“Did Pepper or Nonny give you permission?” he asked. “It’s late. Past your bedtime.” They were dressed in night clothes, which meant Pepper had put them to bed. They were little escape artists.
The triplets looked at one another. Gino shook his head, lifted all three of them up and stood. “You three. Ginger, you’re such a little ringleader.”
She grinned at him, completely unrepentant. “I know. Nonny says I keep everyone on their toes.”
“You’re not walking on your toes, Uncle Gino,” Cannelle pointed out.
Although extremely intelligent, the children were very literal. He kept a straight face. “No, you’re right. It’s a saying, remember, Pepper explained that concept to you?” He kept striding toward the house, picking up speed, not wanting them to realize he was taking them back inside before it was too late.
“How are we supposed to know when it’s a saying?” Thym protested, patting his face with her little hand.
That did something to him. He liked that her hand was so tiny, brushing over his rough shadow. She seemed intrigued with the dark sandpaper along his jaw, rubbing at it over and over. His heart melted just a little when he’d been so certain it was made of stone. It was the three little girls who had given him back some humanity.
Pepper burst out of the house, glaring at her little ones. “You do not get to take advantage of me throwing up in the bathroom, you little hooligans.”
They didn’t have to ask what a hooligan was. Pepper called the triplets that often, and the word had been explained. Gino set them on the porch just as Wyatt’s grandmother stepped outside. She smiled gently at the girls and seated herself in the rocking chair, and gestured, using her pipe, toward the three little rockers Wyatt had made for his girls.
“Girls, your mother wasn’t feelin’ well this evenin’, was she?” The tone was mild.
Gino’s stomach turned to knots. How did Nonny do that? She didn’t raise her voice, but just by the tone and words, you knew she was disappointed. No one ever wanted to disappoint Nonny—especially the triplets. Their little faces dropped as they all obediently sat in their appointed rockers.
“I wanted Daddy to come and find us,” Ginger said, her lower lip starting to quiver. “He works all the time now.”
Gino leaned one hip against the post. Pepper, Wyatt’s wife, was gorgeous. Not just gorgeous, that didn’t begin to describe her. She was exotic. Sexy. Every movement she made was sensual. She was enhanced that way, and sometimes just looking at her hurt. Right now, she looked beautiful but very tired. Her pregnancy appeared to be a rough one.
He wanted to put his arm around her and offer her a little sympathy like any brother might do for his sister, but one didn’t touch Pepper. There was something on her skin that could cause a man to need her. They were all very careful around her. Fortunately, her husband watched over her, and he came up behind Gino and went straight to his wife.
“Hey baby. Did they wear you out today?” He brushed gentle kisses over her mouth and then sank into a chair and pulled her down onto his lap. “You girls were good for Mommy while I was workin’?” he asked.
Ginger, Cannelle and Thym looked at one another and then shook their heads. Ginger looked down at her hands. “We snuck out of bed while Mommy was throwin’ up and were goin’ to hide in the swamp and make you find us,” she said. “We don’ like you gone so much.”
There was a small silence while Wyatt regarded his children. Gino went on into the house, giving Wyatt and his family privacy. The men were all building homes close, with Trap’s home the fortress to defend should they come under attack, but most of them were still using the Fontenot home as a barracks until the buildings were complete.
Gino went down the hall to his room. He didn’t have to share with anyone and he pulled off his boots immediately, grabbed his laptop and sank down onto the bed. There were hundreds, no thousands of entries about Zara Hightower. She’d been a child prodigy just as Trap had been. Gino wondered if she had the same problems as Trap. Trap had Asperger’s and missed a lot of social cues. Draden interpreted for Trap often, and Gino had found himself doing so as well. He studied Zara’s face. She was looking straight at the camera, something Trap wouldn’t do in a million years.
She was beautiful. He found an image of her in color. That hair of hers was the perfect mixture of red and gold. She wore it long, but usually in a tidy braid down her back. There were only two images of her with her hair outside that braid, and both times the wind was blowing and the sun was shining. The thick mass looked like spun silk gleaming in the sun’s rays, more red than gold, but a soft, barely there red.
Her eyes were very large, a slate blue framed with long lashes. Her mouth was generous, her teeth very straight. She had legs that went on forever and he knew he shouldn’t be looking that close—not at someone he might have to kill. He cursed and slammed the lid down on his laptop. What was he thinking? He didn’t look at women that way. He hadn’t for a long, long while. If he needed relief, he found it for a night and walked away.
The problem was those three little girls. Wyatt’s daughters. His wife. Cayenne and Trap. He never thought Trap would get married, but the man was crazy about Cayenne, couldn’t keep his eyes or his hands off of her. They shared those soft, intimate looks. She made Trap smile when Gino had never known him to. Then there was Ezekiel with Bellisia. The two were inseparable. And Nonny, Wyatt’s grandmother. She was the glue that held them all together. She’d made a home for all of them, and Gino hadn’t had a home in a very long time.
Gino knew he wasn’t the kind of man to find the happily ever after, because what woman could put up with him? He wasn’t like the rest of them. He’d watched the others succumb, even Trap, to their women. When Cayenne wanted to join the men in a firefight, she did it. So did Bellisia. Pepper might be the guardian of the safe room, but she wasn’t in it. His woman would be. He had a coldness in him the others didn’t. Trap was antisocial, he could be dark and very dangerous, but he didn’t have that well inside him that turned to ice and allowed him to do ugly, vile things when needed. Wyatt was way dominant, but again, he didn’t turn to a cold, unnatural place when riled. Zeke was always interesting. He was the sweetest man on the planet, but he had a wealth of darkness shadowing him. He had been given that strand of big cat DNA just like the rest of them, so he was a hunter, but to his woman, he was beyond nice.
Gino leapt off the bed and paced across the room to stare out the window into the gathering night. Zara Hightower was physically beautiful the way Draden was beautiful. The kind of looks that were noticeable and turned heads everywhere they went. She would always garner attention, if not with her looks, then with her brains. Gino was a man to fade into the background and his wife wouldn’t be somewhere where a fuckin’ goon could grab her and throw her in an interrogation room. With her good looks, she should belong to man like Draden, one who matched her, but could look after her.
He touched the pane, looking up at the stars just beginning to show themselves. Zara was the type of woman a man might come to crave. To obsess over. If he were the wrong kind of man he might come to think she could be taken against her will. She shouldn’t be all over the Internet. He was tempted to go back and look to see how many stalkers she’d had over the years because he was certain it would be more than one.