“Where do you live, girl?” he asked, sauntering through the living room toward the kitchen.
She went on to give directions. Turned out, she lived in the same neighborhood, only a couple of streets over.
“Your momma and daddy gonna be all right if we both come over?” he asked directly.
Keegan knew what the girls at school were saying about them. They’d already pegged Keegan as the bad boy, the one without a care in the world. And they were calling Kaden studious and sweet.
“They’re not home right now,” Anna said.
Keegan mouthed her response to Kaden and waited for him to answer.
He got one. A quick jerk of his head and Kaden had relayed his lack of desire to hang out with the firecracker known as Anna Benson.
“You know what, Anna? I think we’ve got homework. Maybe another time?”
“Maybe Kaden could do your homework for you,” she said, a teasing tone in her voice. “And you could come by. Doesn’t have to be both of you.”
“Sorry. He’s not good at math.”
Kaden glared his way.
“Talk to you later,” he said into the phone, then hung it up and set the cordless receiver near the charging base.
“I’m not good at math?” Kaden grumbled.
“Hey, I coulda told her we’d come over and you coulda watched her paw at me like a cat toy. Which way’d you rather have it?”
“Whatever.” Kaden marched to the fridge, yanked open the door, stared inside.
Before they could rummage through the kitchen for some after-school snacks, the doorbell rang. Footsteps sounded overhead, then trampled down the stairs.
“I got it!” Eve shouted.
What was it with twelve-year-old girls having to be the first one to answer the phone and the door? Eve had certainly mastered the art of getting there first.
From where he leaned against the kitchen counter, Keegan heard a soft female voice. “Are your brothers home?”
Keegan glanced at Kaden, cocked an eyebrow in question, and got a shrug for an answer.
“I’ve got five,” Eve said snidely. “Which one?”
“The twins.”
Okay, that piqued his curiosity, had Keegan marching through the house toward the front door, Kaden right on his heels.
“Who’re you?” Eve asked the woman.
“Shauna Whitley. Your next-door neighbor.”
“Really?” Eve didn’t sound impressed.
“Eve, don’t be rude,” Kaden said, stepping in front of Keegan as they reached the door. “I’m Kaden. This is my brother Keegan. It’s nice to meet you, Mrs. Whitley.”
Shauna Whitley smiled, and Keegan was almost positive she radiated.
That was the day they’d been introduced to the woman who would forever change their lives. It would be months of manual labor—mowing her yard, cleaning her pool, tending to her flowers—before Mrs. Whitley finally got around to her real reason for introducing herself that day.
By the time they were seventeen, they would and did consider themselves men in every sense of the word, thanks to the sassy, sexy, suburban housewife whose husband spent a majority of the year away on business. Or with his mistress, if Mrs. Whitley was to be believed.
They had whiled away many afternoons over at Mrs. Whitley’s, and as the months passed, after she’d taught them things that would last a lifetime, they continued to show her all they’d learned. After all, practice made perfect, did it not?
Turned out, Mrs. Whitley was the woman who had sealed their fates, made them realize their idea of sharing one woman between them was exactly what they wanted in life.
And one day, like the ranch, Keegan was damn sure they would finally find exactly what they were looking for.
***
Twenty years later…
Wednesday, December 25, 2019
Keegan Walker grinned over at his brother as he lifted his hand. “Last chance to back out.”
He waited for Kaden to change his mind, something his twin was prone to do.
“She told us she’d meet us,” Keegan reminded him. “True gentlemen will check on a lady, right?”
Before Kaden could say a word, Keegan dropped his knuckles to the door. Three quick raps and he was stepping back.
Kaden sighed. “She’s probably as—”
The door opened and Bristol appeared, fresh-faced, her silky brown hair pulled back into her normal ponytail. Her eyebrows lowered, confusion written all over her beautiful face.
“Hey,” she greeted even as she stuck her head out the door and peered down the hall. “What are you doing here?”
Keegan smirked. “The real question is why aren’t you downstairs?”
Her eyes widened as though she just remembered she’d promised to meet them in the bar.
“I am so sorry. I must’ve forgotten.”
Yep. Or she chickened out, which was likely her real reason for avoiding them.
“No worries. Mind if we come in?” Keegan asked, knowing his brother would be too tongue-tied to get the sentence out.
“In?”
Keegan held up the bottle of Goose, grinned. “Figured we’d bring the party to you. Hang out for a bit. Chat.”
Bristol’s eyes remained on his. “Chat?”
“Yeah. You know, that thing friends do?”
“Friends?”
Figuring they could spend half an hour doing this, Keegan took a step forward. “Perhaps we could have this discussion inside. Before we wake up any of those kiddos.”
That seemed to get through to her, because Bristol took a step back, but she never took her eyes off them.
“I was getting ready for bed.”
“Well, I was hopin’ we could hang out,” Keegan said, realizing Kaden really had lost the ability to speak.
Figured.
“And do what?” The edge of caution in Bristol’s voice made him smile.
“Watch a movie? Play cards? Gossip? Doesn’t matter,” he told her, then held up the bottle. “As long as we come up with a way to finish off this bottle.”
Bristol laughed and she seemed to settle somewhat. “Finish that off? It’s not even open.”
Keegan took care of that right quick. “Is now.”
While Bristol and Kaden acted like teenagers who were forced to play seven minutes in heaven, Keegan made his way into the bathroom, retrieved the two glasses the hotel kept stashed there. Why did they put them in the bathroom? he wondered. Seemed an awkward place for glasses.
Not that it mattered.
“All right,” he said when he returned. “You sit there.” He motioned for Bristol to move to the bed. “You”—he pointed to Kaden—“can sit in that chair. And I’ll take the floor.”
“You’re serious,” Bristol said, but at least she was following directions, making her way over to the bed.
“Very. So what’ll it be? Movie? Strip poker?” And because he’d thought of it and it sounded appealing, he added, “Seven minutes in heaven? We could play spin the bottle”—Keegan held up the bottle—“but we should probably wait till it’s empty.”
“I am not playing spin the bottle,” Bristol said with a laugh.
“Seven minutes in heaven it is.”