Page 74 of The Devil's Pair

“Hell, yeah,” they said together, and Dux added, “It’sallwe want, honey.”

“So,” Silver repeated, this time with a grin. “When are you guys talking to Wolf?”

They exchanged glances again, then looked at their friends.

“Now,” Drake said. “We’re going right now.”

Chapter Twenty-one

Bellefonte, Pennsylvania

The next day

Briley sat in her sunny, teal living room, her lips set, for once studiously ignoring the incredible view. Today was the day that she wasfinallygoing to bulldoze through the goddamn stack of paperwork that had to be filled out for her maternity leave. She’d dragged her feet and dawdled and dithered – but she might end up on bedrest any day now, and she’d better have her ducks in a row if that happened.

She sighed, took a disconsolate sip of decaf with low-fat milk, then jumped a bit as a volley of kicks happened in her abdomen. It felt likebothof them were tap-dancing in there, and she knew that as long as they were, she’d feel like she was in a tumble dryer, so she set down her pen and stared at her stomach. Sure enough, there were little feet marks pushing out, and she smiled. OK, it wasn’t super comfortable – especially at night – but she loved seeing her skin rise and fall, and she wanted nothing more than to kiss those busy little feet.

Well. Shealsowanted their fathers there with her.

“We’re going to be OK,” she said aloud, partly to the twins, mostly to herself. “We got this, and we’re going to be a team, and Daddy and Daddy will be here for us as much as they can. It’s not perfect, I know and I’m sorry… but it’s still pretty damn good. Your fathers are great men, you’ll see.”

There was light tap at the door, and she startled a bit; right away, the twins jumped too. She’d heard that babies could sense and react to their mothers’ feelings, but she’d always dismissed it as bullshit. She believed it now, though, as her son anddaughter seemed to mirror every thought and emotion that she had.

“OK, OK,” she muttered to them. “Calm down in there. I ordered a few onesies off Amazon for you guys, so I bet that’s why someone is at my door at nine a.m. on a Saturday.”

Briley pulled herself up off the sofa with a groan, lumbered ungracefully across the room. She opened the door a bit, kept the chain on as an automatic precaution, and peered out. What she saw almost knocked her backwards off her swollen feet, onto her getting-curvier-by-the-day ass.

Dux and Drake were standing on her front porch. The morning sun was shining on them from behind, almost making them glow with some angelic light… except thatnoangels wouldeverhave such sinfully sexy and delicious grins on their gorgeous faces.

“Ummm,” she managed, wishing that she’d brushed her hair and put on lipstick and was wearing something besides an oversized t-shirt and track pants; the babies gave her a bunch of exasperated kicks in agreement.“Uh – hi?”

“Hey, babe,” Dux drawled at her. “Wanna open the door?”

“Oh!” she blurted. “Uh… yes! One sec.”

She shut the door, slid the chain, opened it again. She half-expected them to not still be standing there, like they’d been some weird hormone-induced mirage created by her wishful thinking… but there they were. Tall and broad and so,sohandsome, the most amazing men that she’d ever known.

“Hi,” she repeated, feeling stupid and slow, like her head was filled up with cotton wool, but she didn’t really have much else to go with at the moment. “Please come –”

Without any warning, the world was suddenly spinning. Briley gave a small gasp and grabbed the doorjamb, but of course she needn’t have bothered: two strong sets of hands grasped her under the elbows, around her waist. They caught heras she swayed forward, caught her as she almost tumbled down. And as she stood there, supported and held up and wrapped in their embrace, it came to her that they hadalwayscaught her, right from the very beginning.

“Hey,” Drake’s worried voice rumbled against her cheek, and she knew the exact expression that he’d be wearing. At this point, she knew their faces like she knew her own, and she idly wondered how much the babies would share their fathers’ looks. “Those dizzy spells haven’t gotten better?”

“I thought the doctor said your levels were all normal.” Dux’s words came from behind her, and she smiled a bit, knowing that he was the twin curled around her back. “You need more tests?”

“I’m OK,” she murmured, loving being nestled between them, not caring if the neighbors might see them like this. “I really am. I think it was just the shock.”

“Have you had breakfast?” Drake asked her and in response, the babies kicked against her stomach, hard, in a flurry. He felt it against his own rock-hard abdomen, and he laughed. “The kids say no.”

“Briley,” Dux admonished her. “What’d we say about eating regular meals?”

“Ihavebeen!” she said with some indignation, and right away, the babies let her have it for telling such a bald-faced lie. “I mean – I’ve beenbetterabout it!”

“Jesus, woman.” She heard the smile in Dux’s words, even as he attempted to sound stern. “Let’s get you inside and feed the three of you.”

“Well,” she said as they each took a hand and led her back in the house. “Maybe we can talk first? Like maybe you can tell me why the hell you’ve taken a page out of my book, and shown up at my front door with no warning at all?” A terrible thought seized her, and she stopped dead in her tracks. “Wait– is something wrong back in Denver? Is – has anything else happened to anyone else?”

“Nah, darlin’,” Drake said gently, deposited her on the sofa. “Everything’s good.”

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