“You should keep the chaps in the bedroom,” she said on a winded breath.
“You were the one who said they were never going back to the costume store.”
She maneuvered her body off of his, and they turned to face each other, lying side by side. She traced her finger down his jawline and stared at his handsome face, unable to imagine a life without this man. Together—and often with the world watching—they’d crafted a life that was uniquely theirs.
The eight and the ten who became more than just a number.
“Look at all the things I’ve been right about,” she teased, reaching down to see if her randy ranch hand was up for round two when the door to the bedroom swung open.
“Look, Mommy! Daddy’s dressed like a cowboy who lost his underwear!”
Epilogue: Part Two
Jordan
“Cowboy Daddy! Mommy! Come quick! You have to see what Janey did!”
Jordan pulled the bed covers up to his chin and plastered on an oh-shit grin.
No parenting manual teaches about the oh-shit grin. This is the face you make when your kid busts in on you while doing the naughty, and you try to appear as un-naughty as possible—which is harder than you’d think, especially in assless chaps with your dick hanging out.
“What is it, Lizzy? Is everybody okay?” He glanced at the clock. It was barely eight in the morning on a Saturday, but that didn’t mean anything to kids.
His precocious six-year-old daughter cocked her head to the side, looking like an exasperated version of her mother.
Yep, Elizabeth Lorraine Marks, who’d come into the world on a chaise lounge at the Denver country club, was six years old.
Another whopper?
He’d become a girl dad—three beautiful times over.
“Lizzy, sweetheart, give Daddy and me a minute, and we’ll be right there,” Georgie said, modifying her oh-shit grin to the slightly nuanced, I-may-look-like-I’m-composed-but-I’m-in-bed-with-a-man-wearing-assless-chaps face.
Another thing they don’t teach in VR simulations.
Lizzy pursed her lips. “You better hurry. They’re in Mimi’s room, and Janey’s got the markers out.”
He frowned. Oh, shit—his real oh-shit face.
He shared a look with his wife, who was rocking some amazing sex hair—something he’d love to mess up, even more, but…kids.
“Wrap the sheet around your body. You don’t have time to take the chaps off!” Georgie cried, springing from the bed and throwing on her robe.
Why didn’t he wear a robe?
A question for another time when his four-year-old daughter wasn’t armed with a Sharpie. He took his wife’s advice, yanked the sheet off the bed, and wrapped it around his body like a toga-wearing cowboy. It would have to do.
After Janey, named after Jane Eyre, was born, they’d outgrown the bungalow and had moved to a larger home in the same neighborhood. Now, all three girls had their own room—which they destroyed daily…or hourly. It was a crapshoot.
He followed Georgie out of their room, and Mr. Tuesday met them in the hall. With a touch of gray around his nose, he’d become the keeper of the girls, completely devoted to their happiness.
But something was different.
“Is Mr. Tuesday wearing lipstick?” Georgie asked.
“It’s marker makeup, Mommy,” Lizzy called with her head peeking out of Mimi’s room.
He shared a look with his wife, and they bolted down the hall, then skidded to a stop.
“Whatever we find in there, there’s got to be some substance that can clean it or paint over it,” he said, more to himself than to his wife.
Georgie sighed. “Okay. We tackle this on three.”
“One,” he began.
“Two,” she said with a chuckle.
“Three!”
They entered the bedroom, prepared for complete Sharpie devastation, only to find the cream-colored walls marker-free.
“Hi, Daddy! I’m a pretty, pretty princess, and so is Mimi,” Janey, his flirt, said, marker in hand and flashing a fire engine red smile with one of Georgie’s old pageant crowns sitting cockeyed on her head.
“Okay, we can wash that off, I think,” Georgie said, kneeling to get a better look at the four-year-old’s face.
His gaze went to the crib where, at thirteen months, Hermione or Mimi, who’d gotten the nickname because Janey couldn’t quite pronounce the vowel-laden moniker, stood in her crib with her back to them and Faby in her arms.
Good old Faby was still with them and had turned out to be their ticket to winning the Battle of the Births. The Hail Mary he’d been hoping for actually happened. It turned out that they were the only couple that kept their infant simulation doll with them night and day. Thanks to Faby’s high-tech tracking abilities, which had since been turned off, they’d learned that the other participants only took the poor fake baby out of its bag for the challenges. And boom! Their attentive care of that sweet hunk of plastic had put them over the top and made them the winners.
He took a step forward and focused on the doll.
“Mimi, is Faby wearing lipstick?” he asked, and then it happened.
Mimi, the beefcake baby after his own heart with energy for days, did a one-eighty jump—an advanced skill she’d picked up in the baby NFL.
Yep, that’s right! The baby NFL.
Georgie might have nixed the toddler trombone lessons, but she’d caved on the NFL classes, which weren’t much more than music and movement activities. Still, he already saw his Hermione rocking those ninja courses. She gravitated toward the tractor tire in his gym and could fart like a grown man.
A tomboy in the making until…
“Holy, circus act! Janey, what did you do to Mimi’s face?”
Looking like a tiny drunk clown, Mimi stomped around her crib, dragging poor Faby like a caveman.
“She’s a pretty, pretty princess for the pictures, too!” his daughter replied as pleased as punch.
“Pictures?” he repeated.
Georgie gasped. “Everyone is coming early this morning for that CityBeat photo shoot. You know, the one with everyone who’s been with us from the beginning. I told the girls about it last night!”
That’s the other thing. Besides bringing their own trifecta into the world, they’d managed to become a worldwide brand, endorsing items from toys to gym equipment to books. They blogged for CityBeat, CityBeat Rattle, and were frequent guest bloggers on the Belgian Waffle Princess’s page.
Today, their closest friends and family were scheduled to come over for a group photo shoot. Hector and Bobby had the idea of doing an origin piece on them. And, of course, because that was their life, it just happened to be the day when two of his three daughters looked as if they were ready to run off with the circus.
Not to mention, with the outfit he was sporting, he looked ready to join an X-rated rodeo.
He shook his head and stared at the ceiling.
As if on cue, the doorbell rang, and then the door opened.
“Knock, knock! It’s Grandma Lorraine and Grandpa River, and we’ve got Uncle Gene and Aunt Marjory with us.”
Georgie glanced at the clock. “My mom and Wandering River are here with the Gilberts, and they’re early!”