Special Forces Father

Chapter Two

“That was some hard-core sack time—eleven hours straight. You must have been beat.”

“I was coming off about thirty-six hours without, so yeah,” Liam confirmed to his older brother, Conor, on Monday morning over coffee and the bacon and eggs Conor had made. “Sorry, though, for being the lousy houseguest who comes in the door and just crashes.”

“No problem, I understand. And so did Maicy.”

Liam had barely said hello to the woman his brother was now engaged to and shared a house with—Maicy Clark. They’d grown up with Maicy in the small Montana town of Northbridge. Conor and Maicy had only recently met up again, resolved old issues and rekindled their romance.

But after a brief greeting when Liam had arrived from the Freelander place the night before, he’d begged off to get much-needed sleep.

“I was just glad to hit the rack,” he said. “But now that I have, the first thing I need to hear about is Declan.”

Liam hadn’t known anything unusual had been going on with his twin until a week ago when he’d returned from his latest mission—the same time he’d received the message from Dani Cooper about Audrey. The message waiting from Conor had been old and it had only relayed that Declan had been wounded in action.

After receiving the two communications, Liam had immediately called Conor. But even then his older brother had said only that Declan was all right. Liam could tell Conor had been holding something back but he hadn’t been able to get him to say more. Because their phone time had been limited, Liam had needed to move on to the other news that had rocked him. Since then Liam had been in transit and unable to make more contact.

Last night Conor had only repeated that Declan was okay, but now Liam wanted to hear the details.

“It happened two days after Mom passed—after I’d called you about that. But when I tried to get hold of you to tell you about Declan, you were already out of reach,” Conor began.

Their mother had died in October. It hadn’t come as a surprise. She’d been in a steep decline physically and mentally for over a year by then. In some ways it had been a relief to Liam to hear it on the eve of his mission because at least he’d left knowing she wasn’t suffering any longer.

“Mom died, I left, Declan got hurt—all in three days?” Liam said, giving a succinct timeline.

“Yeah, it was a helluva three days,” Conor said, showing some of the strain it had put on him.

“So what happened?” Liam prompted.

“Declan and Topher were in a Humvee when they drove over a buried IED.”

Topher was Topher Samms. Like Maicy, Topher had grown up in the same small town with the Madisons. Both Liam and his twin brother, Declan, had considered Topher their best friend. The three of them had even gone through Annapolis and joined the marines together.

“Is Topher okay, too?” Liam asked, suspicious that this was the first he’d heard his friend’s name mentioned in the incident that had injured Declan.

“I’m sorry, Liam,” Conor said, his words, tone and expression enough to convey that Topher hadn’t made it.

That news was another blow to Liam, who closed his eyes and leaned on forearms he set on the table on either side of his breakfast. He let his head fall between his shoulders and took a steeling breath that he held until his lungs burned, all while Conor gave him that moment.

It was a lengthy one as he tried to digest that his and Declan’s old friend was gone.

When he could, he exhaled, sat up straight and opened his eyes again.

“Tell me about Declan,” he said curtly because it was the only way he could keep emotions in check.

“It’s been rough,” Conor finally admitted. “There was more than once that we came near to losing him—”

“But we didn’t. You didn’t let that happen.”

Conor was a navy doctor and navy doctors treated marines.

“He’s family so I couldn’t take an active part in his care, but I took all the leave I’d accumulated so I could go with him from hospital to hospital, to make sure nothing was overlooked—he was in bad shape at the start. But yeah, he pulled through and even kept the leg I wasn’t sure was going to make it with him. I did some shuffling and he’s on his way here for rehab, so I can keep track of that, too. You’ll be able to see him.”

“So he really will be okay?” Liam said, still needing some reassurance.

“His body’s healing,” Conor seemed to hedge. “I’m a little worried about his head—”

“Brain injury?” Liam asked.

“No, thank god there wasn’t that. But I think he’s carrying a lot of baggage about Topher. Declan was driving the Humvee. As bad as he was hurt himself he did everything to try to save Topher. He even carried him away from the burning Humvee—although seeing Declan and how bad he was, I can’t begin to guess how he did that.”

“He’d have done anything to help Topher,” Liam said, knowing his twin, knowing it was what he himself would have done.

“But Topher took the brunt of the explosion. He died before anybody could get to them. Declan won’t talk about it—not to me, not to the counselors I’ve sent in. I’m afraid we’re still facing some rough waters there. But physically... He has some scars, he may have a limp, but yeah, he’s gonna be okay.”

Liam was grateful for that at least. “I do want to see him. As soon as he gets here. But in the meantime, can I call him?”

“Sure, I got him a cell phone. I’ll get you the number when you’re ready.”

“Yeah, I’m ready now,” Liam said. “I’m not going to be staying here...”

He explained the arrangement he’d made to move into the Freelander place.

“You’re gonna start playing dad even before you know for sure?”

He told his brother his reasons for that.

“Did you see the kids?” Conor asked.

“For a few minutes. The nanny—that’s the Dani Cooper who sent me the message—told them I was a friend of their mother’s. They weren’t too interested.”

“And what did you think? Did you feel any kind of instinctive connection?”

“Uh, no, I didn’t even know what to say to them. I was just glad I wasn’t alone with them and that the nanny is pretty smooth.”

And even though he meant Dani Cooper was smooth in her dealings with the kids and the awkwardness of him showing up the way he had, it was suddenly the nanny’s skin he was thinking about—flawless peaches-and-cream skin so smooth he’d wanted to run the back of his hand over it to see if it felt like it looked...

He reined in the odd wandering of his mind and said, “They’re cute kids, I guess... They have dark hair like ours. Blue eyes—”

“Like ours? The color Kinsey thinks ties us to the Camdens?”

“No, theirs are more the light blue that Audrey’s eyes were. There might be a little resemblance between the girl and Kinsey when she was a kid, though—I kind of thought I might have seen that.”

“So they really could be yours.”

“I told you that anyway. That week with Audrey before I deployed was a wild one. Audrey was a partyer and we were drinking like there was no tomorrow. And not always being safe...stupid as that is.”

“But that was five years ago and she never came after you for child support, for anything. Seems like if the kids were yours she would have at least wanted you to pitch in with some money.”

Liam repeated what the nanny had told him about Owen Freelander and described the house that made it obvious there hadn’t been a need for more money.

“It doesn’t surprise me that Audrey would have gone with somebody who was offering what this guy was,” Liam said. “Marriage, money, to take care of her and claim her kids as his own to provide for, too. And actually, the more I think about it the more sense it makes that the guy was so much older than she was—”

“She had daddy issues?”

“Maybe. She saw herself as a helpless kitten, I know that. She was raised by older parents with money. There were nannies and people paid to take care of her every need. Her parents spoiled her rotten and I had the impression that when they died she started searching for replacements to take care of her and spoil her the way she was used to. Finding herself pregnant? With twins?” He shook his head. “There’s no way she would have wanted to do that by herself. I’m kind of surprised that she didn’t terminate the pregnancy at the get-go.”

“Never an easy thing to do.”

Liam conceded to that. “And I don’t think she really understood what it is I do—we met when I was here, doing that training. That lasted two months, looked more like a normal job—”

“But then you deployed...”

“Right. And even though I’d warned her how it would be when I did, I don’t think it really sank in with her until she actually experienced it a few times. I know when I finally did call her that last time—the call that, according to the nanny, was when Audrey made the decision to take this Owen guy up on his offer—she was pretty upset that there hadn’t been one word from me in a long while.” He tried to get some breakfast down but the appetite he’d woken up with had disappeared, so he just pushed his plate away.

“Sooo...how are you doing with the idea that these kids could be yours?” Conor asked.

Liam shook his head. “I’m just kind of in a daze,” he admitted. “Like your message about Declan, the one from the nanny—now guardian—only caught up to me a week ago. I almost thought it was some kind of bad joke. Audrey was dead? She’d left twins that are mine? The kids have no one else and now need me to step in or risk being separated and put into the foster care system?”

He shook his head again. “It sure as hell seemed like it must be a joke. But then I got to a computer and found an obituary for Audrey that didn’t say how she died but said she was survived by four-year-old twins. Four years plus however many months since they turned four, add nine more—that puts it somewhere in that five-years-ago time slot that I spent with Audrey. And here I am.”

“Still, you just said yourself that Audrey was a partyer... You are going to test the DNA the way the lawyer told you to, right?”

“Oh, yeah. This afternoon. I got a text from the nanny saying she scheduled an appointment with the pediatrician to do it.”

“And what about the nanny?” his brother asked.

Yeah, what about the nanny...

That mere mention of Dani Cooper brought the image of her into his head again.

Not only did she have great skin, she was something to look at all the way around. Exquisite caramel-colored eyes. High cheekbones, a straight nose. Pretty, luscious lips. And a delicate bone structure that gave her a kind of sophisticated, unapproachable beauty.

Or at least it would have seemed sophisticated and unapproachable if her long, dark brown hair with its rich reddish cast hadn’t been in some kind of weird style that he couldn’t imagine she’d done on purpose. But the style was so weird—and silly—that it had softened the distant, classy beauty.

And she had one damn fine body to go with it—trim without being too skinny, not tall, curves in all the right places.

One damn fine body that she’d been using to gyrate like a crazy woman with as much abandon as the kids when he’d first pulled up to the house and could see what was going on inside.

And yeah, he had to admit that even though the kids had been the reason he was there, even though he’d been sleep deprived and freaked out at the thought that the kids might actually prove to be his, it was still the nanny who had caught his attention. And held it for a while, sitting in his rented SUV, unable to take his eyes off her.

But what about the nanny—that’s what his brother had asked.

“What do you mean?” he answered with a question of his own because all he could think about was the way she looked and he didn’t think Conor was asking about that.

“You said she was the guardian now,” Conor reminded him.

“Right. I guess she’s been their nanny for a few years, and when Audrey and her husband died she had Audrey’s husband’s attorney go to court to have her named as the kids’ temporary guardian so they could stay in their own home for now.”

“That’s nice of her. That’s got to mean she went from taking care of them as just her job to being completely responsible for them and playing single parent 24-7?”

“Yeah, that’s the way I’m understanding it.”

“That’s above and beyond the call of duty.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, realizing that he’d been so busy thinking about how she looked that he hadn’t given her credit for that. And he should have.

“Are you going to start trading shifts with her?” Conor asked then. “Taking care of the kids part of the time so she can get away?”

“Oh, god no!” Liam said, feeling a rise in his stress level at that idea. “I figure if the court appointed her as their guardian she has to stick around, right? And she needs to—I don’t have a clue what to do with them. I mean, I said I want to get to know them, that I thought it would be good for them to get to know me, in case I am their father. That it would be good for me to learn the ropes. And that if by some chance I’m not their father, I want to make sure they get well taken care of for Audrey’s sake. But I can’t be left alone with them.”

His brother’s expression was amused and sympathetic at once. “Okay. But you know that if you are their father eventually that could happen?”

“I... Yeah... But that isn’t right now. Right now the nanny will be there and I’m just planning to lend a hand. To follow her lead. I can’t be left alone with them,” he repeated.

His brother grinned. “So you’re really terrified of them?”

“Wouldn’t you be?”

“I had to do a rotation in pediatrics so I’ve had a little experience,” Conor said of his training as a doctor.

Liam got up from the kitchen table and took his plate to the sink to rinse it and do what he could to calm his nerves over a prospect he hadn’t considered before this: being left alone with twin four-year-olds.

Once he felt as if he had some control, he turned back to his brother and said, “I just have to do what I have to do. Whatever that is.”

“Sure,” Conor agreed. “And I’m here for you, if there’s anything I can do.”

“You can take me shopping for some clothes,” Liam said. “I don’t have any civvies with me—I pretty much just threw what I needed to travel in a duffel and took off. And I think the uniform makes me a little intimidating to the kids.”

“Whose names are?”

“Oh, yeah, they have names,” Liam said, sounding overwhelmed and at sea. “The girl is Evie. The boy is Grady.”

“Evie Madison. Grady Madison. I guess that works,” Conor mused.

“Yeah, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Liam cautioned, thinking that he could only handle so much at a time.

And also thinking how grateful he was that Dani Cooper really would be there to hold his hand through what seemed like the most daunting mess he’d ever been in.

Well, not to literally hold his hand.

Although there was something about that idea that made the thought of going back to the house to face what he had to face much easier...

* * *

“That man from last day is coming back and we have to go to the doctor with him?” Evie said, questioning what Dani had just told her and her brother.

“The man who was here last night,” Dani corrected. “Remember his name is Liam, and yes, he’s coming with us to the doctor.”

She was combing Evie’s long hair and putting it into pigtails while Grady watched.

“But we aren’t sick,” he pointed out. “Why do we have to go to the doctor? Are we gonna hafta have shots?”

“No, no shots and nothing that will hurt. You won’t even have to get undressed. All you’ll have to do is open your mouths and let the nurse touch the inside of your cheek with a cotton swab.”

“But why?” Evie persisted.

“It’s a test. Remember last time you guys had sore throats? The nurse used a cotton swab to get some stuff from back there and sent it to be tested to see if you had strep—”

“I didn’t like that,” Evie said.

“Me either,” Grady chimed in.

“I know, but this will be easier than that. Here, let me show you.” She took three cotton swabs from the medicine cabinet, demonstrated what would be done on herself first and then persuaded them to let her do it to them.

“See? This one is no big deal. But then they can send the swab to a laboratory to test it and tell all kinds of things about you.”

“Like what?” Grady asked suspiciously.

“It could tell that Evie is a girl and you’re a boy. It could tell the color of your hair and eyes—”

“I can tell you that,” Evie reasoned.

This wasn’t easy to explain to inquisitive four-year-olds.

“It can also tell you stuff that you can’t see—what’s inside of you that makes you you and who your family is. Like if I had the test, it could tell me that my grandmother was my grandmother.”

“So it’s gonna tell us if we have a grandmother?” asked Grady.

“Well, no, we already know your grandparents are all in heaven, too, but it might tell us if you have any other family you don’t know about.”

“You think we do?” Evie asked.

“Maybe,” Dani said. “And that would be kind of nice to know, wouldn’t it? That there might be someone else in the world who would love to know you guys are their family?” And she hoped that would somehow prove true—that if Liam Madison was their biological father, he’d eventually make his way through what had seemed like shock last night and embrace the news and the kids and become a loving, caring parent to them.

“I s’pose it would be nice,” Grady agreed marginally.

“Then would we hafta leave the glass house to live with them?” Evie asked.

They’d referred to this place as the glass house since moving six months ago from what they’d called the brown house—the house they’d lived in while this place was being built.

“I don’t know,” Dani answered honestly.

She didn’t want to go beyond that so she changed the subject.

“Okay, how about if you guys do some of the new puzzles while we wait for Liam?”

It felt a little odd saying Liam Madison’s name with such familiarity but it was for the sake of the kids. She wanted to give the impression that he really was a friend to them.

Dani sent them into the common area just outside their bedrooms. Once she knew they weren’t going to fight she went into the room she was using and checked her own appearance.

She’d gone to a few extra lengths today to make up for the way she’d looked the night before. She wore a pair of her good jeans and a blue T-shirt over a tank top edged with a row of lace that showed above the T-shirt’s square-cut neckline.

She’d also gotten up early so she could pay special attention to her hair. Rather than a quick blow-dry, she’d let it air-dry so she could scrunch it and bring out the natural waves. Then, instead of keeping it contained in some fashion the way she ordinarily did for working with kids, she let it fall free to the middle of her back—what Grady had deemed real princess hair when he and Evie had seen it this morning.

She’d also applied a pale eye shadow to accentuate her eyes and a little mascara to go along with her blush and lip gloss.

But even though it was all what she might have done for a casual, daytime date, that wasn’t the reason she’d put in the time and effort, she told herself as she checked to make sure the hours that had passed since then hadn’t left her in need of touch-ups. She just wanted to improve upon the bad impression she was afraid she might have made on Liam Madison with her hairstyle by Evie the previous evening.

As nanny—and now as guardian—she had to play two roles. To the kids, she had to be a disciplinarian in a warm, caring manner so that her young charges could be at ease with her. But to the adults in their lives, she had to present a more professional image. A more professional image that she might not have presented to Liam Madison the night before.

So today she wanted to compensate. It didn’t have anything to do with the fact that Liam Madison was a fantastic-looking man.

So fantastic-looking that the image of him had stuck with her, even as she’d tried to fall asleep last night. And it had still been with her the minute she woke up this morning and the whole way through her shower and all that extra primping.

But picturing him in her head merely came along with thinking about him actually doing what Audrey had wanted him to do—coming to the kids’ rescue. It wasn’t about anything personal between the two of them. And there wouldn’t be. They had one thing and one thing only bringing them together: the current care and future well-being of Evie and Grady. And once what would happen to them was established, Dani would move on.

It came with the territory of being a nanny.

Yes, she did get a little attached. It had happened with kids she’d nannied for much shorter lengths of time before Evie and Grady. It was especially true of these twins because she’d been with them for a little over three years now. And they were great, smart, adorable, funny kids who she’d needed to provide for more than she had others whose parents were more involved than Audrey and Owen had been.

Add to that that she’d gone through weighty loss with them—both the loss they’d suffered and a particularly difficult loss she’d suffered herself at almost the same time—and now she was their stand-in parent, so a bond had definitely formed.

But still, her attachment to them had to have a limit because it all came with the knowledge that Evie and Grady were not her kids. That she would have to move on and leave them behind. It was something she never lost sight of. And since her sole connection with Liam Madison was through the kids, she’d be moving on and leaving him behind, too.

So the fact that he was great-looking was insignificant and the fact that she couldn’t stop carrying around the image of his great looks in her mind was also unimportant and meaningless.

Besides, she reasoned with herself as she turned upside down to brush her hair from underneath to add some fullness, even if they’d met at a party, locked eyes across a crowded room and been drawn together last night, nothing would have come of it. Too much had happened recently that had left her in no position for anything.

She’d ended her engagement to Garrett after too long indulging his need for control and living under his thumb.

She’d lost the grandmother who had raised her, the grandmother she’d loved dearly.

And then Audrey and Owen had died.

Now she had to make sure that Evie and Grady would be okay.

Plus her grandmother had left her with the biggest decision she’d ever faced—a decision that could not only affect everything for her from now on, but that could also affect numerous people and their jobs.

And if all that wasn’t enough—which it was—Liam Madison was in the military.

She knew only too well what that could mean because her own father had served. And suffered for it.

So no matter how fabulously handsome the guy was, she had a laundry list of things that all added up to one really big no when it came to Liam Madison, and made those good looks and the fact that she couldn’t stop carrying the image of him around in her head totally and completely irrelevant.

She straightened up and flipped her hair into place, feeling a strong resolve settle over her at the same time.

She’d enjoy the view of Liam Madison but that was it. The nurse at the pediatrician’s office had said DNA results took about five days. There would likely be a few more days before a final decision was made for Evie and Grady, and she would do whatever she could to help them transition to any new situation once that decision was made. After that she’d pack her bags, move on and leave that view behind.

Simple as that.

“Evie says this piece is for her puzzle but it’s not for her puzzle. It’s for my puzzle!” Grady hollered from the other room.

The doorbell rang just then, making Liam Madison ten minutes early but giving Dani an excuse to sidestep the kids’ conflict.

“That’ll be Liam and we need to get to the doctor’s office so we’ll sort it out later. Get your shoes on,” she said to the twins before snatching one last glimpse of herself in the mirror and then hurrying to the front door.

Denying along the way that what she felt was eagerness to see the big marine again.

* * *

“Is he really gonna stay here?” Grady whispered to Dani that evening when the four of them returned home. Liam Madison was outside, retrieving his things from the back of his rented SUV to move in. Dani was in the kitchen with the kids.

“He really is going to stay here,” Dani confirmed. “He’ll be up in the guest room. It’s what your mom wanted.”

“Because he’s her friend?” Evie said in disbelief.

“Yes. And because she wanted you all to get to know each other, and he wants to help out with you guys.”

“I don’t think so,” Grady added his own skepticism, which had some foundation based on the way today had gone.

But rather than confirm the little boy’s doubts Dani instead said, “I want you guys to be kind of patient with him, okay? I don’t think he knows much about kids.”

“I don’t think he likes us,” Evie amended.

“I don’t think we like him,” Grady added under his breath.

“We all just have to give each other a chance,” Dani said, making it a quiet command. “That’s why we get to know people—so we can find things about them that we do like.”

“He doesn’t smile,” Evie observed.

“He’s like a robot. But not a fun robot,” Grady contributed.

There was no disputing either criticism because both things were true during the time they’d known the man.

“It’ll get better,” Dani assured, hoping she was right. “Now go put on your pajamas and I’ll cut you some yellow cheese and tomatoes and avocados to go along with your yogurt since you didn’t have much dinner.”

“I want my adocados in salad,” Evie informed.

“And the magic word is...” Dani said.

“Please,” Evie complied.

“Please,” Grady said, too, even though Dani hadn’t been instructing him. “But I want my adocados sliced.”

Then they headed downstairs. But they were both eyeing the front door the whole way, not looking pleased with the addition that was about to be made to their household.

Dani couldn’t blame them.

It had been a long—and stilted—four hours since Liam had arrived that afternoon.

The first stop had been the pediatrician’s office where—after a half-hour wait during which the twins had played with the office toys and Liam had sat silent and straight-backed in one of the waiting room’s chairs—Evie’s and Grady’s DNA had been taken.

Unfortunately, between the time Dani had called and made the appointment—when the receptionist had said that yes, they would also take Liam’s DNA—the doctor had nixed that. Apparently the receptionist hadn’t been clear on just how strict the office policy was against addressing anything to do with an adult. Instead they’d been given an address for a lab they could go to for Liam’s swab.

The lab had been a twenty-minute drive from the doctor’s office. A twenty-minute drive during which Liam had not made conversation beyond asking for Dani’s navigations.

The lab had required another long wait in a small area with only three chairs and no office toys for the kids. Dani carried coloring and activity books in her purse but there also wasn’t a table the kids could use. So she’d set them up on the floor, out of the way of incoming and outgoing patients. Then she’d sat in one of the empty chairs but couldn’t persuade Liam to take one of the others.

“The kids should sit in them,” he’d said, standing as if he was on lookout, and seemed embarrassed that the kids weren’t using the remaining chairs.

After his test, Liam had suggested taking them all to dinner at a restaurant his brother had recommended. At the restaurant there had been another lengthy delay before a table opened up for them—during which the kids had again colored, this time using the seat of a chair as a desktop—something else that Liam eyed as if the irregularity made him uneasy. From his position again standing like a sentry.

Once they were led to a booth Liam had sat at one end of the table while the twins had huddled on either side of Dani as far away from him as they could get.

They’d agreed to grilled cheese sandwiches from the uninspired children’s menu and while they’d waited for their food, Grady had devolved into entertaining himself by tormenting his sister. That caused a small ruckus when Evie fought back, and while Dani managed them, Liam seemed not to know where to look, staring over their heads like a Buckingham Palace guard.

By the time the food arrived the kids were just plain contrary and had taken one look at the grilled cheese sandwich and refused to eat it because the cheese was white instead of yellow. And even after Dani had persuaded them just to try it, Evie had gagged on her bite and Grady had let his roll back down his tongue and onto the plate, delivering the verdict that it was yucky.

They did eat the french fries and fruit that came with the sandwich, so that was something, but through it all Liam Madison’s discomfort and embarrassment had been palpable.

And the twins hadn’t been all that happy themselves when they’d learned during the meal that Liam was going to be coming to live with them.

Dani had been grateful that they hadn’t said anything rude, saving their comments for Dani alone now that they were home and Liam was out of earshot. But the news had so sobered them that there was no mistaking they were not thrilled with the idea. From then on they’d become as quiet as Liam, so the car ride home had been stony all the way around.

And that was how a weary Dani had left it. She’d exhausted every effort to engage Liam in things with the kids, she’d failed at getting the kids to interact with Liam, and for the time being she just gave up.