The door burst open and two tiny, dark haired boys rushed into my room. “Jon a beeve!” Cooper jumped right onto my bed first. I grabbed onto my laptop for dear life.
Carson joined him, bouncing around my bed.
“Bonjour, Carson et Cooper,” I said in greeting as I laughed at their sweet, excited faces.
“Hey, who’s that? Another Jon a beeve?” Cooper asked, his head quirked to the side in confused wonder. If the twins were mini-Beaus, then I was definitely my mom’s mini-me.
Although I was two inches taller than her, so not exactly mini anymore. My whole life, everyone who knew my mom always commented how alike we looked.
I took it as a compliment. Even well into her forties now, my mom was beautiful and still turning heads wherever she went.
I laughed out loud and unplugged my earbuds. “That’s my mom. Can you boys say, Bonjour?”
“Whoa, cool. Two Jon a beeves?” Carson asked, his head now pushing Cooper’s out of the way.
“Bonjour, boys!” my mom said as she giggled at them. “I’m Geneviève’s mom. She’s told me all about what good boys you two are.”
Carson and Cooper looked at each other and frowned. “Nah, she must’ve been talking about some other kids,” Cooper said, and Carson nodded his head in agreement.
That made Mom burst out into even more laughter. I sat up and moved the laptop to the end of the bed and arranged the boys on my lap. “You two are very good boys. Remember how gentle you both were with the puppies this morning?”
Then they both broke into stories about the puppies. Watching them meet each other for the first time had been one of the cutest things I’d ever seen. Cooper’s voice was so high pitched, it had been hilarious. He’d been beyond excited.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” Beau’s voice came from the doorway. My head turned to him. He had a slightly agitated look on his face, and it gave me a weird feeling.
“Yeah, one sec,” I said, then slid out from under the boys. “Can you guys keep my mom company while I talk to your dad? Just make sure you don’t touch the computer, okay? Please?”
They both looked at me with the sweetest brown eyes and nodded. “Don’t worry, Geneviève, I will show the boys around the ranch. Would you two like that?”
I smiled at the three of them before I rushed out the door. Beau shut it behind me. He rubbed his face and said, “Our coach just called an emergency team meeting.”
“Okay.”
“I can’t take the boys with me.”
We stared at each other for an awkward minute before I spoke up. “And you want me to watch them?”
He let out a breath. “Would you? The only thing is, I have no clue how long it’s going to be. I can call Sienna if you don’t want to take care of them.”
His words felt almost hurtful, but I wasn’t sure he’d intended to sound that way. “I want to babysit them. It’s fine.”
“It could be an hour. It could be three. Or more.”
“Look, if you don’t trust me with them, that’s fine. Call Sienna. I can wait with them until she gets here,” I said, feeling my stomach wrench at the thought of Beau hesitating to leave his sons with me.
He closed his eyes and dropped his head back. “Oh my God, of course I trust you. I just don’t want you to feel like you’re the resident babysitter because you live here. If you’ve got other things to do, I can call Sienna.”
“And I said I can do it. Go. Or call Sienna. I really don’t care.” Then I let out a huff and walked back into my room, hoping my laptop was still in one piece.
“Le sol est lave!”Cooper shouted suddenly, in almost perfect pronunciation. They’d been quietly doing a puzzle on the floor while I started supper.
And now the floor had suddenly turned into lava and I had nowhere to go.
Darnit.
The boys squealed as they found refuge on top of the couch. I however, was miles behind them. I hurried into the living room and leapt toward the wooden coffee table.
It would have been the perfect display of athletic grace and ability.