you’re sure it’s not a problem, I wouldn’t mind adding a few feminine touches,” she told him.
“You can sleep in the nursery until it’s finished, or if you’d prefer more privacy, there’s a fold-out love seat in my office.”
“The nursery is fine.” She didn’t care about privacy, and she liked the idea of sleeping near her girls.
He nodded to Fern and said, “I think we should lay them down. It’s afternoon nap time.”
Sierra looked down at Fern and realized that she had fallen asleep, her thumb still wedged in her mouth, and Ivy, who had laid her head on Coop’s enormously wide shoulder, was looking drowsy, too.
They carried the girls back to the nursery and laid them in their beds—Fern on the right side and Ivy on the left—then they stepped quietly out and Coop shut the door behind them.
“How long will they sleep?” Sierra asked.
“On a good day, two hours. But they slept in until eight this morning, so maybe less.” He paused in the hall and asked, “Before we call my attorney, would you like something to drink? We have juice and soda … baby formula.”
She smiled. “I’m good, thanks.”
“Okay, if you’re having any second thoughts, this is your last chance to change your mind.”
That would never happen. He was stuck with her. “No second thoughts.”
“Great, let’s go to my office and call Ben,” Coop said with a grin. “Let’s get this show on the road.”
Three
Coop stood outside Sierra’s bedroom door, hoping she hadn’t already gone to sleep for the night. It was barely nine-thirty, but today had been her first official day watching the girls, so he was guessing that she was probably pretty exhausted. God knows they wore him out.
She had signed the contract the afternoon of her second interview, then spent most of the next day moving her things and unpacking. He had offered to pay a service to do the moving for her, but she had insisted she had it covered, showing up in the early afternoon with a slew of boxes and two youngish male friends—orderlies from the hospital, she’d told him—who had been openly thrilled to meet the great Coop Landon.
Though Coop had tried to pay them for the help, they refused to take any cash. Instead he offered them each a beer, and while Sierra unpacked and the twins napped, he and the guys sat out on the rooftop patio. They asked him about his career and the upcoming season draft picks, leaving a couple of hours later with autographed pucks.
Coop had hoped to be around today to help Sierra and the twins make the transition, but he’d been trapped in meetings with the marketing team for his new sports equipment line all morning, and in the afternoon he’d met with the owner of his former team. If things went as planned, Coop would own the team before the start of the next season in October. Owning the New York Scorpions had been his dream since he started playing for the team. For twenty-two years, until his bad knee took him off the ice, he lived and breathed hockey. He loved everything about the game. Buying a team was the natural next step, and he had the players’ blessing.
After the meetings Coop had enjoyed his first dinner out with friends in weeks. Well, he hadn’t actually enjoyed it. Though he had been counting the days until he was free again, throughout the entire meal his mind kept wandering back to Fern and Ivy and how they were doing with Sierra. Should he have canceled his meetings and spent that first day with them? Was it irresponsible of him to have left them with a stranger? Not that he didn’t trust Sierra—he just wanted to be sure that he was doing the right thing. They had already lost their parents—he didn’t want them to think that he was abandoning them, too.
When the rest of the party had moved on to a local bar for after-dinner drinks, dancing and skirt chasing, to the surprise of his friends, Coop had called it a night. On a typical evening he closed out the bar, moved on to a party and usually didn’t go home alone. But the ribbing he endured from his buddies was mild. Hell, it had been less than a month since he lost his brother. It was going to take him a little time to get back into his normal routine. And right now the twins needed him. He would try to work from home the rest of the week, so he could spend more time with them. After more than two weeks of being together almost constantly, he had gotten used to having them around.
He rapped lightly on Sierra’s bedroom door, and after several seconds it opened a crack and she peeked out. He could see that she had already changed into her pajamas—a short, pink, babydoll-style nightgown. His eyes automatically drifted lower, to her bare legs. They weren’t particularly long, or slender, so the impulse to touch her, to slide his palm up the inside of one creamy thigh and under the hem of her gown—and the resulting pull of lust it created—caught him completely off guard. He had to make an effort to keep his gaze above her neck and on her eyes, which were dark and inquisitive, with that exotic tilt. Her hair, which he’d only ever seen up in a ponytail, hung in a long, silky black sheet over her shoulders, and he itched to run his fingers through it. Instead he shoved his hands in the pockets of his slacks.
You can look, but you can’t touch, he reminded himself, and not for the first time since she’d come by to meet the girls. She was absolutely nothing like the sort of woman he would typically be attracted to. Maybe that alone was what he found so appealing. She was different. A novelty. But her position as the twins’ nanny was just too crucial to put in jeopardy.
Maybe hiring such an attractive woman had been a bad idea, even if she was the most qualified. Maybe he should have held out and interviewed a few more people, made an effort to find someone older or, better yet, a guy.
“Did you want something?” she asked, and he realized that he was just standing there staring at her.
Way to make yourself look like an idiot, Coop. He was usually pretty smooth when it came to women. He had no idea why he was acting like such a dope.
“I hope I didn’t wake you,” he said.
“No, I was still up.”
“I just wanted to check in, see how it went today.”
“It went really well. It’ll take some time to get into a routine, but I’m following their lead.”
“I’m sorry I wasn’t here to help out.”
She looked confused. “I didn’t expect you to help.”
He felt his eyes drifting lower, to the cleavage at the neckline of her gown. She wasn’t large-busted, but she wasn’t what he would consider small, either. She was … average. So why couldn’t he seem to look away?
She noticed him noticing but made no move to cover herself. And why should she? It was her room. He was the intruder.
And he was making a complete ass of himself.
“Was there anything else?” she asked.
He forced his gaze back to her face. “I thought we could just talk for a while. We haven’t had a chance to go over the girls’ schedules. I thought you might have questions.”
She looked hesitant, and he thought her answer was going to be no. And could he blame her? He was behaving like a first-rate pervert. But after several
