Three Little Words (Fool's Gold #12)

“I’ll hold those two weeks until Friday,” Ford told him.

“You have other companies interested in them, don’t you?”

Ford smiled. “We’re getting busy, but don’t worry about that. As soon as I hear from you, the time is yours. I’ll hold the hotel block of rooms, as well.”

“I saw the casino on my drive into town. Could we stay there?”

Ford leaned back in his chair. “You can, but I’ll tell you, the casino offers a big distraction. Your people will stay up later gambling, so they’ll be less focused the next day. If you want to offer them accommodations there, I would suggest they switch hotels Friday night and then stay the weekend.”

“Good point,” Jeff said.

They rose and shook hands. Ford walked the other man out. As they reached the parking lot, he saw two blonde women walking toward them and sighed heavily. Jeff noticed, as well.

He whistled softly. “They part of the team?”

“No. They’re my sisters.”

“Sorry, man.”

“No worries. They’re both married, by the way.”

“Right.”

Jeff nodded and got into this rental. Ford thought about ducking into the building but knew there was no point. He had no problem running from a fight when it came to his family, but Dakota and Montana would simply continue to hunt him down. Disappearing meant postponing the inevitable.

So he waited as the two women approached.

They were the same height, with the same attractive features. Brown eyes, blond hair. Montana wore hers longer. Their other triplet—Nevada—was missing, but Ford knew he would be hearing from her soon enough.

“Hey, big brother,” Montana said as she reached him and leaned in for a kiss. “How are you?”

He hugged her. “Wondering how much of a pain you’re going to be in my ass.”

She stepped back and laughed. “Bigger than you know.”

“Montana, don’t,” Dakota said, taking her turn for a hug. “You’ll scare him off.”

“I don’t scare that easily.” He put his hands on Dakota’s shoulders, looked into her eyes and said, “No.”

“I haven’t asked a question yet.”

“You don’t have to. I know that’s why you’re here and that I won’t like it. So no.”

“It’s about Mom,” Montana informed him.

He dropped his arms to his sides and headed for the safety of CDS. If only there was some kind of security system so he could lock them out. There was food in the fridge—he could make do for a while. Hole up here until they forgot about him.

His sisters followed him inside. Once he reached the hallway, he couldn’t decide where to go, which meant they had him trapped.

“She’s really upset,” Montana told him.

Dakota nodded, her gaze uncomfortably direct. “It wouldn’t kill you to humor her.”

“It might,” he muttered.

“All she wants is for you to be happy,” Montana said. “Is that so bad? She loves you. We all love you and we don’t want you to go away again.” Tears filled her eyes. “We missed you so much.”

That low blow was followed by Dakota setting up for the kill shot. “Just one date. How bad could it be?”

“Bad.”

“Ford, she’s your mother,” Dakota said, as if he were in danger of forgetting.

He could feel the doors of the prison closing. For maybe the thousandth time since coming home, he had the thought that life would be a hell of a lot easier if he didn’t like his family. If he could ignore them or yell at them.

What they couldn’t understand and he didn’t know how to explain was his mother’s plan was never going to work. He wasn’t going to meet a nice girl and settle down because he wouldn’t do that to anyone he liked. Most people wanted to fall in love and then stay in love. He didn’t.

When he got involved, he had a short attention span. When things got serious, he got gone. That had been his pattern since the day he’d left Fool’s Gold. He knew he wasn’t still in love with Maeve, so it must be a character flaw.

He’d tried to stay involved, to emotionally commit, but no matter what he did, he got restless and wanted to leave. He couldn’t summon more than passing interest. He’d liked the women he’d been with, but he’d never once been in love. Not even with Maeve.

But his family wouldn’t understand. He came from a long line of happy marriages. His mother had been a widow for a decade before she’d been willing to start dating again. Except for Kent, all his siblings were blissfully married. Both sets of grandparents had successful unions that had lasted more than half a century.

“I’m seeing someone,” he said, the words as unexpected to him as to them.

Montana looked pleased while Dakota’s expression turned skeptical.

“How convenient,” she murmured.

“It was hard to start dating a local girl before I got home,” he told her.

“Uh-huh.” She didn’t sound convinced.