“How long have you actually had them in your custody?”

  “About an hour and a half.”

  About the time it took to get from Phoenix to Shelter Valley, with a few minutes to spare for the walk to the horse barn.

  He’d brought them straight to her.

  “You want me to take them?” She couldn’t, of course. Because, well...she tried to swallow past the lump in her throat...she’d always wanted to be a mother.

  But she was a ranch owner, with many ventures to oversee. A craft influencer. Busy. Busy. Busy.

  Those two precious little blondes were her biological daughters? Elation rose up to make her dizzy for a second. And then her mind, her emotions were clouded and murky again.

  “I think I need to adopt them out to a good family,” Jordon was saying. “It’s the only thing that makes sense. But that’s a process, and in the meantime, I don’t know. I just...came here.”

  That fissure in her heart split open a bit more. She didn’t fight the warmth that seeped out. She would. She’d scoop it up and shove it back inside.

  When she had a minute.

  “You bring me my children to tell me you’re going to give them away?”

  “Mariah O’Connell, the child life specialist I met with at Sierra’s Web this morning, mentioned your horse therapy program. Apparently, you do great things with little kids, getting them to confide their true feelings to the horses or something, and, well, as soon as she said the name of your ranch, I knew it was an omen. Not because of the therapy, so much, but...it was too much of a coincidence.”

  “Forever Friends, the horse therapy program, is a private venture owned and run by Mariah Montford. Homestead Ranch gets a percentage of the profits.”

  “I was told you own some of the horses.”

  If he wanted to get technical about it... “Yeah.”

  “And that you work with them.”

  “With the horses,” she specified. “Not the clients.”

  How much more did he know about her?

  It wasn’t right, him knowing things about her and her knowing nothing about him or his life.

  Macy, the gentle mare Mariah Montford was introducing to the girls, raised a hoof and put it back down. Both little ones stepped back. And Mia ached to have an arm around each one of them, reassuring them that Macy wouldn’t hurt them.

  Not on purpose.

  And knew, in that second, that she wasn’t going to hurt them, either. Not if she could help it.

  Was it best for them if Jordon adopted them out?

  Her heart said absolutely not, but what did she know? She’d given away her eggs, anonymously, and moved on.

  Ruby and Violet, two little human beings born from something she’d donated, stepped forward again, each reaching out their tiny hands to Macy’s lowered neck. Showing a strength to overcome fear. At least that was what Mia saw, filling with hope for them.

  “Maybe a few days at the ranch, in horse therapy, is a good first step.” She heard the words before they’d completely registered. Almost as if her heart had purposely rushed them through before her brain could try to nix the idea.

  “Unless...do you have a place in Phoenix?” He’d grown up there. She’d assumed he was still in New York, but she’d refused to let herself look him up. Maybe he’d moved back.

  Her heart jumped at the thought and she issued a swift reprimand. A reminder.

  “No. I own a high-rise apartment in Manhattan.”

  Okay, well, there then. They really were polar opposites.

  “Are you married?” Might figure in to future choices made, at some point.

  “No. And before you ask, I live alone.”

  Right. Good to know.

  Her mind immediately pushed back on the satisfaction his answer had given her. The state of his love life had no bearing whatsoever on her or their current situation.

  Him living in New York was a big issue, though.

  “Do you plan to adopt them out from there?”

  Mariah was walking Macy slowly around the barn, the girls on the other side of the therapist, matching her step for step.

  “I have no idea.” Jordon’s tone drew Mia’s gaze. And she looked at him. Really looked.

  Saw the lines at the corners of his eyes. The shadows beneath them. And the confusion within them.

  This wasn’t a Jordon she knew.

  He was in trouble. And he’d run to her.

  Bottom line.

  Past aside.

  “All of my guest cabins are full, but I have plenty of room in the house,” she said. “Why don’t the three of you stay here? At least for tonight? It’ll give us a chance to talk after they get to sleep.”

  To come up with some tentative, short-term plans. Period.

  Anything else they might have had to discuss with each other had all been said.

  He nodded. Shook his head. Ran a hand through his hair. “I...I can stay until they’re asleep,” he said. “Can I impinge on you for overnight? I just...” He broke off, glanced at the girls for a long minute. Shook his head.

  “I know I’m asking too much, Mia, and you’re busy here, but you know people, have a whole town of friends to pull from...”

  He wanted her to find the adoptive family?

  To have her own daughters living right there in Shelter Valley where she’d see them every day?

  Ready to tell him to think again, she couldn’t get the words out.

  Wouldn’t she rather be able to watch out for them? To know if they ever needed help?

  “I had no warning here, no time to make plans to be away, and I have a couple of major trades to make when the bell rings in the morning. I could be back by two at the latest, tomorrow afternoon. The final bell is at four eastern time.”

  Which was three hours ahead of Arizona.

  And he wasn’t asking her to find a family for the girls?

  “I don’t know anyone, let alone someone I trust well enough to babysit while I work, while you probably have a whole pool to pull from...”

  Babysitting. He’d been talking about the two of them needing to work and which of them had a better chance of finding someone to watch the girls.

  Relief flooded her in such force she actually smiled at him.

  “Okay,” she said.

  “Okay?”

  She nodded.

  He smiled.

  And that fissure inside her leaked a bit more.

  * * *

  He bugged out at bath time. Mia clearly knew how to bathe girls. How to wash long hair without getting soap in the eyes. He did not.

  Nor did he know where towels were kept.

  And when the twins announced that they wanted to bathe together—with Violet asserting that’s what they always did—he had his exit excuse. The room just wasn’t big enough for all of them.

  He suggested that he head out as the small group was heading down the hall toward the bedroom that had been assigned to the little sisters. They’d been happy to see that they were sharing a big Mommy-and-Daddy bed, not sleeping in two little-kid beds.

  No one seemed fazed by his announcement.

  “Bye,” Violet said as though she’d been told to do so, nudging her sister, who then said, “Bye.” Ruby was busy pulling pajamas out of the suitcase he’d just brought in.

  With a quick glance at Mia—who nodded briefly before giving full attention to the four-year-olds unexpectedly in her care—he made his escape.

  And didn’t feel anywhere near as relieved and free as he’d thought he would as he drove the dark desert highway back to his elegant high-rise hotel in Phoenix. Had it only been twelve hours since he’d left his suite that morning? Seemed like a lifetime ago.

  Maybe because he’d been thrown back a lifetime, seeing Mia.

  And Brown Eyes and Blue Eyes...Violet and Ruby...wow. What did a guy do with that?

  Chapter Four

  What Jordon did half an hour down the road was phone Mia. Wasn’t surprised when there was no answer. They were probably all still in the bathroom. Which would be followed by a story, Mia had said, and then bedtime.

  Had she ever put kids to bed before?

  Of course she had. She’d started babysitting when she was twelve.

  But what about little girls who’d been suddenly separated from the two people who’d put them to bed most every night of their lives? And then from the friend who’d had them for the past week?

  Inconsiderate of him to have rung in, giving Mia more to deal with. Completely understandable that she hadn’t answered.

  An hour and a half later, sitting on the couch in his suite in Phoenix with a shot of whiskey in a tall glass filled with water, Jordon looked out of the wall of windows in front of him, overlooking the city that had somehow grown to be the fifth largest in the country since he’d grown up there.

  He should be feeling validated. He’d left the desert behind to head to New York City with nothing but the clothes on his back and a prestigious college degree, and ten years later he was back, sitting on the top of the world.

  He’d thought about driving by the small house his mother had raised him in after his father had died. Just to remind him how successfully he’d fulfilled his promises to himself.

  There’d been no time that morning. Absolutely none, since he’d had two four-year-olds in tow. And after dark...the old neighborhood hadn’t called out to him at all. He’d said all he had to say to the space the day he’d moved his mother out of the house and into the lovely waterfront condominium he’d purchased for her in Connecticut.

  Another promise fulfilled.

  So many of them.

  And yet...they still didn’t seem to make up for the one promise he hadn’t kept.

  To Mia Jones.

  He’d been so certain that as soon as they’d finished college together and saw the writing on the wall where the failing family ranch was concerned, she’d need more than the small college town where she’d grown up. Where they’d met. That she’d be ready to leave with him—just as her siblings had left town before her.

  Shelter Valley was a great, friendly, welcoming place for a college kid to spend four memorable years. But for a financier needing to make his place in the world? He’d have suffocated within a month.

  And Phoenix, the state’s largest city...hadn’t even been a blip on anyone’s radar back then. Except with retirees who’d fly in for the winter months, golf until spring and then head back home. At least it had seemed that way to him.

  In reality, the city had already grown into an entity, attracting corporate offices to the year-round sunny climate. But no way had he seen what was coming. A metropolis that had tripled in size in a ten-year span.

  Not that such insight would have changed his mind. The hub of his profession was New York City. Everything in him had cried out to get there as fast as he could. To make his mark among those he’d studied and followed in the market. And to do it with integrity.

  And other than Mia, he didn’t have a single regret. At thirty-two, he was who he’d wanted to become. He loved his life.

  City lights gleamed. Shining with success.

  His glass was half-empty and his phone hadn’t rung.

  He didn’t love that.

  He was temporarily responsible for two orphaned children and he had no idea if they’d been able to get to sleep in a strange home, cared for by a person they’d only just met.

  Their biological mother, yes, but they didn’t know that. Probably wouldn’t understand even if they’d been told.

  But Mia knew.

  His gut clamped. Not in a good way.

  What in the hell had he done? Delivering a woman’s children to her, out of the blue, with no warning, and convincing her to take them for him? At the same time that he was telling her he was going to give them to someone else?

  Had he really become so...

  Lost?

  From the second he’d accepted custody of the twins, he’d been completely engulfed with desperation.

  No excuse for dumping on Mia.

  What in the hell had he done?

  Phone in hand, not wanting to chance waking the kids, he texted her.

  I didn’t consider your feelings enough. Not in the past. And most definitely not today. I apologize. Do you want me to come get them now, or in the morning?

  If the girls were asleep, and no problem to her, it would be best for them to stay in bed. And Ruby and Violet had to come first.

  His phone rang.

  Mia.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, picking up on the first full ring.

  “You should be. For disregarding my feelings in the past. But not for today. You were hit over the head by something I initiated years ago. It’s right that I help.”

  A sense of familiarity washed over him. He let it.

  “You didn’t want to donate,” she said then. “You thought it could get messy, and you were right. It has.”

  “I thought you’d struggle...knowing our baby was out there being raised by someone else.” Truth. Not anything that was going to help their current situation.

  “And it wouldn’t have bothered you.”

  He hadn’t thought so. At the moment, he wasn’t sure about any of it.

  Except, “As it turned out, we helped create two innocent orphans.” A dozen hours later and he still couldn’t wrap his mind around the morning’s revelation.

  “They’re skittish and hesitant and mostly quiet,” he continued. “Except when it comes to Macy. They stumbled over each other trying to get words out first about that half hour they spent with her, remember? And Mariah, too. Naming her Mariah Macy’s Mom.” Both girls had laughed as first Violet, then Ruby, had called the therapist the name. It was the first time he’d heard them laugh.

  And when Mariah had accepted the special title, acting as though she loved it, the girls had taken her at face value. For the rest of the evening they’d used her full title, expecting everyone else to do so as well, correcting them if they didn’t, anytime any of them spoke of Mariah.

  He’d noticed. “And they ate the cheese pizza I ordered for dinner.” He just kept on talking. He’d had the wherewithal to ask them first if they liked pizza and had received nods in response. He also sounded like he was praising himself.

  Maybe he had been.

  Not a character trait he wanted to own.

  He wasn’t overly fond of Mia’s lack of response, either. Or the silence that was hanging between them—leaving so much unsaid.

  “How long did it take you to get them to sleep?”

  “Not long. They’re good girls, Jordon. Super well behaved. Well raised.”

  “Back when you were convincing me to donate, you said everything in the Robinsons’ surrogate profile made them seem like they’d be great parents.” Apparently she’d been right.

  “I read them a story—there were several books in the satchel you brought in. I’m assuming their favorites. We need to find out where the remainder of their belongings are...”

  “It’s on my list of to-dos tomorrow,” he told her. “Everything is in a living trust left to the girls, with me as executor and guardian. The house, and everything in it, is just sitting there waiting for something to happen.”

  “Didn’t Madeline and Keith have relatives? Parents? Siblings?”

  “There are a couple of siblings, one on each side. Both brothers. And they both left contact information with Sierra’s Web, who passed it on to me, but neither have been in touch with the girls since their parents died.” All in the folder sitting unopened on the full-size desk behind him. “They’re both married. I thought maybe one of them might be a candidate to adopt the girls. They’re family. People the girls know.”

  He’d felt better thinking about the idea sitting in Sierra’s Web that morning than he did in his hotel suite.

  “Wouldn’t you guess that Madeline and Keith would have left them as guardians, if that’s what they thought was appropriate for their children? And that they’d have already expressed an interest in taking them if they wanted them? So that Sierra’s Web could give you that option?”

  If he’d had half his brain cells working, he might have.

  “There was a portable sleep machine device in their suitcase with a note to play the sound of waves. And there was a night-light, too. And a baby monitor. As soon as I had everything up and going, and told them it was time for bed, they cuddled up together and that was it. There hasn’t been a peep on the monitor, and I’ve looked in a couple of times, too.”

  His gut relaxed. Maybe for the first time all day. “Thank you.”

  “I’m not doing it for you.”

  A timely reminder. “I know.”

  “I think, based on their need for immediate stability, they should stay here, at the ranch, while you figure out the future. The horses are a hit. We can keep their focus there for now. I already called Mariah Macy’s Mom. She’s willing to take them on...”

  Whoa. She was moving fast. Too fast.

  While he wasn’t moving at all.

  Except to drop off his biological daughters immediately after taking custody of them. He’d run them to Mia as quickly as he safely could do so.

  “They’re my responsibility.”

  “I’m aware of that. Consider me a full-time babysitter until you have a chance to make arrangements.”

  If anyone had any idea how over-the-top relieved he was to hear her offer, they’d think him a loser, for sure.

  He wasn’t all that fond of himself at the moment.

  “They should get to know me, too, since I’m their guardian,” he said, with no clear reason why he’d be pushing himself in where he didn’t fit.

  “If you’re giving them up, what good would it do? They’d just have more people to say goodbye to.”