Newborn Needs a Dad / His Motherless Little Twins

by Dianne Drake

  “One opinion, then consider it dropped. I want you to know that I know you’re a talented nurse. One of the best I’ve ever seen. If it’s the kitchen you want, that’s fine, but that man who was supposed to love you enough to marry you was wrong. Now, no more opinions. I want you to teach my daughters how to bake.”

  It was a deal that left a bitter taste, apparently for both of them because the memories of that betrayal hurt Dinah, and because Eric wanted to know more. Much more. But couldn’t ask. This was how it had to be, though. Dinah was reconciled to that because her history repeated itself and, for once, she was fighting hard not to let that happen again. Eric tempted her, and she caught herself wanting to be tempted. But she couldn’t let herself be. It was as simple as that. Or as difficult.

  Yet one glance into Eric Ramsey’s eyes and she wondered if she could do what had to be done. Because he stirred things inside her she’d never known could be stirred.

  “I thought you’d be at the hospital.” At least, Dinah had hoped he’d be there, which didn’t turn out to be the case because he was standing in the doorway, looking dropdead gorgeous in his jeans and black T-shirt. A distraction like that was something she didn’t need and, for a moment, she considered cancelling the cookie lesson, or postponing it until he was gone. But while she struggled against taking a second lip-licking look at Eric, a whirlwind from behind literally pitched him forward, almost into her arms—a giggling, squealing whirlwind of little girls, which jolted her back into the moment, and into the recognition that this was not about her, or Eric. She’d made a promise to Pippa and Paige, and she couldn’t break it.

  “Sorry about that,” he said, shoving off her and trying to stand upright against the twin force jumping up and down behind his back. “They’ve been excited about this all morning. I couldn’t calm them down.”

  Pippa and Paige each wore a tiny version of a chef’s apron. If it weren’t for the fact that the aprons were embroidered with their names, she wouldn’t have been able to tell the girls apart, they looked so much alike. Pippa had the brown eyes, she remembered, while Paige had the hazel—if they stood still long enough to get a good look. Which wasn’t the case right now. Pretty girls. Exuberant. They looked like Eric, with dark hair and beautiful, perfect smiles.

  “We have lots of chocolate chips, if Paige didn’t eat them all,” Pippa said.

  “Did not,” Paige defended.

  “Saw you,” Pippa argued.

  “Saw you,” Page retorted.

  “Which is why you should always buy twice as many chocolate chips as the recipe calls for,” Dinah interrupted, stepping around Eric and entering the house. Nice house. Homey. But it didn’t suit Eric. Of course, it wasn’t Eric’s house. He lived with his sister. “That way, you’ll have enough for your cookies, and enough for your tummies.”

  The girls each latched on to one of Dinah’s hands, and pulled her toward the kitchen in a collective effort. “We got everything ready last night,” Pippa said. “And checked it again this morning to make sure nobody took anything.” She gave her sister a dubious look, one which was returned.

  “Good luck,” Eric said from the doorway. He was standing there, filling up the frame, arms folded casually across his chest. Smiling.

  “I think we’ll manage quite nicely,” she replied, wishing he’d go away. She didn’t want him there, didn’t want to keep looking to see what he was watching, afraid that he was watching her, afraid that he wasn’t. “Am I going to teach you how to bake cookies, too?” Hopefully he’d take the hint and leave.

  “On call all night, on duty all morning. Meaning nap time for me.”

  He did look tired. But it was a long-time weariness she saw more than anything else, and her heart went out to him. His life couldn’t be easy. Between his work and his girls she doubted Eric had any time left over for himself. “We’ll save some cookies for you,” she promised, then turned away. Her thoughts were too cozy, she had no business sympathizing with the man. Had no business having any kind of thoughts about him.

  As she began to hunt for the proper bowls, Eric motioned Paige and Pippa over to him. “Girls, Daddy’s going to sleep for a little while. Be good for Dinah. Do what she tells you to do, and come get me when the last batch comes out of the oven because I like my cookies warm.” With that, he kissed each one on the top of her head, then plodded down the hall. Seconds later, the distinct thud of a shutting door told Dinah she could relax. Suddenly, though, it was just her and two eager, ricocheting little girls. Sick children she knew how to deal with. But these girls…

  It probably wasn’t the nicest thing for him to do, leaving her in the kitchen with the girls. They were high energy on a normal day and this wasn’t a normal day for them. But he couldn’t be there. Couldn’t watch the cozy scene going on. Back in the days when Patricia had been pregnant with the twins, she’d had so many plans, so many hopes and dreams for her family. And sometimes the cruel bite of how unfair life was simply got to him. Today was one of those days. It should have been Patricia teaching her girls to cook, Patricia and the girls in their kitchen, not in his sister’s. Seeing Dinah in there, doing something that should have been Patricia’s to do, tore at his heart, and it had nothing to do with Dinah. She was just being nice.

  But, damn it, the girls were all over her, so happy to be involved in such a simple thing. When Dinah had volunteered to do this, it had sounded like a good idea. But now the reality of it made him question why he’d wanted to bring Dinah closer to their lives. The girls had a hard enough time hanging on to a mother they’d never known, and this wasn’t going to make his task of keeping Patricia in their lives any easier. But something was nagging at him to move on with his life. It had been for a while, and Dinah only accentuated it.

  Just look at him! An adult with children, living in his sister’s home, making do. Postponing life. Refusing to move forward.

  Back in California, before he’d agreed to come to White Elk, he’d had his mother to help him. She’d swooped in to take care of the girls, and promised to stay as long as he needed her. Which had turned out to be until the time he’d moved to White Elk and allowed his sister to do the same thing. He’d taken an apartment here, hired a nanny for his daughters, planning on putting life on a permanent delay. Janice had come here, with his niece shortly after, solely to help him, once it had become clear he was struggling to manage without family. Once she’d got here, she’d found a real life right away. She’d bought a house, established a business, made friends everywhere. On the other hand, he’d moved in with her, at her request, to make her care of the twins more convenient, while he’d secluded himself at the hospital. His life on an even bigger delay.

  That’s exactly what it was, and most of the time he didn’t think about that because it worked well enough. The girls were happy, they didn’t feel the pressures. Right now, though, with Dinah assuming a mother’s duty…“Damn,” he muttered, dropping onto his bed. A single bed. For one. Grown men didn’t sleep in single beds, and this was just another reminder of how he’d allowed things to get out of hand. It was his duty to make sure his daughters came first in his life, but what came after them? What was out there for him?

  “It’s not easy, Patricia,” he whispered, looking at the wedding ring on his finger. For a few moments he simply stared at the glint of the gold and the plain contours of it, trying to empty his mind of everything. Yet for once his mind wouldn’t empty. It was chock full of memories…good ones like the day he’d met Patricia, the evening he’d proposed marriage, the afternoon they’d married. Flashes of the day she’d learnt she was pregnant were there, the excitement of discovering it was going to be twins…hopes, dreams, futures to plan. But the bad memories were there, too…her obstetrician telling him she’d bled out during the delivery, that she was in a critical condition. Sitting at her bedside, never leaving for three days, never letting go of her hand. Never having the chance to tell her that her daughters were beautiful and healthy…

  Eric
swiped at the tear straying down his cheek. The kitchen. The damned kitchen is what caused this…what forced this. It was time.

  He stroked the gold band on his finger, twisted it around, stroked it again. It was time. He resisted it, tried to argue himself out of it. Didn’t want it. Dear God, he didn’t want it. But it had to be time. He needed a life, too. Needed to be normal again. For himself. Especially for Pippa and Paige.

  On a deep, sad sigh Eric slipped the wedding band off his finger, kissed it and held it to his heart for a while. He wasn’t sure how long. But eventually he stood, walked over to the dresser and opened the top drawer. There, nestled into the corner, was a small velvet box with another plain gold band. A smaller one. The one he’d placed on Patricia’s finger nearly seven years ago, promising her he’d buy her something more beautiful someday. She’d laughed at him, called him silly, told him the plain gold band was all she wanted, that to her it was the most beautiful ring in the world.

  It was another few moments before he placed his gold band with hers then, reluctantly, shut the box lid and tucked the box away.

  Someday, when the girls were a little older, he would have both rings melted down and made into heart pendants for them. That’s why he’d kept Patricia’s ring. He’d wanted Pippa and Paige to have it, to have something that had been so loved by her. Now it only seemed right that they would have both rings…rings that belonged together, for ever.

  Yes, that was a good idea. And it did give him some comfort as he stared at the empty, stark white band of skin on his finger. Then, for the next few minutes, he leaned against the bedroom door and listened to the laughter coming from the kitchen. It was good, he thought. Bad in so many ways, painful beyond anything he could have expected, but good, too. But, damn, it hurt.

  Good, bad, or otherwise, first thing tomorrow he was going to start looking for a house for one dad and two daughters. Yes, it was time for that, too.

  Funny, though, how he’d only now come to terms with that after he’d met Dinah. It had nothing to do with her, of course, but the timing was…odd. Unexpected. “One thing at a time,” he whispered, plodding into the bathroom to splash cold water on his face. Taking off a wedding ring didn’t mean he was going to go out and get involved right away. It was only a first step. Truth was, the second step scared him to death. Especially if it was in the direction of someone who came with so much baggage. And Dinah did have her fair share of it. Yes, one thing at a time, and that didn’t include the beautiful nurse-chef-amazing woman who was in the kitchen, teaching his girls how to bake chocolate-chip cookies.

  Or did it?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  “NO, THE chocolate chips go in after the flour.” Pippa had chocolate smeared all over her face. Paige, on the other hand, had wiped it on her apron. And Dinah was loving every minute of this. In fact, she couldn’t remember when she’d had so much fun. It was like everything was right in their world, and their world was all there was. She was drawn into it, and happy to be there.

  “But won’t the flour turn them all white?” Pippa asked. “Maybe if we put them in first, then cover them up…”

  “With more chocolate chips,” Paige chimed in. “If we put more chocolate chips on top of the first ones, then the first ones won’t get all white from the flour.”

  “Then how do you keep the ones on top from getting white?” Pippa asked, somewhat miffed.

  “It comes off,” Dinah said, trying to hold back her laugh. These little girls were deadly serious about this. They wanted to make perfect cookies, and she wondered if they strove for such perfection in everything they did. It was so cute, and she owed Eric a great big thank-you for letting her do this. “Once we get everything all mixed together, and get the cookies in the oven, everything will come right off the chocolate chips.”

  Both girls frowned at her, like they didn’t believe her. “But Aunt Janice makes us go to another room so she can have room to wipe the chocolate chips clean,” Paige said in all earnestness.

  Probably because by this time in the process Janice was tired of answering all the questions and wanted to get on with it. By last count, each girl had asked Dinah about a hundred, only she’d thought it was fun trying to find answers for questions she would have never, in her life, anticipated. Where does salt come from? Who was the first person to ever cook food and how did they know they were cooking if cooking hadn’t been invented yet? Wouldn’t it be better to have a whole bunch of aprons in different colors to match all the foods so they wouldn’t look dirty when food gets spilled on them?

  Maybe for Janice the questions got tiring, but for Dinah they were amazing. She liked the challenge. Liked the way the girls thought. But she was concerned that they were trying to be much older than they were and, in effect, losing a little of their childhood. Maybe because their care was, by necessity, left up to so many people? Or maybe because their father wasn’t at a place in his life where he knew how to have fun anymore, and the girls mimicked what they saw. “Well, I’m sure Aunt Janice is used to doing it her way, but this way has always worked for me.”

  The girls looked at each other, considering something unspoken between them—that twin connection—then both came up smiling. “Can I mix?” Pippa asked.

  “Me, too?” Page also asked.

  “I have two bowls, so I’d say I’m going to need two good mixers.” Ten minutes later, with all the ingredients split evenly between the bowls, and mixed as well as any cookie dough had ever been mixed, it was time to get the dough to the cookie pan.

  “Let me warn you that this is where they eat more than they bake.”

  Dinah spun around, almost knocking into Eric, who had crept back to the kitchen and was leaning against the fridge, watching. Barefoot, hair mussed, shirt untucked…wickedly sexy. “Do you always sneak up on people that way?” Her voice was amazingly calm considering how nothing else about her was.

  “Only people worth sneaking up on,” he said, stepping aside as Dinah brushed herself against him, trying to wedge herself between the fridge and the utility drawer.

  “Why aren’t you sleeping, Daddy?” Paige asked.

  “I discovered I wasn’t sleepy. And I thought I would come out here and wait for my cookies.”

  “Then wait in the dining room,” Dinah said, brushing up against him one more time on her way back from the utility drawer. It caused a chill to shoot up her spine, first time, this time. A chill she was fighting to ignore. Why was it that whatever governed one person’s attraction to another was working overtime with her right now? She’d never been this wildly attracted to Charles. Hadn’t gotten chills ever during her brief marriage to Damien. But Eric…It’s because she couldn’t, that’s why! Couldn’t have him, couldn’t get involved. Couldn’t even think about it. Couldn’t! And that little streak of opposition in her that knew she couldn’t was rebelling. Hence the attraction, and the shivers. It was simply a personal little insurrection.

  Good explanation, she decided as she handed large spoons to each of the girls. She turned back to insist that Eric stepa way, but surprisingly he already had. He hadn’t gone all the way to the dining room, but he was in the doorway, and the look on his face…It was distant. He was staring out the back window, but if she’d had a paycheck coming in, she’d bet every penny of it he wasn’t seeing anything outside.

  “How much?” one of the girls said insistently.

  “What?” she asked.

  “How much cookie dough?”

  Pippa had a chunk on her spoon that approximated the amount for six cookies, which snapped Dinah back into the baking lesson. “Not quite that much,” she instructed, showing the girls the proper amount. Then she showed them the appropriate spacing of the dough on the pan, and stepped away while they worked to get the unbaked cookies lined up in perfect little rows. Once, when they were halfway through, she looked back at Eric, who was still there. Physically. But his eyes were still so distant.

  Propped there against the doorframe, he looked…sad. She st
udied him for a moment, trying not to be obvious. But something caught her eye. Something missing. So, when had he removed his wedding ring? “No, Paige. You can’t squeeze them that close together. They have to have room to expand, so spread them out a little more. Just look at the first row I did, and copy that.”

  The girls chattered away as they finished putting the dough on the pan, while Dinah supervised. Then, as Dinah, not the girls, placed the cookies in the oven, Eric withdrew from the kitchen altogether. She thought about going after him, asking him if there was anything she could do to help, but her two little assistant cooks weren’t about to budge from the kitchen while the timer was counting down the minutes, and she wasn’t going to leave them alone in there. So she sat down at the kitchen table and fielded another battery of questions from the girls.

  “Who was the one who decided how long a minute was?” Pippa asked.

  “And how did he know it was a minute and not an hour, if no one had ever had a minute before?” Paige chimed in.

  “The girls are great,” Dinah said. She sat a plate of warm cookies on the table on the patio outside. Eric was leaning against the deck rail outside in the backyard, this time looking into the kitchen through the window. “You’ve done an amazing job with them. And if you don’t mind, they want me to take them shopping for…well, let’s just say, five-year-old unmentionables.”

  “Unmentionables?” He arched his eyebrows, even though the eyes underneath them were still distracted.

  “Well, panties. Apparently Aunt Janice buys boring panties and your daughters want…”

  Eric blinked himself back into the conversation. “They want new panties? You don’t have to,” he said.

  “But I don’t mind. And I sort of promised them manicures and hair appointments.”