LITMIR.BIZ

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thought of that,” he murmured, staring at her with a bemused expression. “I could set up my office here easily enough, but don’t you work at a flower shop?”

      “My parents own a flower shop in town,” she corrected. “I work at a garden supply warehouse, but I was thinking of quitting, anyway. I could pay my share of the bills with the profits from the cut-flower business.”

      “Hmm,” he said, pushing out his bottom lip and toying with the whiskers underneath. “I like this idea more and more. The babies would have both of us around for a year and by the end of that time they’d be easier to manage.”

      “Um-hmm,” Abby said, worrying about the idea more and more. Could she and Jack actually live here, together?

      He might not know her from a garden of weeds, but she was painfully aware of his vitality. Always.

      She also knew he led a pretty active social life. Would he want to bring his women here? She began to imagine a revolving door of various women, coming in and out of the farmhouse and cooing at the babies before they vanished into Jack’s room to coo some more.

      “Sounds cozy,” he said, breaking into her angst.

      “Doesn’t it, though?” She feigned composure, but her alarm grew exponentially as her idea hurtled from impetuous to barely conceivable to likely. And remained, all the while, quite impossible.

      CHAPTER THREE

      ABBY HAD HAULED seven loads of her belongings past the burned-out front porch light before she finally decided to change it. She had just dragged a kitchen chair outside and perched on top to make the adjustment when her new neighbor, Sharon Hauser, hollered from inside. “Donation box, or new location?”

      Sharon’s matronly figure filled the doorway. She held a bean-pot lamp on one hip, and Wyatt on the other. Her usual smile was missing as she stared at Abby’s precarious pose.

      Abby held up the bulb and light cover, and chuckled when her friend’s big, gummy smile returned. Though Sharon had at least fifteen years on Abby, she was on the same wavelength. Sometimes words weren’t necessary.

      Abby finished the job and hopped down. As she carried the chair back in, she said, “I asked you here to help with Rosie and Wyatt. I can finish unpacking.”

      Sharon jiggled both baby and lamp, prompting a happy squeal from Wyatt. “Shush,” she told Abby. “Scrap or keep—that’s all I need to know.”

      Abby knew not to argue. She squinted at the lamp. “Keep,” she answered. “Put it on the table beside the sofa.”

      Sharon swept the lamp and the giggling Wyatt off toward the living room, and Abby headed off in the other direction to cart the chair back to the kitchen.

      Her helpful new friend was well on her way to becoming a cherished old friend. She had appeared on that very same porch the morning after the accident, and she’d been just as obstinate then about lending a hand. She’d pushed her way in behind a pierogi casserole, explained that she was the wife of the farmer down the road, and had commandeered the babies and the kitchen duties so Abby could deal with the tragic news.

      That morning, Abby had been too stunned to argue. She’d been baby-sitting the twins the night before, and had waited up all night for Paige and Brian’s return. She’d thought they must have decided to stay out overnight, and reasoned that they’d been having too much fun to let her know.

      She had only learned the grisly truth at dawn, after their overturned car was discovered near a dirt road just two miles from the farmhouse. The white-tailed deer Brian had swerved to avoid was found dead a few yards away, and the furrowed path in the steep embankment told the rest of the story. At first, Abby blamed herself. If only she’d thought to call someone, perhaps they could have been saved. But the coroner had said their death was immediate. He’d called it merciful.

      Abby didn’t know if a healthy young couple could die a merciful death. She only knew they were gone forever, leaving her behind with a couple of babies who would never be orphans as long as she was around.

      That night had created a deep and unhealing chasm in her memory. Everything before had become part of a past that was already lost. Everything since was the future.

      Uncertain. Frightening. As important as air.

      The delicious sound of baby cackles broke into her thoughts and led her down the hall. She discovered her neighbor and the twins—vital components of her new life—cavorting in one of the rooms she had emptied for Jack.

      Sharon now held a baby in each arm, and she was spinning lazy circles in the middle of the room. “Looks funny without Brian’s exercise equipment,” she said. “You sure about this living arrangement?”

      Abby glanced around at the generous space, unwilling to voice her turmoil. “Sure I’m sure,” she said.

      And she was, in a way. At least she was glad to know that Wyatt would be here, in this house, with her and Rosie. Abby might have snagged a rather large stray in the form of Jack Kimball, but since the baby boy she’d tried to lasso was included, it should be well worth it.

      “Since I volunteered to baby-sit the twins during the funeral, I’ve never met Jack,” Sharon said. She stopped turning, and caught Abby’s eye. “I assume you know what you’re getting into.”

      “I think so,” Abby said with a shrug. “Besides, this was the only way to keep Wyatt for the time being.”

      “Didn’t you say Jack was granted permanent custody?”

      “I did.” She pulled Wyatt away from Sharon. “He’s a bachelor, though. He has no idea what he’s getting into. I’m predicting that he’ll want out within three months.”

      Sharon frowned. “You know they can learn, right? Most men start off clueless when it comes to their first baby.”

      “But Jack isn’t like most men,” Abby said with growing confidence. “He’s like Tim, my ex-husband.”

      “How’s that?”

      Abby counted off the similarities on her fingers. “He likes women, he spends too much time in bars and he buys expensive, big-boy toys.”

      “Sounds like a typical single man, if you ask me,” Sharon said. “My Earl rode a Harley before we got married. He only traded it for the tractor after our third son was born.”

      Abby swung Wyatt to her opposite arm and used her other hand to continue her tally. “Well, now I’m just guessing on these,” she said. “But I’ll bet that Jack bores easily, avoids commitment and hates self-sacrifice. He’s a Tim, not an Earl.”

      “What does he look like?”

      Abby scowled. “That’s irrelevant.”

      “Is he tall?” Sharon asked with a chuckle.

      Abby nodded. No need to deny that particular quality, since Sharon would find out for herself soon enough.

      “Brian had nice eyes. Does Jack?”

      She thought about a pair of devilishly handsome eyes and shrugged. “Doesn’t matter.”

      Sharon’s mop of graying blond hair floated triumphantly out of the room. “Sounds to me as if you’ve got more than the twins to worry about.”

      “Jack Kimball is completely resistible,” Abby said as she followed her friend into the living room.

      “What if you aren’t?”

      Abby stopped near Paige’s plum curtains and pulled them closed. “Are you kidding?”

      Her neighbor turned around and shook her head. “You said he likes women. You are one, Abby.”

      She laughed at the thought. “I’m not his type.”

      Sharon sat on the sofa with Rosie on her lap and tickled the little

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