by K. C. Crowne
Triplets for The Millionaire
A Secret Baby Romance
K.C. Crowne
Contents
Also by K.C. Crowne
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Epilogue
Irish Doctor's Secret Babies (Preview)
About the Author
Also by K.C. Crowne
K.C. Crowne is an Amazon Top 10 bestseller.
All books are FREE on Kindle Unlimited and can be read as standalones.
Doctors of Denver Series (This series)
Doctor’s Secret | Doctor’s Surprise Delivery | Irish Doctor’s Secret Babies | Millionaire’s Surprise Triplets
Mountain Men of Liberty Series
Baby for the Mountain Man| Junior for the Mountain Man| Knocked Up by the Mountain Man| Baby For Daddy's Friend | Triplets for the Mountain Man | Taken by the Mountain Man| Secret Baby for the Mountain Man | Mountain Man’s Accidental Surprise | Quadruplets for the Mountain Man | Delivering His Gifts| Mountain Daddy’s Fate | Mountain Man’s Lucky Charm | Mountain Man's Best Friend's Sister
Lumberjacks of Grizzly Falls Series Lumberjacked | Lumberjack’s Baby
Rainbow Canyons Cowboy Series
Taboo Cowboy |Cowboy’s Baby|Her Cowboy Daddies | Southern Charm| Cowboy’s Bride
Big Bad Daddies Series
Big Bad Doctor | Big Bad Daddy| Big Bad Taboo Daddy | Big Bad Prince|Big Bad Mountain Man| Big Bad SEAL| Big Bad Boss| Big Bad Sugar Daddy| Big Bad Mountain Brothers
Bearded Brothers Mountain Man Series
Her Mountain Daddy| Beauty and the Beard| Bride and the Beard| Built and Bearded |
Firemen of Manhattan Series
Big Bad Fireman’s Baby| Big Bad Firefighter| Big Bad Fire Daddy|
Spenser Sisters Reverse Harem Series
Men on a Mission| Christmas with Four Firemen| Dirty Cowboys
Checkout KC’s full Amazon Catalog
All books are FREE on Kindle Unlimited and can be read as standalones.
Description
He's a famous artist - reckless and unpredictable.
She's a rigid type A doctor who thrives on rules.
Except for one teeny tiny one…
No fraternizing with the patient.
Lola
Patrick walked away from an avalanche lucky to be alive.
But his eyesight was left jeopardized.
I've trained my entire life for this and I'm the best in the business.
But one thing I wasn't prepared for...
Was the intense desire I have for the sexiest man I've ever treated.
Patrick is Irish.
Gorgeous.
And a genius in his craft.
He's also a remarkable lover.
This is wrong in so so many ways.
And lines are being crossed like never before.
The most apparent of those lines...
Are the two red lines on the pregnancy test I'm holding. Maybe now he'll change his mind about not wanting to be a dad. Yikes!
Chapter 1
Patrick
Alright – come on, little guy. Almost got you right where I want you.
I stalked through the forest, silent and swift as the expert hunter I was. I had my prey in my sights.
The little guy in question was a kit fox – the smallest of all fox breeds native to the States. He was long and sand-colored, about the size of a Labrador in the middle of being a puppy and a fully-grown hound. Hell, the fox didn’t actually look too dissimilar from a puppy, with his big eyes and pink tongue that he let hang out of his mouth when he needed to catch a breath.
And I was thankful that catching a breath was finally on his to-do list. I’d been chasing the little bugger through the snow-dusted forests of Colorado for the last hour, and I was ready to go in for the kill.
I took a slow, deep breath of my own, making sure I was good and steady. It was late afternoon, the sun streaming in angled beams through the bare branches of the trees above. We were in the dead of winter with snow still on the ground. The temperature had risen slightly above freezing for the day, so the snow was melting into clear pools that gathered in the dips of the forest floor.
My prey had his eye on one of those clear pools. He stepped gingerly toward one of the puddles on black paws – paws that had caught my attention and made me certain he was just the prey I’d been waiting for. When he reached the edge of the pool, he lowered his furry, angular head and began lapping up the water with quick flicks of his tongue.
Doesn’t get any more perfect that this, I thought. I raised my arm, my eye to the sights. He drank still, ready for me to make my move. After pulling in one slow breath and holding it in my lungs to get my sights straight, I lined up the shot.
Stay just like that, I thought. Don’t move a muscle.
The shot was so damn perfect that it took all the restraint I had not to smirk and let my cheek rise enough to put my sight at an angle. I kept my composure and slowly, slowly, pulled the trigger.
Click-click-click.
The shutter of my camera snapped once, twice, three times. I took one photo after another, catching the kit fox in action. He drank more of the water, and I made damn certain to get some photos of him with his tongue out, his black paws curled up under his sleek body.
In the middle of a beautiful shot, I heard a snap-crack in the near-distance. The fox quickly lifted his head from the shimmering water, his eyes in the direction of the noise. I was too much of a professional to get distracted. I kept my sights on the fox, snapping again and again, catching him in the act of running to safety.
As I watched him run, my visioned blurred. The fox turned into a brown, fuzzy mass in my sights, my vision so unclear I couldn’t even make out his black paws.
“Fuckin’ hell.” I rose, letting go of my camera so it dropped to my chest and hung from its neck strap. I pulled off my gloves, the cold air biting my skin, and rubbed my eyes.
I knew it wouldn’t help. It’d been months since my eyes had gone wonky like that, and I knew the only thing that would fix them was time. The scene around me was a blurry mess of white and green, and I turned to sit on the trunk of the fallen Aspen tree I’d been using for cover.
Minutes passed, however, and my vision didn’t clear. I blinked and blinked, trying to focus my eyes. Come on, come on, I thought. If I die in the middle of some forest stumblin’ around blind…
The moment the thought finished, I blinked one more time and my vision returned. Slowly but surely, the blurriness faded as if someone were turning down a dial. Things became clearer, and soon I could make out all the details of the forest scene around me, down to the drops of melted snow hanging off the ends of the branches.
I stood and pu
lled the zipper of my Canada Goose parka shut, bracing myself against the cold. I blinked a few more times to make sure my vision was clear, a pleased smile forming on my lips when I realized I was set. Before I could even think about deciding what to do next, my phone buzzed from the inner pocket of my parka. I unzipped enough to reach in and pull it out. The notification on the screen was a text from Finn, my brother.
Mind picking up some pizzas?
I grinned, pulling off my right glove with my teeth and firing back a response.
Only if you remembered supreme this time.
As if I’d forget ; ) now get your ass back here – the kids are missing you.
I sent a thumbs-up emoji before tucking my phone back into my parka pocket, zipping up again, and replacing my glove. The woods around me were gorgeous; I could’ve spent all damn day gazing at the Rocky Mountain scenery. The sky was clear enough for me to see the slate-gray peaks of the mountains in the distance, and all I could think about was scaling them and taking some shots from their peaks.
My stomach growled, letting me know what it thought of the pizza situation, and the Cliff Bars I’d been eating since starting my trip that morning were wearing off. Something hot and cheesy sounded grand. After replacing the lens cap on my camera, I began my trudge back down the slope of the mountain.
About twenty minutes later, I reached the bottom, and with the temperature dropping and the melted snow refreezing for the night, I had to step carefully. By the time I was down, the blue sky had vanished, and the clouds had become dark and gray.
Once in the F-150 I’d rented for my stay, I turned over the engine, cranked the heat, and turned on the radio. The local country station blasted out of the speakers, putting a big grin on my face. I wasn’t all that much of a fan of the genre, but it had started to grate on me less as time passed.
As I drove, my thoughts turned to the blur in my eyes that had happened for the first time in a long while. It’d first started years ago; around the time I was in the States when Da had his stroke. I wasn’t the type of man to be afraid of anything – you couldn’t be in my line of work if you were – but the thought of something happening to my vision was enough to get my mind thinking good and clear. After all, I’d have no career if my eyesight was somehow damaged.
After thirty minutes of driving, I reached the Denver suburbs where my brother, Finn, lived with his wife, Kenna, and their twins, Sam and Sophie. Though calling them “suburbs” wasn’t quite right. The area was the perfect blend of urban and rural, roads that branched off into secluded estates leading back into little town centers that reminded me of the hamlets that dotted rural Ireland where Finn and I had grown up. And if they wanted some big-city action, Denver was a short drive away.
I followed the GPS to Gio’s, their preferred pizza place. After a quick stop, I was back in the car with four large pizzas on the seat next to me, the delicious scents filling the air.
Ten minutes later I was on the winding road that led to Finn and Kenna’s house. Tree branches canopied the way, the forest eventually opening to reveal a huge, three-story chateau-style home, the mountains in the distance giving it the perfect quality of picturesque, like some gorgeous Swiss ski lodge.
“You did damn good for yourself, brother,” I said aloud to myself. “Got to hand it to ya.”
I pulled into the circle driveway in front of the house, killing the engine and hopping out of the truck. And the day caught up with me. My muscles ached and I was ready for a good night’s sleep. I grabbed the pizzas and started up the front steps leading to the arched double doors, which opened as I approached.
“There you are.” Finn, my older brother, stepped outside and approached. He was dressed in a black, cashmere, V-neck sweater and gray slacks and black slippers, looking every bit the dad relaxing at home. “And about fuckin’ time – we’re starvin’ in here.” He flashed me a smirk as he busted my balls, as big brother’s do.
“You keep that attitude up and you’re gonna be wearin’ this Hawaiian pizza,” I said as he took a couple of boxes off the stack I was carrying.
“Get your ass on in here, brother – snow’s about to start any second.”
I glanced over my shoulder to see the clouds had grown even heavier since I’d last noticed them. A few flurries of snow fell, landing on my gloves. We hurried through the open doors, and the moment we stepped into the huge entrance room, the eager sounds of the twins filled the air.
“Uncle Patrick!”
Finn glanced at me with a wry smirk. “Never a moment’s peace, eh?”
The pitter-patter of two sets of little feet hurried down the hall, followed by four-year-old Sam and Sophie appearing around the corner.
“Hey there, wee ones!” I said as they rushed to me, throwing their arms around my legs. Their hugs were so intense I nearly lost my balance. “Now, easy there – you two aren’t careful, you’re gonna be wearin’ these pizzas as hats.”
They shrieked with laughter.
“Did you take any cool pictures?” Sam asked, looking up at me with those eyes that were so much like Finn’s it was almost eerie.
“Like of birds and stuff?” Sophie asked.
“You bet I did,” I said. “And I found the best little fox out there. He had little black paws and got so close to me I could almost touch him.”
“Wooow,” the kids said at the same time.
“I’ll show you once I get a couple of slices in me.”
We headed down the long hallway toward the kitchen. The walls were decked with pictures of the happy family, shots of the four of them on various vacations around the country, some of Sam in his baseball gear, others of Sophie playing piano. I wasn’t much for having a permanent home, but I had to admit the pictures made the place feel welcoming and warm.
Kenna finished setting the plates at the marble kitchen bar as our little group came in. “Hey, Patrick!” she said with a big smile. “Good to see you, and even better to see those pizzas.” She followed this with a friendly wink.
“You don’t know the half of it,” I said as Finn and I set the boxes on the kitchen counter. “Took all the restraint I had not to shove half of one of these down in the car.”
“After the day you’ve had,” she laughed, “I wouldn’t blame you.”
We passed around plates with slices, and once my plate was stacked with a couple slices of supreme with extra cheese, little pools of grease in the pepperoni, I was set.
“Tell me about the fox, Uncle Patrick!” Sophie said as she climbed onto my lap. I loved to hear her and Sam talk. Their voices were all-American, but every now and then I’d hear traces of the musical Irish brogue my brother and I spoke in. It was a little reminder that these kids were sure as hell half-Irish.
“Oh, he was the cutest little guy,” I said, wiping the grease off my hands before reaching over to the far end of the kitchen bar and grabbing my camera. “And I could tell he loved havin’ his picture taken.”
I clicked through the photos on my digital camera, Sophie and Sam watching eagerly as I did. They let out “oohs” at the various shots, and as they watched me scroll, I took some mental notes of which photos were good and worth going over in Photoshop later.
“Now,” I announced. “You can go through ‘em, but be very careful, alright? Press that button there and that’s it. If you accidentally delete any, I’ll be sendin’ you both up into the mountains to take new ones.” A smile came with my words, and the excited looks on the kids’ faces revealed they considered this anything but a punishment. My camera in their hands, they headed to their end of the kitchen bar and began looking through the photos.
“How was it out there?” Kenna asked, a glass of red wine in her hand.
“Beautiful,” I said. “You are all kinds of lucky to be so close to nature.”
“It’s part of the reason we picked this area to build,” Finn replied. “Right in the middle of nature.”
I glanced out of the tall windows in the living room past the kit
chen. The snow had started to fall hard, but I could still see the sliver of moon enshrouded in a silvery glow behind the clouds above the mountaintops.
“Sure beats livin’ in a hotel like I’ve been for the last several years.”
“Now,” Kenna said as she set down her wine and prepared for another bite of her cheese slice. “You know you’re welcome to stay in the guest house for as long as you like, right?”
Through the windows I spotted the guest house. It was next to the pool, which was covered and closed for the winter. If the main home was in the style of an elegant chateau, the guest house was more like a cozy little cabin, one you’d expect to find tucked away in the woods, far from civilization.
“I know,” I said. “And I most certainly appreciate the offer. But I’m not anticipating bein’ here more than another few weeks, yeah?”
“Then off to…where?” Finn asked with a smirk. “Crashing in some posh hotel in Prague with all the high-class bankers and espionage artists?”
I shrugged. “Wherever the story takes me. Thinkin’ I might do a little urban shooting in LA for a while, see if I can get enough good stuff to scrounge up somethin’ to sell.”