been back to Ireland in over twenty-some years. What are they going to do there?”

The brothers turned to stare at him.

“That is the most emotion I think I’ve ever heard you spew,” Rafe said. “I feel like I’m in the presence of the angel of human psyche.”

“There’s probably no such thing,” Sam said, “but that was pretty heavy, Jonas, for a tight-ass like you.”

Jonas threw a tissue box at them. “Go ahead, bawl your brains out. We all want to.”

“I’m not crying.” Rafe took a deep breath, not about to let himself get drizzly, although he did feel like a water balloon in danger of being punctured. Fiona’s decision had left him pretty torn up. “I’m going to convince Fiona she’s worried over nothing. I’m—”

They heard a door slam. The brothers glanced at each other.

“Must be going out to check on the horses,” Creed offered.

“Or to change her holiday lights. It’s about time for her to take down the Fourth of July décor-anza.” Pete nodded. “She left them extra long because all the little girlies liked them so much. She said her great-nieces should always have sparkly decorations to look at.”

Fiona was famous far and wide for her lighting displays. Rancho Diablo always looked like a fairyland, sometimes draped with white lights, sometimes colored—but always beautiful. “I want to wring Bode’s scrawny chicken neck,” Rafe said.

“I do, too,” Judah said, “but that’ll just land us in jail.”

“Miserable old fart.” Rafe couldn’t believe what had happened. His luscious Julie had to know that her father was beginning to go around the bend. Not that she would ever admit to such a failing in him, locked in her ivory tower of daddy-knows-best. “Maybe Bode has terminal dumb-ass disea…” Rafe stopped, listening to a sound that had caught his attention. “Was that a motor? A vehicular motor? Visitors, perhaps?”

Or Bode serving up more trouble.

The brothers looked at each other, then jumped to the many windows of the library to study the driveway in the dimming evening light.

“That is a taxi,” Jonas said, “and if I’m not mistaken, our aunt and uncle just bailed on us.”

Chapter Three

“I’m not sure what any of this means,” Sam said to Rafe a week later. They were all busy trying to adjust to Fiona and Burke’s sudden departure. He waved a bunch of legal documents. “It seems our aunt was keeping a lot of secrets.”

Rafe gazed out toward the horizon of Rancho Diablo. The two of them were in Fiona’s library, Sam having called him there to vent his frustration with their aunt’s dispensation of the ranch. “You’ll figure it all out.”

“I wish I’d known half the stuff before we got knee-deep in battling Bode. Did you know that originally this land was owned by a tribe? Our father bought it from them.”

Rafe shrugged. “That explains the yearly visit from the chief, maybe.”

“Yeah, it sure does. The tribe retained the mineral rights to the property.”

Sam sure had his full attention now. Rafe turned away from the window to goggle at his brother. “All mineral rights?”

“Oil, gas, silver—you name it, it’s not Rancho Diablo’s.”

Rafe couldn’t help grinning.

“What’s so damn funny, Einstein?” Sam snapped.

“Bode doesn’t know.” Rafe laughed out loud.

After a moment, the thundercloud lifted from Sam’s brow. “That’s right, he doesn’t. And he can’t sue a tribe for their mineral rights. Well, I guess he could, but he wouldn’t win. This is a signed and properly executed document.”

They both sank onto a leather sofa and chuckled some more. Jonas poked his head in, favoring each of them with a grumpy gaze.

“Don’t you two ever do any work?” he snapped.

“Listen, Oscar the Grouch, close the door,” Sam told his elder brother.

Jonas obliged, though not happily. “Why are you two lounging when there’s work to be done?”

Sam handed him the sheaf of papers. Jonas gave it a cursory glance and handed the stack back. “I don’t have time to read a wad of papers as thick as your head. That’s your job, Counselor.”

“Well, if you would read,” Sam said, “and if you could read, as your medical degree claims you can, according to these papers, Rancho Diablo Holdings owns no mineral rights. They are instead owned by the tribe of Indians from which Chief Running Bear hails.” Sam grinned, waving the papers. “An interesting turn of events, don’t you think?”

Jonas stared at his brothers with obvious disbelief. “All mineral rights?”

“Yep. All we own is the land and the bunkhouses and the main house. Actually, if you think about it,” Sam said, waxing enthusiastic about the topic, “no one really owns the houses, either. The banks do, and even once they’re paid off, the government can still come along and decide to kick you out. They either want the land for building, or they decide you owe back taxes on the property, and poof! There goes your domicile.” Sam shrugged. “The value is in the mineral rights, I’d say, and those, brothers, we do not own.”

“And we never did,” Rafe said, glancing at the papers. “These documents were executed the year before you were born, Sam.”

“Yeah, I noticed that.” He frowned a bit. “But let’s not go there for the moment.”

“Holy Christmas,” Jonas said, “that means Bode’s lawsuit is basically nullified.”

“In large part, if not in total,” Sam agreed. “Lovely day, don’t you think?”

“Fiona knew this,” Jonas said. “She had to know the mineral rights weren’t ours, and that we couldn’t give them over even if Bode won his case.”

“Maybe she didn’t,” Rafe said, wanting to defend their small, spare aunt. “Even Sam said he didn’t really understand the papers.”

“I understand them perfectly,” Sam said, “and I can’t find any documents that state otherwise, which might indicate a later sale from the tribe to Rancho Diablo Holdings. So what that tells me—”

“Is that Fiona probably never saw those documents,” Rafe said stubbornly. “They were signed before she came. When our parents were alive.”

Sam pursed his lips. Jonas sighed and looked out the same window that Rafe had been gazing from. Rafe knew his brothers thought Fiona had withheld the information on purpose.

“She hardly had time to go digging through every document pertaining to the ranch. Overnight, she became guardian to six boys in a foreign country,” he pointed out. It made him slightly angry that his brothers seemed to think Fiona might have been deceptive about what she knew about their property. She was the executor of their estate. “It doesn’t make sense.”

“She became guardian overnight to five boys,” Sam said, bringing up a point that Rafe had chosen to gloss over. “I came later.”

Rafe saw no reason to chase that particular ghost right now. He waved a dismissive hand. “You’re a Callahan. Let’s not dig up every screaming specter in this house right now.”

“What I’m saying is that Fiona knows who my parents are,” Sam said, and Rafe and Jonas stared at him in shock.

In all the years they’d been a family, this was the most they’d discussed Sam’s abrupt arrival. They wouldn’t have even known about it, but Jonas had been old enough to remember that Sam had come later—after the accident that had claimed their parents. Rafe wished Fiona hadn’t left, and that all this discussion of documents had never arisen. Nothing good could come of the past interrupting the present. He looked at Sam’s strained face and felt sorry for his brother.

“I’m just saying this because Fiona knows who my parents are, and she knew about the mineral rights. I know that,” Sam said, “because Chief Running Bear doesn’t swing by every Christmas Eve just to share toddies with our aunt in the basement.”

“Well, he probably does,” Jonas said, “if I know Fiona.”

Rafe sighed. “This is ridiculous. Just call her and ask. Or go down to the county courthouse and sift through some records. There’s no point in getting all wild and woolly about stuff that doesn’t matter.” He felt ornery at this point. It was too hard seeing Sam suffer. “There’d be no reason for her to keep this from us,” he said, refusing to believe that their aunt could be quite so manipulative. “If she’d known, she would have revealed it in court so Bode would shove off.”

Jonas shook his head. “She might be protecting the tribe.”

“Or she didn’t know!” Rafe insisted.

“Or, and this is the most likely scenario,” Sam said, “this was the perfect way to get right up Bode’s nose.”

Rafe blinked. “You mean to let him sue us for practically no reason?”

Sam shrugged. “Everyone’s been talking for years about the rumored silver mine on our property. We know there’s nothing here, but Bode would believe the gossip. More important than land would be a silver mine. Treasure seekers have always tilted at windmills.”

“Bah,” Rafe said impatiently. “So what. I’ll tell him myself.” He was getting more ruffled by the moment, which made sense, since he was enamored of making love with Bode’s daughter.

“You can’t tell him,” Jonas said, his tone forceful and big-brother-like for a change. “None of us in this room is going to say a word to our brothers or anyone, until we find out why Fiona didn’t want it known that the mineral rights had been sold. I’m pretty certain it’s bad to withhold pertinent information in a court case, and we can’t get our aunt in trouble.”

“Not in this case,” Sam said. “Fiona and Burke are just going to say that the document was executed before they arrived, and they had no knowledge of its existence. And you,” he said to Rafe, “may I suggest you curtail your activities with a certain judge? Try not to annoy her or her father? We need time to figure everything out, before we hurt our case or our aunt. And I don’t trust you to keep your mouth shut if you’re in the throes of pleasure.”

Rafe crammed his hands in his pockets so he wouldn’t take a swing at his brother, and told himself that the family that kept secrets together stayed together.

He could keep a secret.

He could stay away from Julie.

No, I can’t.

I’m sitting on a powder keg. And when it blows, I’m probably going straight to hell.

LIFE DIDN’T SEEM TO BE getting any better when Rafe opened the door to his room in the bunkhouse and found the judge sitting on his bed. “What the hell?” he asked, trying to be nonchalant and not quite making it. She looked delicious, and as heat flooded his groin he realized he’d never been cut out for a monklike existence. “Get out,” he said. “If you’ve come to mess up my face with a permanent marker again, I should warn you I don’t fall for the same tricks twice.” He waved his hat at her. “Anyway, let’s go out in the main room.”

“I have to see you privately,” Julie said, and Rafe sighed.

If it was up to him, he’d love to see the good judge very privately. But he wasn’t going to break with the rules set forth by his brothers, even if the rules were unfair as hell. He looked at Julie’s clouds of luscious dark hair and beautiful tilted brows and delectable full lips and made himself sound stern. “Julie, you need to go.”

“Rafe, I’m not going.”

“Then I’ll go.” He turned to leave, and it was harder than leaving behind part of his own body. He told himself he was truly a man of steel for his virtuousness.

“Rafe,” Julie said, standing up, “we have to talk.”

But his brothers had warned him, and somewhere in his mind, he figured they were probably right. “You’ll find me on the couch if you want to tal—”

Her hand on his arm stopped him. “Rafe.”

Well, technically, they were in a doorway; they weren’t really alone, right? “Yes?”

“If I have to have this discussion with you via a court order, I will.”

He grunted. “So your father sent you.”

“No one sent me. I’m here because I need to talk to you.” She looked at him closely. “The last two times I’ve seen you, you’ve done your best to seduce me, and unfortunately, I’ve let you. Now you’re acting like you don’t even want to look at me…” Her voice drifted off. “It was all about the lawsuit.”

He blinked. “What was?”

“Seducing me in chambers. You just wanted to convince me—compromise me—into recusing myself.”

“Well,” he said, wishing he could kiss her, but knowing he couldn’t without risking his brothers’ wrath, “it’s an interesting premise, but no.”

She pulled away from him, standing a prim and proper three feet away, no longer in the doorway but outside in the den. Rafe knew it was for the best, though he could tell by the hurt look on Julie’s face that she completely had the wrong impression.

But how could he tell her that if it was up to him, he’d toss her into his bed right now and ravish her until next week?

He couldn’t. And the curse of it was he’d never had Julie in a bed. Never had her with hours to spare.

Always quickies. “Damn.”

“What?” Julie stared at him, her pretty face wreathed with suspicion.

“Nothing,” Rafe said with a sigh. “Anyway, what did you want to tell me?”

She took a long look at him. “I wanted to tell you I heard through the grapevine that your Aunt Fiona and Uncle Burke have left.”

He shrugged. “It’s true. What of it?”

“What does this mean for the lawsuit?”

He shrugged again, not interested in discussing it. “Ask your father.”

“I…we don’t discuss it much,” Julie said, and Rafe snorted.

“Right. You were the judge in charge of hearing the case.”

“And since I’m off the case,” Julie said with heat, “we have not discussed it, or your family. I am not the judge, and therefore I am not privy to details!”

She was so cute when she got snippy.

“You’re a jerk,” she said, when he made no reply, and she flounced out the door, her white sundress practically blinding him as he tried to stare through it. He remembered her delightful derriere, and he wanted her. She made him crazy in ways he’d never been crazy before.

“I am a jerk,” he said, and turning, bumped into Sam.

“I won’t argue with that,” his brother said gleefully. “I heard the whole thing, and you have very little understanding of how to treat a woman, bro.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Rafe snapped, his patience addled by being so near Julie and unable to possess her. “You told me to stay away from her until this whole thing blows up or over.”

“True,” he conceded, “but she didn’t wear that darling little dress to talk about cases, dummy. She came wearing that hot number hoping you’d take it off of her.” His grin was wide. “Boy, are you dumb.”

Sam continued on, and Rafe sighed before heading out to the barn.

He wasn’t dumb. He was playing it safe, and right now, that seemed like the smart thing to do.

And maybe the only thing to do.

RAFE CALLAHAN WAS AN ASS, Julie fumed as she stalked to her truck. She got inside and resisted the urge to peel out of the Rancho Diablo driveway. It would solve nothing, and it served no purpose for him to think he’d won.

That’s what this was all about. From time immemorial, women had been played by Romeos, and she was no different. The Callahans were great tricksters, fond of practical jokes and mayhem. They loved one-upping anyone who tried to outdo them.

Her father was right: Callahans were trouble. And she should have known better than to think there was anything real going on between her and Rafe.

“An ass,” she muttered. “A big, braying ass.”

Her heart jumped and fluttered as she thought about how wonderfully he kissed, and she wiped at a tear that slid down her cheek. One tear, that was all she’d spare for that tall, dark, handsome Romeo.

He wasn’t worth her time.

Unfortunately, she still had to talk to him. The problem now was telling him what she had to tell him without killing him.

This time, she wouldn’t settle for permanent marker hearts all over his face.

A branding iron would be much better, but unfortunately, she didn’t have one of those. “Oh, heck,” Julie said to herself. “This is not going to be good.”

Chapter Four

“So,” Jonas said, rattling pots and pans in the kitchen as Sam walked in. “We’re going to need to organize KP duties. I think an org chart might be necessary. We’ll divide up days of the week for cooking, cleaning—”

“Whoa,” Rafe said, “I’m not eating your cooking.”

“Excellent,” Jonas said. “You can have my days.”

“All right,” Rafe said, as Sam entered the kitchen and poked his head in the fridge. “You can do my cleanup.”

“Why can’t we just eat out?” Sam asked, his face mournful as he considered the fridge. “Frankly, I don’t think the three of us are qualified to take care of ourselves.”

It was probably true. Creed, Pete and Judah had wives and families who could take care of them. Rafe figured Jonas and Sam were pretty useless at providing for themselves, and he didn’t particularly want to be shackled with babying them. Sabrina lived upstairs at the main house, but she definitely could fend for herself. Rafe grimaced. He could take care of himself, too, but someone was going to have to take care of his boob brothers. Sam was busy with the court case and probably couldn’t subsist on hamburgers from Banger’s Bait and Tackle, not if they wanted him firing on all cylinders legally. And Jonas didn’t have the sense to come in out of the rain. Rafe sighed as he looked at his helpless brothers. “We could hire a cook.”

“For the three of us?” Jonas looked outraged. “Doesn’t that seem wasteful?”

“It seems practical,” Rafe snapped. “I make good food, but I’m not cooking for you babies.”

They both looked at him with regret in their eyes. Rafe realized that a trap had been sprung on him. “You two discussed this. You planned this pity party! You want me to do the woman’s work—”

“Don’t let a female hear you talking that way,” Sam interrupted with a glance toward the ceiling, as if he suspected Sabrina might be lurking upstairs. “You’ll get your head handed to you.”

“I don’t care.” He shot his brothers a sour look. “What a pair of wienies.”

“If you cook,” Jonas said, “I’ll do the grocery shopping.”

“And I’ll do cleanup,” Sam said. “Sort of. We’ll eat off paper plates and use paper napkins. No more niceties like cloth napkins, which Fiona used to spoil us with.” A woeful sigh escaped him.

“And what about clean sheets in the bunkhouse?” Rafe asked. “Basic hygiene? We haven’t taken care of ourselves our whole lives.”

“No time like the present,” Sam said, injecting cheer into his tone.

Rafe wasn’t buying it. “We need a housekeeper. Jonas, you’re going to have to open the purse strings.”

“I can’t,” he stated. “Remember, we said we were going to be cautious with our resources until the lawsuit gets dismissed.”

Crap, Rafe thought. “If I cook it, you eat it, no whining. And I never, ever do cleanup.” The very fact that his brothers had shanghaied him into this, when he needed to be thinking about Julie and her long, beautiful legs, teed him off greatly. “I do not have time to be Rachael Ray for you lazy bums. But I will, as long as all I ever hear from you is ‘mmm-mmm good.’”

“Deal,” Jonas and Sam both said, and Rafe stalked out of the kitchen, wondering why today was his day to have everyone lined up against him.

He poked his head back inside the kitchen. “Starting tomorrow.”

His brothers nodded eagerly.

“By the way,” Jonas said, “congratulations.”

Rafe blinked. “On what? Being a patsy?”

Jonas stared at him for a long moment. “Yeah. Sort of.”

“Great. Thanks.” Rafe left again, wondering why Jonas had looked so surprised. “Jerk,” he muttered under his breath, though he loved his older brother. The word jerk made him think about Julie calling him that, walking away from him in her pretty white dress, and he decided maybe thinking about her was just too hard.

To hell with his brothers. They were weird, anyway, even for Callahans.

He was the last normal one left on the range.

FIVE MINUTES LATER, RAFE stared at Julie’s latest handiwork in the bunkhouse. As pranks went, it was a doozy. He appreciated the size and scope of her one-upmanship. He hadn’t wanted to pay attention to her, so she clearly had decided there were better ways to get a man’s attention.

She’d put a sign on his bedroom door in the bunkhouse. It had a stork carrying a blue-swaddled bundle of joy.

His breath stung in his chest. “‘Congratulations,’” he read aloud, “‘baby Jenkins arrives in May. Julie.’”

Rafe was reeling. There’d been no warning. No clue.

Except from Jonas, but whoever paid attention to him? “My world has gone mad,” Rafe muttered, and tore the stork off his door.

He was not having a baby. This was some mad attempt by Julie to rattle him, like the time she’d doodled on his face. Only this would last longer than a week. His brothers would be in top form over this joke. Everyone knew that Callahans were supposed to marry and populate. She was adding fuel to the fire.

But the sign said May. That was pretty darn definitive, and judges were typically pretty careful with details. Rafe tried to take another gulp of air and decided he might be having a wee panic attack. He needed a shot of something stiffening, like perhaps whiskey.

He hit the bar, and didn’t bother with a glass, just let the liquor burn down his throat from the bottle. After capping it, he wiped his brow and concentrated on the pain.

“I had no other way to tell you,” Julie said, stepping out of his room. Rafe’s throat went dry as a bone, no longer moist from the alcoholic drenching. “It takes a lot to get your attention, cowboy.”

“There’s no way,” he told her. “I used a condom when we were in the field. Mind you, it wasn’t the newest, but latex lasts forever. It’s nuclear material. So you must be mistaken, Julie. Condoms are safe.”

“I don’t remember hearing the sound of foil tearing open in my office.”

This was true. “I figured you were on the pill or something by then,” he said, and Julie looked outraged.

“Excuse me if I never considered us an ongoing thing.”

He blinked. “And now?”

“Now you know.” She walked past him, obviously about to leave. “That’s all I owe you, Rafe.”

“Who else knows?” he asked, wondering if he needed to talk to Bode.

“You and whoever saw this sign.”

“Did Jonas know you were waiting in my room?” Rafe’s head was spinning. “I mean, he told me congratulations.”

She smiled. “I asked him not to.”

Great. Everyone loved pulling the wool over good ol’ Rafe’s eyes, he thought bitterly. “Well, things will have to change. You, me, everything.”

“Probably,” she said, and walked out the door.

As if he was supposed to know what to make of that. Rafe hurried after her. Julie got in her truck, gunning it, sending up plumes of driveway dust, and the little judge went off without even a glance at him.

Not even caring that she’d totally kicked his ass in a major way.

“I’m going to be a dad,” Rafe said. “More importantly, I’m also going to be a husband, whether that little judge and I ever see eye to eye on the subject or not.”

“Talk to yourself often?” Sam asked, wandering by with a smirk on his face. “Dad?”

“Only when I want to,” Rafe said, and headed off to ponder what the hell had just happened to him.

“YOU’D BEST FIND A BUNKER,” Jonas told Rafe an hour later when he found him staring up at the ceiling, his gaze fixed on the plaster as he lay on the leather sofa. “Bode’s going to tear you limb from limb when he hears the not-so-good news. Jeez, Rafe, what were you thinking?”

“I wasn’t.”

“Obviously. This throws a wrench into everything.”

“Tell me about it,” Rafe said. “Great sex goes out the window once the little woman’s got a bun in the oven. And I never got to have great sex with her.” He moaned piteously.

“Ugh,” Jonas said under his breath to Sam, who leaned over the sofa to punch his brother in the chest with a grin. “Do something with him, will you? Explain to him how neatly, with one fell swoop, he’s destroyed our court case you’ve slaved over for three years.”

“Idiot,” Sam told Rafe. “You’re supposed to be the smart one. Turns out you’re the dumbest of all.” He laughed, enjoying his brother’s plight.

“It’s not funny,” Rafe said. “Now she hates me.”

“Now we all hate you, dummy.” Jonas sank onto the sofa, staring at the fireplace. “I was hoping it wasn’t true. I was hoping you weren’t as dumb as you look. Once again, however, you prove yourself.”

Rafe waved a hand in the air. “Try being me for a change. The most beautiful woman in the world is having your baby. She doesn’t want you. Life is ugly from where I’m lying.”

“Please don’t let me ever be that pitiful,” Jonas said aloud. “If I ever get like him, Sam, you’re in charge of shooting me.”

Sam took a seat in a wingback chair. “It’s just that he’s been convinced for so long that he was so much smarter than everyone. Bulletproof, like Superman. Only now you’re Superwienie,” he told Rafe. “This is going to complicate the hell out of things, especially when Bode comes to kill you.”

“I know,” Rafe said. “I think I better go talk to him.”

“No!” Sam and Jonas exclaimed.

“Don’t set a foot on that property, Rafe.” Jonas’s tone was grim. “Don’t go see Julie. Don’t upset Bode. We’ll try to hide you as best we can, but we’re not the Secret Service. We’re not nannies, damn it.”

“Be careful,” Rafe said. “I’m the cook. Mind your manners or you’ll be eating Rice Krispies for days.”

Sam shook his head. “Look, Plato, Jonas is right. You’re going to have to lie low. If you think Bode wanted to put lead in you for picking on his little girl when we made her recuse, he’s going to send out a team of snipers to take you out once he finds out you’ve knocked up his little lambkins.”

“I think he should leave town,” Jonas said, as if Rafe wasn’t there. “He could hit the rodeo circuit. The boys’d cover for him. He could fly the plane up to Alaska and do something productive for a change.”

“Fly fishing’s productive?” Rafe asked. “I’m not going anywhere except over to Julie’s.”

“No!” Sam said. “Look, freak, you’re in big trouble, even if you’re too dumb to know it. God, all kinds of IQ and not a grain of street smarts.”

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